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Thyssen sat on the wooden Adirondack chair and stared out at the crashing surf as it broke onto the rocks. He never should have come here, not yet, and brought this kind of trouble to Charlotte and his son's door, but his feet had followed his dazed and fevered mind home. His subconscious knew he was trying to make his way back here to her, earn his way home once he finished the contracts for Stephanopoulos, so he supposed fate brought him to be lying at her feet in the shed.
He should have been on his fucking knees.
Gulls squawked and swooped over the water as if making their agreement known.
First thing in the morning he would back track to everything he could remember of his movements to see what kind of trail he left for The Stop to follow. Then he needed to track that killer down and end this chase before it got out of hand. Only then could he even hope to set things right with Charlotte. Meet his son and try to be a fatherThat is if Charlotte allowed it.
Fuck, he hoped she let him. So far, the only thing he saw of her were the shadowed memories from when he woke up. She had successfully avoided him all day and made sure their son did not come near him. But Thyssen had heard him, peals of laughter filtering in the window or under the door. He wondered what he looked like now.
He'd know Charlotte since they were kids, and his father brought him here to hunt and fish. He never really noticed her much at first, most of his time was spent out on the water or in the bush, until they were teens and she started helping her mother out in the Inn. The first day he really noticed her was so clear in his mind it could have been yesterday. He'd strolled into the main door, tired as hell from hours of driving, bleary eyed with his father's cigarette smoke in the truck cab. It didn't matter if the windows were rolled down, that shit still blew back inside. When he found the inn's desk empty, he let his finger rip on the bell.
Charlotte had stormed around the corner like an avenging angel, her dark red bun half fallen down her back and in her face, her gray eyes sharp on him, her neat little body bearing down on his bigger one with determination. He literally held his hands up and backed away as she approached.
A noise behind Thyssen broke into his memory.
"I see you're still alive."
He gave a half smile at the caustic tone of her voice behind him, even as his body hardened at feeling her so close again. This face to face confrontation with her had been years in coming, and his body was going shields up despite him wanting to be open and receptive to whatever she decided to throw at him. It was the soldier in him. Always prepared for battle.
He kept his eyes on the water. "Hangin’ in." He'd always been comfortable on the water, in the water, and around water. It was had made him such a good SEAL.
"Hmph." She came around his chair and leaned on the wooden rail. "Bloody assassins never get it right. I should have saved my money."
He squinted up at her. Still so fucking beautiful. That hadn’t changed. Not even a little bit. Her red waves were loose, her gray eyes still sharp and assessing, able to see right through his crap, and steady on him. Her body was now rounded into curves, he guessed from having their baby, which made her so much more of a woman now, and the way she filled out the skinny jeans and fitted T-shirt she wore was sexy as hell.
Fuck. Hewas such a bastard for questioning his son’s paternity, then walking out of their lives. He may not have been up to being a father back then, or to being the man she needed, he was so screwed up but he should have at least tried and not left her alone. He should have manned up and did something instead of doing fuck all.
"Thank you for not throwing me out on my ass again."
"Pfff." She narrowed her eyes, and he could see the storm of words gathering behind them. Three years' worth of built-up shit could be spewed at him any minute. "I never turn away a guest. You know that."
He sat forward. "Lucky—"
She held up her hand. "Don't call me that."
He clenched his jaw and tried again. "I know I have a lot to answer—"
"No, you don't." She pushed off the rail. "I came out here to tell you I want you gone. In the morning. Before I get up. I don't want to get up and find you still here."
He wanted to stand up to gain the advantage by dominating her space. He was miles taller and broader than her and had been conditioned to use everything he had in him and around him to subjugate situations to his advantage. But this was Lucky and he was in the wrong, so he forced himself to stay down. "Charlotte . . ." He looked up at her, but she spoke right over to him.
"You don't get to see Ian. You don't get to apologize. You don't get to come back here to ease your conscience and make nice."
"I want to explain—"
Her eyes darkened. "You don’t get to do that either." She turned to leave.
This time he stood directly in her path. Her womanly frame colliding with his. Sharp slivers of heat knifed through him every place their bodies touched. "Luck—Charlotte, I'm so fucking sorry—"
She hit him with an icy glare. "That is such a small thing to say." She stepped back and hopped over the wooden rail onto the rocks below.
He did not see that coming.
She put her hands flat on the wooden planked top. "And I don't know what kind of trouble you've got on your tail, but take whatever it is with you when you go. Your sorry will not protect my son."
"Our son." The words came out of his mouth before he could stop them.
"Your son? Tell me, Thyssen, how much did your son weigh when he was born? What vegetable does he hate? What does he like to sleep with? Is he potty trained? How about the color of his eyes? What do you know about your son?" She twisted her expression of one of complete disgust then pushed off the rail and headed off into the night.
He watched the line of her back for a moment before he spoke. "Ten pounds. Hates peas. My old fishing bear. Uses pull ups. Has his mother's gray eyes."
***
HOW THE HELL DID HE know all that about Ian? Charlotte’s insides still shook as she tried to snap Ian into his car seat the next morning. Her fingers wouldn't cooperate, so it took her two tries. Finally, the pieces clicked into place.
"There we go," she huffed and closed the door. Her mind wouldn't whirling with unanswered questions.
Thyssen could have asked Iannis about her questions, God only know her father-in-law knew everything there was to know about Ian, but last night her questions had been random and had come to her in that moment, not things Thyssen could or would have asked his father about after waking up from a fever yesterday.
She pulled open the inn's work truck driver side door and jumped into the front cab before pulling quietly away from the work shed. Everything was quiet with everyone still asleep or just waking up at this hour of the morning.
She needed to get out there before she stormed back to Thyssen's room and demanded answers. She'd almost done just that at least nine times last night so she was operating this morning on very little sleep. Damn that man.
What exactly was he sorry for? Leaving, staying away, or ripping my heart out?
And where has he been for the last three years? Walmart or the CIA? Either? How do did he know so much about Ian? Was he kicked out of the Navy or did he leave? Did he miss her? Ian? The life they had together?
She had so many questions that she was terrified of asking even one lest it be the floodgate that opened to all the others, a barrage beyond her control.
Bloody Thyssen Skalas. Washed back up on her door, looking so dangerously vulnerable. He looked exactly the same but so very different. An unnaturally hard edge and aggression lay behind his eyes now. Thyssen was always rough, but in an outdoor mountain man kind of way. She was used to that. He'd become a soldier and adopted a certain confidant aloof air after he'd joined the Navy and become a marine. She got used to that too. But, after he'd become a SEAL he'd become a whole different animal, and now this street gutter hardness? That was something she didn’t know anything about.
Who was he now? She had no idea and was almost scared to find out. She didn't know what to do with the dark stranger back at the inn. She'd always thought Thyssen would age like Iannis, into a rough Greek gentleman but—she checked Ian in the rearview mirror—he was off in a direction all on his own.
Her son looked out the window with the kind of eagerness only a toddler could have at this time in the morning. Iannis gave her a photo album of pictures of Thyssen when he was young. Ian looked exactly like him. Painfully so with a slight mix of her family. Dark black hair with a red tinge, dark gray eyes in olive-colored skin. He had a pouty little mouth and dimpled cheeks that popped out when he laughed. Her son was an adorable mix of dark Greek prince and highland Scot clansman.
Charlotte pulled onto the empty tree-lined highway that followed the waterline and beautiful stretch of the bay. The roadway was pleasantly deserted in the predawn morning. It was exactly how she loved it and if not for Thyssen would be thoroughly enjoying it on her balcony having her coffee before starting the day's rush.
She checked Ian in the rearview again and noticed a car coming up behind her. "He's flying low," she mumbled, slowing slightly so he could pass. He didn't though, and instead pulled right up to her bumper and sat there. "Asshole," she frowned.
"Asshole," Ian echoed.
"Ian." She sighed, lookingfrom the rearview to a few cars approaching in the other lane. Clearly, they were the reason the car behind her didn't pass her. She looked into her rearview again when the cars on the other side passed. The car behind her finally pulled out to pass. She glanced out her window to see a woman or maybe a very short man in a hoodie breeze past her. She looked out her front windshield in time to see the car jerk directly in front of her front bumper. "Shit!" She yanked the steering wheel right, immediately furious at herself when she hit the roadside gravel and started to skid. "Dammit!" Her heart slammed into her chest as the truck twisted toward the embankment. "Ian!" Her eyes went to the rearview as the truck started to roll.