Page 50 of Innocent Target

This team had his back like no other. “Expect to have a chocolate overdose delivered to your office, Imari. Thank you.”

As the meeting was dismissed and everybody walked out, Nick slapped his shoulder, his usual show of support before leaving the room.

Mercy stood, running her fingers through his hair, before cupping his cheek. “Well, Uncle James, I think you should be proud of yourself. You saved your sister and niece. That was great work you did.”

His hand went to her hip until he grabbed her ass, pulling her forward. “I think it was great teamwork, and we were incredibly lucky. Me, most of all, to have you by my side this whole time.”

Mercy smiled before settling on his lap. Her beautiful mouth took his as his hands caressed her back. This delightful woman ended the kiss way too soon for his liking.

“Let’s agree that all those answers are right and that even if we redid the entire mission, we couldn’t have done it better. In fact, I wouldn’t change a single thing, because if I did, we might never have found each other.”

James’s heart softened and he leaned forward for a kiss but was blocked by Mercy dangling a key between them.

“What’s that? The key to your heart?”

With a laugh, she swatted him, amused. “It’s a given with you. No, that’s the key to your new boat.”

“Okay. You want to go give it to him? We can go now.”

He gazes turned sultry when she shook her head. “Maybe we could test it out first? You know, me, you, alone in the boat in the middle of the ocean. Preferably naked.”

His skin felt too tight as his hands roamed her curves. “Oh, baby, I love your brilliant mind. And I love you, Mercy.”

The words felt so right when he spoke them, he knew he was the luckiest man on earth.

His woman, his love, his partner, leaned forward for a last whisper on his lips. “And you are the love of my life, James. Never forget that.”

Epilogue

“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this. What was I thinking?” Mercy sighed as she shot her husband an exasperated look and dove for her son’s diapered butt as he climbed up the port side hull of the Mercy.

James leaned down, a grin playing on his lips as he held their daughter in his arms and touched his mouth to hers. The kiss still managed to give her that sharp edge of desire every single time. Even after five years, a wedding, and the birth of their twins Ben and Paige, two years ago.

The days after Abbie had brought them together had been the best of her life. She’d even reconciled with her parents, although she recognized they’d always be poles apart. Which was why, when they got married, Ian had walked her down the aisle. He was more a father to her than her own had ever been. Mercy had no problem bucking tradition, and Ian was the father she should’ve had.

As her husband lifted his head, a sexy promise in his eye, she shivered. “You were thinking about how much you love to see me in swimming trunks.”

Mercy snorted. “I do love your arrogance.”

“I love you.”

“Yeah, I know, and for some crazy reason, I love you too.”

Moving Ben to her other hip, she rubbed his nose with her own as her son stuck his thumb in his mouth and laid his head on her shoulder. Getting to this place hadn’t been easy; fertility treatments were heartbreaking each time they failed. James had held her as she cried after each one and decreed that if the third attempt didn’t work, they’d find another way to become parents.

His love for her was in everything he did, and he proved time and again that she was the only woman for him. Thankfully, at the third and final try at IVF, she’d caught with these two angels. Her heart felt so full of love for the man at her side and her children, that she frequently pinched herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming.

James lowered Paige, and Mercy bent and let her son go after his sister toward their Aunt Beth and Uncle Miles as they climbed on board the boat where they were docked. But it was their older cousin Abbie who held the twin’s attention. Abbie smiled and bent to the babies, and Mercy knew she’d always have a special place in her heart for that child. Much as she loved all her nieces and nephews, including the one Beth carried, it would always be because of Abbie that she got her own happily ever after.

Warm, strong arms slipped around her waist from behind, and she leaned back into the strong, familiar body that made her feel so safe and loved.

“Can you believe she starts school soon?” His lips at her ear made her shiver and being the devil he was he chuckled, knowing he could play her body with such ease.

“It seems like yesterday that you held her in your arms and we both had no clue what to do.”

“Worst time of my life, yet it brought us together, so I’ll always see the positive in what happened.”

“I was thinking the same thing earlier, and Beth met Miles too.”