She wanted Mike to say something, but he just stood there looking at her, studying her and waiting for her. The silence was more painful than she could have expected.
“You were right about Ben. He doesn’t just work for a petroleum company—it’s a little more complicated than that.”
He scoffed, stepping back from her. “No crap. I called that.”
She chewed at her bottom lip, wishing she had allowed the kiss to keep going instead of standing there and exposing her weak points.
“He wasn’t here to get back together, was he?” Mike continued.
She shook her head.
“What did he want from you?”
She swallowed back the fear that had pooled in her throat. “He and I...we both worked for the same team at a certain point. We don’t anymore. And when I quit, apparently they came to suspect some things about me, thanks to Ben. Things I can’t tell you about. But if they find out that there is any validity to the rumors, they are going to take Joe and kill me. Mike, I’m afraid.”
Mike’s eyes widened and she was sure she saw flames at their centers. “And here I thought I needed to be a gentleman. If I ever see Ben again, he’s as good as dead.”
Chapter Seven
Mike wanted to go back in time and take Ben out. One little tap of the trigger and Summer’s problem would be handled for good. He really should have trusted his gut about the guy, but it was hard to look at any situation objectively when it involved an ex and their newest fling.
He just couldn’t get over the fact that Summer had let this man into her life. Seeing Ben as merely a jerk of an ex, a man who didn’t know how to treat women, was bad enough, but then add a death threat and it took his hate toward the guy impossibly deeper.
Ben had to go.
“I’ll take care of him. Where does he live? He can’t be that far ahead of me. I bet I can still get the drop on him.” Mike’s thoughts were a flurry of whats, buts and whys. He needed to be logical. Stop his mouth and click on his brain. But first he needed some answers. “Does he think you will tell me who he is? The threat I pose to him?”
If the guy was smart, he would already be heading for the hills in anticipation that Mike would be just about to come bearing down on him. No matter the status of Mike and Summer’s relationship, she was the mother of his son and if anyone dared threaten them, hell would have no greater fury.
The man had to know his ass was on the line. That meant any sort of element of surprise was well out of the question.
If only he had taken the lead when he had first heard about this dude, maybe it wouldn’t have played out like this. Mike could have lied about who he was, what he was doing there...if only Summer had told him the truth earlier. If only she had been honest about her ex with him well before their confrontation.
Summer opened her mouth, about to answer, but Mike waved her off. “Never mind. I answered my own damned question.”
He paced around the apartment, thinking about the resources he had on hand and what he could quickly access if he was in a pinch. STEALTH had operatives all around the world and if he needed... No, this was a personal matter. He didn’t want to bring in his siblings or any other members of the team to handle this. He could kill the bastard himself.
“Wait. Ben isn’t the bad guy here,” Summer said, raising her hands in surrender. “I mean he isn’t a good guy, but he isn’t the one threatening my life—he was only the messenger. Don’t get ahead of yourself.”
The anger seeped from his pores, but instead of diminishing, it changed direction. “What in the hell are you talking about? I thought you just said that he came here and threatened you and Joe, that you were in danger.”
“Yes, but it’s the entire group I’m worried about. Even if we take Ben out, they could be coming for me.”
He was so confused. What all had she gotten herself into? And how had she fallen prey to this group who threatened her life?
“You need to explain to me what the hell is going on. If not, I can’t... I’ll take care of Joe, but...”
She looked at him like he had just asked her to tell him the location of the last unicorn so he could go and murder it.
“I know this is uncomfortable. I know you don’t want to tell me. And I’m not going to judge you for whatever the hell happened to wrap you up in this mess. But I need to know what I’m going to face. We need to be prepared in order to keep you and Joe safe.”
She chewed on her lip. “If I tell you the truth, you have to promise that you won’t tell anyone... Ever. And you can’t judge me for this. I... I have been struggling.”
He nodded, but fear rattled through him. What had he done to her that she’d felt compelled to get involved with Rockwood—and maybe worse—to provide for herself and her son? If only he had followed through on their wedding, none of this would have ever happened. Instead, they could have been living in a house of their own, maybe something along the river like they had always dreamed about, and he could be playing out in the yard with Joe. Instead, here they were, needing to run for their lives, and it was all his fault.
He had tried to do the right thing, and it had come back to bite not only him but all of them square in the ass.
“I have no room to judge,” he said, trying to not self-flagellate when he’d have years to think about all the things he had done wrong. “I’m here to listen and help, nothing more.” It felt strange saying that, but he absolutely meant it.
“After our breakup, STRIKE and I had a bit of a falling out. They weren’t using me much, I’m sure it was because I was a massive train wreck.” She sucked in a long breath and, as she paused, he could almost hear what she was going to tell him next. “Another company approached me, asked if I would like to be involved with their cyber team working on government-issued contracts. They had me working undercover.”
He chomped on his lip, trying to stop himself from saying anything that would upset her and stall her confession.
She looked away, guilty. “I was doing really well as a double agent, and after Solomon Scot—Kate’s father—was killed, the group I was working for with Ben had me doing industrial espionage, spying on ConFlux, trying to get military engineering secrets. I got them and handed them off to Ben. Before Ben and his colleagues could use them, the codes were changed, access denied. I came out okay, and ConFlux didn’t lose anything.”
“Were you gathering and selling state secrets, Summer?” He took his phone out of his pocket, thinking about Zoey. Maybe she could help them, maybe she knew someone in the higher-ups who could pull some strings and get Summer out of this jam. Treason was serious business.
But he put his phone down on a nearby box. No. If he told Zoey, she would want to know everything. She would ask far too many questions he didn’t know the answers to. He had to play this smart. They had to.
“It appeared like I was—at least to the people whose group I was infiltrating. But all I knew at the time was that I was to find a way into the ConFlux network, grab a specific set of codes for my main team, and then leave the door open for the rest of the teams. Kate was in on it. She knew that we were trying to bait a trap and pull out anyone who was trying to steal American military secrets.”
Mike didn’t know what to think about all of this. There was so much information, so many secrets and so many twists. Summer had gotten herself much deeper into the world of spies and counterspies than he could have imagined.
“It was then, when I met up with Kate, that Ben might have seen me. Maybe he connected the dots, or someone did... I think I may have compromised my work.”
“This is crazy,” he grumbled. “You. Me. This is crap. You were stealing military-grade secrets.”
She raised her hands in supplication. “That’s not it... I was just doing my job. I am working for and loyal to the good guys. I swear.”
Mike opened his mouth. She hadn’
t told him enough so that he could really believe her, and he wasn’t sure that he wanted her to bring him any deeper into her blurry-lined world than she already had. She was a spy. What if she was using him to spy on STEALTH? She had been asking questions about Rockwood, too.
He struggled to connect the dots based on everything she had told him so far.
Joe crawled toward the couch, and after bonking his head on the corner of a box, he started to cry. Mike swooped in and picked him up just as Summer moved to get him. “He’ll be okay,” she said, her tone soft and cooing as she gently cupped her son’s head and nodded. “He’s a tough boy. Aren’t you, baby?”
Joe rubbed his eyes as he sniffled and then took hold of Summer’s finger.
The simple action threatened to rip out Mike’s heart and trample it on the ground. This was his family; he had unintentionally made this family and, as angry and upset as he was, he would do whatever it took to make sure they were all safe.
He rocked him, trying to comfort his son. As he swayed side to side, it occurred to Mike that this little man in his arms was perhaps a sponge for all the emotions swirling around him. If that was the case, even though he didn’t understand the conversation, it was still doing the child no good.
Joe stuck his thumb in his mouth and looked up at him, his blinks starting to get slower and slower.
“Do you have somewhere we can put him down for a little nap? I think our boy is getting sleepy,” he said.
“As soon as you put him down in the crib, he will wake right up. He hates being alone. But you’re right, our little guy looks sleepy. Most of the time, when he fights it, I take him for a little drive in the car.” Summer looked toward the window. “We left his seat out there in the car. We can take him for a short ride. You know, drive around a bit until he’s fast asleep.”
The last thing he wanted to do was to put the kiddo down and upset him.
He chuckled as he realized what he had been thinking. Here he had only known he was a dad for a day and yet this little being already had him wrapped around the tiniest of his fingers. It was only too easy to fall so desperately in love with a child.
It was strange, but once upon a time, he had fallen in love with Summer almost as quickly.
“I’m going to freshen up and grab some things for his diaper bag. I will meet you out there in a few minutes,” she said.
“I’ll go put him in the car seat. Sound good?”
“Great.” She headed toward the back bedrooms. “The car’s unlocked, but the keys are beside the door.” She motioned to the peg where her keys were hanging.
He looked down at Joe, who was sucking away on his thumb, still fighting the sandman. “It’s okay, little man, you can give up the ghost. Papa has you, you’re safe.”
As she disappeared down the hall, Mike made his way outside. Ben was nowhere to be seen and the apartment complex had slipped into the midday sleepiness that came when it was a warm late-fall day. It was cooler outside than it had been in the apartment. No wonder Joe liked sleeping in the air-conditioned car far more than sitting in the muggy crib.
Truth be told, Mike could have gone for a nap too. His mind wandered to Kate and Summer working together. Had Summer told Kate about Joe? Had Kate told his brother? Did people in his family know that he had a child and yet no one had told him?
He was furious, but he was also so freaking confused. Could he be mad at his teams for keeping a secret from him when they were all members of a shadow team? Everything they did was for a reason. No doubt, no one wanted to be the person to tell him about a son he didn’t know he’d had when that was Summer’s decision to make.
And who knew, maybe Summer hadn’t told them about Joe. She hadn’t given any clues outwardly that she had a kid when he had first seen her. It was more than plausible she hadn’t wanted to put any of his family or team in such a compromising position by telling Kate about the baby.
She hadn’t wanted to leave the news on his voice mail, so there was no way she would put the power of this revelation in the hands of anyone else.
He opened the back door of the car and put Joe into his car seat. As he pulled the straps over Joe’s arms, the thumb went right back into his mouth and he turned his head to the side as though the little guy knew exactly what was going to happen next and he was just readying himself to fall asleep.
Mike couldn’t be angry. Not really. Not when he had been given such a tremendous gift. Summer had tried to talk to him. He hadn’t listened. By her stepping forward at the wedding, she had granted him access to their baby. She hadn’t had to do what she had done. There had been other options.
He couldn’t even imagine how it would have felt only to learn in twenty years that he’d had a child, after Joe was grown and likely starting to think about having a family of his own. She could have held out. She could have been so angry with him that she could have denied him the opportunity to be involved in their child’s infancy. And yet she had forgiven him enough to let him in.
She had mucked up her life and she had gotten herself into trouble, but if they worked together, this potential compromising position was something they could get her out of. It would be hard, sure, but maybe with a few of the right phone calls to the right people, she could be safe.
But that didn’t mean he didn’t need some answers both from her and from his team.
He reached down and moved to pull his phone from his pocket, but realized he’d left it sitting on top of the box in the living room. And, he’d left the keys hanging beside the door. He needed to run back inside.
Joe had his eyes closed and his head was resting comfortably on the gray polka dots of the car seat’s lining. Mike glanced around, looking for a button or something that would unlatch the car seat from its base, but there were a million little red buttons and tabs and he wasn’t sure which was the self-destruct button. Joe looked so at ease that Mike didn’t want to go through the motions of trying to unbuckle him.
There was no one around, no cars coming or going, and he would only be inside for a second... But every part of his being told him not to leave the child alone. He looked down at Joe, whose eyes were now closed. His head dipped in sleep but jerked back up, eyes still closed.
His son was definitely a fighter. Hopefully he would remain that way for the rest of his life—it was the only way to come out the other side of it in a way that was true to a person’s soul.
How had Summer been able to be a single parent? This was such a simple thing and yet, by himself, it was immeasurably hard. He couldn’t imagine going through these seemingly easy, inconsequential moments where a person was stuck between a rock and hard place. She really was deserving of some kind of an award.
He wouldn’t let her be on her own with his kiddo ever again. Joe needed a father and Summer needed a teammate, someone she could call whenever she needed anything.
He held his breath as he pushed the red button near the top of the car seat and it unlatched from the base. Thankfully, Joe didn’t stir.
He walked to the apartment and set the car seat down just inside the door. He pushed the door gently, barely closing it behind him as he made his way into the living room to grab his phone.
Dude, seriously, this was rough. This back-and-forth thing. How did a parent get anything done?
He’d heard many new parents complain about the inability to even do something as simple as take a shower when they had a new baby, and now he finally understood it. It wasn’t that they were incapable of showering, it was the anxiety that kept them needing to see where their child was and what they were doing at every second of every day.
He suddenly felt sorry for his own parents. The hell he and his siblings must have put them through. At what point had they started to loosen the reins on their kids and started trusting that they would be safe? Or did they ever really assume they were safe? What if this fear never went away? He do
ubted that it did. Rather, it had likely only been dampened by the ravages of time and the need to keep moving forward and through the crippling anxiety.
How did parents live like this, regardless of the age of their children?
He grabbed his phone and glanced down the L-shaped hallway in the direction of what he assumed was Summer’s bedroom. “I don’t know how you do it,” he yelled toward her.
“What?” she asked, her voice muffled behind the door.
“I said, I don’t know how you do it.”
“Huh?”
He walked down the hall and to the left until he was standing outside the closed door. “I said, I don’t know how you do it.”
“Do what?” she asked, moving closer to the other side of the door.
“This. Be a single parent. It seems like it’s a real juggling act.”
She gave a sarcastic laugh. “You don’t even know. You’ve only been at this for a day. And, honestly, I don’t know how I’m doing it. I have to admit that I feel like I’m literally figuring this out minute by minute.”
That, he totally understood.
He rested his forehead on the door for a moment. “Thank you, Summer.”
“Huh? For what?”
He put his hand on the white paint of the paneled door, it was cool under his fingertips. “For letting me into your guys’ life. I know things must have been so hard for you. But you don’t have to go through any of this by yourself anymore. I’m here for you. I don’t expect that we will always see eye to eye, and we will probably fight about a lot of things, but whenever you need anything you know I have your and Joe’s back.”
There was a long silence from inside the room. “Thanks, Mike. And hey, you know I’m sorry.”
“What do you have to be sorry about?” He had been the one to put all this chaos into motion.
“I’m sorry for not telling you sooner. I hope you know I tried.”
“I know... I know you tried.” He paused, still angry with himself. “I am the one who needs to be sorry. I am sorry.”
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