She thanked Trent
and took the seat next to Drew. “Hungry?”
“I got distracted by a beautiful woman on my way to dinner last night,” he murmured. “And then she put me through my paces.”
She grinned. “Well, eat up. Maybe we’ll have time for another private training session before you leave.”
He finished chewing and put down his fork. “I’m sorry I said that yesterday. We came together, we’ll leave together.”
“I don’t want you to get in trouble at work.”
“I’ve got more than thirty-six hours before anyone will be expecting me. We’ve got some time to enjoy the beach.” He nudged her leg under the table. “And talk more.”
“Talk?”
“Yeah, you know. String words together, form sentences. Share information. Converse.” He grinned. “I’ll tell you about the time we locked Kevin out of the showers, buck naked.”
“Oh good lord. Deal. And I’ll tell you about him dressing up in my Mom’s hat and gloves for a tea party.”
He lifted her hand to kiss her knuckles and her heart just about exploded from happiness. This couldn’t be real, the other shoe would drop any second and she’d go back to being alone. As if he could read her thoughts, he leaned over and whispered in her ear. “Keep breathing, sugar.”
“You
aren’t God’s gift to women, you know.” She mock scowled.
“Nope, just to you.” And with a self-satisfied smile, he dug back into his breakfast.
And that really was the truth. They were a gift to each other, and she wasn’t going to over-think it any further than that.
— —
After breakfast, Trent led them down the hallway from where he appeared earlier, and Annie realized there was a heavy
sliding panel fully recessed into the wall at the entrance. As they stepped into what looked like a NASA control room, she understood the need for secrecy.
She knew better than to say anything, but when Drew leaned in and asked Rik just how top-secret the bodyguarding business was these days, she couldn’t help but crane to hear the answer. Which of course didn’t come.
Instead, Rik chuckled and
waved for Trent to begin. On one of the screens in front of them a black command prompt window opened up, and Trent typed, waited, then typed again. A few more windows flitted by, full of code, then after a minute Trent clicked on a shortcut to a program from his desktop.
“Skype?” All the heads in the room swiveled to look at Annie and she realized she’d asked the incredulous question out loud.
In for a penny… “Seriously? We fled the country to a high-tech spy base, and we’re going to call him on Skype?”
Trent winked. “Sure thing. And the FBI or whoever is listening thinks we’re located in the Mediterranean. If they’re even looking anymore.”
“Anymore?”
Trent and Rik exchanged a quick look. “You don’t seem to be a person of interest to them any longer.”
“But I was.”
“Briefly, yes.”
Trent winced. “Possibly because you ran from the police.”
Drew snorted. “And why were they looking for her in the first place?”
“Because, wise guy, the senator had identified her the night before as someone who might be at risk.”
Annie groaned. With all that had happened with Drew in the interim, she’d forgotten how embarrassing it was being the center of all of this drama.
“All’s well that
ends well?” Drew gave her one of his patented eager kid faces, and she rolled her eyes.
“It’s a good thing you’re cute, Castle.”
Trent cleared his throat. “We good to place this call?”
“Yep, go ahead.” Annie ignored the looks of surprise from Rik and Drew. Yeah, she was in charge now. She didn’t love the feeling, but there were times when a girl needed to step up and push the boys out of the
way, and this was one of those times. “Where’s our web cam?”
On the screen there was just a black box where the return video feed would display. Trent shook his head. “Let’s wait and see what happens at their end before turning it on. But it’s up there, at the top of the screen. Takes in most of the room.”
And everyone in it. Annie’s heart rate picked up. She glanced at Drew, who was already
stepping into a dead spot in the corner.
The call connected, and the video feed flickered a few times before a comfortably handsome face filled the screen, his brows creased more than Annie remembered from media coverage. Rob Harris was in a richly appointed office, and he appeared to be alone.
“Ms. Martin?”
“Yes. Nice to meet you, Senator Harris.” Her voice warbled and she clenched her hands
into fists at her side.
“I’m sorry it’s not under different circumstances.” He paused and glanced at something beside his computer. “I’m sorry it wasn’t much sooner.”
Annie decided to dive right in. “I understand we have something of a connection?”
He nodded. “And I understand you received an awful phone call the other day. My wife had a similar message left for her as well, and then I received
a follow up call yesterday.”
She couldn’t read his face and stepped closer to the screen, desperate for more. More clues. More straight up information. More connection.
On the screen, the father of her biological nephew rubbed his face and sighed. “I hoped to connect with you before…but that wasn’t to be. I think it’s time I tell you a bit about my son.”
She nodded. “I’d like that.”
“His name
is Bobby, and he loves dragons and baseball. He’s more athletic than I ever was, which makes his grandfather happy, and he’s left-handed, unlike my wife and myself.” Annie could feel Drew react to that from across the room.
Just like Kevin
. “When he was six months old, he was small for his age and wasn’t gaining weight as well as he should. We ended up doing genetics testing for cystic fibrosis.
It was at that point that I met your brother.”
Annie couldn’t help the gasp that slipped out. The overheard conversation between Kevin and the mysterious woman at the other end of the line now made sense.
“Something you need to understand, Ms. Martin, is that I love my wife very much. I always have, and I always will. But there was a period of time when we were new in Washington that I didn’t
give her as much attention as I should. I was too focused on laying the foundation for a leadership run or some such nonsense, and I neglected our relationship. It was in that time period that she befriended your brother.” A wistful look crossed the senator’s face. “When she realized she was pregnant, she knew there was only one possible father. I spent a week in the ICU following an untreated
strep infection in college that made it impossible for me to have children of my own.”
She could fill in the rest. “And Kevin’s job didn’t allow him to take on shared custody of a child.”
Harris leaned forward, his face filling the screen. “We would have, if he wanted. He did visit, in the role of a family friend, once or twice a year. Beth-Anne sent him pictures from time to time, and email
updates.”
“They stayed in touch?”
He nodded. “Not regularly, but from time to time. We don’t have any secrets between us. A lot of sad history, maybe, but no secrets. I was the first person she told when she took the test. First she told me, then she told him. And she would have shared custody with him, but she wouldn’t leave me. I didn’t deserve that loyalty, but she gave it to me anyway, and
I’ve never let her down since. My wife and my son…they are my world. Your brother gave me that, as hard as that may be to imagine.”
— —
Drew couldn’t watch from the shadows any longer, not when Annie’s shoulders started to shake almost imperceptibly. He was at her side as the first tear fell, careful to keep his back to the camera. Trent cut their video feed momentarily, and Drew gave
her a quick squeeze.
“You okay?” he whispered.
She nodded and he brushed a quick kiss against her lips. He glanced at Rik and jerked his chin. He didn’t have anything to hide.
As the pixels re-formed their moving image, Harris didn’t show any surprise to see Drew. Either he hadn’t made a briefing book, or Harris wasn’t interested in a SEAL’s presence. Both possibilities were reassuring.
Harris chewed on his bottom lip for a minute then leaned back in his chair. “Annie, part of why this came up is probably because I’ve been approached by different people to consider running for higher office. Beth-Anne and I have talked about it. I won’t deny I’ve been swayed, but I’m not interested if it risks my family. And I know we haven’t met, but I include you in that. If you’re still planning
to come here for that research trip, I hope you’ll come to dinner.”
“Dinner?” Her eyes were big and suspiciously wet still.
“We think it’s time you meet your nephew, don’t you?”
She swallowed hard. “Does he…”
“Know? No. But he knew Kevin as a friend of the family, and we’d introduce you as his sister.” Harris tightened his lips for a moment, and Drew couldn’t read his expression. “We’ve visited
his grave in Arlington. When he’s older, we’ll tell him. I hope that’s enough for you.”
A sob wracked through her body, and Annie twisted toward him, burying her face in his chest. Drew cleared his throat, drawing the attention of the senator and the other men in the room. “That sounds like it would be enough for Kevin.”
Annie nodded into his shirt, and he pulled her tighter. A sharp realization
sliced through his gut as he processed that with anyone else, he’d have made the same decision as Kevin. Walk away, watch from afar. But if Annie were carrying his child? He’d slay dragons to be at her side.
Unaware that Drew’s entire sense of being had been permanently altered, Rik stepped into the center of the shot.
The senator nodded. “Amundson.”
“Harris.”
Drew wasn’t surprised there
was a history there. Rik had always been more than an average special operator.
“There are people who aren’t going to like your meddling in this.”
Rik shrugged. “Can’t be helped.”
“There was supposed to be egg on my face here. I’m glad there isn’t, but that’s probably disrupted someone’s plan for something else.”
Drew tightened his grip on Annie, not wanting to let her go. Not liking the tone
of their veiled back and forth statements. “I thought you said last night this was about a paparazzi thing.”
Trent spoke from the corner, the burr in his voice more pronounced than usual. “That’s definitely who was interested in Annie, and now that there’s no story there, she’s probably not a person of interest to anyone. But there’s a money trail, and it runs dark in a way that tells us it didn’t
originate in a good place.”
Drew knew some of the options there. Could imagine the others, and didn’t like any of the thoughts running through his head. “And what about Harris? And his son?”
On the screen, the senator shrugged. “This is probably bigger than me as well. I have a feeling that we haven’t seen the last of each other, though.”
“All due respect, sir, but I’ve got retirement plans
in my future. The next time you see me it had better be at a family picnic.”
Annie’s lips quirked and he glanced down at her. “What? I like picnics.”
“Yeah? Me too.” She grinned. “I’m just shocked you used the word family without shuddering.”
— EPILOGUE —
~ 9 months later ~
Her man was coming home. His flight had left Dubai fifteen hours and forty-seven minutes ago, and now she paced in the arrivals hall at LAX willing herself to play it cool when he walked through the gate. Not to cry. Jeez, no crying. He’d survived a six month deployment, and while she knew he couldn’t tell her much—anything—about it, he was all in one piece.
When they Skyped the night before, he’d even seemed relaxed and happy.
Really happy. And horny. That had to be a good sign.
Her arms ached to hold him and her heart felt like it might just thump out of her chest. It had only been fifteen seconds since the last time she checked the arrivals board, but she glanced up again anyway, and let out a too-loud whoop when she realized the status had
changed from
Expected
to
Arrived
.
Hot damn
. Somewhere on the other side of the sliding doors, Drew Castle was back on American soil.
She wanted to announce to the crowd around her that a hero was about to walk amongst them, but rule number one of dating a SEAL…no glorification of the job. And keeping this reunion private was part of why Drew flew into LAX a few days before the rest of his men
came home. Even though she was happy to socialize with the other girlfriends and family members in San Diego, Drew resisted mixing their lives together more than was strictly necessary.
He cited security reasons, but Annie knew better. As much as she loved him, Drew was still an overgrown man-child in many ways, and commitment sat front and centre on that list. It was okay. She likely had two
more years of research before she finished her doctoral thesis, and she’d give him that long to sort out what he wanted.
No, that wasn’t fair. He definitely wanted her. A shiver wracked her body at the heated words he’d whispered across their computer connection the night before. He wanted her mind, body and soul, and she didn’t need to worry about the details. When the time was right, they’d
take their relationship to the next level.
She smoothed her hands over the flat front of her cherry-red dress, then tucked her small handbag securely under one arm. How much time would it take him to move through customs and security? He didn’t need to wait for any luggage, he just had a carry-on bag as most of his gear was being shipped directly to Coronado. The opaque glass doors on the other
side of the barricade slid open as other international travellers passed through, and she craned her neck for a glimpse of her tall mountain of a man.
Five minutes, then ten, passed by, and the few butterflies in her stomach filled the void by procreating and turning into a full on swarm.
Then the doors slid open once more, and Drew was ten feet on the other side. He flashed a wide grin as
they made eye contact, but before he got close enough to the sensor, the doors closed, and she leaned hard against the yellow metal barrier.
One…two…three
. And then with a whoosh the glass parted again and he was in front of her and then around her, his strong arms hauling her against his body, the metal bars between them fading away.