Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 75643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
I’d thought long and hard about what I was going to do with the rest of my life, and I still hadn’t quite figured out the best answer.
I could quit and transition back into civilian life. I could get a job with the police department. It wouldn’t be too hard. But, I had a feeling that I would hate it. I’d despise not being able to do something that I loved to do—something that challenged me.
Or, I could stay in. I could continue with the Delta team and I could continue being gone for months on end, never knowing when I would have to leave and when I’d be coming back.
She looked at me, her eyes soft and knowing. “You’re not getting out of Delta because of me or the babies,” she told me bluntly. “You need to get out because you want to. Because it’s your time to get out. Because that’s where you see our life moving toward. If you’re thinking on getting out because of me or the babies, don’t. I survived the last few months without you, and I think I can do it again. Will it be tough? Sure. Will I like it? No. Will I live? Yes.”
I pulled her to me and sank my face into the soft curve of her neck.
The position was awkward, being hunched over her, but the way she threw her arms around my neck made me want to stay there forever.
After a few long moments of standing there, I pulled my head back up and dropped a kiss onto her mouth. A kiss that quickly went from chaste to erotic in about two seconds flat.
It turns out that both of us were quite overexcited, and let’s just say that she was lucky that she came in about two seconds flat because I went in four.
Chapter 20
There are times I contemplate the cost/benefit ratio of shooting a man in cold blood.
-Text from Hoax to Pru
Hoax
Dropping her off the next morning was the last thing in the world that I wanted to do.
I wanted her to remain in my arms, snuggled under the most comfortable comforter ever, and stay there until our stomachs drove us from bed. And only then, I wanted to order a pizza and only put pants on long enough for me to pay and grab the pizza before I returned to the bed.
Being clean, and in my woman’s arms, was literally the only thing that I’d thought about when I wasn’t focusing on the mission.
Now that I had it back, I didn’t want to let it go.
Unfortunately, she had to go to work.
I also had a date. With her dad.
After our family dinner last night with her parents, uncles, multiple cousins, and grandfather, I’d gotten a summons from her father to meet him at his office once I’d dropped Pru off.
“It’ll be all right,” she pressed into me, her belly and her mouth the only thing touching me.
I pulled her in closer, loving the baby bump that pressed between us.
I’d never really given much thought to being a father.
I’d always assumed I would be, at some point in time, but I hadn’t really given much thought as to when I’d like this to happen. Seeing my teammates getting married slowly over the last few years, and then starting to have children, had really started to ease me into the idea of having that life for myself.
So when I’d found out from Pru that I was going to be a father, I hadn’t been nearly as freaked out as I would have been only a few years ago.
Her smile was big as she pulled away from my embrace.
“I really have to go,” she sighed. “I don’t want him to have a reason.”
We both knew who the ‘him’ was, and I didn’t like it one bit.
I hated that she had to work with that man, and that would be the first thing I brought up with her father—because I knew damn well and good that he didn’t like his wife nor his daughter working with the piece of shit.
“It’ll be okay,” she whispered, her nose coming back to touch mine. “Be good today. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
I rolled my eyes and pulled her back in for one more devastating kiss, and then relinquished her to Conleigh, who was waiting by the front entrance for her.
I waved at Conleigh, who waved back, and turned back to my truck.
Instead of driving back home to get my bike, I chose to drive my truck straight to her dad’s place.
Taking the turn out of the parking lot and onto the main road that would lead me all the way out of town and to the compound-like place that Free called home, I’d just started to accelerate when a familiar car took the corner to the hospital’s road on two wheels.