by Sara Arden
If she did see Sean, if she was able to tell him, he’d demand to be part of everything even if it wasn’t what he wanted.
He’d have the right to an opinion on her life because it would affect his child. They’d be tied together forever.
And if she wasn’t pregnant, this realization about home and family would be the loneliest, saddest place she could go inside her own head.
So she guessed it didn’t matter what the test said.
Her life had already changed, as had who she was inside.
She’d never been such a twisted-up mess of hope and fear.
Kentucky’s thoughts were on a loop as they drove to the store. As they paid for the tests. They seemed to have more weight than just two little paper boxes should in a small plastic bag. As she carried them out of the store, it was like hauling bricks.
Rachel stopped at the grocery store and bought some ice cream. She just seemed to know that Kentucky would need it no matter what the test told them.
She took both tests in rapid succession and placed them on the sink counter to wait.
They were both almost instantly positive.
Kentucky waited, afraid to breathe, afraid to hope, afraid to experience any feeling until she knew unequivocally what the results were.
She waited three minutes. She waited ten minutes.
They were both still positive.
She was pregnant with Sean’s child.
The terrified feeling didn’t go away and she started crying. Not just watery eyes or a few tears slipping down her cheeks, but big ugly sobs.
Rachel knocked on the door softly. “Kentucky, honey…are you all right?”
“No. Not at all.”
Rachel pushed the door open gently and, seeing the positive tests, pulled Kentucky into her arms.
“It’s all going to be okay. I promise you.” Rachel stroked her hair.
Kentucky let herself be comforted. “What am I going to do?”
“What do you want to do?”
Kentucky dared whisper her secret desire aloud. Dared to fling it out in the universe and own it. “I want to have a family. I want to be a mother.”
“Then that’s what you’ll do, my dearest.” Rachel hugged her tight. “On the plus side, this gives us an edge when it comes to getting information about Sean. We’ll be able to talk to his commanding officer and while we won’t get any classified information, they’ll be able to tell us a little more. Or get a message to him.”
“I’m terrified to tell him,” Kentucky confessed.
“Why? Do you think he’s going to be an asshole?”
“No, I know he won’t be. I know he’ll do what he thinks is the right thing.”
“I understand. You want to be wanted for you, not for the baby you made together.”
Kentucky nodded. “And it’s more than that. He doesn’t want any commitments tying him down and with his job, I don’t blame him. I wouldn’t want to live that way.”
“What do you mean?”
“Never knowing when he’s coming back, if he’s coming back? Living like this, like we are now, in the shadow of doubt. We don’t know if he’s alive, dead or just what’s going on. But I’d never ask him to give up part of himself.”
“You wouldn’t have to ask.”
“I know.” Kentucky shook her head. “Which is why there’s this part of me that just doesn’t want to tell him.”
“That’s not fair, honey. I know this is scary, but he deserves to know. Can you imagine how that would feel to him that you didn’t trust him enough to share this with him? Or even your baby when she is old enough to ask? You’ve never been a liar.”
“No, I haven’t. I wouldn’t do that. It’s just all of these feelings are so intense.”
“If it’s okay with you, I’m going to tell Eric so he can try again to get some answers.”
“Yeah, I’m going to have to if I want to talk to Sean. Tell him.” Kentucky bit her lip. “I hope he’s okay.”
“I bet he’s fine. We’d know if he wasn’t.”
That was the problem. Kentucky did know. He wasn’t fine.
12
SEAN DRYDEN HAD managed to get his team to safety, and for that, he was grateful.
What he wasn’t so grateful for was that it had been at his own expense. He knew that as a hero—and all spec ops operatives were supposed to be heroes—he was just supposed to be thankful that his death could serve the greater good.
He was supposed to be willing to lay down his life in the execution of his mission.
But he wasn’t. He didn’t want to die. He wasn’t ready.
Trading his life for that of his team was supposed to be an honor, but he’d admit that he only felt as if he’d gotten screwed.
He was glad they were safe and he wouldn’t wish for any of them to be in his place, but his place sucked at the moment.
He’d experienced pain like he’d never imagined before this moment. The horror wasn’t just in the pain; it was in the knowledge of the things that this man, this specialist in torture, was doing to his body. The irrevocable damage that made him wonder if he did survive, if he’d even want to.
A spec ops pilot was no good without his hands.
Hell, as a man, he felt as though he had nothing to offer the world. There was no place for him, nothing he could contribute. He’d be a taker, needing a full-time nurse.
Sean looked down at his hands, seeing the mangled mess the guy had made with the hammer. He didn’t know how reconstruction could even be possible.
If he made it out of this sweltering shit hole. He didn’t know how long he’d been there, but having a better idea of where was more important.
He knew he wasn’t far from a secret CIA facility that could get him home; he just had to escape this fuck and navigate the jungle—without using his hands.
A task that seemed nigh on impossible.
He’d lost feeling in his shoulders some time ago, suspended as he was. He hadn’t decided if that was a blessing or a curse.
He thought about Kentucky—her smile, the way her hair looked spread out on the pillow behind her with her cheeks flushed after making love. She was so beautiful. He wanted nothing more than to see her face again.
He’d tell her.
He’d tell her that he loved her, tell her that he wanted to be with her. He’d tell her that she was more than just a Band-Aid for his grief and guilt over Lynnie. He needed to tell her that. Needed her to know how much she meant to him—how much she’d always meant to him.
Even though the last day they’d spent together had been something amazing—the very fabric of summer memories—it couldn’t be the last one ever. He couldn’t live with the idea that the last thought she’d ever have of him was him sneaking out of her apartment in the predawn hours after an amazing night without so much as a real goodbye.
He should’ve woken her, should’ve told her then that he’d see her again. That he wanted more than temporary. That would have given her time to think and it would’ve given him some piece of mind that he’d not hidden from living.
As Kentucky always said, he should have lived a little.
Because now, in these moments that could be his last, he felt as if he hadn’t lived at all.
He wasn’t going out like that.
So what if his hands were in agony? The pain meant he was still alive. As long as he could feel the pain, as long as he could still suffer, he was still breathing. Still had more living to do.
He scanned the room again and again for some way to free himself, but there were still no good options. He’d have to wait until the man with the hammer came back.
He was supposed to start on Sean’s knees next. If he didn’t make something happen soon, there would be injuries there was no coming back from.
Even with his hands as wrecked as they were, he could fight through the pain. If he damaged himself further, so be it.
When the man came back, his body launched into action before
his mind could make the conscious decision to move. He surrendered to his training and it was as if space and time blurred. He’d wrapped his legs around the man’s neck and even though the man stabbed at him with a scalpel, he kept squeezing until he was dead.
He managed to pick up the scalpel with his toes, and in a feat of superhuman strength, he lifted his leg to the rope that tied him and pushed the blade back and forth across the heavy weave until he was free.
Landing on the sawdust-covered floor, he saw that he left a trail of blood behind him.
That wouldn’t bode well for his survival in the jungle.
But he had to risk it. He might die in the jungle, but he would for sure die here if he stayed.
So he ran. He ran out into the darkness with blood dripping from his hands, out into the humid foreign jungle, where the apex predators had come out to hunt.
The night birds and other animals made quite the ruckus, with howls and caws and even the occasional roar of a jungle cat after the screams of its prey. Those sounds comforted him because if they were consuming that prey, they weren’t stalking him.
Not like the thugs at the compound he’d just fled.
Sirens blared loud and he realized they must have noticed his escape. The Humvees they’d sent out to hunt him roared and echoed in strange directions, momentarily disorienting him.
He looked up at the stars, using the planet Venus to determine his position. He knew if he kept heading south, he’d find that base and, hopefully, an evac.
The darkness was absolute when he moved deep enough that the canopy of trees obscured the night sky, and the method of his navigation.
He closed his eyes and breathed deep, recalling his training. He’d flown in fog with nothing but the altimeter working. His inner compass wouldn’t lead him astray.
A cold numbness had started in his feet and was slowly working its way up his leg. He realized he had another wound. He’d cut himself somewhere with the scalpel and he was losing blood faster than he’d anticipated.
His vision started to blur and he stumbled, crashing down to the jungle floor.
*
WHEN HE AWOKE, he was surprised. Surprised to be awake and alive. His hands were in bandages. So was his leg. But he could still feel all of his limbs—they hurt in ways he hadn’t known were possible.
The room he was in was large, sterile and white—a hospital room. The scenery outside of the window was familiar—it was home.
And sitting in the chair by the window, with the warm light of the sun falling around her like a halo, was Kentucky.
She was sleeping, her red cowboy boots propped up on the edge of his bed. That splash of color so bright in a world of white and grays. It made everything so much more real somehow.
He wanted to reach out and touch her, but he couldn’t with his hands bound as they were and, he realized, in traction.
Jesus Christ, it was humiliating for her to have seen him this way.
But you’re alive, he told himself.
You made it home.
It must’ve been serious for Kentucky to be at his side. They must’ve gotten in touch with Eric. Otherwise, how could she be here?
She shifted in her sleep and turned her face toward the sun, which caused her to stir to wakefulness.
The look on her face when she saw his eyes were open told him that he’d been closer to death than he’d ever imagined.
Kentucky’s eyes were luminous pools of unshed tears.
She looked at him, gesturing helplessly.
He knew exactly what she wanted—needed. Contact, touch. But she didn’t want to hurt him. “Come here, baby.” Sean nodded his head. Even that action was a little uncomfortable, but he didn’t care. He needed the same thing she did.
She inserted herself in the bed next to him, ducking under his arm and resting her head against his chest while carefully embracing him.
“You’re not going to break me. I can’t hug you back, so you have to do it double for both of us.”
“They thought you were dead,” she breathed.
“Takes more than that to kill me.”
“Not much more.” She tightened her hug incrementally until she was pressed hard against him.
“It probably looks worse than it is.” He decided to put on a brave face for her. He wouldn’t lie—he was afraid of what had happened to him, what it meant and what his life would be like. But she didn’t need that on her shoulders.
“It looks pretty bad. You’ve been here for two weeks. They were wondering if you were ever going to wake up. I need to get the doctor.”
“No, no. Give me just a minute with you.” He breathed in the scent of her. “I don’t even know how you’re here.”
“It’s not me who is here but you. You’re in KU Med. Eric used his connections to get you transferred here from the hospital in South Carolina after they pulled you out of Colombia. You’ve been under sedation waiting for the swelling in your brain to go down.”
“Jesus.” He wondered how much more he’d lost than just the time.
Her shoulders quivered and he could feel the heat of her face against his chest. She was crying.
“Hey, Tuck. I’m okay.”
“Yeah, but you weren’t. And I knew you weren’t. I could feel it.” She clung more tightly to him. “I thought you were going to die and I…”
He wished he could touch her, soothe her, but his goddamn hands…
“But I didn’t. I’m fine and you’re here with me.”
She pulled back and looked into his eyes. “That really makes it better?”
“Of course it does. I wouldn’t have left if I hadn’t been recalled. I didn’t lie.”
The expression on her face softened. “I know you didn’t lie, but I also know that what we were doing was going to end eventually. And that’s okay. It’s not the time to talk about it anyway.”
Suddenly, he wanted nothing more than to tell her he wanted to be with her, but that wasn’t fair to her. Especially not knowing what his mobility was going to be like, the extent of his injuries.
He believed that you should care for someone through thick and thin, but he wasn’t about to hang himself around her neck like an albatross.
But one small part of his confession couldn’t hurt, could it? Something to let her know if he made it through this, if she wanted him, he wanted to try having a relationship with her. “Tuck, all I could think about out there was you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Let’s talk about it after I get out of here, okay?”
“I… I…” The expression on her face looked almost as if some witch had stolen the words right from her lips. She just nodded and leaned back down, her face buried in his neck.
“If only I could touch you, the things I would do to you right now.”
“Really? You just woke up and you’re thinking about that?”
“I think about that in my sleep. I think about it awake. I think about it every time I’m anywhere near you.”
“So if I were to do this, you’d like that?” She pushed her hand beneath the sheet and over his chest.
“Hell yeah.” His cock rose to salute her.
At least there was nothing wrong with that.
She pushed the hospital gown up higher until his chest was bare and she lay her head over his heart, dragging her nails lightly up and down his flanks in the most delicious way.
“I just want to hear your heart. It’s so strong, beating solid against your chest like you didn’t almost die. Like you’re not…”
“I told you, I’m fine.”
“I couldn’t stand it, you know.”
“What?”
“If you died. It would kill me, too. I can’t lose anyone else.”
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t know what to say.
“I’m not asking for any promises. I know what’s between us. You were my friend before we slept together.”
“Kentucky…” All the things he’d sworn he w
ouldn’t say welled on his tongue.
“No, it’s okay. Just don’t die.”
He thought about what it was like back in the jungle when he believed he was going to die. He thought about how angry he’d been about it. He’d had a pat answer about it being part of the job and he’d even talked himself into believing it, until it was there on his doorstep.
“That wasn’t exactly part of my plan.”
“It never is. I know you can’t promise you won’t. You’re not a liar.”
Oh, but he was the worst kind of liar. He’d been lying to himself. He was no hero. He’d never been worthy of that mantle she’d pinned on him. He was a coward. He was afraid to die, didn’t see any honor in wasting a life.
He thought about his team and the others he’d managed to get to safety. One life for many—even if it was his. If he’d bailed on them, he’d never have been able to live with the guilt.
So maybe he wasn’t as much of a coward as he thought himself after all.
“Your heart is beating so fast. What are you thinking about?”
“Honestly? Dying.”
She was silent but continued caressing him.
“I was thinking about all the things I want to do but haven’t. I was thinking about how much I really didn’t want to die, wasn’t ready to lay down my life. I was thinking that I was a coward.”
She sat up now. “Don’t you ever say that, Sean. Of course you don’t want to die. It’s not a sacrifice if you give up something you don’t value. Look, I know maybe some women like to see heroes as superhuman, but what makes them heroes is that they’re all too human. Men and women who sacrifice themselves for something greater, for the people they love. I doubt that when their last moments come, it’s ever pretty or it’s ever okay. It’s fucking terrible. But they do it anyway. Like you did.”
“How much do you know about what happened?”
“More than I should. Eric has top-secret clearance, since he’s a secret squirrel. So I guess everything that your CO knows.”
“Jesus, Kentucky.” He found himself saying that a lot, like many people in her life.
“Yeah, well.” She made a dismissive gesture. “And I stand by what I said.”
He wanted to shrug it off, wanted to dismiss her words because he knew that she had always seen him as a hero, but he wouldn’t discount her like that. Even if he didn’t agree.
