Rev It Up

by Julie Ann Walker

  “I wouldn’t let him go up to the command center.” Her brother’s expression very succinctly conveyed gimme some credit. “You guys could sleep out in the old foreman’s house. Dan doesn’t use it anymore.”

  The thought of seeing everything her brother had built for himself was tempting, but not nearly as tempting as avoiding Jake. “I really can’t. I’ve got some work to finish tonight. Franklin needs a bath. There’s a load of laundry to fold and—”

  “Michelle Knight, are you making excuses?”

  She glared at him. “I’m Michelle Carter, remember? And I don’t understand why you’d want us to come spend the night. It’s preposterous.”

  “Like I said, Snake wants to see you. This way, it’ll give you guys plenty of time to catch up.”

  “Why would I want to catch up with him?” After the way he abandoned us. She didn’t need to say that last part. It was there in her tone. Directly after Steven’s funeral—God, Steven’s funeral. She still got sick to her stomach every time she thought of it—Jake had transferred to Alpha Platoon and signed on for a two-year mission that’d taken him to parts unknown. And when he’d finally returned to CONUS—continental U.S.—when she’d swallowed her pride, disregarded her better judgment, and sent him a letter begging him to come back to them, telling him they were his family and they loved him and needed him, what had he done?

  He’d completely ignored her, that’s what. Acting as if she was nothing, as if her brother, his best friend, was nothing.

  “Shell?” Frank reached forward and placed a hand on her shoulder. She hoped he couldn’t feel the trembling there. “What happened between you two? Did he treat you like he treated all those other—”

  “No,” she was quick to interrupt him. Because even though four years ago she’d been determined to be the last notch on Jake’s bedpost—and they’d been close, oh so close that night at the Clover—she couldn’t let her brother go on thinking his best friend had pulled one of his typical Austin Powers moves on her.

  Shall we shag now? Or shall we shag later?

  Much to her surprise and dismay, Jake’s sense of loyalty and friendship, and whatever other noble notion you could possibly think of, had overcome his libido that night.

  “Jake wasn’t like that with me,” she admitted, having lost count of the number of times she’d asked herself how things might’ve been different had they actually finished what they’d started in that bathroom.

  “Good.” He nodded decisively, his frown turning into that weird pod-person grin again. “So there’s no reason why you can’t come out to the shop and help me welcome him back.”

  No reason? Oh, sweet Lord…

  Of course, maybe it was better this way. They say, whoever they are, that in order to conquer one’s fears, one first had to face them.

  Swallowing, rolling in her lips, she called for Franklin to grab his jacket and tried not to pass out cold on her kitchen tiles as she wrapped up the remaining ball of dough and went to the sink to wash her hands.

  The darn things were shaking like gravel on a dirt road during an earthquake.

  ***

  Black Knights Inc. Headquarters

  Goose Island, Chicago

  “So, mon ami,” Rock murmured in his slow Cajun drawl as the breeze wafted the meaty smell of steaks cooking on the grill and mixed it with the waxy scent of the burning tiki lamps and the slightly fishy aroma of the nearby Chicago River, “ya said you’re here for Shell?”

  Uh…yep. That was the first thing Jake blurted upon his arrival the evening before. I’m here for Shell.

  Geez. Just call him Captain Obvious.

  “That’s what I said,” he grumbled uncomfortably, adjusting himself in the brightly painted Adirondack chair.

  Rock grinned, his teeth flashing white against his dark goatee as he sat forward in gleeful anticipation. “Tell me, what size must a guy’s balls be in order to walk up to his former commandin’ officer and declare his intent to plant his flag, so to speak, in the man’s baby sister? Texas-sized, maybe? Alaska-sized?”

  “Cut it out,” Jake growled, avoiding Rock’s gaze as he took a sip of locally brewed ale and let his eye wander around the enclosed courtyard located behind the motorcycle shop that was the front for Black Knights Inc.

  Black Knights Inc…

  They’d really done it.

  All those years the three of them, him and Rock and Boss, had talked and planned and dreamed of building their own clandestine government defense firm, and they’d really gone and done it.

  Without him…

  He didn’t know whether to burst with pride for his former Bravo Platoon teammates or break down and cry because he’d missed it all. What he did know was he’d made himself sick on the ride from the west coast to Chicago, wondering what his reception might be.

  But he shouldn’t have worried. Men who fought wars together had a connection, a soul-deep connection that time and distance and familial affiliation couldn’t touch.

  Rock and Boss welcomed him back with open arms. And for the first time in a very long time, glancing at the familiar, sardonic expression on Rock’s face, he felt like he was home.

  If home included the pins and needles he was sitting on as he waited for Shell’s arrival, that is…

  Because no matter how hard he’d tried—and you better believe there’d been times he’d given it his all—he’d never stopped loving her.

  He hadn’t stopped loving her that night in the Clover when, scared out of his mind, after barely stopping himself from nailing her up against the wall of the men’s bathroom, he shoved her in Preacher’s arms and saw the hurt and disbelief fill her eyes. He hadn’t stopped loving her that rainy day when she caught him at the base’s front gates to tell him she’d fallen for Preacher. He hadn’t stopped loving her that afternoon two weeks later when Preacher pulled him aside on the way to mess to softly inform him, Shell and I are getting married. He hadn’t stopped loving her that day in the mountains of Afghanistan when he learned she was having another man’s baby. And he hadn’t stopped loving her in the long, too long years between then and now. If anything, his love for her had grown, become an overwhelming thing.

  And any minute she was going to come through that door. Any minute.

  He snatched a glance at the door in question. Did the knob turn?

  No. Just his eyes playing tricks on him and, good grief, he was so totally losing it.

  “And Shell?” the Cajun broke into his spinning thoughts. “How d’ya think she’s gonna feel about havin’ you back around?”

  That was the question of the hour, wasn’t it?

  He shrugged and stared past Rock’s right ear, the air inside his lungs getting sucked out like he’d stepped into a vacuum.

  “Dunno, brohah,” he wheezed, trying and failing to drag in a much-needed mouthful of oxygen. “But I think I’m about to find out.”

  ***

  Why does he still have to look so darned good?

  That was Michelle’s first thought as she stepped into the courtyard and set eyes on Jake. He was lounging in a bright red Adirondack chair, sprawled there as if he hadn’t a care in the world. And the audacity of that pose considering… well…everything that’d happened, burrowed under her skin like a chigger.

  Since this was her first time inside the big gates of Black Knights Inc., she should have been scoping out the place. She should have been overcome with curiosity, checking to see exactly what her brother had been building for himself over the last three and a half years.

  And she was…Sort of.

  With a teeny-tiny portion of her brain, she registered the mammoth, three-story factory building with its aged brick and leaded glass windows. Through the most fleeting of observations, she took in the various outbuildings surrounding the tidy brick courtyard covered by a red-and-white striped canopy. With the most miniscule portion of gray matter, she noticed the unlit fire pit, the mammoth stainless steel grill, the basketball hoop standing next to the f
urthest outbuilding, and the odd assortment of brightly painted lawn furniture.

  But she was able to catalog all of this by using only about 0.1 percent of her brain, because from the moment she set foot inside the courtyard, her eyes were glued to Jake’s ridiculously handsome face and that body of his that could’ve been the model for an anatomy class, and the other 99.9 percent of her mind was wholly occupied with one and only one thought…

  Why, why, oh why does the lowdown, no-good cad still have to look so frickin’ good?

  Couldn’t the universe have taken pity on her, for once, and let wonderboy get fat or go bald? Couldn’t it have allowed him to develop a rather tragic case of full-body psoriasis or fall victim to a series of odd facial tics?

  No?

  Damn you, universe!

  Of course, if he had acquired some strange affliction, bleeding heart that she was, it would’ve probably only softened her toward him.

  And she couldn’t afford that.

  Oh, no. She definitely could not afford that.

  Taking a deep breath, reminding herself of the way he’d treated her four years ago, the way he’d treated all of them, she marched forward on knees threatening to give way with every step.

  What she wanted to do was crawl into the nearest hole and hide until he went away again—and he would go away again; that’s what he did. But since that wasn’t an option, she mustered all the composure she could and blurted the first carefree-sounding thing she could think of.

  “I see the years haven’t had any sort of positive effect on your fashion sense, Jake.” Her voice didn’t come out sounding as shaky as her gelatinous insides felt, thank God. She’d never be able to make another JELL-O mold again without thinking of this moment right here, right now, and the way her stomach was quivering inside her. “You’re still wearing those god-awful Hawaiian shirts like you’re auditioning to be the next Magnum PI.”

  Although, with his shaggy mop of sun-bleached hair, Coppertone tan, and five o’clock shadow which, at the moment, looked more like the twelve o’clock version, he more closely resembled Josh Holloway.

  Crap.

  And yes, she’d watched each and every episode of Lost simply because of the resemblance between the two men…

  Crap, crap, crap.

  “Magnum PI! Ha!” Rock hooted with laughter, slapping his knee. “Good one, Shell.”

  “Mmm,” Jake rubbed his chin, his beautiful, emerald green eyes sparkling with warm humor as he glanced down at the shirt she’d just insulted. The hideous thing was coupled with ratty jeans and a pair of dingy, leather flip-flops. A California surfer until the day he died.

  And, man, he made it look good. Heaven help her…

  “I don’t know if I’ve ever heard two words more oxymoronic than fashion and sense,” he murmured, grinning. Oh geez. There are those dimples. “And dude” he added, glancing pointedly at Rock’s faded Green Day T-shirt, holey jeans, and scuffed alligator cowboy boots, “you’re not one to talk.”

  “Okay,” Rock admitted, still chuckling, “so a couple of Giorgio Armanis we ain’t.”

  “On that we can agree,” Jake said, clinking his beer bottle against Rock’s. And just like that, they seemed to fall into their old rhythm, the give-and-take. As if nothing had ever happened. As if he’d never crushed her soul and abandoned them all.

  It was all so familiar and heartbreaking, her throat closed up like she’d swallowed the industrial-strength cleaner she liked to use on Franklin’s potty-training toilet. And then she couldn’t breathe at all when Jake winked at her in that flirtatious way he had before tilting his head back and sucking down a mouthful of suds.

  She took the opportunity of his distraction to do two things. One, she tried to steady her thundering heart and drag in a much-needed lungful of air before she passed out. And two, she let her hungry gaze travel over his face.

  There were webs of fine lines at the corners of his eyes that hadn’t been there four years ago, and a little crescent-shaped scar near his left temple. And even given all that, he still looked like he belonged on a billboard selling expensive shaving cream or designer cologne.

  It wasn’t fair! Particularly when he dropped his chin, letting his bright eyes leisurely wander down her frame.

  Her cheeks heated under his rather…thorough scrutiny as if she’d shoved her head in a four-hundred-degree oven.

  And now she could breathe. She gulped in a mouthful of air like a drowning victim.

  Ugh, stop looking at me! she wanted to shout like a petulant five-year-old. Because, despite the fact that she sported the fuller breasts, wider hips, and slight roundness to her lower belly that no amount of crunches or yoga seemed to remedy—the physical badges of motherhood—he was still watching her the same way he’d always watched her. With affection and humor and sweet, burning desire in his eyes.

  It made her remember things she thought she’d forgotten. It made her question her decision—

  No. She’d given him chance after chance, and all he’d ever done was let her down. He was a rake and a wanderer, just like her dear ol’ dad, and instead of being mad about all of that, instead of slamming into him with vitriol like he deserved, like any intelligent woman would do, the only emotion she could seem to conjure up was sadness.

  An intense and overwhelming sadness…

  “You look more beautiful than ever, Shell,” he murmured appreciatively. “The years have been good to you.”

  And how did he do that? How did he make her want to believe him?

  “How long has it been since you’ve been to the optometrist?” she quipped, pushing back the urge to cry as she stopped beside Rock, bending to give the Cajun’s cheek a sisterly peck before accepting the chair Frank pulled out from around the unlit fire pit.

  Okay, Shell, you’re doing good. Just keep up the mild banter so nobody guesses you’re slowly dying on the inside.

  “My eyes are just fine,” he declared, the eyes in question flashing to her jean-clad legs when she sat and crossed them.

  At least that was one body part that’d bounced back after her pregnancy. She was proud to admit, she still had a rockin’ good set of stems. Although, it wasn’t like he could see her rockin’ good set of stems, given they were covered in a tattered pair of jeans.

  Okay, and why hadn’t she thought to change into something a little more fabulous than an old Texas A&M sweatshirt and this threadbare pair of Levi’s?

  Oh yeah. Because she’d been scared out of her mind while walking out the front door of her town house, and all she’d been able to think about was getting this little reunion over and done with double-time, as her brother would say.

  “They” said confronting one’s fears was the only way to conquer them? Well, in her opinion, “they” were all a bunch of idiots.

  “Hey!” he declared, frowning when she leaned back in the chair. “The ragin’ Cajun gets the love, but I don’t? I haven’t seen you in nearly four years, woman. You better come here and put one on me.” He tapped a finger against his cheek.

  And there he went again, regarding her with such genuine pleasure she almost began to wonder if she’d imagined the way he treated her. Then, a brief image of her waiting for him in the rain outside the base stabbed into her brain like a pickax and the harsh words he’d spoken rang in her ear like a death knell.

  Stay strong, Shell. Don’t let him see how much this hurts.

  “Rock gets the love,” she grumbled, fighting the tears clogging her throat. That particular memory always evoked the same reaction in her, “because although I don’t know where he’s been recently, I’m pretty positive it was woefully short on friendly faces. You, on the other hand…” She gratefully accepted the cool glass of chardonnay Frank handed her. She sure as heckfire wasn’t going to say no to a little liquid courage right now. “…have probably spent the last couple of years with Alpha Platoon working your way through all the base bunnies you’d failed to sample during your stint with Bravo Platoon. And I’m sure th
ey were extremely friendly.”

  Instead of coming back with a snappy rebuttal as per usual, Jake’s jaw hardened to living stone, his eyes flashing in the low light of the covered courtyard.

  Well, at least that took care of those dastardly dimples…

  “Some things change, Shell,” he said quietly.

  Her heart somersaulted at the solemnity, and something else she couldn’t quite put her finger on, in the tone of his voice.

  “Yeah,” she stared at the scuffed toes of her sneakers, trying to ignore the nearly overwhelming desire to believe him. She was such a softhearted fool. “And then again, some things never do.”

  A strained silence settled over the courtyard then, broken only by the sound of Rock’s boots clacking against the pavers when he pushed up from his chair to stroll over to the giant stainless steel grill. He lifted the lid in order to transfer a load of sizzling steaks onto a big platter, and Michelle absently watched him cover the plate with tinfoil before he plopped half a dozen fat bratwursts onto the grill.

  All the while, she could feel Jake’s piercing gaze on her flushed face.

  Yes, some things never change.

  His effect on her body temperature being one of them…

  “Woo-ee!” Rock exclaimed, adjusting his sweat-stained John Deere ball cap as he turned away from the grill and let his eyes ping back and forth between the two of them. “Y’all are making me nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room fool of rockin’ chairs. Why don’t you kids just kiss and make up? Let bygones be bygones and all that?”

  Let bygones be bygones?

  As if it was that easy…

  She glanced at Jake. Whatever odd tone she’d heard in his voice and whatever strange expression she’d glimpsed in his face vanished when he winked and once again tapped his cheek with a finger. “Yeah, Shell. Let’s let bygones be bygones. Get your fine fanny over here and lay those famous lips of yours on me.”

  She knew she had no choice but to set her glass of chardonnay on the ground and push up from her chair.