Hot Shot (A Hostile Operations Team Novel)(#5) (23 page)

“I don’t see why not.”

One corner of his mouth turned down. “Thankfully, he does. I almost didn’t get past him. Darren’s a good guy, and his firm has a good reputation. I’m glad you have him.”

“I feel bad he’s in the hall. I should let him in.”

“I sent him downstairs for dinner.” He patted his side. “I’ve got this shift.”

Her heart thumped. Of course he was armed.
 

Gina moved toward the living room and Jack followed, prompting Eli to look up when they walked over. His little eyes were wide and fixed on Jack. Gina prayed he wouldn’t burst into tears at the sight of a stranger. He’d been a little sensitive the last couple of days when room service came by, and she didn’t know how he’d react.

When she turned to look at Jack, he was staring back at Eli and her belly churned. “Jack, meet Eli.”

He shook his head slowly. “How did Metaxas not see it?”

“What?”

Jack’s gaze flickered over to her before turning back to Eli. “Me. I was standing right there in front of him, and you were holding Eli.”

She knew he was talking about the resemblance.

“Not everyone can see the truth when it’s staring them in the face. I’m thankful for it, quite honestly, because if he’d realized…” She shivered involuntarily.

“Yeah.”

She pulled in a breath as Eli went back to playing with his toys. The noise of the cartoon filtered into the room, its bright sounds out of place when they were discussing such darkness.

“I haven’t told him you’re his father. I wasn’t sure how you wanted to do this, so I thought it was best to wait.”

“I can’t believe he’s mine. I see it in his face, and I still can’t believe it.” He turned to her, his blue eyes full of emotion. “We were together once, we used protection, and he’s here. Hayley—”

He stopped speaking abruptly and she bit down on her cheek. He seemed lost in his own thoughts and she hated to see him suffer. “What, Jack?”

There was a well of suffering in those blue eyes. “You don’t want to hear it.”

“I
do
want to hear it.”

He looked at her for a long moment. “Hayley had trouble getting pregnant. She wanted a baby pretty badly, and I wasn’t always there when the time was right. We tried for over a year.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“I know. But it hurts you, and I care about that.”

He sank onto the arm of a chair and stretched his leg out. “She found out she was pregnant the day she had the accident. I was forward deployed, but we were cooling our heels at the base, so when she called, I was there.”

Gina didn’t quite know what to do, so she put her hand on his shoulder. She hadn’t known that he’d learned of the pregnancy the same day as the accident.

“The accident happened about an hour later, but I didn’t know for hours. Takes time for that kind of thing to filter through channels.”

She couldn’t stop herself from stepping into him, from putting her arms around his neck and hugging him tight. One of his hands came up and splayed across the small of her back.

“You don’t need to hear this. It’s in the past, and there’s no going back.”

“I think she must have been very happy that day.”

“Yeah, I think so too. I just hope…” His hand tightened on her for a second. “I hope it happened fast, you know? They said the impact killed her. I just hope that’s true.”

She held him for a long while. The television blared, Eli played, and Jack just sat there staring at his son, his arm around her waist. It was almost companionable and she closed her eyes, laid her cheek against his head, and wished the circumstances were very different.

“Mama,” Eli called, and her eyes snapped open.

“What, sweetie?”

“Cheese, Mama. Want cheese.”

“Okay, baby. Let me see if we have some.” She went over to the refrigerator and found the bag of string cheese she’d had sent up. She tore off a strip and opened it, then took it back and handed it to Eli after she’d started the process of peeling the cheese. He stood up now and leaned against the couch while he looked up at Jack.

After Gina handed him the cheese, he occupied himself with tearing off the strips and eating them. Then, when he got to a strip he couldn’t make work, he thrust the cheese at Jack. Not at her, but at Jack.

Gina’s heart lodged in her throat as Jack reached for the cheese.

“What’s wrong, buddy? Can’t peel it?”

Eli nodded as Jack took the cheese and peeled it, then handed it back to Eli. This time, Eli moved closer until he was standing at Jack’s feet and bracing himself with a hand on Jack’s knee.

Gina wanted to sob. She pressed a hand to her mouth and stood there breathing deeply while Jack talked to Eli. He slipped off the arm of the chair and down into the seat.

“Want to sit with me?” he asked.

Eli nodded and Jack picked him up. After a second, Jack settled him into the crook of his arm. Eli ate his cheese and watched cartoons. Jack dipped his head, sniffing Eli’s hair. But then she realized that his body shook and tears rolled silently down his cheeks.
 

“Jack?”

He didn’t look at her. He just held up a hand as if to silence her, and she knew he didn’t want her comfort. She didn’t blame him, but it still hurt. Gina shuffled into the bedroom to give him time alone with Eli. She stood there numbly until her body began to tremble and the tears she’d been holding in broke free.

Jack wasn’t the only one whose heart was breaking.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

GINA WAS SITTING ON the bed when Jack walked in with a sleeping Eli in his arms. She swiped beneath her eyes and sat up, muting the television as she did so. It had been nearly an hour since she’d left him with Eli.

And Jack didn’t look as if he’d fought an emotional battle at all. No, he looked like a battle-hardened warrior dominating her bedroom with a small child cradled tenderly in his arms.

“Where do you want him?”

Gina sniffed and got to her feet. “There’s another bedroom.” She led the way back across the suite and into the room where she’d put Eli. She’d wanted to keep him with her, but she’d finally decided it was important she treat him as if everything were perfectly normal. He had his own bedroom at home, so she’d gotten a suite with two rooms.
 

It was hard to put him to bed every night and walk back to her own room, but she’d done it. She’d left a light on in the living room and both doors open so it wasn’t quite so bad, and Eli seemed to be adjusting.

Gina tugged the covers back and Jack laid Eli on the bed. Then she pulled the sheets up and tucked him in, sliding his stuffed lion in beside him. He clutched it and yawned before burrowing deeper into the pillows. He never once opened his eyes.

Jack left first and Gina followed. She pulled Eli’s door most of the way shut before turning to find Jack raking a hand through his hair and rolling his neck to pop out the kinks.

“Thanks for sitting with him.”

“He’s beautiful, Gina.”

“Well, that’s half you.” She tried to make the words bright, but his expression didn’t lighten.

“Sitting here with him, I realized…” He shook his head. “I missed a lot, didn’t I?”

Her throat ached. “Yes, and I’m sorry.”

He sank onto the couch, then leaned forward and put his head in his hands. “I wasn’t in the right place anyway. I wasn’t ready. I was pissed as hell at you for keeping him from me. But now I’m not so sure how I feel… It’s a lot to process.”

Her heart thumped. “Are you ready now?”

He lifted his head. “I don’t know. I want to be.”

“All you can do is try.” It was a lame answer, but it was all she had. He hadn’t said he forgave her, but if he understood, just a little bit, then maybe there was hope.

He snorted as his gaze drifted around the room. “And how would this work, babe? You’re a superstar. Rich, famous, with the world at your feet. Just look at this hotel room.” He lifted his hand, let it fall again. “I’m a soldier. It’d probably take an entire month’s salary for me to afford one night here. And you’ve been here three.”

She swallowed. Of course this would be an obstacle between them. She’d be naive to think it was only about her lie or about Hayley. Her life was fundamentally different from his and they couldn’t ignore it. “Does the fact I have money change who I am? Who you are? If I had nothing, would it be easier for you?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

Those simple words made her mad. They negated her whole life. “I worked hard to get what I have, Jack. And it’s damned misogynistic of you to want me to have nothing so you’ll feel more comfortable about the whole thing. You’re Eli’s father, for God’s sake. Isn’t that more important than who has what?”

His eyes flashed. “Yes… but are you gonna drop everything to accommodate my schedule? Fly halfway around the world when I have a week off? Stay in my apartment while your adoring fans cluster outside and clamor to see you? You can’t even walk down a street without a mob, Gina. Fuck.”

It was all true, and yet she really didn’t want to think about it right now. “I don’t want to fight with you. Not tonight.”

He got to his feet and limped toward her. It hit her that he’d taken a bullet for her. He’d done everything he could to get her and Eli away from Stavros, and now he was here and her heart ached because she wanted him so much.

But she didn’t know how to make it work. They were so different. He put his hands on her arms, his gaze intense and hot.

“We weren’t supposed to happen. It was an accident of timing and bad luck.”

He had no idea how much his words wounded her.
 

“So I’m bad luck, huh?”

His eyes closed. “That’s not what I meant.”

She shrugged out of his grip. “It’s okay, Jack. I can take it. You don’t want to be with me. You’re in this by accident because you had the misfortune to use a condom that didn’t work. And then I called you up, all crazy like, and told you three years after the fact that you have a child. It’s a lot to process. I get that.”

His jaw tightened. “You sure do know how to push my buttons. No one else has ever pissed me off quite as much as you do. Yeah, you lied to me and that hurt, but I’m trying to see it from your perspective. I was a dick to you three years ago, and I made you think I didn’t care if there were consequences to our actions. That was wrong.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “Does that mean you forgive me?”

“I’m working on it.”

“That’s what you say about everything,” she cried. “And you know what? You piss me off too. You aren’t perfect, Mr. Hotshot Sniper Man. You’re no picnic to deal with.”
 

He was glaring at her. “Maybe I should go, let us both cool off.”

She folded her arms over her chest. “Maybe you should.”

He started toward the door, but then he stopped and turned back to her. “Is this really what you want? Because I got a whole different vibe from you on the yacht, I gotta say.”

Her insides quivered. How could she begin to tell him what she wanted? Him and her and Eli as a family. But that would be baring too much of her soul just now.

“What do you want me to say, Jack? I already know what it’s like to hand you my heart on a platter and get nothing in return. I’m not crazy about repeating the experience.”

He shook his head. “I thought I dreamed that… And I didn’t give you nothing.”

“You thought it was a dream?” She’d poured out her feelings and he hadn’t known it was real. Just her luck.

“I wasn’t sure. I was pretty drugged up, I guess, and I couldn’t remember what was real and what wasn’t. But I didn’t give you nothing. I know that much.”

“No, you tried to have sex with me. I guess that’s not nothing. It’s just not quite what I was looking for.”

“I’m trying, Gina. This isn’t easy for me.”

“You think it’s easy for me?”

He shoved a hand through his hair again. He looked golden and rumpled, like he’d just gotten out of bed, and her body insisted on reacting even though she didn’t want it to.
 

“Nothing about this is easy, babe. For either of us.”

She didn’t say anything and he went to the door. Then he stood there with his back to her, his hand on the knob. He let his forehead rest on the door, and then he swore.

When he turned around and strode back to her, she was frozen in place. “This is fucking ridiculous,” he growled, yanking her to him.
 

And then his mouth slanted over hers, his lips firm and demanding, his hands gripping her hips and pressing her into his body. He was firm, big all over, and she melted into him in spite of her wish not to. Couldn’t she resist just a little bit?

But no, her arms went around his neck and her traitorous body arched into him like she’d been deprived for too long. Had it only been a few days since they’d made love? It felt like months.

His hands shaped her, gliding over her waist, her hips, her thighs, and then up to cup her cheeks. His tongue stroked into her mouth, finding hers and sliding against it over and over. She might have moaned. She might have melted.