SEALed With a Kiss: Even a Hero Needs Help Sometimes... (48 page)

In almost no time, she felt Jax touch the bottom and urge her to stand as well. Wordlessly he took the baby and when she stumbled, clumsy in her wet clothes, steadied her with his other arm.

People appeared to pull her from the surf. Someone threw a large beach towel around her. Before she could ask where Tyler was, he was throwing his arms around her knees.

"Did you jump, Pickett? Did you swim on my Daddy's back? Was it fun?"

Jax's hand caressed the back of her neck. "You'll be okay. Stay with Tyler. I'm going back in."

Before Pickett could reply, he was already diving back into the surf. Yards away he reappeared, head bobbing in a lazy-looking breaststroke that nevertheless covered distance easily.

Then, her attention was taken by the hysterically grateful mother of the baby. No matter how Pickett tried to explain that she hadn't saved the baby, it didn't seem to make an impression. As an EMT pulled the woman away to check the infant over, Pickett lost sight of Jax.

She knelt and wrapped Tyler in the beach towel with her, while scanning the water.

Surfers with their boards started appearing in twos and threes as if by magic, and racing into the water. A Hobie Cat had been launched and was being paddled to the end of the pier. Sirens wailing, the fire department arrived, and set up giant stadium-type lights and deployed their hoses.

Suddenly Pickett's eyes found Jax. She blessed her flowered scarf. Because he still wore it on his head she could locate him among the bodies in the water.

"See, Tyler," she pointed. "There's your daddy. He's helping people onto the surfboards."

Tyler followed Pickett's pointing finger for a few minutes, then sagged tiredly against her breasts.

"I wish he was here with us." His voice wobbled a little.

"I wish he was here too, but he has to be there because he has to save people." Pickett rubbed her cheek on Tyler's salt-matted hair.

"Why?"

Pickett smiled tenderly at the whiny question. "'Cause he's a hero, darling. He's just doing what he has to do, 'cause that's who he is."

"Is he coming back?"

"Sure he is."

"My mommy's dead. She's not coming back."

She tightened her arms and rocked Tyler gently.

"I know, baby." She tucked the towel closer around Tyler's neck and rocked him some more. "I know."

Three separate police officers asked her if all her party were accounted for, and someone pushed a cup of hot coffee into her hand.

And Pickett rocked Tyler, and they waited for Jax.

Why the hell did you say you could swim?" Jax's words, no less angry for being soft spoken, jerked Pickett from her near doze.

Jax had been tight-lipped and silent since getting behind the wheel, clearly thinking about the pier fire and their narrow escape. That was okay. Pickett had a lot to think about too. During the eternity spent on the burning pier, waiting for Jax to swim back to her after carrying Tyler to safety, she had not so much watched her life pass before her eyes as seen it totally rearrange itself.

Pickett sat up straighter. She blinked red eyes at his profile, lit by the glow of the dash. He had on his no-expression expression. She half-laughed at the unfairness of the attack. "I can swim."

"The hell you can. You're pathetic. You were about to drown yourself in front of my eyes. Shit. I could have been teaching you. I
would have
been teaching you if I'd had any idea a woman who has lived on the fucking sound for two fucking years could not fucking swim."

"Language, Jax," Pickett warned. "There are ears in the back seat."

Jax flicked his eyes to the rearview mirror. "He's asleep."

"He's worn out. So am I." Pickett tightened her grip on her patience. "So are you. Can't this wait?"

"Hell, no. You are going to listen to me, and listen to me good. You go through life like some kind of Mary Poppins, passing out advice and spreading good cheer. Well, when the shit hits the fan, training is what will save your ass."

Pickett's patience slipped another notch. "What are you so upset about? I jumped off the pier, just like you told me to. And I didn't die," she added flippantly.

"That's another thing. What the hell did you think you were you doing letting yourself down over the rail? If you'd fallen from that position, you could have broken your back. And then you waited so long to jump, I thought you had frozen and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. You scared the hell out of me."

His hands tightened on the steering wheel, then slowly, consciously ungripped it, one finger at a time. "I don't ever want to feel that kind of fear again."

He took one hand off the wheel to tiredly massage his face, stopping to rub the corner of each eye, the way men do when they're trying to erase tears before they can fall. Compassion melted Pickett's impatience. He'd been so calm. So matter-of-fact and confident. And now emotional reaction had settled in.

"I'm going to tell you what you did wrong, and you're going to listen," Jax continued in the same soft growl.

Pickett turned her face toward the passenger window so Jax wouldn't see the tender smile she couldn't quite suppress. She'd tell him later. He was in full testosterone mode, and there wasn't much for her to do but ride it out.

She inhaled deeply to keep the giggly bubbles tickling her insides from popping to the surface. His lecture freely mixed technical jargon with profanities she'd never heard before. She couldn't understand most of it; nonetheless, she had to admire a man who could swear so creatively, and in an absolutely level tone.

They were turning onto her short sand and gravel driveway when he finally ran down. Hobo Joe, who was turning into a good watchdog, met them at the road and raced beside the SUV in his rocking, three-legged gait as they circled the house to the back door.

"Are you done with your rant?" Pickett let her dimple peep and added a flutter of eyelashes for good measure.

Jax gave her an acid look. "You're not scared of me one bit, are you?"

"No, but if you've finished dressing me down, I have a question ..." Pickett paused for effect. "What does," she repeated a salty phrase he had used,
"mean,
exactly?"

"
What?"
Jax shut off the engine and slumped back in the seat. He scrubbed at his forehead with a fist. "Shit, Pickett. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have used language like that. I really went off on you."

"Hmm." Pickett noticed he was only apologizing for the language, not the rant. One day soon, they'd need to have a talk about that, but there were other things to be discussed first. "Did you get it out of your system?"

He scrubbed at his forehead again. "Some."

Jax turned out the lights, opened the car door, and moved to the back door to begin unbuckling Tyler, almost surprised to note how steady his hands were. On the inside he was still shaking.

All three dogs alerted at the smell of smoke and danger. Patterson whined, and Hobo went to the back of the vehicle to stand sentry. Lucy put her forelegs on the running board, straining to press her nose to every inch of Tyler. Tyler whimpered but didn't waken.

"Get down, Lucy," Jax scooped up his son's lax little body, gently settling the heavy head on his shoulder.
Precious cargo.
"He's okay, Lucy. Everything is going to be okay."

But God! His heart started to pound like a pile driver every time he thought of it.

He'd almost lost everything.

Not bothering to turn on a light in the kitchen, Pickett poured a glass of water from the filter pitcher, and drained it in almost one swallow. Immediately, she filled the glass again, but this time savored the coolness washing across her smoke-scorched throat. Her damp clothes, her hair, her skin reeked of wood smoke and burning chemicals.

She ran cool water at the kitchen sink and washed her hands, then splashed some water on her face only to be rewarded by painful stinging when smoke, trapped on her lashes, washed into her eyes. Blindly, she reached for a paper towel to blot her face. Scratchy paper pressed to her eyes, she didn't turn around when she heard Jax come through the hall door. "Is Tyler okay?"

"Yeah. I just skinned him out of his clothes and put him in bed. I don't think he even woke up. What are you doing?"

"My eyes are burning."

"Let me see." Jax was beside her in one step. He turned on the light over the sink with one hand while pulling the wet paper towel away gently with the other. "Come on. Let me see."

With exquisite care he peeled back one eyelid and then the other. His breath was warm and moist on her cool, wet face, and smelled of the Mountain Dew he had all but inhaled in the car driving home. "Hum, a little red, but I think you're okay— wait," he turned the side of her face to catch the light, "what happened to your cheek? It looks bruised."

Pickett felt her cheek. "I hit it on something. I don't remember—oh! It was when the gas tanks exploded and you pushed me down. My face connected with the planks."

Pain filled his eyes, as he ran a careful finger across the swelling. "Oh God, I'm so sorry."

"Don't." Pickett stopped his lips with fingers that trembled slightly. "Glass and burning chunks were flying all around us. You covered my body with your own. You could have been hurt much worse." Pickett put her arms around Jax's waist and laid her cheek against his broad chest. She pressed her ear against him to better hear the reassuring thud of his heart, to get closer to his vital heat. "I was so scared."