Hard to Hold Page 13

  She’d never had the heart to tell him that part of the reason she’d gone had been to get away from him, to gain some perspective on their relationship, to figure out a way to tell him she wanted to break it off.

  Running to Africa. Running to the Navy. She had to stop running, and it appeared that Jake was her brick wall. “I’m going to be all right, Mom.”

  “I might not be there for you all the time, but I know what you need.”

  “I know what I need too.”

  Jeannie smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. Isabelle knew this fight was far from over.

  CHAPTER

  10

  Jake was already outside, waiting in his car as she dragged her two suitcases past the security team on the porch, brushing off their offers of help.

  She’d already said an uneasy good-bye to her mother, who was now on the phone checking in with her assistant. Her uncle’s office door was closed, which was good. She didn’t want to give him time to think about stopping her again. The conversation with her mother had continued along the same vein of Please don’t go to Africa, ramping up to insistent yelling until Isabelle had been saved by her mother’s ringing cell phone and Jake’s honk.

  Jake, who was out of the car and onto the porch in seconds. “What are you doing?”

  “She refused help,” one of the men offered and Jake just shook his head, first at the men and then at her.

  He watched her with an unabashed stare, his gray eyes picking up the navy blue of his sweatshirt, making them look deep and mysterious, waiting as if he had a lifetime of patience. Or at least the training to pretend.

  He’d wrapped his hair back in a bandanna, much in the same way he’d worn it in Africa. She’d meant to ask him how he could get away with wearing his hair so long, how many times he’d been shot … how many women he’d rescued. How he was so brave.

  So many things she wanted to know. And he was still waiting for her answer to what she thought she was doing.

  “I’ve got them,” she argued, still feeling ornery. She even tried to wrestle one of the suitcases out of his hand while he stood there and stared at her, not releasing his own grip on her bags.

  “I don’t believe it. You might actually be as stubborn as I am.” She relented at his words and he took both suitcases and, despite the fact that he was the one recovering from a bullet wound, carried them effortlessly to the car and threw them into the back of the old Blazer. “Is that it?”

  “For now. The rest of my stuff’s in storage. I figured I’d have it delivered once I’d found myself a more permanent place.” She paused. “Can I drive?”

  “No.” He opened the passenger-side door for her and she climbed in. He had the radio blasting—some old school heavy metal rock, and when he got in and went to turn it down, she shook her head.

  “Keep it,” she called, and let herself get lost in the pounding beat of the music. This was the stuff she played when she performed surgery—the more delicate the procedure, the more frantic the songs, as if the force of the beat could tamp her nerves down to a manageable place.

  She leaned in to turn the music up more as he yanked the SUV away from the curb, plowed straight through a snowdrift and shot off down the street.

  And somehow, even though his driving methods actually seemed to have gotten worse in the span of a few hours, she was getting used to them—enjoying the motion, even. She found herself leaning into the curves, the speed filling her body, and once they got moving—really moving—on the highway, she asked, “Can you open the sunroof?”

  He didn’t blink or question, just rolled it open and glanced over at her.

  In response, she undid her seatbelt and maneuvered herself so she could stick her upper body completely outside the car.

  At first, she hung tightly on to the ski rack on the roof as she steadied her footing on her seat and the console below. The wind buffeted her body so hard she couldn’t open her eyes, and so she didn’t—kept them closed and let herself sway with the sensation of the fast moving car underneath her and the bite of the wind and she was free, without boundaries.

  She let go of her hold and held her hands over her head and the car moved on a downhill slope of the parkway—with no one in front of them, Jake was pushing the Blazer faster, as if he knew she needed a free fall with a net.

  Her ears rang, lungs pained with every breath she took and, as the car barreled along the highway, she opened her mouth and yelled into the cold night air, as loud as she could manage against the pressure building in her lungs, over and over until the tension left her body, until her throat hurt.

  Until she felt better.

  She climbed back inside the car and sat heavily, rubbed her arms to try to get rid of the chills racking her body. She noted that Jake had taken a much different route to his house and realized she’d been up there for longer than she’d thought.

  He rolled the sunroof closed and jacked up the heat. “Rough night?”

  “You could say that. After I told them that I’d already signed my new Doctors Without Borders commitment contract, the shit pretty much hit the fan. At first, I thought we’d come to an understanding, but the more we talked, the worse things got. My mother told me that I was not listening to reason and Uncle Cal asked how I managed, and I quote, to take on one of Jake’s finer qualities in such a short time.” She was breathing hard, thanks to the cold air blasting her lungs, and her side ached from her exertion.

  He snorted. “I don’t think that’s a compliment to either of us.”

  “You think?” She rubbed her temples. “Did you ever get caught up in something without realizing it? And then, all of a sudden, you turn around and you’re trapped and you have no idea how you got there?” she asked, didn’t wait for his answer. “With the trips—with Doctors Without Borders, I was taking back me. Discovering what I wanted. When I was there, I wasn’t a senator’s daughter who’d just gotten an offer to practice in a prestigious practice or someone’s fiancé. I was just Isabelle. I liked who I was. But that doesn’t matter to them. They’re going to try to stop me. Any way they can.”

  She wouldn’t let that happen. And she had so much more to tell him—and the words just came out in a rush. “It’s just that … I feel better around you. Safer. Comfortable. Is that wrong? Does it mean I’m not healing the right way? What’s the right way, Jake? Because if you know the secret, I’d love for you to share it.”

  “I think you’re too hard on yourself. It’s all right not to be all right,” he said.

  “Cresswell women don’t fall apart,” she said. “That’s my mother’s motto.”

  “I think you’re going to have to find a new motto.” He paused. “You told your mom you were moving out too.”

  “Of course I did. I’m not a prisoner. But my mother thinks I should move back into her house since I’m not happy at the clinic. I’ve lovingly nicknamed her place the compound.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  “She wanted to assign me two bodyguards after it all happened. I mean, how could I ever trust—” She bit her lip. “No, that’s not true. I have to trust.”

  “You don’t have to do anything.”

  “That’s a really good motto. How’s that working for you?” She saw the tug of a smile playing at the corner of his mouth.

  “Works just fine if you do it right.”

  “And you’re going to teach me how to do it right?”

  “Some people might say that I’ve taught you too much already.” He cut her a sideways glance. “What did you have in mind?”

  What did she have in mind?

  “Suppose I want to trust you to touch me? Any way you’d like. Any way that I’d like.” The words had tumbled out faster than she could stop them and yet she didn’t avert her gaze from Jake’s profile, stared at the way his large hands held the wheel easily, with his thumb caressing the braided leather. And she held her breath a little too.

  “Rules of the game?” he asked finally.

  �
�What do you mean?”

  “Before I go into a mission, I always ask what the rules of the game are. I need to know what I’m allowed—and not allowed—to do.”

  “And do you always follow those directions?”

  His eyes met hers for a quick second—calm and direct in the soft glow from the oncoming car headlights. “For your game, yes.”

  His words took her breath away again. For a few seconds, she couldn’t answer him. When she finally did, she tried to keep the tremble out of her voice.

  “I don’t know the rules. I’m just making them up as I go along,” she admitted. “But I want you to keep trying … to touch me.”

  “You’re going to get mad at me. A lot,” he told her unapologetically.

  “Probably. And I’m sure I’ll piss you off again too. But I’ll try not to jump onto any more buses without telling you first.” She watched as Jake bypassed a slower-moving car from the narrow shoulder left of the fast lane. “Where are we going?”

  He pulled into a back parking lot and she saw the neon diner sign. “I figured you never did get around to eating anything tonight.”

  “Is this a date?” she asked as he started to climb out of the car. He shut the door behind him without answering, and before she could shift and open her own door, he was doing that for her.

  “It’s dinner, Isabelle,” was all he said.

  Jeannie had stormed into Cal’s office without knocking. At first he thought her fury—justifiable, of course—was aimed at his allowing Isabelle to move out.

  When he actually looked into her eyes, a deep, rich brown that had pulled at him since he was seventeen years old, he knew something much worse had happened.

  “He called me … that bastard called me, Cal.” Her voice shook, a mix of anger and fear as she shoved her cell phone at him, as if he could trace the number.

  It would be a pre-paid cell. “Tell me what he said.”

  “He said he’s coming back—back here. For me, for you and for Isabelle.”

  “He won’t get out of Africa.”

  “He said he’s got his transport out of Africa. He said he’s …” She drew in a sharp breath. “Said he’s ready to see Izzy again. We need to get her better protection.”

  “I’ve got protection detail on her,” Cal said.

  “A SEAL? One SEAL?” Jeannie let out a harsh laugh and stared at him, and he remembered a time when she’d thought one SEAL would be enough. A time when he might’ve agreed with her.

  “I’m going to ask Jeannie to marry me.”

  James said it so matter-of-factly that Cal nearly dropped the weapon he’d been cleaning.

  “That’s fast, isn’t it?” Cal asked with a feigned casualness, tried not to think about the way Jeannie had ended up in his bed last night after her fourth date with James. Tried not to think about the way his time with her was running out.

  “It’s never too fast when you’ve found the right woman.” James had worn a smile Cal remembered clearly to this day.

  “Why did you let her go?”

  “You were too close to telling her, Jeannie.” If Isabelle hadn’t stormed out of the house before Rafe called … well, he didn’t want to think about that.

  “I’ll give you forty-eight hours, Cal. And then I’m telling her everything.”

  “Now you’re threatening me?”

  “It’s not a threat. Isabelle deserves the truth. She should’ve learned about all of it years ago, when I did.”

  “The truth isn’t always the right thing,” he reminded her.

  “The truth is the only thing I’ve ever had.”

  Jake nodded to the familiar hostess and she led him and Isabelle past the noisy main portion of the diner and into one of the side rooms. Quieter, but still large enough so she’d be comfortable.

  She slid into the booth and tucked her legs underneath her. He noticed that she’d kicked off her shoes, as his feet hit them when he slid in across from her.

  She still wore her blue scrubs, hair up, and if she wore any makeup, he couldn’t tell. Even with light smudges under her eyes signaling lack of sleep, she was easily the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

  He watched the way her hands held the sides of the menu, her fingers playing along the plastic edges as if they couldn’t keep still, constantly seeking … feeling.

  She’d done that along his arm, his thigh the night of the rescue. Her entire body had been shaking, except for her hands, which had been steady and nimble as they’d stroked along his cammies.

  Surgeon’s hands. Hands wasted working in a clinic doling out Motrin and doing physicals.

  Hands he wanted all over his body. Right now.

  Jesus Christ, he had to get a grip.

  He noted when they’d both gotten out of the car that she didn’t even check her six and made a mental note to start reminding her, subtly, to stay more aware of her surroundings.

  He was already far too aware of her.

  “So, when am I going to meet your brothers and which one of them can I blame for your driving technique?” she asked after they’d placed their orders and had taken some time choosing songs from the mini-jukebox that sat on their table.

  It was as good a time as any to tell her. “You’ve met both of them. Devane and Waldron.”

  “Oh. Yes, I remember them,” she said quietly. “From Africa.”

  “We’re brothers by adoption. Chris’s dad took me in after my stepfather died. Nick moved in two weeks later. I don’t even think the adoption was legal or anything, but at that point, no one argued.”

  “That’s how you were allowed to be on the same team.”

  “Yes. Although that was more of a fluke. A pretty recent one too. Chris just came back from Coronado a few months ago.” He didn’t tell her that Nick had transferred out of the mythical Team Six, aka DevGru before it had disbanded. That was still classified information. “They’re my brothers, but they’re also my best friends.”

  “My dad was best friends with Uncle Cal. They were on a mission together when he saved Uncle Cal’s life. I’m sure the admiral must’ve told you that story.”

  They paused while the waitress placed the heavy plates in front of them, winked at Jake and left them alone again. If Isabelle noticed the wink, she didn’t say anything, just dug immediately into her food.

  “The admiral never talks about his missions, unless it’s to give us a specific piece of advice.” He took a bite of his turkey club and realized it had been too long since he’d eaten as well.

  She swallowed a large bite of her own sandwich before she spoke again. “My father was on a mission with Uncle Cal—when Uncle Cal was still UDT and my dad was with Naval Intel. There was another UDT sailor they were both friends with, a guy named Kevin. I remember him—he came around a lot. For a long time, it didn’t make any sense to me, how a man who used to bring me stickers and candy when he used to visit could just turn on his friends.”

  “Kevin killed your father?”

  She nodded. “Uncle Cal found out that Kevin had been smuggling arms and was about to get caught, and wanted to put the blame on my father and Uncle Cal. I guess he tried to kill them both so they wouldn’t talk. My dad jumped in front of Uncle Cal to talk Kevin down, and he took the bullet for him.”

  “And then Cal shot Kevin.”

  “Yes.” She stared out into the dark for a second, the sounds of the jukebox playing softly filled the silence. “I can’t imagine what that’s like—living with that guilt.”

  “I’m sure it tears him up, but he’s got training on his side.”

  “How can you train for something like that?”

  “It’s different for us,” he said finally. “We’re trained not to think about that—we’re trained to react and concentrate on the good of the mission, not the aftermath.”

  “But you’re human.”

  “Not when we’re on the job,” he said. “Look, if I worried every second about my team, I’d never be able to focus on the task at hand.
You clear your mind and let your training take over. I know it sounds bad, but it’s the way it is. We don’t take the oath First do no harm.”

  She’d finished her own fries and began to eat his right off his plate. He’d never been one to share—or share well—but he didn’t say a word.

  “It’s actually similar to the way I’ve been taught to view patients—cool and calm, without emotion,” she said. “What oath do you take, by the way?”

  “Do no harm. Unless someone harms you first.”

  That made her smile a little bit, and God, he liked making her smile. “You said this would be your fourth trip to Africa with Doctors Without Borders. What was your first time there like?”

  She rested her chin in her palm, her fingers tapped the side of her face. “My first trip lasted six months—I was in the Congo. It’s always longer the first time. I guess they figure you’re green enough that you’ll agree to it. The next few times, you know better—know what you can handle and what you can’t.”

  She drew in a breath before continuing. “The first time you go, it’s intense. You have no idea what to expect, even though you’ve been told over and over. And then you get there and you’re immersed and then you come home and you’re lost. No one gets it. And it’s not their fault and it’s not yours, but for a while there’s just this huge disconnect.”

  He nodded, because he got it. Immediately. Wasn’t so different from returning from any combat mission. Reentry was always a bitch.

  “I wondered, for a while, when things would feel normal. And then I realized that they never would.” She shrugged, like it didn’t matter, but he knew differently. “It’s better the second time. Because you realize that talking about it doesn’t change anything. For you, or for them.”

  “Not an easy life.”

  “Well, I guess we all chose it,” she said.

  “You’d be surprised at how that choice is made for a lot of men and women. If you consider the military over jail to be a choice.”

  “So it was jail or the military?”

  “No, not for me. Nick and Chris got themselves into some trouble and got caught. They let it go too far and they had to make that choice.”