Gina pictured Eric, a twenty-three-year-old, blond, attractive and charming L.A.P.D. rookie of four months. He’d worn the uniform proudly and well, with just enough swagger to make the leather of his gun belt creak when he moved. She’d loved the sound. She hadn’t loved the fact he carried a gun all the time, even off duty, even on their two-day honeymoon in Las Vegas after their hasty wedding.
But he’d courted her zealously, dazzling her, somehow knowing she needed someone to pay attention to her.
She hadn’t met anyone who’d wanted children as desperately as she—until Eric.
“Eric was an only child,” she said to J.T., “as was his father. It was very important to him that the Banning name continue. So important that when he was eighteen he banked sperm, in case something happened to him that made him incapable of fathering a child.”
She appreciated that J.T.’s expression showed merely interest. But maybe he was accustomed to not reacting to people’s eccentricities.
“He told me that the only wedding gift he wanted was a child to continue his name. I couldn’t reconcile that with the fact he’d entered a line of work with a higher-than-average mortality rate.”
“That may be people’s perception, but it isn’t true,” J.T. said.
“Yes, he assured me of that. It wouldn’t have mattered, anyway. He believed it was his calling. Don’t you feel the same way yourself?”
He seemed to retreat at the question. “I became a cop for a reason, yes.”
“Then, you should be able to understand.” She hesitated, considering his reaction, then a memory teasing her. Something Eric had told her about J.T. and a shooting, but the details were fuzzy. “Anyway, his dreams and mine were the same, so it wasn’t a sacrifice for me. I was more than willing to try to get pregnant right away. And more than willing to have his child if something happened to him. It was an easy promise to make.”
“So that dream you had about your father calling you a brood mare…?”
“The truth. Like the pot calling the kettle black, right? Look at my mom. Seven kids in twelve years.”
“And you were the fourth girl, not a novelty anymore, then followed by the first son. Did you get lost in the shuffle, Gina?”
His perception startled her. Her childhood was normal by most people’s standards, and she’d been loved, if not for herself, for her mere existence. But she’d wanted more. “My parents did the best they could.”
J.T.’s lips compressed but he said nothing.
She dug deep into her memories then. “After the accident I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to carry to term. My injuries were critical. I’d lost the baby I was carrying. I never got to feel my baby move, but I knew it was there. And I loved it.”
J.T. wrapped his hands around hers as she faltered.
“I needed around-the-clock care for a while, then extensive physical therapy for months. I moved in with my in-laws. Winnie, my mother-in-law, nursed me back to health. Then just about the time I was ready to be on my own again, my father-in-law died. I stayed on to help Winnie.”
“And you never left.”
“No. It was hard. She constantly reminded me of my promise. And I was haunted by the miscarriage. I kept dreaming of a baby crying, and I knew that the only way to end my grief was to get pregnant again. The first two times didn’t take. Then, finally, the miracle happened.”
“You got to keep your promise.”
“And satisfy my empty soul, too. I was beyond happy.”
“And your mother-in-law?”
“Obsessed wouldn’t come close to describing her. She monitored my every movement, every phone call. I couldn’t go anywhere without her. She hovered. She dictated. I kept trying to grow up, but she wouldn’t let me. Every time I tried to break free of her, she became more desperate. My blood pressure skyrocketed. The doctor told me that if I didn’t do something to change my situation immediately I could harm the baby and myself.”
“So you were right when you said you had to be protecting the baby,” J.T. said.
“Always. My child will always come first. I’m sure my doctor didn’t mean I should go so far from home, but I didn’t see another option. I had to go where she wouldn’t think to look.”
“To me.”
Such simple words. To me. Not, to Lost and Found. Not, to an old friend. To me. To him. Yes, him. In the time she’d known him, he’d confused her more than anyone she’d known, but she’d been sure he would help her.
“Yes. To you.” She held his gaze for a moment. Their hands were still linked, and she rubbed her thumbs over the backs of his hands, feeling their strength. “When Winnie made a quick trip to the grocery store, I wrote her a note, called my doctor to say I would be in touch after I settled in someplace, then I came here. I wanted to have time with my baby first, to learn on my own how to take care of him. Then I would contact Winnie.”
“So, what’s your plan now?”
“I figure I’ve got three weeks before she becomes desperate. Until my due date.”
“You don’t think she’s looking for you now?”
“Of course I do. But I left on my own accord. The police wouldn’t get involved, right? And I don’t think she knows about you—that we were friends. Or that I would come to you.”
“You’ve said that before. Were we friends, Gina?”
She frowned. “What would you call it?”
“You said you hated me.”
Gina felt her cheeks heat up. “I came to realize that you were only looking out for me. Then I never saw you again to say I was sorry. I’d accused you of being jealous, when all you were doing was being concerned.”
“Did I have reason to be?” His grip tightened on hers. His gaze bore into her. “Was he good to you, Gina? Were you happy?”
How could she answer that? Her expectations had been high. She’d thought Eric was her soul mate, but he’d changed after the wedding, becoming possessive, always making her aware that her primary duty was to have his child, to the point of nothing else mattering. He’d wanted her to quit college, to be accessible to him all the time.
“I’d known him a month when we got married,” she said to the patiently waiting J.T. “Then we were married for only three months when he died. We hadn’t had time for our relationship to settle in.”
The baby started to fuss then, the sound coming over the monitor. Deputy padded into the room and stared at Gina. “I think he’s trying to tell me something. And I’m kind of talked out, anyway.”
J.T. helped her up. She stood on tiptoe and kissed his soap-scented cheek. “Thank you for listening. You were always good at that.”
“Stop thanking me. It’s no hardship.”
She took a few steps, then turned around. “I think you’re the only person who’s ever looked at me, really looked at me when I talked.” He was doing it again, she realized. Right that second. “Good night, J.T.”
When the baby started to cry three hours later, J.T. was already awake. He’d barely slept since they’d gone to bed, instead listening for sounds from the next room, keeping at bay the old nightmare that had resurfaced upon Gina’s return to his life.
No. She wasn’t to blame. Guilt by association with Banning? That wasn’t fair. But if it hadn’t been for Eric, there would be no nightmare. No reason to quit the force.
That night in the pizza parlor might have turned out so differently.
J.T. stuffed an extra pillow behind his head as her voice, soft and soothing, filled the brief spaces when the baby stopped crying long enough to take a breath. He’d been pondering all she’d said earlier, trying to understand what drove her.
She’d taken too long to reply to his question about whether Eric had made her happy, then never really answered the question at all. “We hadn’t had time for our relationship to settle in,” she’d said. It seemed to him that the first three months of a marriage would be the happiest, the most exciting.
So, what did it mean?
His thoughts drifted back three years. Helpless, he’d watched Eric pursue her, had listened to him brag about how easily she’d fallen for him, like it was a contest and she was first prize. When Eric announced their engagement, J.T. agonized for days over what to do, finally convincing himself that since she didn’t have any family around, someone needed to be a big brother to her. He knew Eric; she didn’t. He wouldn’t be too specific.
He’d gone to her dorm room, had tried to dissuade her from such a quick decision to marry, but she was head over heels, almost defiantly so, resenting his interference more than he imagined. He’d taken a chance, and lost. She would marry a man completely unworthy of her.
“He makes me happy,” she announced. “And I hate you—hate you for trying to steal my happiness.” She moved in on him, close enough that her perfume clung to his shirt afterward. “I think you’re jealous.”
He touched her for the first and last time, cupping her cheek, understanding that she was lashing out because he’d hurt her, hadn’t treated her as an adult. Her eyes went black with emotions too complicated for him to sort, but not from anger alone. “I only want the best for you,” he said honestly.
“He is,” she insisted.
He made himself walk away, then hadn’t seen her again. She and Eric eloped to Las Vegas the next week, and their social lives didn’t mingle after that. But either she’d told Eric about their conversation, or he’d picked up on something, because his retribution came in a moment on the job that led directly to J.T.’s resignation from the force.
Hell. He punched his pillow, trying to get comfortable, not wanting to think about it anymore. The baby stopped crying midhowl. Gina yelped. Curious, he climbed out of bed and headed to her room.
He tapped on the door, waited to be invited in.
“Did we wake you?” she asked apologetically from among a pile of pillows. The top of the dresser had been converted into a changing table, a lamp beside it turned on low. “He has lungs, doesn’t he?”
“I heard you shout.”
“My milk came in. I’m really tender, and he latched on hard, then got a mouthful of milk. I’m not sure which one of us was more surprised, but his expression was so funny. Now he’s just chugging away.”
“Do you need anything?”
“Company.” She patted the bed beside her. “I get a little worried that I’ll fall asleep on him. I’ve never been so tired.”
He stretched out beside her, leaned into her nest of pillows and watched the baby nurse. She wore an old flannel shirt of his, unbuttoned and flipped open on one side. Rosie had commandeered it because Gina’s long nightgown didn’t allow easy access to nurse.
The baby hiccuped, gulped and squeaked his way through the feeding. No one could stay detached watching him.
Gina laughed, said “Ow” a few times, and used her childbirth breathing techniques to try to relax. J.T. smiled sympathetically.
“You’re a greedy boy, aren’t you, sweetheart?” she crooned.
Not as greedy as I would be. J.T. put an arm around her. She stiffened for a second, then wriggled into a more comfortable position.
“I need him to change sides and relieve the pressure. I’m bursting at the seams.”
Unable to utter a coherent word, J.T. rested his chin against her shoulder and watched as she maneuvered clothing and baby. She glanced in J.T.’s direction when her son was settled and suckling.
“Want to feel how hard my breasts are?”
He lifted his gaze, not saying anything.
“Go ahead. You won’t believe it.”
Shifting a little, he pressed his knuckles to her breast. “Whoa.”
“I don’t know why I’m laughing. It hurts like the dickens.”
Fascinated, he spread his palm over her, sliding his fingers under the fabric above her breast. She went silent and still. Joey continued to nurse, oblivious.
“How can something so…maternal be so damned sexy?” he asked, knowing it sounded perverse, but refusing to apologize for telling her the truth.
“That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.” She focused her gaze on her son again as J.T. moved his hand to cup the back of the baby’s head. “Why haven’t you married?”
“I don’t have a clear-cut answer to that, Gina. I just haven’t.”
“Don’t you want children of your own?”
“It’s never been high on my list.” Which was a simple answer to her complicated question, so he added a bit more. “I’ve seen a dark and ugly side of life.”
“I know that being a police officer gives you a whole different perspective, but you have to have faith, J.T.”
There was nothing he could say to that. Nothing. It wasn’t only being a cop that made him see things differently. There was Mark, too, his brother, who’d lived so tragically, then died so violently.
“What about the woman you’re seeing?” Gina said then.
Small-town gossip. Would he ever get used to it? “Rosie’s information isn’t up to date.”
“Oh.”
Just one word, but a lot of emotion packed into it, if he cared to break it down.
He didn’t. “Will you be okay if I go back to bed now?”
“Sure. He’s almost asleep, I think.” She avoided his gaze. “Thanks. It’s really nice being able to share everything with you.”
“Yell if you need me.”
“Okay.”
At the door he turned around. “Did you tell Eric about our conversation?”
“Which one? The time you came to my dorm?”
He nodded.
“No. Why?”
“Just curious.”
He gripped the door frame. Somehow Eric had known J.T. was a threat. After they were married, Eric gloated about her while he and J.T. were on patrol, about the fact he’d found the world’s last virgin and how hot she was. J.T. changed the subject or tuned him out, but images burned, anyway—as Eric had surely intended.
“Eric didn’t need to know,” Gina said. “It was personal, between you and me. He would’ve read too much into it, plus you had to work together. As it turns out, I was wrong, anyway. You weren’t jealous. Good thing I didn’t say anything.”
Trusting his instincts again, he walked back to her bed, no plan in mind, no words on his tongue, just a need to clear the air about that night.
She’d kept their conversation secret. He didn’t know why that surprised him, but it did. And pleased him.
He started to thank her, but she looked at him with those deep, dark eyes that reminded him of the night they met. He leaned toward her, watching her, seeing need reflected in her steady gaze. No words, after all. He kissed her instead, without the restraint he’d used earlier, invading her mouth, feeling blistering heat in return, more than acceptance, beyond cooperation. Her sighs and moans fueled him. He dove his fingers through her hair, cupped her head, changed the angle of the kiss, searching, seeking, devouring, years of need released in one brilliant moment.
The pedestal he’d placed her on sank to ground level. Equals now, in passion and need. Just that damned age difference of a century or so, and a philosophical difference of more than that.
He still couldn’t give her what she needed—children—and she wouldn’t be happy with just one. But she also needed to know that he’d never judged her and found her wanting, as she’d believed.
He forced himself to stop, disciplined himself to walk away. At the door he looked at her, at the innocence still shining in her eyes after all she’d been through.
“I was jealous,” he said, setting the record straight, not staying to see her reaction.
Rather cowardly, don’t you think, for a knight of the realm? Mark’s voice echoed in his head, as it had been too often lately.
In his bedroom, J.T. slid a photo of his brother from where it was buried in his dresser. Mischievous eyes. A charming smile. Brilliant mind. And all those demons inside.
“Just who the hell are you to speak of cowardice?” he asked his brother.
A silent taunt answered him, but it spoke volumes.