Jake (In the Company of Snipers Book 16)

by Irish Winters

  “A princess and a prince!” she belted out. That must be Gabe Cartwright’s little one. With those mahogany curls, she looked just like him.

  A red-haired boy of maybe three frowned at Suzette, his lips pursed. “Doesn’t always hafta be a prince. My Daddy loves my Mommy, and he’s no prince. He’s just a regular dad.”

  The adults in the room chuckled while Lacy lost track of whose child was whose, until Tess Hart muttered, “You tell ’em Charlie.” Okay. Charlie belongs to Lee and Tess Hart. God help me remember all these faces and names.

  “But what does it truly take?” Zack asked as his fist thumped his chest. “Down deep. What does it really take for a man and woman to be happy together?”

  Lacy smiled. He’d already given the answer away. These little ones just had to think for a moment.

  Damned if Jake didn’t unfold his long legs and stand to attention beside her. “I know what it takes,” he said, his back stiff and his eyes on Zack. All those little faces turned expectantly upward to Jake.

  “What are you doing?” Lacy asked. “Sit down. This story’s for the little—”

  “True love takes true love,” Jake said loudly and proudly, and, oh, my gosh. He turned and dropped to one knee. Lacy blinked and blinked again. Someone giggled, and she was pretty sure it wasn’t her. “Jake Weylin?” she asked, her heart fluttering as if a million butterflies had just taken wing inside its chambers.

  “Lacy Wright,” he said as he tugged something out of his back pocket. “Will you marry me?” he asked, not a bit of doubt in his strong, masculine voice.

  Oh, wow. Oh, Wow. A… a diamond ring.

  “M-m-me?” she asked, stuttering enough for the both of them. Oddly, she couldn’t come up woth any moisture in her throat when she needed it most, but her eyes had plenty.

  “Yes, you, you, you,” he said as he nodded. “You’re my heart and soul, Lacy. I want you to be the rest of my life, too.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked, thinking of all those paintings in her closet.

  It seemed the room held its breath. Not Jake. “Never been surer,” he said without missing a beat.

  “Yes,” she managed before she choked on the emotions in her heart. “Oh, yes, Jake Weylin. I’ll marry you.”

  Without a single tremor, he placed the ring on her left ring finger. It fit. Perfectly.

  A sweet “Awww…” came from the little girls, a few of the older girls, too.

  “See, what’d I tell you?” cute little Charlie stage-whispered. “It just takes a smart man and a smarter woman to fall in love.”

  Lacy sputtered at that. Oh, the stories Charlie’s mom must have told him.

  “You may kiss your future bride,” Zack intoned like a minister.

  “Yes, I may,” Jake growled as he leaned in and blessed Lacy with a moist, warm, but chaste, kiss.

  She couldn’t let him go after that, just pressed her forehead to his. His lips pressed another kiss to her nose. “Like the man said, it just takes a man and a smarter woman.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The goodbyes took longer than the hellos, but when it came time to leave Zack and Mei’s, Jake was on top of the world. His lady said yes! He was walking on air. He couldn’t feel the cold snap in the evening air, and the accumulated snow on Lacy’s brand new Toyota, the one he’d bought with his bonus for joining The TEAM, didn’t bother him one bit.

  He looked up at the leaden overcast sky, which blanketed most of the eastern seaboard, and his heart lifted to heaven with thanks for second chances. All the operatic voices in his hard head had gone silent. Even sweet Fantine hadn’t spoken a word since the day he’d nearly died on the edge of the Potomac. What more could a man ask for?

  “Do you want me to drive?”

  Jake looked down at the woman in his arms, for the first time seeing his reflection in her green eyes. Lacy was the same as him. They’d endured the same kinds of inner battles; she just hadn’t buried her heart so deep that it couldn’t breathe. He got it now, the whole two becoming one thing between a man and his wife. It made its two separate parts better and stronger. Braver.

  “Tonight, yes, but tomorrow, I’m getting my license back. You don’t need to be driving me everywhere I’m supposed to go.”

  “Like to work? I don’t mind.”

  “Yes. Like to work.” He winked and opened the driver’s side door for her. “Alexandria isn’t exactly on the way to the Good Samaritan. Speaking of which, when will it re-open?”

  Lacy took her place behind the steering wheel. “Possibly the end of January. One of the doctors over at Holy Cross is taking over until there’s a permanent replacement for Marlee, and quite a few nurses in the area volunteered to keep it running. We don’t always need a physician on staff, but sometimes...” She took a deep breath. “Did I tell you how much I love this new car smell?”

  Jake grinned as he ran around the car and let himself in. “It was nice to be able to shop for you for a change. Where do you want to get married?”

  She cast a look to the loving home at her left. “At Zack’s.”

  That put a grin on Jake’s face. “Good idea. Do you want me to ask him or would you rather?”

  “I think we should both ask him and Mei, but not tonight. They’ve got their hands full with… how many kids are sleeping over?”

  “A hundred?”

  A chuckle bubbled out of her throat. “It seemed like a hundred, didn’t it? So, umm, kids. We’ve never talked about that. How many do you see us having? None? Two? Six, like Libby and Mark are trying for?”

  That deserved an eye roll. What was Mark thinking? “Not six,” Jake replied firmly, his fingertips tapping a beat on his knees. That was half a dozen and too close to a hundred.

  Despite having had a good day at his buddy’s home, he was smart enough to know he still needed help. He hadn’t broached the idea of counseling with Lacy yet, but Harley knew a good group near Mount Vernon that he’d used back when he was struggling with PTSD. Jake wanted to check them out. Drugs and anti-depressants with all their side effects were a definite no-go, but the Malinois pup Harley had also offered up might be the perfect solution. The little guy was pure black, the offspring of proven service dogs, and sharp as a blade.

  Hmmm. Blade. That’d be a good name. “Can I get a dog?” blurted out of his big mouth before he gave it license to speak.

  “So you’d rather have a dog than kids?” There was something different about Lacy tonight.

  “Oh no, I just...” His fingers stabbed through his hair as Lacy started the car, maneuvered out of their parking place, and began the drive back to Anacostia. “We could start with one kid and go from there,” he suggested.

  That got him a funny giggle out of his sexy driver. “That’s the way it usually starts, Jake. One egg. One sperm. One infant that looks like either you or me. It was funny that every time I turned around today, you had a little one sitting on your lap. Song seemed to think you were her personal chair, and who was that little boy sitting on your shoulders when I was helping Mei in the kitchen?”

  Oh, him. “That was Taylor and Gracie’s little guy, umm, Peter, I think his name is.”

  “He looked mighty comfortable.” Lacy gave Jake a sideways glance. Those pretty green eyes were up to something, but he still hadn’t a clue. “You’re good with kids, I can tell. You seemed to attract them like magnets.”

  And it was time to change the subject. “So what’s the secret you couldn’t tell me at Zack’s?”

  Streetlights on the bridge across the Potomac cast a muted yellow glow through the windshield. “You’ll see.”

  “You do know I’m going to molest you in all the best ways tonight, don’t you?” he teased, his fingers itching to unravel her.

  “That’s the plan.”

  “So this is the surprise?” Jake asked, his eyes wide at the latest painting in Lacy’s hands. He’d made himself comfortable on the couch, his boots off, and his long legs taking up most of the cushions, his st
ocking feet crossed at the ankles. Lacy stood at her open bedroom door, but he sounded disappointed.

  She peered around the canvas, canting the painting from side to side, “What did you think I meant?” Her heart thumped a little faster than normal. “Don’t you like it?” Look closer, Jake. Come on. You can do it.

  “It’s different than the others. It’s not... bloody.” Cocking his head to a sharp right angle, he looked totally flummoxed, his eyes narrowed, and those adorable—yes, adorable—brows pinched together.

  “I know, right?” It was hard not to laugh out loud. This guy didn’t get hints very well. “But this right here is Marlee. She loved the sunlight streaming through our windows every morning, so we agreed. I painted sunflowers and shadows, also known as cadmium yellow and black.”

  “You really do talk to them, don’t you?”

  Her head bobbed. “I knew her longer than everyone else I’ve painted, so yes. This one was easy and now...” Lacy released a sigh and the worry she’d been holding onto along with it. There wasn’t anything she could do at this point. Either Jake would fall in love with it or not. That would be up to him. Now… if he’d only notice the real surprise hidden between her fingertips and the canvas frame. She tilted the picture one more time and asked, “Can you see what I’ve hidden right in front of you?”

  That brought him up on his knees and like a lithe jungle cat, he crawled to her end of the couch, his shoulder blades jutting under his shirt, and she nearly set the canvas aside and jumped his bones right then. That all male body was headed her way and he’d tripped every early warning indicator in hers.

  His brows furrowed. His lips pinched. Oh, this guy! How could he not see what she wanted him to see? “Look closer,” she suggested, shifting to the left so the right side of the canvas frame was directly in his line of sight.

  But—argh! His nose followed her painting, his laser sharp eyes center stage and not on her fingertips at the edge. “See what?” he asked, his nose wrinkled now as he scrutinized the starburst design closer. “Did you paint a puzzle I’m not seeing, an image hidden in the shadows? Or am I just that—”

  “You’re not stupid, Jake.” She cut him off before he could voice that false conclusion. Hyper-vigilance did not equate to compromised intellect, and he needed to stop cutting himself down. But you are a little dense sometimes…

  Finally! Jake plucked the real surprise out from under her fingertips. “What’s this?”

  Please be happy. Please don’t be mad.

  The sharp eyes of a sniper landed on her, and Lacy froze. “A pee stick? Are we pregnant?”

  A tsunami of relief coursed through her at the word he’d chosen. We. Not you. She set the canvas aside, and jumped into his arms. “We are,” she announced, her body thrumming at the momentous news she’d just revealed. “Isn’t that great?”

  “No.” Jake’s hands were saying all the right things. He held her close, but his mouth was another story. “I would like to have exercised a little more forethought. That’s a big decision and…” His fingers combed over his head, his signature tell when he was nervous or stressed. “We’re pregnant?”

  Her mouth fell open and her lips went dry. “You don’t want it?”

  “No,” he said again, his eyes wide and his chest heaving. He shook his head and her world fell out from under her.

  Lacy twisted away from him and shoved to her feet. How could he be the man of her dreams one moment and such an ass the next?

  “I should have taken better care…” he murmured, his voice as distant as his gaze, “of you. I should’ve thought to use protection instead of going down on you like some animal. You deserved... God, Lacy, you deserve better.”

  “Better than what? This baby?” she snapped, her Irish up. “Better than the man I love in my bed every night with me? Better than the father of my child in my—in our lives?” The temperature in her dinky apartment soared, and suddenly she was sweating and fed up with the entire male gender.

  “Lacy, stop!” he barked.

  She stopped all right, but her heart was broken, and now, she was drenched in sweat, and tears, damn him. This was Jake’s fault. He’d done this to her. No one respected a female Marine who bawled her eyes out when the going got tough. She crossed her arms over her tender breasts and told Jake in no uncertain terms, “I’m keeping it.”

  He launched to his feet and she found herself pressed against a solid male chest that still smelled like the home she craved, damn him. “Of course we’re keeping it,” he growled. “I just wished I’d put your needs before mine instead of thinking only of myself when we made it, ah, him. Or her. Guess it could be a girl.”

  That sounded different than what she’d thought she’d heard a moment ago. Lacy eased back to peer up at Jake, her fingertips fluttering at his collarbones. “Zack knew when he ran into me at Starbucks. He said I glowed like his wife did when she was pregnant.”

  The bug-eyed comical look wrinkling Jake’s face made her smile. “That soon? But we’d only made love—”

  “Once. I know. I guess you’re really good at doing what you did to me,” she offered slyly. “So you’re not mad about the baby?”

  His entire face wrinkled then. His head shook. “Oh, hell no. It’s our baby, Lacy. Yours and mine. Why would I be mad about that?” He scooped her off her feet and into her—ahem, their bedroom they went. Jake set her down gently, her back at her headboard and knelt at her side. “Our baby,” he murmured, his tone filled with wonder this time. “I like the sound of that.”

  And I’m falling in love with you all over again. Warmth blossomed in Lacy’s chest as his skillful fingers slid under her shirt to her bare tummy. Palming the flatness of it with his big rough hand, the biggest smile broke over his face like the sunrise on Christmas morning. “I’m a father,” he told her in a reverent hush. “What do you want? A boy or a girl?”

  Lacy answered him true. “You, Jake. I want you.”

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  And baby, I want you. Jake fell into Lacy’s arms and straight into love. A baby! They were having a baby, and why that made him hard as a spike, he didn’t quite understand. Jake only knew he had to get her out of her pants, so he could sink into the luscious body trembling beneath his fingertips.

  The man in him peeled her clothes off with incredible speed, while the lover in him anointed her lips and mouth, her chin and her cheeks with kisses he couldn’t hold back. She’s mine, he thought. All mine.

  As much as they’d already made love, knowing that it was his seed growing in her belly juiced him up like nothing else. He couldn’t kiss his wife-to-be hard enough or deep enough. Certainly not long enough.

  After all they’d been through on their different paths, after all they’d suffered, they were finally safe and sound in each other’s arms. Knowing he was where he was meant to be, pumped a man up was what it did. Jake needed her scent all over him and his all over her—now—before he went up in flames.

  His fingers and hands knew what to do, and before long, her hips started bucking, and she started moaning and… “God, I love the sounds you make, Lacy.”

  A needy whine lifted from her throat. “Then you know what I want.”

  Oh, yes, he did. Leaning over her like a grunt pounding out pushups for a drill sergeant, he eased inside her slick fiery core, and like a match to a trail of gasoline, they went up in flames together. Sex with Lacy was as close to heaven as he’d ever been, and with her long legs wrapped around him and her heels digging into his ass—paradise beckoned just a throbbing heartbeat away.

  He gave all and she returned the favor, meeting him every inch and thrust of the way until... her fingernails pierced his shoulder muscles. That sweet strong feminine muscle inside her gripped him like a determined hand in a glove and she…

  “Come for me, Lacy,” he whispered. “Come all over me.”

  She screamed as she obeyed, “Jake! Jake!”

  A man loved to hear his name on his woman’s lips, especially
when she was sweaty and gripped with passion. That was all it took to tip him over the edge into breath-stealing sweet surrender. Lacy had never screamed before. What the neighbors must think, but who cares?

  Jake came to rest with his heart pounding in his throat and his face in the crook of her neck, the scent of her sexy hair in his nose. This was the fragrance of paradise to a man used to waking up in a cold abandoned basement surrounded by all the rank odors of the homeless and damp concrete left too long in the dark.

  “Stay here. I’ll be right back.” He said as he rolled off his woman and made a mad dash to the bathroom for a warm cloth to clean her beautiful self. Back in their bedroom, he eased her knees apart and took special care wiping the folds where a baby would soon make its entrance into the world. “This is the best Christmas present ever,” he whispered. “In nine months, we’re going to be parents.”

  “And then we’ll start using birth control,” she whispered, her eyes big and black, her attention one hundred percent on him.

  “But what if we want more?”

  Up on her elbows now, and still spread like a feast before him, she asked, “Do you want more children, Jake? Would you like a big family?”

  “Yeah, I do.” He nodded, extraordinarily emotional for the tiny life his war-hardened body had helped create. What a miracle it was that a man like him had enough of the right stuff left in him to still do good. To be good. “This little girl or boy we’re bringing into the world is our Christmas gift to each other, Lacy. Think about it. Why wouldn’t we want more?”

  Something shimmered in her pretty green eyes. “I know he’ll be smart like you.”

  It was all Jake could do to not cry with Lacy. He pulled her against his chest, her head tucked under his chin so she couldn’t see what a blubbering mess he was about to turn into. Smart was the last thing he was, but teachable? Willing to learn? Eager to try again? Oh, hell yeah. Better yet, he was ready to live. “Thank you for painting me,” he told the woman he loved with his whole heart and soul.

  “I painted us,” she whispered, and Jake had to agree. It was true. It had taken years to get here, but USMC Sergeant Jake Weylin was finally—home.