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“Watch out for yourself, Jaye. Jack won’t be the only one in danger through all this. He loves you, and that will make him vulnerable. No more late night visits to the funeral home by yourself. If I can get in without notice, then others can too.”
I heard the deadbolt unfasten and the click of the door as it opened and closed again. When I looked up to the top of the stairs, he was gone.
CHAPTER TEN
By the time I finished with Leanne and had her back in the cooler it was almost ten o’clock. I used the shower in the little bathroom off my office and changed into clean clothes, bagging up the ones I’d been wearing down in the lab.
I needed to go home and go to bed since I had an early morning with Mr. Mosely, but my brain wasn’t as tired as the rest of me was. I couldn’t get Lauren Rhodes’ words out of my head. How Jack could be so much more without me. She was right. But despite it all I felt the need to be selfish for once. He was mine. Just like I was his. And he was worth fighting for.
If Jack wanted a career change or to get out of Bloody Mary, then I was okay with that as long as we were together. Lauren had another thing coming if she thought she could wiggle her way back into Jack’s life.
I thought back to what she’d said—about how she’d tried to come see him over and over again while he’d been recovering from his wounds. I’d been there by his side and hadn’t seen or heard a peep from her. And if Jack had told me to go away and let him deal with it on his own, I’d have told him too bad and muscled my way beside him anyway. If Lauren had loved him as much as she’d claimed, then she would have fought tooth and nail to help him through his recovery, despite what he said.
Jack’s past was in the past. I trusted him unconditionally. Which wasn’t easy for me to do considering. We’d work through this mess and then we’d finally get our happily ever after. We sure as hell deserved one.
I flicked off all the lightsand locked up before I went out to the Suburban. Agent Donaldson was still in the exact place he was when I went inside, and I gave him a wave to let him know I was heading out.
My dad had been right about one thing. Jack and I wouldn’t take unnecessary chances. No more going places alone, and if we needed an agent inside the house, then that’s what we’d do.
Agent Donaldson turned right behind me into the long driveway that led to the house. I parked next to Jack’s cruiser and another black SUV, and I assumed Greer was still with Jack inside. I looked around for any visible signs of human life—good or otherwise—before I got out of the car and headed inside.Donaldson was right behind me with his hand on his weapon. I wasn’t sure it would make him feel better to know I had my hand on my own gun in the pocket of my windbreaker.
The front door opened before I got there, and Jack stood there with his weapon down at his side as he waited for me to come inside.
“I’ve got it from here,” he said to Donaldson, and Jack pulled me inside and closed the door at my back.
My pulse jumped as he held me against his body, and he burrowed his face against my neck, breathing in the scent of me. I was glad I’d decided to take a shower.
“I missed you.” He kissed just below my ear and chills pebbled over my flesh. He pulled back so he could look into my eyes, and then he took my mouth in a gentle touching of lips. The sweetness of it all enveloped me and I wrapped my arms tightly around his waist.His eyes never left mine and I could see the relief and worry now that I was safely in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” he said again. “I don’t want to fight.”And then he kissed me again and took it deeper. My lids fluttered closed, suddenly heavy, my blood thrumming through my veins and awakening as his hands skimmed my breasts and followed the curves of my waist and hips.
When he pulled back I was panting and the room was spinning. “Do we have company?”
“Carver’s in the office with all of the paperwork. He just got in about an hour ago and relieved Greer of bodyguard duty. Greer wasn’t happy to see him, but once Carver assured him he wasn’t there to take his case away, Greer backed down.” He gave me another soft kiss on the forehead and then backed away. “We need to talk, Jaye. This can’t fester between us. It’ll only make things harder.”
I nodded and took my gun out of my pocket and put it into the little safe that looked like a drawer in the sideboard in the entryway. I hung my jacket on the hat stand and followed Jack into the kitchen. I smelled fresh coffee and immediately went to get a cup.
“Did you eat?” He already had his head in the refrigerator pulling out sandwich stuff. “Of course you didn’t. And you’ve got a headache too. I can see it lurking there behind your eyes.”
“I just need some coffee. And probably the sandwich wouldn’t hurt.”
He didn’t say anything else until a thick sandwich and potato chips was placed in front of me. He grabbed a beer from the fridge and then took a seat.
“I need to explain about Lauren,” he said. “I know you probably heard more than you wanted to this afternoon.”
I grunted because my mouth was full of food, and it turned out I was hungrier than I thought. Martha’s hamburger from lunch wasn’t meant to stretch ten hours. I took a second to swallow and studied Jack. He looked a little uncomfortable and maybe a little nervous too.
“I heard enough,” I finally said.
“We were involved for about a year before the bank heist. She’d barely finished law school and gotten a job at the district attorney’s office. I had to testify in court one day about a gang killing we broke up, and she came up and introduced herself after. We dated for a while before things got more serious.”
“I’m not really sure what happened or how it happened, but one day I looked up and we’re all but living together. We were both overworked, and I was in the middle of my doctoral work.” He looked up then and gave a halfhearted smile. “I didn’t tell you about that.”
“No, you didn’t.” I took a drink to clear my throat. “Why not?”
“Mostly because I wasn’t sure I could go through with it to the end. I knew I couldn’t be SWAT forever. It wears on your mind and your body after a time. But I wasn’t sure after I quit the squad I could go back to being a regular cop either. So I thought if I got more schooling, maybe I could join the FBI and teach a few classes at Quantico. Or maybe I could sit as chief somewhere someday.”
“You’d be good at whatever you decided to do.”
