Officer and the Secret (Semper Fidelis. Always Faithful.)

by Murray, Jeanette

  ***

  An expectant father book. Jesus, the hits just kept on coming. He wasn’t sure what to do with that information. Well, clearly he was supposed to read it. But damn, she took him by surprise with that one. In a very good way.

  After tucking Veronica in for a nap, Dwayne sat in the living room, wondering exactly how long he could hold on to his feelings. Keep control of them. Could he make it until he knew how she felt?

  “Damn it,” he muttered, leaning over to unlace his boots. Something by the side of the couch caught his eye and he reached for it. Veronica’s tote bag, full of her stuff for school. Or, well, studying for the GED. He grabbed the huge textbook and flipped through it absently, remembering his own high school days. Now there was a distraction.

  He felt sixteen again, hoping to win over the cute girl in fourth period by doing her math homework with her.

  The book dangled from his fingertips and a loose piece of paper fell out. He reached for it, not intending to read the study material until his eyes caught the words man I love. Then he couldn’t go back.

  Starting from the beginning, he read. And read again. And another time, until the sentiments were burned into his memory.

  ***

  She awoke to the sounds of banging in the kitchen. After a quick side-trip to the bathroom, she weaved her tired way down the hall and squinted into the bright light.

  “Morning, darlin’.” Dwayne turned to smile at her from behind the refrigerator door.

  She stifled a yawn. “It’s like three in the afternoon. And I woke up from a nap, not from the night.”

  “You say tomato… Sit down and let me get you something to eat. Juice? You want juice?” He scooted her onto a stool and flew around the kitchen, grabbing a glass of juice to sit in front of her before heading back to the stove to poke at… something.

  “Dwayne? What’s in the skillet?”

  “Eggs.”

  They most certainly did not look like any eggs she’d seen before. For the most part, Veronica had taken over the meals, mostly because she didn’t mind working in the kitchen. Unlike what the books seemed to say, being around food all day didn’t dampen her desire to make her own meals at home. “Do you like to cook?” How odd that she still had to ask that, after agreeing to marry the man.

  “Nah, I’m not much of a kitchen guy. I’ve sort of lived off takeout and frozen pizza. But I figured eggs were a no-brainer. Who could screw up eggs?” He set the spatula down, turned to face her, and crossed his arms over his chest. “You good with an egg sandwich for a late lunch?”

  She gave it a moment to sink in and see if her stomach would rebel at the mere thought of eggs. But everything seemed calm on that front. “Sure.”

  “Good. And after that, I’m hoping we can have a nice talk.”

  “Talk?” The gulp of juice she’d taken expanded in her throat like a balloon, and she fought the urge to choke. “Talk about what?”

  He propped a hip against the counter and looked completely at ease. “Things in general. How everything’s going. Our relationship.”

  Tears stung the backs of her eyes, but she blinked rapidly to stall any tears. “Of course.”

  He stared at her a moment, the infuriatingly blank look on his face, and then pointed to her glass. “Drink. I don’t know if you ate a good breakfast or not before you went over to Madison’s. Which,” he added with a pointed look, “I’m not all that thrilled about.”

  Veronica rolled her eyes, but diligently picked up the glass and took another sip. This one went down better. “I’m capable of eating when you’re not here. I’ve done it enough times when you’re working late.”

  Something that looked like guilt crossed his face. “That’s going to come up in our talk. But until then, just humor me and eat good meals, please?”

  She smiled placidly. “I think your good meal is burning.”

  He froze, then turned around and grabbed the spatula, shoveling blackened egg around the skillet in a fruitless effort to save them from singing. “Well, hell.” He flipped the burner off with a flick of his wrist and tossed the skillet—egg and all—into the sink. With a sheepish smile, he shrugged. “How about cereal?”

  “How about we talk? And then you can order a pizza for an early dinner.” She might have her appetite back, but her energy was still lagging a little. And fixing another meal wasn’t really on her to-do list at the moment.

  She walked into the living room, propping herself up on the arm of the couch. Dwayne followed, surprising her by sitting on the couch with her rather than in the armchair on the other side of the coffee table. That had to be a good sign, right?

  She motioned with her juice glass. “Talk.”

  He blushed a little up the back of his neck, over the tops of his ears. “I have a confession first.”

  Suddenly, her stomach roiled and she was glad she hadn’t had a chance to eat the eggs.

  “I was flipping through your GED book, just thinking about stuff and wondering if you might need help, and a paper fell out. I shouldn’t have read it, but I did.” Leaning to one side, he reached in the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a folded piece of paper. The lightbulb turned on when he unfolded it and held it out.

  Her hand darted out to snatch it away before she even knew she was moving. Her private, intense, overly emotional, hormone-driven thoughts. And he knew every single one of them.

  “I’m sorry. I really am. It fell out, I meant to just shove it back in but something caught my eye and I couldn’t stop myself. It was wrong.”

  She clutched the paper to her chest like a shield.

  “I’ll ask for forgiveness in a minute, but I have to say something before that.”

  “What?” she croaked out, fighting a losing battle to swallow down the lump in her throat.

  “You were wrong.” His voice was low and husky, but carried perfectly. “I want something to do with you. I want everything to do with you.”

  Confusion momentarily blocked out her embarrassment and she glanced down at the first line of her hastily typed message.

  The man I love wants nothing to do with me.

  “I might have given you that impression, and I know exactly how I did it. But I wasn’t staying away because of you. It was me. All me. I thought I needed distance to keep things square in my mind, but that was just bull.”

  She waited for more, her heartbeat pounding a tattoo in her eardrums.

  “And you were wrong about something else. In there you said you’d have to love enough for the both of us. But you don’t.” Reaching out, he gently pried one of her hands away from her chest and held it. “Darlin’, I love you. I have for a while; I just didn’t trust myself, my situation, my own self to say it. I let stuff from the past get to me because I wasn’t sure if I could believe. If I was ready to take that step, or if things were going to fall apart any minute. My mind was still in survival mode, even if my heart was five steps ahead of the game.”

  She choked out a watery laugh. “I—”

  “No, wait. Let me get it all out.” One corner of his mouth tilted up. “I’m not great with words, remember? I had this whole thing planned out. I’m sorry. I couldn’t be more sorry for how I let things fall apart between us. I made some serious mistakes, and I can’t change them. But I know what went wrong and I won’t let it happen again.”

  With a shuddery sigh, he rolled his shoulders. “So, can you forgive me? Or have I really screwed things up for good?”

  She stared at him, taking in the hesitant expression on his face, the way his body was coiled, as if ready to run at any second. Did he seriously doubt for a moment? “Of course I do. I screwed up too. I shouldn’t have led you on with the whole school thing. And then not knowing better about the birth control so I—”

  “No.” His voice, so fierce, cut through her apology like a knife. “Don’t. I k
now it wasn’t expected, but Kidney Bean’s here now. And I don’t want either of us to want to take that back. I love the bean already. No way would I give that up.”

  One hand instinctively went to her belly. “Neither would I. And I love you. I do. Still, always.”

  He grabbed under her arms and tugged until she sat with her legs draped over his, her head resting on his shoulder.

  “Good. Very good.”

  She sat for a moment, breathing in his scent, being lulled into a happy state by the feel of his arms around him.

  “I’m sorry, did you call our child Kidney Bean?”

  His chin rested on the crown of her head. “I think it has a certain ring to it, don’t you?”

  “Why not Dwayne Junior?” she teased.

  He groaned. “I love him too much to do that to him. We’ll figure something out.”

  His hand covered hers, resting protectively over their child.

  “You’re right. We’ll figure something out.”

  Acknowledgments

  This series has been such an eye-opening experience, from beginning to end. It was the birth of my first paperback, my first full-length series, and my first time working with my agent. I learned how to shoot a gun while researching this series, I moved twice while writing it (one move was a five-stater!), and survived the terrible twos as a mother. Talk about a learning curve, in every way possible. On-the-job training doesn’t come close to writing a series like this. But I loved (almost) every minute of it.

  There are too many people to thank from throughout this entire series, and I’ll forget 67 percent of them just due to excitement, so to be fair I will give everyone a shout-out combined. To those who have touched my life or these books in some way, thank you for your positive thumbprint on my life and the life of this series.

  There’s one group I can’t help but single out… the readers. I can’t thank you enough for joining these three Marines on their journeys to find love, and for joining me on this equally special journey. Stick with me, guys. I’ve got more in the tank!

  About the Author

  Jeanette Murray is a contemporary romance author who spends her days surrounded by hunky alpha heroes… at least in her mind. In real life, she’s a one-hero kind of woman, married to her own real-life Marine. When she’s not chasing her daughter or their lovable-but-stupid Goldendoodle around the house, she’s deep in her own fictional world, building another love story. As a military wife, she would tell you where she lives… but by the time you read this, she’ll have already moved. To see what Jeanette is up to next, visit www.jeanettemurray.com.