Page 83 of Her Defiant Warrior

“When I’m on a big job, I’ll get a truck while I’m there. Nothing special.”

“Then you’ll get a glamourous car like this when you’re here in town. Must be nice,” Jase teased.

Renzo gave him the side-eye.

“So, what’s this conversation really about?” Jase asked.

“You know I spent time in Jasper Creek, Tennessee, right?”

“Yep.”

“It’s a small town. It felt good. It felt right.”

“It’s pretty far from all of us,” Jase pointed out.

“Yeah, but it’s where Millie’s farm is at.”

“Millie, huh?”

“Yeah. Millie. And I don’t want to start something, if I’m just going to end up being some asshole who's a rolling stone and destined to leave.”

“Renzo, you don’t have it in yourself to be an asshole. Not to the right woman. Now tell me all about her.”

* * *

Two days of debriefing. It might not have been as long as they had him in solitary in Dubai, but it felt even longer because he was so close to Bonnie. All the others, but Kostya, had already been home for days. He’d seen their group texts as soon as he got his personal cell phone returned to him after the debrief was done. The Navy didn’t mess around; they wanted to make sure that everything matched up. Especially when there was a rogue CIA agent involved.

Captain Hale had talked to him for twenty minutes. He wanted to ensure that if the prince or anyone from the UAE ever reached out to him, that he would immediately report it to Kostya. Jase hadn’t really considered that might happen. But, all things considered, the Captain might be onto something, so Jase promised.

The first thing he wanted to do when he left base was call Bonnie, but first he needed to get cleaned up. A shower sounded wonderful, and he was hoping more of his absorbable stitches might have fallen out, and maybe they would if he accidentally scrubbed too hard in the shower. He really didn’t want Bonnie to see him injured.

When he pulled up to his house, he saw something taped on his front door. What UPS delivery had he missed while he was gone? He hit the remote to his garage door and pulled in.

“Shower here I come.”

When he was done with the shower, he took time to give himself a smooth shave. He’d been feeling itchy for days. All but one of his absorbable stitches had fallen out in the shower, so he used his tweezers to pluck out the last little tricky one. He pulled on a pair of sweat shorts and headed for the kitchen. Once again, he found the kitchen pretty well empty. But he did a frozen pretzel which he nuked. He ate that with that and some hot mustard and apple juice.

He looked at the clock over his stove and saw that it was almost noon.

It’s Wednesday. Bonnie clocks out early on Wednesdays.

Jase marched down his hallway to his bedroom and got dressed in double time. He grabbed his keys and his phone and headed for his Mustang. As soon as he got on the road to the salon, he called Farah’s number.

“Jase!” she shouted. “You’re home!”

“Softer, sweetheart. You’re worse than artillery training.”

“You’re home,” she whispered.

“I am,” he agreed. “Look, sweetheart, I need a favor. Do you know where Lachlan and Amber go to school?”

“Sure, I do.”

“Can you pick them up for me? I want to surprise Bonnie at the salon today and take her out to dinner.”

“Bullshit. You want to take her somewhere horizontal,” Farah laughed.

“Okay, maybe we order dinner in. Anyway, can you pick them up for me?”