Sarah Beauchamp was a tall leggy blonde from California married to a lieutenant commander in the Navy, who was a fighter pilot with the Navy squadrons attached to the Marine Air Group 31 in the area. Sarah was a civilian OR nurse and the head of the Naval Ombudsman Association, a job that, coupled with wife and nurse, seemed monumental to Melanie. Sarah had been adding bits to the conversation, but right now was enthralled with Juliana, whom she was holding.
Beside Sarah, wearing chic slacks and a blouse, was Sue Bradshaw, the LINKS team leader, who was married to a marine gunnery sergeant in Force Recon. While her son, Shawn, was having a blast on the gym set, Sue’s husband, Gary, was on the other side of the yard standing at the grill with Jack and Sarah’s husband, Daniel. Maria, a black-haired Hispanic woman who seemed to know every answer to every question, sat next to Melanie. She was a former Marine, though at first glance, she was the last person Melanie would have expected to carry a weapon and shout “oo-rah.” Maria was head of the Marine Key Volunteer Program for two bases in the area. The women were a font of information, yet after about ten minutes of talking in abbreviations and acronyms, they had Melanie’s head swimming.
“Okay, let’s see, BX means Base Exchange, PX means Post Exchange,” Melanie said.
“Yeah, Post is Army talk,” Maria said, “and practically blasphemous.”
Melanie smiled. “MP means Military Police, MWR means Morale Welfare and Recreation, and that includes child-care centers, BX bowling alley, gyms, shops, theaters.” She stopped. “So what’s TMO?”
“Traffic Management Office. Those are the household-goods supervisors, freight shipping, passenger travel, all on orders. They’re the people who’ll organize the moves for you.”
“They do it all?”
Sue laughed softly. “No, they don’t. You have to fill out paperwork until you are blue in the face, but they do great things like come by and inspect the movers in action. Take action if anything is damaged or improperly packed.”
“And sometimes you do it all yourself if your husband is out of the country,” Maria said. “My husband is deployed right now.”
“I can do that.”
“Good, because with Jack’s MOS—method of service,” Sarah clarified, “you’ll likely do it at least once alone.” Sarah crossed her legs and bounced Juliana on the top of her foot.
Melanie was learning more in one afternoon than she thought she could in a year. They brought her booklets and actual books on how to be an officer’s wife, books about protocol, relocation packets and change of duty. Services. She’d be reading for a week, she thought, feeling overwhelmed.
“Hey, Singer, do you need a Marine to show you how to cook that steak?” Sue called out.
“The Navy can handle it,” Jack said. “Anyway, we have a Marine, though I don’t know what good he’s doing.”
“I’m reminding you when to flip the steak,” Sue’s husband said.
The four men growled out “Hoo-yah” and “Oohrah.”
“Oh, Lord, the testosterone level is hitting new heights,” Sarah said, cuddling Juliana, then looking for permission from Melanie before she offered the baby a cookie to gnaw on.
“Ask and you shall receive,” Maria said. “If I don’t know the answer or Sarah doesn’t, then we know who can give it to you.”
“And come to LINKS,” Sue said. “It teaches you how to be a military wife. Sometime the service member thinks either we don’t need to know or we already do know after one coffee klatch or a chat in the commissary.”
Collectively they rolled their eyes in agreement.
“The one thing is that Jack’s a SEAL, which means that more or less the wives are on the need-to-know basis,” Sarah said. “SEAL actions are classified, so don’t expect to learn where he’s been and what he’s doing. It’s the same with Force Recon.”
Sue leaned forward and said, “And they’ll debate for years about which is the more macho, Recon or SEALs. I never add my two cents. I like my Navy friends too much.” She patted Melanie’s arm.
“Oh, forewarned,” Melanie said, smiling.
“When they are deployed, there’s a chain of command for information. Because I’m the Key Volunteer, I get it straight from the colonel and the sergeant major. My job is to keep the spouse informed and stop nasty rumors,” Maria said.
“Same here,” Sarah said.
“How do you get over the fear?” Mel asked.
“You don’t,” Sue said. “You live with it. Your job—our job—is to make certain when our men go into battle, they won’t worry about home and family and they’ll know you’ll be okay. Learn to handle anything they throw at you and do it in a—”
“—proficient military fashion,” the rest of the women joined to say.
Melanie laughed. “Okay, as long as I can call on you all, I’m content.”
“Good.” Almost in unison, they set aside the paperwork and books and leaned in.
“Daniel’s known Jack since the academy,” Sarah said. “And I know Gary and Jack served together, but neither of them will say doing what. So how did you meet Jack?”
Melanie glanced over at Jack. “His sister is my best friend. She was my pledge to the sorority. I’d heard a lot about him, but had never met him until two weeks before Lisa married.”
“It must have been awful learning you were pregnant when he couldn’t be reached.”
Melanie had been up front with the women, especially when Jack announced to their husbands that he was married with a child. “It wasn’t pleasant, but I dealt with it.”
“True Navy-wife material,” Sue said. “My husband wasn’t around for one of my pregnancies. Left when I wasn’t even showing and arrived home three days after I’d had our second child. I wasn’t exactly feeling frisky, if you know what I mean.”
Melanie smiled again, admiring them and wondering how they survived so well. She wanted to be a valuable part of this elite group of women, as she was, by virtue of marriage. They were strong and resourceful and giving. She looked over at Jack, suddenly thinking about more children and years down the road with him. She’d been on birth control since Juliana was born, but the thought of having another child didn’t scare her as she’d thought it would. She had some of the burdens to share. Well, all of them to share, she corrected.
“Oh, I remember that look,” Sarah said, when Melanie didn’t take her eyes off Jack. He was smiling at her, his gaze doing that lazy prowl over her that made her feel beautiful and desired and possessed. She wanted to be possessed. Because Jack did it in the best way.
“Catch all you can now, honey,” Sue said. “We have to make it last through tough times.”
Melanie stood and walked to Jack. The other men backed up a bit, offering a greeting, but Melanie slid her arms around Jack and kissed him.
The group howled with applause.
Jack caught his breath and said, “What’s that for?”
“Thanks for inviting them, Jack,” she whispered.
“I thought an introduction from the ladies would be clearer than hearing it all from me.”
“Oh, it is.” She eased back, but he kept his arm around her waist. “Now,” she said, looking at the men. “I want to know how come the Marines are a part of the Navy?”
Gary spoke up. “We need someone to sail us to the war.”
Good-natured laughter erupted, and Melanie thought she might be afraid for Jack, but she would be well taken care of—her family had just grown so much bigger.
Eleven
It was official. She had an ID card with the most dreadful picture of herself ever, stickers on her car, and she could actually speak in acronyms and abbreviations, like IPAC, Cencom, SecNav, and know what they meant. In the back of her heart, she felt she was destined for this. She soaked it up like a sponge. Jack had shown her the local base, and although they were Marine installations, he wanted her to get the feel of it, be aware of passing by armed guards, security checks and know the territory that was off-limits, as well a
s all the facilities. He’d answered her questions patiently, and she felt her excitement build. Life with him was going to be an adventure. She was looking forward to it. Which surprised her.
“You need to stop grinning to yourself,” Lisa said. “People are gonna talk.”
Melanie swung her gaze to Lisa’s and smiled. Juliana was in bed, Jack was off helping Sarah’s husband put in a dog fence at their quarters, and she and Lisa had enjoyed a good hour of cappuccino and catching up on their friendship.
“You stop in the middle of a conversation and just grin,” Lisa said.
“Yeah, so?”
“Lord, you sound like Jack,” Lisa said with a laugh.
Melanie frowned questioningly.
“He can’t stop talking about you two, the future, and he does that same—” Lisa gestured meaninglessly “—face thing you do.”
“And your point is?”
Lisa’s eyes widened. “You’re in love with my brother, aren’t you? Despite everything that got you here, you fell in love with him.”
“Yes,” Melanie admitted. “I did.”
“Have you told him?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’d thought I was in love before and it came back to bite me.”
“Jack loves you.”
Melanie rolled her eyes and knew she shouldn’t have said anything. Lisa was just as bullheaded as Jack. “You’re prejudiced.”
“No, honest. I know he’s in love with you.”
“He said that?”
“No, but it’s the face thing. We sisters know when they’re guilty, too.”
“Oh, really. How so?”
“Don’t try to change the subject. You’re scared.”
“Sure I am. We’re married—it’s lifelong in my book.”
“So you think you’re going to go through, say, thirty years of marriage and never say the words to him?”
“No.” Melanie looked down at her coffee cup. “He didn’t marry me because he wanted to, Lisa, and I’m having a hard time believing what he’s feeling. He was doing the right thing in his mind.”
“Oh, Melanie,” Lisa said sympathetically. “He’d love you without Juliana.”
“He married me because of her.”
“And how do you think he feels, marrying a woman who did everything she could not to say I do. He could have just married you and gone back to work. Or never showed up at all.”
“I know.”
Lisa frowned. “You don’t trust him.”
“I trust Jack, the man. Feelings are another subject. He was so adamant about marriage, almost fanatical. Like it was the only solution.”
“For Jack it was.”
Melanie opened her mouth to agree, then she focused on Lisa’s expression. It was almost sad.
“Jack’s honorable, and it means a lot to him for his child to have his name.”
“It was more than that.”
Lisa hesitated for half a minute. “That’s because of his father.”
Melanie frowned. “He loved his father. He talks about David all the time.”
“David was my father, not Jack’s.”
“I don’t get it.”
“That’s because I was born a bastard,” came the response from the doorway, and Melanie looked up as Jack entered the kitchen through the garage. He set his new toolbox, which no longer looked new, on the floor.
Lisa got up to prepare a small pot of coffee.
Jack winked at her, assuring Lisa that she hadn’t done anything she shouldn’t have. He didn’t think she believed him. “Lisa and I have the same mother, not the same father,” he said to Melanie. “My father skipped out on Mom when she was pregnant with me. So she raised me alone until she met David.”
Lisa grabbed her purse and, whispering that the coffee was on, said goodbye to Melanie and quietly slipped out.
Melanie only nodded, her gaze on her husband.
“So you see, Melanie, I know what it’s like being called a bastard to my face.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
“You didn’t want to marry me in the first place, and I figured you would think my own illegitimacy wasn’t reason enough to marry me.”
“Your lineage doesn’t matter to me, Jack.”
Jack’s mouth quirked in a smile. He should have known. “When my mom fell in love with David, I was a happy kid. He treated me like his own and adopted me, so I had his last name. He was the greatest father in the world.” Jack smiled to himself, missing the heck out of David and thinking he could use his advice right now. “Then they gave me a sister to tease.”
Melanie realized that though Jack might be telling this casually, it meant a great deal to him. He looked at Melanie, his eyes hardening. “I lived for a few years with the stigma, and it wasn’t pleasant. Not till David changed everything. I remember being called names, but it was the judging looks from adults that hurt the most.” He moved toward her, gripping her shoulders and staring down into her beautiful eyes. “Juliana won’t have anyone but us, and I couldn’t stand that everyone would think her father didn’t have the guts to marry her mother. Or that he didn’t care about her.”
Melanie looked down, feeling her heart moving on shaky ground. “I see.”
He tipped her chin up, dread crashing through him at the tears in her eyes. “Oh, honey, I didn’t mean to keep that from you this long.”
“But you did, when I’ve been honest with you.”
“Were you?”
“Of course I was. I’ve told you how I felt.”
“Sure, about everything except what’s in your heart.”
As if he’d discovered some secret, she curled away, breaking his hold. “And what have you said, Jack, other than the same thing all along—‘I want marriage for her sake.’ I actually feel jealous of my own child because she had your heart first.”
He reached for her. “Melanie—”
The phone rang. Jack snatched it up, about to bark at the caller before he took a breath and said hello. He listened, and Melanie watched his expression grow more serious, harsher. He grunted at the caller and hung up.
“That was Reese,” he said. “I have to report back in two days.”
“Two? But you still have a few days’ leave left.”
“Not anymore. This means I have to leave tomorrow morning for Virginia.”
Damn, Melanie thought. Panic swept her. Oh, damn.
She stared at him, angry with him, with herself for distrusting her heart, and wanting him just to hold her.
Her continued silence cut him. “I have to pack,” he said, and moved past her toward the bedroom.
“Let me give you a hand.”
“No, it won’t take long. I travel light.”
She felt a door shut between them, and she wasn’t going to let that happen. “Jack,” she called, following him into the bedroom. He already had a duffel bag on the bed. “Stop.”
He stilled, clothes in his hands, and looked at her with cool eyes. He was mad. Or just irritated with her?
“You can’t leave like this.”
“I have to. This is what it means to be in the service.”
“Dammit, you know what I’m talking about. Jeez, why do I feel guilty all of a sudden?”
“You figure it out.”
“You’re the one who lied.”
“No, I just didn’t tell you I was a bastard. I was, frankly, ashamed of it.”
“Oh, honey, you shouldn’t be. It’s not your fault.”
“Right, and I wasn’t going to make my father’s mistake with my daughter.”
“Yes, sure,” she snapped. “Marry the mom and make you feel better.” She wished the words back the instant they left her mouth.
He glared at her, hurt glittering in his blue eyes. “You know that’s not true, dammit.”
“I’m sorry, I do, but—”
Juliana began to cry, and when Melanie went to get her, Jack moved past Melanie, saying
he would. She let him go, wondering what she was doing to them right now and thinking herself foolish. The phone rang a few minutes later. She answered it and then went to the nursery, where he sat with the baby in his arms and a solemn look on his face.
“It’s Reese again.”
Jack took the phone from her. “Yeah, okay fine,” he said into the receiver after a moment. He checked his watch. “No, I’ll be there.” He shut the phone off, handing it back to her.
Melanie clutched it to her chest.
“They have a Marine transport plane leaving from the Air Station, headed to Virginia, and room on it for me.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I leave tonight. At midnight.”
Melanie sighed and nodded. Her two days just turned into a few hours.
Well, she’d expected this. He’d warned her. She stared at the phone in her hand and swore she wasn’t going to make a scene. What had Maria said? It was her job to be strong so he didn’t have to worry. She swallowed and when he whispered her name, she met his gaze.
Jack’s heart shattered right then. “Come here,” he said, and she flew to him, trapping him against her. Juliana snuggled herself against her father’s chest and grabbed a lock of her mom’s hair.
Jack pressed his lips to Melanie’s temple. He didn’t want to leave. God, not now.
Melanie cooked as though she expected Jack never to eat again. He was amused and didn’t have the heart to tell her he wasn’t really hungry—not for food, anyway. But the meal eased the tension between them, and he hated that she was hurting. She wasn’t alone in her pain, and when Juliana was in her crib for the night, Jack struggled with the goodbye he didn’t want to say, knowing the baby wouldn’t miss him that much, since she was so young. Then he stowed his gear by the door, pressed and laid out his uniform and glanced at the clock. He felt like a man about to go to execution if he didn’t confess. And his salvation was with Melanie.
He walked into the bedroom. She stood in the shadows, moonlight falling over, missing in spots, showing her beauty in others. Without a word she crossed to him, wrapped her arms around him and kissed him hungrily.
The SEAL’s Surprise Baby Page 13
