Maybe she didn’t realize how much of his time as a sharpshooter was spent waiting. He had patience, and the environment in her home was much nicer than what he was used to when watching a target.
“I’ll check around outside first.” The robbery at the store was probably random, but it didn’t hurt to be careful. “Are the doors and windows locked?”
“Should be,” she answered and reached in a cabinet for a bowl, turning her back on him.
Being with her in her home was surreal. Before she ended their engagement, they’d shared an apartment—shared everything, he’d thought. Except what she’d been feeling. She’d kept that hidden until the end…or maybe he’d just missed the signs of her unhappiness.
With another look at Austin, now sitting in a high chair and gobbling Goldfish, Zach slipped outside to walk the perimeter of the fenced yard. He wished he knew what to say to his son, but he had no clue how to begin interacting with him.
So he did what he was trained to do. He checked a rear gate before circling to the front, automatically evaluating the home’s weak points. Where could an assailant easily enter? The house was well built, but it had too many windows exposing it to risks.
When he was done, he returned inside and went to the living room. Overhead, he could hear splashing and voices. How many bath times had he missed—had she denied him? He’d been out of the country for months, until after the boy’s birth, but he could have been there before tonight. Could have seen a picture of Austin at least.
He prowled the room. Framed photographs were on the mantel and bookshelves. Most were of Austin. None were of him and Carolyn. Had she planned to conceal from the boy who his father was? Looked like it from the pictures. But they proved the boy’s heritage beyond a shadow of a doubt. With his blue eyes and dark hair, Austin looked just like Zach and his brothers had at that age. He recalled a faded snapshot he’d taken with him to the Admiral’s house that showed the three of them as little kids seated under a spindly Christmas tree. Austin would have fit right in.
Upstairs, footsteps moved into a back room, probably Austin’s bedroom. Zach should know that, know where his son slept at night, but she hadn’t let him. By the time Carolyn came down the stairs, his anger simmered just below the surface.
She’d changed into snug-fitting jeans and a flowy purple top. He couldn’t help noticing that her curvy figure was enhanced by having had a baby. Somehow, his attraction to her irritated him even further.
“Is he mine?” he asked before she could say anything.
Her eyes flashed. “I think you know the answer.”
“So he is.” He’d known it since he saw Austin at the jewelry store, but it still hit him hard, and the dam inside him broke. Words poured out, but he didn’t shout. “God, Carolyn, did you hate me so much that you didn’t want to tell me? What were you going to do, pretend he didn’t have a father? Erase me from his life?”
“I never hated you,” she hissed, then glanced up the stairs as if she was afraid Austin might have heard.
“You did,” he countered.
“I hated what you did. I hated that you were gone so much.” She spoke quietly but vehemently. “I never hated you. Even when I should have.”
“If that’s true, you would have told me about him.” He scrubbed his hand over his face in frustration. “Come on, Carolyn, you’re one of the few people in the world who knows the truth about my parents. Do you think I wouldn’t want to be here for my own kid after what I went through? After what you went through?” He and Carolyn had both been abandoned by a parent. They had that very sorry fact in common.
She flinched at his words, but her chin was up, and she pressed her lips together, making her dimples pop out. “Use your common sense, Zach. Would I let a child feel abandoned by either parent? I can’t believe you’d think that of me.”
“Then why didn’t I know about him?” He was struggling to understand the situation and getting nowhere.
“Are you really going to claim that none of my messages reached you? Really?” she shot at him as she dropped onto the couch’s center cushion.
He took a breath, trying to get his raging emotions under control. She’d had an awful day, too. He should be more sympathetic since she’d been held hostage just hours earlier. From what he understood from the cops on the scene, Carolyn had saved the day, catching the criminal and probably saving lives. She’d always been smart and tough, qualities he’d loved about her. He sat on a wing chair facing her and tried to control his tone. “What messages?”
“The twenty I sent,” she stated, the pitch of her voice rising. “I wrote letters, I called and texted, and when I got no response, I went through naval channels to contact you. I never heard a word in reply. Nothing even acknowledging that you knew I was pregnant.”
The months when she would have been pregnant, he was on a black ops mission with his unit. No message could have gotten through. “And after he was born?”
“I tried to contact you again to let you know he was healthy. After that, I gave up.” She looked frustrated and defeated.
“When’s his birthday?” He had a son whose birth and first birthday he’d missed.
“June fourth. He was born at three in the morning, if you want to know.”
He’d still been out of the country at the time of the birth. The mission had stretched longer than anticipated, and he hadn’t returned to the States until nearly Christmas, months after Austin entered the world. But Zach had been stateside since before leaving the Navy earlier in the summer. He could have met his son long before today if she had reached him.
“I never got any of those messages, Carolyn. The mission I was on…” He trailed off when he saw the pain on her face. It was exactly that type of mission that had caused her to end their engagement. “We had no contact with anyone, including other military units or the usual channels of communication.” He wanted to apologize, but he couldn’t be sorry for having done his job and done it well.
Silence fell between them as he watched her. Her brown eyes, large and expressive, were focused on him as if trying to determine if he was telling the truth.
“Not one message got through to you? Not one?” She sounded incredulous.
“If I’d known we had a baby, I’d have been here for him and you. You’ve got to believe that about me.” He hoped she did, but her body language wasn’t giving anything away. He was a master at reading people, predicting their next move, but he had no idea about hers in this instance.
“Then you have to believe that I tried to contact the father of my child. When you didn’t reply, I wasn’t going to beg you to be part of his life. That would only lead to disappointment for Austin. I couldn’t put a child through that.”
“I didn’t know, Carolyn. I swear. My unit was completely cut off from any contact. I know you don’t want to hear about that, but it’s the truth.”
She looked down at her hands, one clasped in the other. She no longer wore the engagement ring he’d given her, but he was as connected to her as any man is to a woman. They shared a child. That had to count for something.
She huffed out a sigh. “I believe you.”
His racing heart slowed only slightly. Her acceptance of that fact was just the beginning. He wanted to know his son, be part of his life. “Okay, so…where do we go from here, since I’m out of the service and home now?”
She gave him a sharp glance, meeting his eyes for a moment before looking away. Had she not expected him to want contact with his son, or was she unwilling to share the boy?
“I think it’s best if we take it slow. You can come over and spend time with him. Get to know him. He’s a great kid, Zach.”
“He’d have to be, with us as his parents.” He got a ghost of a smile in response, making him remember the good things between them.
“You can’t tell him you’re his daddy, though, not yet,” she warned. “I have to see you’re in this for the long haul. If you give me any reason to doubt your commit
ment to him, you’re out. I won’t let him be hurt.”
That should have angered him, but it didn’t. Now that he knew about Austin, he’d make his son the center of his universe. He wanted to rush upstairs and see him again, but she probably wouldn’t let him. Instead, he looked at a picture on the coffee table from what must have been Austin’s first birthday. The boy sat in a high chair and smashed a little cake with his fist, smiling gleefully. Zach vowed to never miss another celebration or holiday with his son.
“Will you be all right for the night?” he asked, wanting to care for Austin and her but knowing she wouldn’t want his protection.
“We’ll be fine,” she assured him, but she was pale—which wasn’t a surprise considering the day she’d had.
“I could stick around,” he suggested. He saw her back stiffen.
“Not necessary.” Her tone was clipped. “I have a security system. You can take my car back to the store. Charlotte or my mom will pick us up in the morning.”
“I don’t want to leave you without a vehicle.” His head filled with scenario after scenario in which she’d need a car in the night. What if she had to escape the house quickly or Austin became ill and had to go to the emergency room? “Can I come back tomorrow?” He hated asking permission to visit his own son, but he was at Carolyn’s mercy when it came to that.
“That’s fine. I’ll text you and let you know when we’re home.” She stood as she answered, signaling it was time for him to leave.
“I’ll do that.” At the door, he wanted to hold her, have some contact with the woman he’d loved and with whom he had a child, but she kept her arms crossed over her chest as if to ward him off. “Good night.”
Outside, the heat of the day had passed, but Zach was still riled up inside. As he walked to the corner, he called a buddy for a ride back to the store to retrieve his car. An hour later, Zach pulled up across the street and a little ways down at a spot that gave him a perfect vantage point of Carolyn’s house.
Whether she liked it or not, he protected his own, which meant his son and his son’s mother. He settled in for the night. He’d never struggled to keep alert while on a mission. That night, his mind churned with thoughts, making it easy to keep his eyes open and his focus sharp. Periodically, he slipped between her property and the neighbors’ to check the back of her house. It remained peaceful.
At dawn, he drove home to grab a few hours of sleep before work.
4
Carolyn hung up after a thirty-minute conversation with her insurance company. A representative had come the previous evening while Charlotte was at the store, but a million questions remained to be asked about the robber, the damage, and when All That Sparkles could reopen.
“Everything okay?” her mother asked from the office doorway. She and Charlotte had beaten Carolyn to the store that morning. They’d been helpful, of course, but she was tired of their concern. It was smothering her.
“As okay as it’s going to get today,” Carolyn responded.
“You must have been terrified.” Her mother stepped closer. “In all the years I owned this store, we were never robbed. I can’t believe this happened.”
“Me either.” And the timing couldn’t be worse. She’d taken out a new loan and refinanced an existing one to cover the remodeling costs. Insurance would pay for the damages, but she was losing money and business with every day the store was closed.
On top of getting the front of the store cleaned up enough to reopen, police tape still stretched across her back door. She didn’t want to think about what had happened in the mantrap. She was leaving Charlotte to deal with having that piece of equipment checked out and recertified. It had saved her life. But she didn’t want to look at it.
“Maybe you should take some time off,” her mother suggested gently.
“Not necessary. I’ll be okay.” The truth was she’d been up most of the night, reliving the events of the day—from her fear the robber would harm Austin to Zach’s sudden reappearance in her life.
“Did you see this?” Charlotte came into the office, her phone clutched in her hand. “I was scrolling through review sites. I’m obsessed with looking at them from that marketing and presentation class I took last fall—but anyway, look.”
Carolyn took the phone and held it so Faith could see it, too. A review site on which they’d had a five-star rating for the past two years was suddenly down to two stars, with some scathing comments: “got ripped off here,” “not real diamonds,” “crappy service.”
“What the heck?” Carolyn muttered. As if her life wasn’t complicated enough. “It’s like the ones I saw on the Jewel Rater last week. All lousy and not true. I wonder…” She let the word dangle as her mind processed her thoughts.
“What?” Faith asked, studying her.
“Does it feel like someone could be sabotaging us? Bad reviews? An armed robber?” Her mind returned to the things the robber kept saying about how this wasn’t part of the plan. Did someone have a plan to damage All That Sparkles? If so, they couldn’t have launched it at a worse time.
“Don’t forget about the canceled orders,” Charlotte added, getting onboard with the idea.
“Those could be connected, too.” Three shipments had been mysteriously canceled or delayed in the past month, and as a result they’d been unable to fulfill orders on time. They’d compensated the customers, who’d been understanding, but it was bad for business. Carolyn had a sinking feeling in her stomach…but why would someone want to do this to them? They competed with the store down the street, which was currently trying to buy them out, but the relationship between the businesses had never been malicious. “If you two can handle things here, I’m going to the police station. I want to run the idea past them.”
“Do that. And then go home. You need some time off.” Her mother pulled Carolyn’s purse from the drawer where she kept it and handed it to her. “Call me if you need anything.”
“I will,” she promised.
“Hey.” Charlotte caught her before she could leave the office. “What about Zach?”
Her mother’s eyes widened. She had loved Zach. “Zach’s home?”
Carolyn hadn’t mentioned it because she couldn’t explain how she felt about seeing him again. She needed time to process his return and what it would mean for her life. “He was here yesterday as part of the response team.”
“Austin?” Faith didn’t have to form the full question.
Carolyn sighed. “Zach didn’t know he had a son until yesterday.” Faith and Charlotte had been there for her throughout her pregnancy, the birth, and the first year of Austin’s life. They had been as upset and disappointed as she had when it appeared that Zach was ignoring her attempts to communicate with him.
“Oh, baby,” her mother said, giving her a hug. “You did have a tough day. Do you want me to come with you to talk to the police?”
“No, I can do it,” she insisted.
Half an hour later at the police station, Carolyn wondered if she was making any sense. She’d laid out the unusual occurrences of the past month: the bad reviews, the delivery problems, and an armed robbery. Detective Novak, who faced her, seemed unimpressed.
“Every business goes through ups and downs,” he said. “This might all turn out to be a coincidence.”
“It seems like more than a coincidence to me,” she argued.
“The perpetrator yesterday has a long record, from purse snatching to drug use. I’ll admit that armed robbery was a bit of stretch for him, but you never know when these guys are going to escalate their crimes.”
“What about what he said, that this wasn’t part of the plan?”
“He probably had a simple idea in his head. Walk in, wave the gun around, grab some jewelry, and run. Anything outside that he might have seen as violating his plan. I’ll note it in the report, but I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that it means anything.”
Detective Novak hadn’t referred to her as little lady, but that was
the sort of treatment she felt she was getting. He didn’t take her seriously. But if someone was trying to malign her business, that was deadly serious to her.
“I think it does mean something,” she said, determination filling her. “I’ll start my own investigation if I need to.”
That got the detective’s attention. “I have to ask you not to do that.” Novak waved his hands as if warding off the idea. “On the off chance you’re right, you could be walking into a dangerous situation.”
Carolyn made no promises. She thanked him for his time and headed to pick up Austin at Nina’s house on her way home. She’d called her pediatrician earlier and had an appointment the following day just to be sure Austin was fine after what he’d gone through.
He sure seemed fine, chatting away in his own lingo as she picked him up and took him home. After giving him a quick snack, she put him down for an afternoon nap and went to the alcove in her kitchen where she sometimes worked from home. She’d just checked in with her mom and Charlotte at the store when she heard a knock on the front door. She dashed to answer it, not wanting the noise to wake Austin. Without looking to see who it was, she whipped open the door.
“Hi.” Zach stood on her front porch with an adorable stuffed dog in his hand. “Is it okay if I visit Austin?”
“He’s napping…but you can come in and wait for him to get up,” she offered. She could have sent Zach away with the ready and true excuse that their son was asleep, but the truth was, she didn’t want to. And the fact that he’d thought to bring Austin a gift warmed her heart.
“Thanks. I appreciate that.” He stepped inside, filling the space as he always had. He was tall and fit, lean and handsome in jeans and a black T-shirt. Underneath, she knew, he was ripped with muscle. How she’d enjoyed running her hands over him. Her fingers tingled with the remembered sensation. She should have sent him away, she realized too late. The temptation to pick up where they had left off hit her. They’d been good together during the good times, but it had been far from perfect. His job got in the way. Carolyn didn’t know how other wives and girlfriends of the SEALs handled it when their men were gone for months with no word from them, never knowing if they were dead or alive. It had been too much for her.
The SEAL’s Surprise Son: The Admiral’s SEALs Book One Page 3
