The Marine's Babies (Men Made In America)

by Laura Marie Altom

  When she finally heard the click of his key in the front door, she called out with forced cheer, “Hey! Hope you’re hungry.”

  “Whoa.” Staring at the virtual Chinese buffet of food she’d spread across the counter he grinned. “Remind me to give you a raise.”

  “Not necessary,” she said, quivery with relief that he’d apparently forgotten her earlier funk.

  “Where are the hoodlums?”

  “They both crashed early. After our trip to the store, they ransacked the kitchen, they ate, had baths then were out.”

  “Sounds like a good day.” He snagged an egg roll. “You feeling better?”

  “Excuse me?” She stood at the sink, gripping the scrub pad so hard it bit into her palms.

  “This morning you were a little weird.”

  “Sorry. I, um, had a wicked headache.”

  “Sure.” Taking a piece of Mongolian beef, and popping it in his mouth, he chewed and swallowed before adding, “I figured it was something like that, because I didn’t think I’d done anything wrong.”

  “Consider yourself a good judge of women, do you?” She spooned steamed rice from a pan to a serving dish.

  “I’m all right.”

  “Vicki being a case in point?”

  As he’d just crammed his third egg roll into his mouth, he couldn’t formulate a comeback.

  “Because—forgive me if I’m wrong—but it seems to me that you might’ve had a communication breakdown somewhere during the course of your six-hour relationship.”

  “Oh, you got me on that one.” He took a plate from the cabinet. “Really funny.”

  “Then why aren’t you smiling?”

  He made a face. “Shouldn’t you be leaving?”

  Grabbing a plate for herself, grinning in his direction, she said, “Probably. But I’m hungry, so I think I’ll eat first.”

  Jace took the platter of egg rolls and a bowl filled with Mongolian beef and set them on the table. He helped himself to the chair in front of the food.

  Emma joined him.

  He asked, “Thought you didn’t like eating here?”

  “I changed my mind.” Especially since the more attached she grew to the twins, the more reluctant she was to leave. She scooped rice onto her plate, followed by samplings of the other dishes. When Jace was still silent, she said, “Sorry about the Vicki dig.”

  “I appreciate the apology, but guess I had it coming. I’ve never been that irresponsible before.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, why were you then?”

  He finished chewing his latest bite. “Wish I had a respectable answer for you, but the truth is that I got caught up in the moment. I’m not proud, but there it is.”

  Keeping her eyes focused on her plate, Emma forked her next bite, willing her flaming cheeks back to normal. Having always been a planner—most especially in the areas of love-making, it had never even occurred to her to engage in spur-of-the-moment sex. She and Rick had actually built sex into their schedules. Saturday night at eleven—assuming they didn’t have other commitments.

  Once, in her freshman year in college, she’d had a little too much to drink at a frat party, and suggested to her date that they go up to his room. He’d seemed all for it until his ex intercepted them. In the morning, part of Emma had been relieved about the aborted encounter.

  But another part…

  The one secretly intrigued by the thought of not always being a Good Girl, had wondered what if? What if she had gone for it? Might it have spun her life into an unexpected direction?

  “What’s got you blushing?”

  “I’m not blushing. Why would you think I was?”

  The grin he aimed her way was devastatingly sexy. Thoroughly befuddling. Brimming with strong, white teeth, framed by whisker-stubbled squared jaws. “The lady doth protest too much.”

  More accurately, The lady hath stopped breathing.

  “My prim and proper nanny is thinking about sex, isn’t she?”

  “Now you’ve really gone too far.” Pushing back her chair, she busied herself—and hid an even deeper reddening of her cheeks—by clearing the table.

  “Probably.” He took an egg roll, biting an inch off the end. “But judging by your hasty exit, I’m right.”

  Chapter Eight

  The second Jace said the words, he regretted them. Moreover, he regretted the awkward silence. Clearing his throat, he manned-up by going over to Emma as she stood in front of the sink, staring out at the inky backyard. With barely a half inch between them, he wanted to touch her, but refrained. “I didn’t mean that. It was a stupid thing to say. Something the guy I used to be would’ve seen as…” Cramming his hands in his pockets, he came up with, “I don’t know, flirtatious—if that’s even something a guy can be. Now, it just made me sound immature. Not like the father of two beautiful girls, but like some Don Juan wannabe who missed the mark.”

  She sort of laughed.

  “You agree?”

  “A little, but…” she turned on the faucet, scrubbing furiously at a wok he’d never even seen.

  “Did you buy that pan?”

  “Uh-huh.” Between all of the baby gear she’d lugged into the house, along with exotic foods and cleaning supplies, he owed her a small fortune.

  “Give me the receipt, and I’ll pay you back.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  From the makeshift nursery erupted a wail.

  “You finish up in here,” she said, “I’ll check on the girls.”

  “What if I want to check on them?” he protested, eyeing the pile of dishes.

  “Tough.” She smiled sweetly, then turned to leave the room. “Cook’s prerogative to call the lesser of two evils.”

  “Bea,” Emma said a minute later, taking the bawling infant from her crib, “sometimes your daddy is exasperating.”

  By faint lamplight, Bea stopped crying long enough to hiccup, bewitching Emma with her gorgeous green eyes.

  “Do you agree?”

  Of course, Emma got no answer, but it was some consolation that at least she had other females in the house with whom she could commiserate.

  While changing Bea’s smelly diaper, Emma found herself vastly relieved that Jace had turned his attention to a topic other than the one that had set her heart racing.

  She’d been on the verge of admitting that Jace needn’t apologize because his assumption had been correct. She hadn’t only been thinking about sex, but more specifically—and a thousand times more irrationally—she’d found herself jealous of Vicki. Not only for having been free enough with her emotions to let loose and be wild, but for coming away from the experience with the ultimate prize.

  Fastening the tabs on Bea’s diaper, Emma whispered to the still-staring infant, “How did your mother ever let you go?”

  “Argggulaaa.”

  Grinning over the baby’s reply, Emma said, “You’re wise beyond your years.” Scooping her up, hugging her close, Emma swallowed hard at the sudden knot in her throat. If Bea and her sister were hers, Emma would move heaven and earth to keep them forever.

  What about their father? Would you keep him, too?

  Her cheeks flamed.

  “Everything all right in here?” Speaking of the devil, Jace blocked the entry, casting shadows where a moment earlier there had been ambient light.

  “Great,” Emma said, cupping the warm and downy crown of Bea’s head. “Finish the dishes?”

  “Just about. I’m on break.” He winked.

  Emma’s traitorous stomach somersaulted.

  “It’s pretty late,” he noted, turning his back on her, heading for the kitchen. “You staying over again tonight?”

  “No.” Bea still in her arms, Emma followed. “Meaning, I should probably hand this angel to you, then be on my way.”

  “You know you’re welcome to stick around, don’t you?”

  She nodded, swallowing the irrational fear that came from giving up the baby—even for the night.
>
  Kissing the top of Bea’s head, Emma held the infant out to him, but he shook his head. “Wait a sec. I noticed when I came in that somewhere in your travels you found a mess of bugs. Let me clean your windshield. It’s tough seeing through guts at night.”

  “I’ve got plenty of that squirty-washing fluid.”

  “I’m sure,” he said, already on his way to the garage, “but let me give it a quick scrubbing first.”

  “Jace,” she protested, trailing after him into the hot and muggy space. The air smelled of gasoline and oil and a little like the chopped grass still clinging to the lawn mower. Even parked, his red Mustang was downright sexy. Meaning, more than ever, she needed to go. “Really, I can—”

  “Woman,” he said, pressing a button that sent the automatic garage door up with a rumble, “how much have you done for me since we’ve met?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t been keeping score.”

  “Well, I have, and I’m losing.” He raised his hand, almost as if planning on patting her shoulder or skimming her hair. But then, as if he’d thought better of it, he crammed both hands into his jeans pockets. “Now, before I have to get all Marine on you, get yourself and that munchkin back inside and out of this heat.”

  Emma did as she’d been told, to escape not the night’s heat, but the internal warmth she felt from Jace’s consideration. No one—least of all, her ex-husband—had ever cared whether her car windows were too dirty to be safe.

  “Your daddy is a pretty sweet guy, Miss Bea.”

  The infant grinned and gurgled.

  Emma rewarded her with a hug and kiss.

  Five minutes later, Jace returned. “You’re cleared for take-off.”

  “Thanks,” she said, attempting a salute. “The insects down here are pretty intense.”

  “No kidding,” he said with a chuckle.

  “Well…” Emma needed to hand him Beatrice, but couldn’t quite make herself do it.

  “Ready for me to take her?” Jace offered, holding out his arms.

  “Um, sure.” During the passing process, Emma ignored excited tingles as she brushed forearms with Jace. His muscles were bronzed and the short hairs golden and sun-kissed.

  “See you tomorrow,” he said, the baby in his arms.

  “Bright and early.” Forcing herself to the front door, she opened it and stepped out onto the porch.

  Jace followed. “You know you can stay.”

  She nodded.

  “Just think of all the gas money you’d save.”

  Not to mention the luxury of never having to leave the girls.

  “I’ll think about it,” she shouted, midway to her car. Trouble was, if she thought too hard, she knew she’d cave. She wouldn’t just stay the night, but move in, as Jace had originally intended. Only how pathetic would that be, to borrow not only a man’s children, but his home? She wasn’t truly that needy, was she? That desperate for solace? For confirmation that she’d done everything for Henry that she possibly could?

  Sadly, climbing into her car, she realized that, yes, she was by the day—the hour—growing more desperate for absolution from the horror Rick had accused her of. Worse yet, the only time she felt sane was when she was with the twins, and most especially, their father.

  “I DON’T KNOW,” Jace said, scratching his head. “It’s an awful lot of money.” Saturday, when he could be watching baseball, Emma had dragged him to a warehouse furniture store out on the highway, claiming the babies’ room had to have an upholstered swivel rocker. The canned music playing over the store’s intercom was giving him a headache—not to mention the high-pressure tactics of the salesman tracking their every move. “And what happens if Vicki shows up? I’m stuck with a girly chair my guys will laugh me out of the Corps for having in my den.”

  “Yes, well, forgive me for pointing this out,” Emma said, her sarcastic tone and know-it-all expression warning of trouble approaching, “but your den is now a nursery. Even if Vicki does show up, don’t you want partial custody? For that matter, maybe even full, seeing as how abandoning your twins—twins she failed to ever even tell you existed—doesn’t exactly open her up for a Mother-of-the-Year nomination.”

  “Let me know how you really feel about Vicki.” He winked.

  She elbowed his ribs, then turned to the salesman, who was trying unsuccessfully to pretend he wasn’t eavesdropping. “What do you have in yellow? Maybe with pink or white flowers?”

  The tallish, thinnish, twentysomething guy consulted a pocket notebook, scribbled something, then said, “Emma, Jace, ladies, let’s move this show to the children’s area.”

  Emma, pushing the stroller, followed the salesman’s lead.

  The guy’s red eyebrows matched his red hair. As an aside, the way he kept calling Emma by name was seriously starting to piss Jace off. Ingratiating sales tactic or not, the guy needed to give them space to make their own decisions.

  An acre of overpriced furniture later, the guy stopped in front of a pink plastic bunk bed. “This is part of our Princess line. Now, if you buy two or more pieces, I can cut you a better deal than the price tags say.”

  “I thought you were showing us a chair?” Emma asked.

  “The chairs for the line are special order. But if—”

  Jace interjected, “Would it be possible for us to just stroll?”

  “Sure,” the guy said, “which areas do you want to visit?”

  “How about when we find a chair we like,” Jace suggested, “we’ll find you.”

  “That would be fine,” he said, “but we’re paid by commission only, so I’m required to stay with you.”

  Jace started to say something else, but Emma cupped her hand around his forearm. “That’s okay. Please just show us everything you have by way of pink or flowers.”

  Ten chairs and no patience later, Emma found the floral cupcake of a chair that she wanted. Trouble was, the price was about five hundred bucks more than Jace wanted to pay.

  Tugging Emma aside, barricading themselves from the salesman with the enormous stroller, he said, “I know this is the one you want, but the cost is—”

  “Let me buy it,” she whispered. “It’s my gift to you and the girls.”

  “It’s too much. And I can buy my own furniture.”

  “Of course you can. I’m just saying that if you let me get this, you can get the paint and curtains and pictures and everything else the room is going to need to become a real nursery.”

  “Last I heard,” he whispered back, adopting her high-and-mighty tone, “all a room needs to qualify as a nursery is a baby. And as luck would have it, we have two.”

  “W-we?” Her voice trembled.

  “You know what I mean. We’re a team, right?”

  “Only if you let me buy the girls this chair. I promise, you can pay for everything else.”

  “Deal,” he relented, if for no other reason than to get out from under the salesman’s watchful eyes. “Just one question.”

  “Shoot.” She raised her chin.

  “Why does a chair mean so much to you? Can’t you just rock the girls in my recliner like you have been doing?”

  “Sure. But it wouldn’t be the same.”

  “As what?”

  Sales Guy said, “If the price is too high, I can come down fifty, but that’s as much as my manager will allow.”

  “We’ll take it,” Emma said.

  Jace dropped the issue for now, but made a mental note to later get to the bottom of why, all of the sudden, his daughters’ nanny was consumed by a chair.

  “THIS IS a momentous occasion,” Jace cracked from where he stood on the front porch, finishing off a protein bar. Three days had passed since their shopping trip, and while it seemed to him that Emma was slowly but steadily loosening up around him, this was still a big deal. “You’re actually three minutes late.”

  “I’m sorry. Traffic was backed up on Birch, and then—”

  “Hey, don’t sweat it. I’m teasing. Your lateness is
actually a little exciting.”

  “Exciting?” Even rolling her eyes, she looked pretty in the soft morning sun. The neighbor had his sprinkler running, heightening the sweet scent of grass glistening with dew.

  Jace liked the way Em always wore sundresses and fancy sandals. Most women he knew were heavy on the shorts, T-shirts and flip-flops. Em was always a little formal. “How many combat missions have you fought? Lives have you witnessed being saved or lost? Yet me showing up late for work is significant?”

  Jace couldn’t help but grin. “Can I help it if discovering you’re not perfect gives me hope that I might one day attain your parenting glory?”

  Nudging him out of her way, she barreled past. “You’re a mess.”

  “That would be a recovering mess, thank you very much.” Following her, he caught a whiff of floral shampoo.

  What he wouldn’t have done to pull her back, stealing just a moment to bury his face in her hair, losing himself in her spell. Since the very idea was nuts, he cleared his throat, asking, “You and the girls doing anything special today?”

  The phone rang.

  “Hold that thought,” he said, jogging into the kitchen. Picking up, he said into the receiver, “Hello?”

  Seconds passed.

  “Hello? Dammit, I hear you breathing. Hello?” He slammed down the phone. “If this prank calling doesn’t stop, I’m calling the cops. Has this ever happened to you?”

  “A couple of times, but there’s never been anyone on the line.”

  “Next time it happens, write it down. I want every call documented.”

  “Yes, sir.” She gave him a sassy salute.

  He glared. “I’m serious. With you and the babies’ safety to consider, I can’t be—”

  “Would you listen to yourself? I hardly think there’s some crazed stalker on the line. Probably more like a bored teen or confused grandmother who keeps dialing the wrong number.”

  Jace’s only reply was a manly grunt.

  “Since you asked—hint, hint on changing the subject. No, the girls and I aren’t doing anything particularly special today. Just the usual. A walk in the park. Trip to the grocery store—which reminds me, do you need anything? I’m picking up the basics, but do you still have plenty of those ice-cream bars you like?”