“No, sir, you don’t,” Lucas agreed, silently congratulating himself for not giving in to a sudden, nearly overwhelming desire to laugh. The older man might have felt that he didn’t interfere and although not intrusive in an obvious way, Josiah took it upon himself to handle things offstage as it were.
“Eve told me that Adam had changed. That he had come here, not looking for her, but wanting to make a fresh start. I found that highly suspicious,” he went on, “for him to just ‘pick’ the same area that she had come to, but I didn’t say anything to her. However, I could tell that Eve was concerned that his promise to her was written on the wind.”
They’d been together, operatives and civilians, for close to two decades. In that time, Lucas had made a study of his former mentor and he could tell now that Josiah wanted some indication that he was interested in this unfolding tale.
Taking his cue, Lucas dutifully asked, “And was it valid?”
At this point, Josiah surprised him with a sound that passed for a laugh. “You have no idea.”
Perhaps not an exact idea, Lucas thought, but from the gleam that had entered the older man’s eye, he had a general notion where this story was ultimately heading.
“Adam Smythe isn’t a bookstore owner, is he?”
Josiah stroked his chin and the neatly trimmed Van Dyke he sported. “No, he most certainly is not.”
Lucas ventured a step further. “And he’s not a drug dealer, either, is he?”
Josiah shook his head. “You do take some of the fun out of this, Lucas.”
Lucas inclined his head in a silent tribute. “I was trained by a master.”
Josiah’s lips twitched just a little, a testament to his amusement.
“All right, Grasshopper,” he said, invoking the nickname of a character in a classic series that had once been a cult favorite, “you tell me. Just what is Eve’s Adam?”
It wasn’t hard to connect the dots once certain assumptions were made. “My guess is that he’s some kind of law enforcement operative.” Lucas paused, thinking. “Since drugs are involved, best bet is that he’s with the DEA.”
Admiration flared in Josiah’s intense gray eyes. “The Bureau lost a valuable man when you decided to leave them.”
Lucas shrugged away the compliment. “Since I couldn’t give a hundred and ten percent anymore, it just seemed like the logical thing to do. How about you?” he asked. “What are you going to do with this information?” He had to admit that his curiosity had been aroused. “Are you going to keep it to yourself, or tell her?”
Ordinarily, other people’s secrets were their own. But this wasn’t exactly an ordinary set of circumstances. They involved someone he cared about. Someone he had been watching over since her unexpected return. His path was clear.
“The poor girl is worried that her baby’s father might get sucked back into ‘the life,’” he reminded Lucas. “The very least I can do is give Eve some peace of mind.”
Lucas knew better than to even vaguely suggest that Josiah hold off in case something the DEA agent was involved in was going down. As a civilian, Josiah’s allegiance was still to his country in general, but the circle of people who meant something to him was very small and he put them first whenever he could.
This was one of those times.
What a difference an hour made.
An hour ago, Eve thought ruefully, she’d been watching the clock, eager to close the clinic’s doors and get home so that she could have a romantic evening with Adam.
She had everything planned: the menu, the music, even some of the conversation. And she had made it a point to stop by the mall during her lunch hour and had picked up possibly the hottest, sexiest lingerie she had ever seen.
But all her plans had come crashing down about her head when she’d stopped to leave Brooklyn with Josiah, who, along with Lucas, had agreed to babysit her daughter for the night. He’d told her more than once that he would be happy to do it. She knew he loved nothing more than playing the doting grandfather, but since his son-in-law had taken a post in England and taken the family with him, Josiah very rarely got the chance. He didn’t talk about it, but she knew he missed his daughter and granddaughter a great deal.
“I’m not a sentimental man, Eve, but there are times that I do miss interacting with a child,” was the way he’d put it. “Anytime you need an evening to yourself, I would be happy to look after Brooklyn.”
So, when she’d had this idea of an evening of sizzling romance in the middle of what was judged by many to be the most hectic season of the year, his offer seemed perfect.
How was she to know that everything would come apart so quickly?
After patiently listening to her review Brooklyn’s routine, he’d taken the baby from her and then said, “Eve, I think you need to know something.”
She had no idea why she’d felt an unsettling tightening within her stomach at his words. Still, despite the premonition, she definitely hadn’t been prepared for what came next.
“What is it?” she’d asked him, her thoughts still racing around, checking off things she had listed only in her head.
Brooklyn began to fuss. He patted the baby on the back, rocking slightly as he stood before Eve. Brooklyn’s fussing ceased almost instantly.
“I looked into a few things and I can assure you that you can stop worrying that Adam is going to revert back to drug dealing,” he told her.
“Oh?” Her heart lodged itself in her throat. Adrenaline, masquerading as fear, filled her veins. “How can you make that kind of a claim? What have you heard?” she asked, curbing the urge at the last minute to ask, “What have you done?” instead.
To get into his narrative, Josiah backed up a little. “He was never a drug dealer to begin with,” he told her, stunning her. “And his last name isn’t Smythe. It’s Serrano.” He saw the uncertainty in her eyes and repeated the full name. “Adam Serrano.”
Her head began to hurt. Where had he gathered all this information? He was a retired businessman. How did a retired businessman get this kind of information?
“How did you…?”
Josiah lifted his slight shoulders in a vague movement, then let them drop again. “I have friends who have friends.”
Eve ran her fingertips over her forehead. The headache dancing just above her eyes was now imitating the sound of angry war drums. The throbbing made it difficult for her to absorb what Josiah was telling her.
With effort, she asked, “And what did these friends tell you?”
“That your Adam Smythe—Adam Serrano—is a DEA agent. It’s not my practice to meddle,” he added as a coda, “and I wouldn’t have told you, except that I know how worried you’ve been that something might come up that would make Adam return to the unsavory life of a dealer. Now you know that he won’t.” He shifted Brooklyn slightly, moving her to his other shoulder. “You mean a great deal to me, Eve, and like it or not, with your father gone I feel a certain responsibility for your well-being. I’m sorry if I overstepped my place, but I just wanted to be sure that you weren’t getting involved with someone who could really hurt you.”
But I am. I did.
Eve could feel her heart breaking in half even as she struggled to smile at the older man. He meant well, but she would have really rather not have found this out now. Maybe later, definitely before, but not now when she had just managed to surmount her trust issues and gotten to a place where she felt she might just be able to move forward.
Still, none of this was Josiah’s fault. “Thank you. I appreciate you looking out for me.”
Gazing into her troubled eyes, Josiah couldn’t help wondering if perhaps, despite her thanks, he had overstepped his ground and triggered something he should have left dormant. He wasn’t sorry he’d looked into the matter, but he now regretted telling her he had.
With that in mind, he tried to do a little damage control. “The life of a law enforcement agent, especially when undercover, is not—”
She did
n’t want him to continue, or to make any excuses for Adam whatever-his-name-was. The information that Josiah had already given her made her feel numb all over.
“I understand.”
Nothing had changed—and everything had changed. All she wanted to do was run, to bury herself somewhere. But there wasn’t just her to consider anymore. She was a mother. She had responsibilities. Brooklyn came first, above everything else.
Eve pressed her lips together. “Look, if now isn’t a good time—” She began to reach for the baby.
Josiah continued to hold the sleeping child against him. “Now is an excellent time,” he told her. “Don’t worry. I’m really quite good at this. I’ll look after Brooklyn as if she were my own granddaughter.”
There was no way she wanted to be alone with Adam now, much less spend a romantic evening with him. Betrayal wasn’t an aphrodisiac.
“But—”
Josiah shook his head. “Not another word. You deserve a little time to yourself,” he insisted. “Brooklyn will be here any time you want to come by to pick her up.”
And with that, the former Special Agent closed the door.
Eve heard Josiah talking to the baby as if she were another adult. At any other time, it would have made her smile. But right now, she felt as if her very insides had been gutted.
With her heart feeling like a lead brick inside her chest, Eve turned away from house and went down the driveway to her car.
To drive to a place that no longer felt like home.
Adam had had an uneasy feeling weaving through him all day, and it was just getting bigger by the hour.
It had begun with a phone call. Danny Sederholm had seemed uncharacteristically jumpy when he called to talk to him. The usual irritating, cocky bravado the student displayed was absent. Sederholm had accidentally slipped and mentioned the head of the organization’s name, Cesar Montoya, when he’d blurted out that the man was seeking another connection. It wasn’t difficult for Adam to put two and two together and realize that the student was now viewing him as a threat.
It hadn’t been easy, but he finally managed to convince Sederholm that he wasn’t out to usurp him. That he was happy with the way things were and all he wanted was to be connected to a steady supply of cocaine, heroin and meth so that he could get back to his dealers.
Sederholm had sounded somewhat reassured when he hung up, but Adam knew that the college student could be easily swayed. If the next person Sederholm spoke to had a different spin on how things were going, the kid would buy into that. And then consequently, he might find himself in a heap of trouble.
This was getting old, Adam thought. He’d been pushing his luck for too long. It was definitely time to change the focus of his work. He needed a position within the department that didn’t make him constantly feel as if he needed a shower.
Funny how things changed, he mused, getting into his car. His current life seemed to suit him, especially when he only had to think about himself. But it wasn’t just him anymore and he didn’t want it to be. He’d come to realize that he really wanted to be part of this new family unit. Wanted to come home to Eve and the baby not just for a little while, but on a regular, ongoing, permanent basis.
Eve.
Not for the first time today, he wondered what was up. She’d made a point of calling him this morning just before noon and saying that she didn’t want him swinging by the clinic this afternoon. Instead, she wanted him to come to her house a little later than usual. She’d ended by saying that she had a surprise for him.
Just thinking about the conversation made him smile.
At the same time, his conscience nagged at him, the way it did more and more frequently these days. This charade couldn’t go on. He needed to tell her exactly who he was. He knew it was against all company policy, but keeping her in the dark indefinitely wasn’t right.
If he hoped to have a chance with her, he needed to let her know what he really did for a living. Not the undercover details, but everything that could be safely released without jeopardizing anyone else’s life. He’d already made up his mind about coming clean.
His job was important, but if she wanted him to get out of law enforcement altogether he would do it. For her. He was no longer defined by his work. Something a great deal larger came into play now.
And once he made these changes, once he either left the department or at least took on another position, then maybe she would consider marrying him. Because his life, he’d come to realize, was incomplete without her and the baby.
He hadn’t realized that he was just existing, not living, until he had something to compare it to. Eve made him feel alive in all the important ways that counted.
Whistling, he pulled up into her driveway. The garage was open and he saw her car parked inside. For the time being, he banked down all his other thoughts, along with that uneasy, nagging feeling at the back of his neck that told him something was wrong. He focused instead on the evening ahead.
An evening he was looking forward to spending with Eve and the baby.
Adam rang the doorbell and waited for a moment. When there was no answer, he rang again. He was about to knock when the door finally opened.
His eyes met hers and the greeting on his lips faded. The uneasy feeling that something was wrong was back. In spades.
Chapter 14
His survival instincts instantly kicked in. Especially when she didn’t step back, didn’t open the door any farther to let him in.
“What’s wrong?” he asked tentatively.
Everything! her brain screamed.
When he stepped forward, she mechanically took a step back, thereby admitting him into the house when she hadn’t really wanted to. Where did she begin? Eve silently demanded. She was so upset, so angry, that fragments of sentences crowded her mind.
One thought stood out.
Her eyes narrowed into angry, blazing slits. “You lied to me.”
The accusation drove a chill down his spine. He scrambled to make sense of it. Was she talking about the past or something current? Had she found out about his dealing with Sederholm and taken it at face value, thinking he had reverted back to the life of a drug dealer?
Adam schooled himself to remain calm. Maybe this all had some sort of logical explanation he hadn’t thought of yet.
“About?” he asked cautiously.
“About?” she echoed incredulously, stunned and furious at the same time. “Just exactly how many things do I have to choose from?”
So many you wouldn’t believe it.
Out loud, he tried to select his words calmly, to keep from inciting her further. “I only meant that maybe there’s been some mistake and that you—”
She jumped on the word. “Mistake? I’ll say there’s been a mistake.”
Eve felt angry tears gathering in her eyes and she fisted her hands at her sides, willing them away. She wasn’t about to cry in front of him. She absolutely refused to let him see how hurt she was.
“And I made it when I thought that you and I could actually put everything behind us and build something together. Have some kind of trust together. Shows what an idiot I am.” Her eyes were all but shooting sparks. “Or maybe it shows how desperate I am to make our relationship work. And you, obviously, don’t feel the same way.” She waved her hand at the door he’d just closed behind him. “Please leave.”
For a moment, he was absolutely speechless. Where had all this fury come from? “What?”
Eve ground out the words. “I said leave.”
At a loss, he grasped at the first thing that came to his mind. “Is this some kind of postpartum depression you’re going through?”
He couldn’t have picked anything worse to say if he tried. It was akin to waving a huge red flag in front of her.
“Oh, just because I’m a woman, right away my feelings have to be pinned on a hormonal imbalance? Well, my hormones are fine, thank you very much. They’re not the ones that betrayed me.” Since he wouldn’
t do the right thing and go, she marched over to the front door and pulled it opened, repeating her terse instruction. “Please go. Now.”
Instead of leaving, Adam jerked the door out of her hand and slammed it shut. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell you’re talking about.” He chose his words deliberately. “If I’m being executed, I wanted to know what you think it is I’ve done.”
Incensed, Eve glared at him. How could he pretend to be puzzled? Had everything with him been an act? The lovemaking, the endearing words, everything, just an act? This is what he does for a living. He fools people. And you’re the biggest fool of all.
“You don’t know?” The question dripped with a sarcasm she didn’t know she was capable of.
He made it a point not to lose his temper because that caused him to lose his focus, but it was a definite struggle to hold on to right now.
“No,” he said evenly, “I don’t know. If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking you what the hell you’re talking about, I’d be explaining to you just why you’re wrong,” he told her, praying that this was just some kind of mix-up.
“The only wrong thing I did was to fall in love with you.”
He stared at her, stunned. “Wait, hold it. You’re in love with me?”
She hadn’t meant for that to come out. Not like this, not now. “Don’t let it go to your head.” She waved an impatient hand at the statement. “It doesn’t change anything. I can’t trust you—”
“Yes, you can,” he told her with feeling. She could trust him to love her, to protect her, to be there for her forever.
But she shook her head. Because she couldn’t trust him, his words to the contrary were meaningless to her. “And you don’t trust me.”
He was still shadowboxing in the dark. She could be referring to so many issues, things he wasn’t at liberty to talk to her about yet. But soon. Until then, she was going to have to stay in limbo—about everything. “It’s not a matter of trust, Eve.” She had to understand that, even if he couldn’t allow her into his world completely.
The Agent's Secret Baby Page 14