by Lynne Silver
“I want you to stay. Please. But no official matching and no kids. Ever.”
She rolled off the bed and riffled through his dresser, looking for a shirt.
“Loren.”
She tugged his plain gray jersey over her head. It fell to the middle of her thighs.
“Loren,” he said again. “When Paulson had me, they…” He broke off, unable to talk.
She sat at his side, soothing him with her touch, unable to ignore his pain. “I’m here. Whatever you want to say. I’m here to listen.”
“They practically raped me,” he said in a hoarse voice. “They wanted my semen and planned on fertilizing Emma’s eggs with it. And…” Whatever he was going to say was gone. She could tell it was something too private. “I have to let you go. Take you back to your Arlington apartment and your precious job.” He raked a finger through his dripping hair.
Oh God, couldn’t he see his words were killing her? The lingering currents of their lovemaking faded into the background at Adam’s rejection of her.
“When Paulson had me, only the thoughts of you kept me steady and I realized I don’t want to live without you. But hell, when they threatened to take my choice about being a father away, it scared the shit out of me. It was clear to me. I should never be a father. There’s too much risk.” Emotion made his voice hoarse. “I care for you too much to give you defective kids.”
Her heart melted and tears choked her at his words. “Adam, you’re not defective.” She reached out to him, but he resisted her advance.
“You didn’t grow up here. You have no idea what it’s like to have the slightest shortcoming. I won’t do it to you or my kid.”
She noted he’d said “should never be a father”. Not that he didn’t want to be a father, but at this point, it was semantics. “There are no guarantees in life. Anyone can give birth to a disabled child.”
“I’m at a higher risk. Doctor Wise tested me and she confirmed there is a genetic component to Rowan’s defect and it affects me too. Do you know what they’d do if they discovered the baby you carried had a genetic defect?” He clamped his mouth shut, but she knew the answer.
“But there’s no guarantee. Our kids could be perfect. And never mind the fact that I’ll love them even if they’re missing every limb. And just let them try to hurt or terminate my pregnancy without our say-so.”
“A nice thought, but sometimes love isn’t enough.” He sat up in bed with less of his usual grace thanks to the ugly bruises covering his ribs.
And sometimes love was all you had. Her parents had demonstrated their love for each other and her every day, and Loren wanted the same for herself. Despite her father’s death, she knew her mom cherished every memory, especially her living daughter. Mom was always telling her, Thank goodness I still have you. If your father had died leaving me without a child, I wouldn’t have borne it.
She stood and paced at the foot of the bed. “I don’t know what to think, Adam. I love you. But I’ve always pictured my future as a wife and a mom, and I hate to give it up because you’re unwilling to consider it. You say you care about me,” she continued, “but you’re not willing to give this a try?”
His eyes narrowed. “Is it a ring? Do you need a proposal?”
“No, it’s not a ring, you doofus. I want your love, and someday I want children. Your children, and you are slamming the door on the possibility.”
His face shuttered. “I told you why it’s not a possibility.”
“Bullshit. You’re scared.”
“Hell yes, I’m scared, Loren. I’m fucking scared that I’d be responsible for creating a life that was doomed to suffer,” he said. “It’s more than I can handle.”
She shut up at his confession. Visions of Sunday barbeques with Adam at the grill vanished. She wasn’t ready for kids this minute, but she wanted them in her future. In their future. But there was obviously nothing she could say to sway him. She could tell him a million and one times there was no risk in having children, but one, she’d be lying and two, he wouldn’t listen.
“Now what?” she asked in a whisper.
He stood and padded over to her side. His hand brushed her shoulder softly. “Do you want me to drive you home right after the debriefing?”
“I don’t know.” Her emotions were a blurry mess. She wanted him, loved him, but he was only willing to give her part of himself. He wouldn’t jump into the abyss with her, despite practically admitting he wanted to be her husband and a dad.
He glanced at the digital clock on the nightstand. “We better get moving. Shep wants us in ten minutes.” They both turned to find clean clothes and left the apartment in silence with nothing resolved.
*
It was standing room only in the conference room for the debriefing. Seemed like everyone even remotely connected wanted in. As soon as Adam walked in, Shep herded him to the chair at the center of the storm. And shit, it felt like a storm. Between the pain in his ribs, the distance he felt from Loren and his dread about this meeting, it was a trifecta of crap. The whole thing was going to be damn embarrassing to tell. It was bad enough he was taken by surprise and kidnapped, but held naked and jacked off was icing on the cake. Rancid, moldy icing.
He sent a hard look to Doctor Jones, who sat in the corner as if she had an invisible two-foot bubble around her. Despite the shortage of seating in the room, no one wanted to get too close to her. She was an unknown, dropped in straight from enemy territory. For all they knew she was a mole for Paulson. People chose to stand or grabbed a chair and moved it away. She folded her arms and put on her mask of stoicism, but he’d seen her with her son, and knew she didn’t like the frosty treatment.
And speaking of moles, someone in this room had set him up. There was no way Paulson had known his flight or hotel information without someone sharing it. He was going to find that person and express his displeasure. With his fists and likely his blade.
Shep pushed his way to the center of the circle and called for attention. For once, everyone settled down in less than a second except for Loren and Emma, who still were greeting each other in soft whispers.
“Do you ever stop talking?” Xander snarled at Emma from where he stood directly in front of her with his arms crossed over his chest. He’d subtly shift every time another male in the room tried to catch a glimpse of the pretty brunette.
“When I’m with you, yes.” Emma smiled sweetly at him in counterpoint to her snarky retort. Whispers swelled and buzzed around the room about the unfamiliar girl who had the balls to snap at Xander. Xander didn’t respond to Emma’s retort and muttered to Shep to start the damn meeting.
Shep looked around the room, muttered something about starting without Keel then shrugged. “Gentlemen, as you can see, we have some new faces in the room,” Shep said. “Xander’s new friend, Emma, who was held at Paulson’s clinic for the last three months.” Emma leaned around Xander and smiled at the room’s occupants, but her cheeks were stained pink, probably at the introduction. “And to my right is Doctor Samara Jones, who was forced under duress to work as Paulson’s geneticist for the last year. Adam, why don’t you start?”
Adam forced himself to stand, ignoring the screaming pain in his ribs. Making love to Loren just now hadn’t been the wisest move for his physical health, but his emotional need trumped the pain. “Everything we supposed about the fertility clinic is true.”
A loud murmur circulated, but stopped when he started speaking again. He kept his talk brief and went through the bullet points of what happened. He glossed over his intimate contact with Doctor Jones and hoped she’d do the same. He sat down with a thump when he finished and waited for questions. But Shep stayed any questions with a hand gesture and asked Doctor Jones to continue.
The doctor stood and he could tell she had a history of making formal presentations. Her voice was clear but not loud and her words precise. “Thank you for your hospitality, Commander Shepard. My son and I are grateful to be somewhere safe after our year
-long nightmare.” With those words, the suspicion and hostility toward her dimmed by a hair.
“As Mr. Blacker shared, Doctor Paulson operated a legitimate fertility clinic for wealthy European families. Behind the scenes however, was another story.” She highlighted the process by which they’d take compatible sperm and eggs, play around with the DNA, and then implant it back into the paying mother’s womb. The parents had no idea the implanted child didn’t share their DNA. Emma hung her head when she talked about donor eggs, and Loren wrapped an arm around her.
Doctor Jones continued her talk, hesitating only once when the door opened to admit Chase. She tripped over her words as Chase shuffled to the chair next to the doctor and sat looking up at her expectantly.
“As I was saying…” She shuffled through the sheaf of papers in front of her.
Adam glanced from Chase’s face back at the doctor. Something was going on between them, but damn if he knew what. Chase was usually good with women, charming them into his bed, but he looked at the doctor as if she tortured puppies for a living. The only people who had cause to look at her like that were him and Emma, as far as he was aware.
After some throat clearing, Doctor Jones found her voice and continued. She had the good sense not to mention anything about her intimate contact with Adam, but did confirm that Emma’s eggs had been taken and were currently in Paulson’s possession. A low growl came from Xander, but he kept his mask in place and stared down anyone who dared to glance his way.
Except Adam saw through him. He saw the look of raw, naked longing in Xander’s eyes. He should recognize it. It was what he felt every time he looked at Loren.
The doctor gave Xander a wary look, then Chase, and continued. “As we discovered, only one child Paulson kidnapped remained on the grounds. I was rarely allowed in the room, they sent my son out to me, so I don’t know how many children passed through the clinic.” Her voice hitched a little at the word children, but she finished her speech then sat. She shifted her chair away from Chase.
At this point, Shep took over the meeting. For the first time in Program history, they were going to work with other agencies, both domestic and international.
“How are we going to work with outsiders when we can barely function internally?” Every head swiveled toward Chase, who had his feet on the table and only two chair legs on the floor.
“Excuse me?” Shep asked.
Adam recognized the tone. Chase needed to can it.
Of course he didn’t. “You need to listen to your team once in a while. My sis knew where her match was, but you stuck to facts and Adam suffered for it.”
Adam sucked back a breath and waited for an explosion. But Shep simply sighed.
“You’re right, Chase. You and Xander will have consequences for going rogue and not following orders. It was damn lucky for you it worked out. Otherwise this could’ve been a very different meeting. I intend to rectify my previous bullheaded behavior and that is why Ms. Stanton, Ms. Harrison and Doctor Jones are in this meeting.”
Chase looked like he wanted to speak more, but swallowed it back under Shep’s gaze.
“Doctor Jones, were there any other people working with Paulson?” Shep asked.
She shook her head. “As far as I’m aware, it was only me, Paulson, Brian and Brad, his hired muscle. Doctor Baresh and all the other medical staff believed they were running a legitimate fertility clinic. And for most part, they were. Paulson only swapped out the fertilized eggs for a select few.”
Shep pursed his lips and then mapped out their future plans. A team of Navy SEALS was moving into place to hunt out and find the missing children. “We go after Paulson,” he said with a predatory smile. There were some protests about missing out on the fun of infiltrating terrorist cells in hostile countries.
“Wait, there are two more things,” Adam said. Doctor Jones had retreated back to her chair and was staring pointedly away from Chase.
“What’s that?” Shep asked.
“Paulson was able to obtain my semen,” he said so softly, he hoped everyone couldn’t hear.
“What?” Loren asked. Her face was white, and angry lines bracketed the skin around her lips.
Doctor Jones glanced at Loren than him. “I’m so sorry. When you were knocked out. They got it, but…”
He couldn’t let her finish. He wanted to hear nothing she had to say. Now he was damn glad they’d been assigned the Paulson piece. Far as he was concerned, it was now deadly personal. Paulson had touched him then dared to touch Loren.
“We’ll take care of it, Adam. Paulson will not use you like this. I promise,” Shep said.
“But—” the doctor said again, but Chase scowled so ferociously at her, she wisely closed her mouth.
“Damn straight we’ve got your back,” Chase said and there were echoes of agreement around the table.
Loren looked as if she might pass out and he wanted to go comfort her as much as he wanted to slam his fist through the table for Paulson’s perfidy.
When the meeting started to break up, Adam cleared his throat loudly. When all eyes were on him, he met every gaze head-on as if he was measuring their worth, which he was. “You forgot to mention our mole, Shep.”
The already quiet room fell to tomb-like silence. “Someone on this campus set me up. Paulson knew I was coming, and now that person should know I’m coming for him.” All of the men in the room grunted with approval. “You better pray Shep discovers your identity first.” And on that note, the meeting dismissed. He remained seated, not looking forward to the pain of standing. The room emptied to everyone but him, Loren and Shep.
“We’ll find Paulson and our mole, Adam,” Shep promised. “Gavin’s going over all lines of communication in and out of the campus.”
He nodded and looked around the room. Something was bothering him about the meeting, but he couldn’t pinpoint what it was. Finally he shrugged and stood to walk with Loren who was now edging out of the room. “Where are you headed? Am I taking you home?”
“Not yet. I’m going for a walk to try to clear some of these cobwebs out of my head.”
She kissed his cheek and squeezed his hand then headed out into the humid summer day toward the outskirts of the compound. Few trees grew out here, for protection reasons she guessed. Harder to sneak up on the compound in an open field, but there were some trees and scraggly bushes here and there which allowed her to pretend she hiked through Rock Creek park or another favorite nature path. She’d always found comfort in the outdoors and today needed some comfort if she was going to find an answer to Adam’s question.
On one hand it made perfect sense to stay with him. She’d always believed marriage lay somewhere in her distant future. If she gave up Adam, would she ever find a partner who completed her, who made her laugh or shiver in passion as well as he did? Doubtful.
But then add in her newly developed fear of living a military lifestyle with a husband disappearing to all parts of the world. He’d be going on dangerous missions and coming home with death in his eyes. It made for a volatile cocktail. If he came home at all. Through her mother, she’d seen firsthand the trauma and damage losing a spouse at a young age could do. Her mom had never quite recovered and lived a reclusive, solitary life.
Deep in thought, Loren found herself on the outskirts of the one-story, single-family brick homes given to matched couples with children. It was her first time exploring this part of the compound and she had yet to meet any of the wives or children. Two women, who looked a few years older than she, sat chatting on the front steps of one of the homes. Three toddlers ran in circles around a sprinkler, shooting water at their ankles. Squeals of glee filled the air. Loren grinned as she noticed not a stitch of clothing on any of the children. Correction. One child had on a pink and rhinestone tiara, which clung to tangled curls.
“Loren.” Both mothers waved their arms over in a welcoming gesture.
She walked over to them, avoiding the spray of the sprinkler. “Hi. How do y
ou know me?”
The women exchanged a glance. One answered, “Think of the Program like a small high school. No one or no bit of gossip goes unnoticed.”
“And you, my dear, are quite a large bit of gossip,” the brunette informed her.
“Great.” Annoyance flickered through her. It would take some getting used to, the whole small-town mentality. But she was leaving. Wasn’t she?
“I’m Beth, by the way, and this is Danielle.”
Both women’s smiles were open, welcoming. Loren returned their warm smiles with one of her own.
“Have a seat,” Danielle invited. “We’ll try to protect you from the water warriors.”
“That’s fine. It’s so hot, I wouldn’t mind a little water, and besides, I love kids.”
“Do you? That’s good.”
Smiles lit up their open faces, but Loren sensed these women were dying to grill her. “Go ahead,” she groaned. “Ask away, I can tell you want to.”
Again Danielle and Beth shared a look then a laugh. “Are we that obvious?”
“Yep. But it’s okay, because I have some questions for you too.” The three women smiled at each other in mutual accord.
“Did you really go after Adam on a mission?”
She nodded and both women nodded along with her.
“I’d do the same thing if my man went missing,” Danielle said. “I’m glad you’re back safely.”
“How’s Adam doing?”
“Fine,” she mumbled. “I’d rather not talk about him right now.” She pretended not to see the meaningful glances Beth and Danielle swapped.
“Understood. I’ll change the topic. Your father was part of the Program, right? But you grew up knowing nothing about us?” Beth asked.
“That’s right. I didn’t know anything until I showed up here to investigate for my job.”
“Where did you work?” Danielle asked.
She took slight umbrage at the use of past-tense. She didn’t used to work at The Post. She was still an active employee there; at least until her boss got fed up with her extended personal leave of absence. “I work at The Washington Post as a research assistant. I’ll go back to work as soon as possible.”
