Bones Of Contention: The McKinnon Legends - The American Men Book 3 (14 page)

She was thinking about her own childhood and the fights she and her father had waged. Those were times she still cherished even if she was not always proud of her actions. She and her father were very close and always had been. Her teen years were the exception. He too had not dealt well with her growing up to be a woman and he had never fully realized she would always be her daddy’s little girl in her heart. She explained that to Josh.

He had been wrestling with this for days. Having an outsider tell him did not make it any easier. However, it did confirm what in his heart he already knew to be true.

“I know, but it’s just been the two of us for so long. I’m just not ready to share her, I guess, not to mention there is so much out there to hurt her.” Josh’s mind was reeling with the dangers she could face.

Jamie smiled. “You’re her father and it is natural for you to feel this way, but you won’t always be able to protect her from that hurt. We both, I’m sure, have had our share of young love and heartache. It is a part of the rite of passage to adulthood. For her this is a wonderful time and a terrible time, and it is all a part of growing up. You have to let her grow.”

Josh stood up and went to the fireplace. He pulled down a photo of the day he and Jacqueline brought Jesse home from the hospital. She was so helpless and depended on them for everything. She still did, but not as much. He had seen the differences lately, and the harder he tried the more Jesse seemed to pull away.

Jamie watched as the lawman facade dropped away leaving him open and honest. He was becoming a man and a father in her eyes, and she appreciated what she saw there. He was in pain and turmoil, and he had felt comfortable enough with her to ask for help. He was a man undoubtedly always in control of his person and always controlled the environment around him, yet he managed to straddle that fine line. This had to be hard on him to see his baby grow up. She came to stand in front of him.

“Listen, Josh, I know I’m no expert in child rearing and probably not saying anything you don’t already know, but knowing when it is time to start letting go is also a part of being a parent. You have to let her start to spread her wings. Usually, it would be her mother who would hold her and tell her the sorry bastard who just broke her heart doesn’t deserve her, but it will have to be you in Jesse’s case. You have to be strong enough to take it. Just be there when her heart breaks and tell her it will be all right. Oh, and keep your gun in the holster.”

She saw him smile and laugh once softly as her comment struck home. He had to let her grow up and being hurt was a part of it. He thought about the young highway patrolman who had been caught in an indiscretion with someone’s daughter. He thought of the traumatic experience Jamie went through at the hands of a drunken college kid. Jamie’s advice on keeping his gun holstered was tossed out in jest, but had a ring of truthful warning behind it as well. Maybe, she did know him after all.

They stood in comfortable silence for a few moments before Jamie’s curiosity got the better of her.

“You said you two have been by yourself a long time. Do you mind me asking about Jesse’s mother? If it is none of my business, then just say, ‘it is none of your business’.”

He liked her straightforwardness. At least he always knew where he stood. In some women he found it off-putting. Not with her.

The details of his life with Jacqueline were not usually something he shared even with the few women he had let into his inner circle. It was none of their business, just as she implied, yet he mentally shrugged. Why not tell her, he thought? She needed to know what happened to Jacqueline if she was going to be spending any time with Jesse.

“My wife divorced me to marry Julio Cesar Vozarosa, a Columbian ‘businessman’ worth millions due entirely to the cocaine he supplies and illegal weapons he runs.”

“Ah, I see.” It made perfect sense that he would not allow his daughter to be in his wife’s custody. “You got custody of Jesse the hard way.”

Jamie watched as Josh hardened. “You don’t know the half of it. I took my baby girl to England and had her protected while I waged war with that woman for Jesse.”

“Because no child of yours was going to be raised in a South American jungle surrounded by low-life drug dealers, and the F.B.I.’s most wanted.”

“Damn, straight. I could not protect my wife, but I’d be damned if I was going to let Vozarosa anywhere close to my baby girl.”

No doubt there was conviction behind those words as Jamie watched his body language shift yet again. He was going to protect his cub at all costs. He just eased up another rung on her ladder of acceptability.

“Where is she now?” Jamie asked curious about the woman who would leave such a gorgeous man and beautiful child behind.

“Jesse?” Josh asked surprised she would think Jess was anywhere other than in school.

“No, silly,” she laughed softly. “Jesse had better be in school. Otherwise, you have a much bigger problem on your hands than just a prom dress. I’m asking about your ex-wife. Where is she?”

“Dead,” his answer was succinct.

“Oh.”

Well, she thought, that takes care of the ex-wife issue, and Jamie was not all that surprised given the company with which the woman chose to run while she was still alive.

Josh continued. He had started, so she needed to have the whole sordid tail. "Jesse's mother thought to play the ends against the middle between two drug kingpins. The cost was her life, the life of another good agent, and almost Barbara’s and my daughter’s lives as well. Jacqueline discovered in spite of the fact she was beautiful, she was expendable once she became a liability. Vozarosa put a bullet between her eyes for her infidelity, fearing she had shared secrets of his operation with the enemy as pillow talk. Guess we'll never know.”

“Oh, my God, Josh, I remember that incident! It was all over the news. I assume Jesse was the little girl who was kidnapped?” She was shocked.

He nodded his head.

He seemed so normal. Yet, knowing this piece of information belayed his normal, ordinary-kind-of-guy status. There was much more to Josh McKinnon than just being the sheriff of a small West Texas county.

“Yes, a lowlife named Del Torres made the mistake of kidnapping my baby to use her as leverage against Vozarosa thinking to force him to give up territory in exchange for the life of his stepdaughter.”

Jamie remembered very vividly the details. It was just happenstance she and another archeologist were on a pre-Columbian dig at the time just south of the Panama border in northern Columbia. The American embassy sent messengers to their site to remove them, thinking there could possibly be repercussions to the team.

“I recall you and some of your family, along with an elite extraction team, went in to bring her out. The details were sketchy on the news, but rumor had it you guys went in and kicked some serious ass.”

That was putting it mildly, Josh recalled.

The trail of destruction the extraction team left behind to Del Torres’ operation was horrendous. The body count was high. All deserved to die yet, it was still not something he wished to discuss. The only thing positive to come from the whole operation was hundreds of millions of dollars of drugs and weapons never made it to the open market. However, the reality was with the death of Del Torres, a new drug kingpen filled his place. The vacuum was not felt for long. He felt sure within six months the drugs were back filtering in by the millions.

“Barbara was there along with her husband to help pull Jesse out. On the record we have to deny it, but off the record, it wasn’t pretty. Needless to say, I really wouldn’t look for me to go to Latin America on vacation any time in the near future.” His look was far away.

She could see he was remembering what must have been a horrific experience for him as a man and more so as a father.

The girl had been kidnapped. That being the case more likely as not, Jesse had been present for the grisly events. “And how much did she see?” Jamie asked grimacing, fearing she knew the answer.

She watched him briefly close his eyes and shake his head as if trying to dispel the memory.

“More than anyone under my protection should ever experience,” Josh answered again, closing his eyes against the thought of what his child had endured four years earlier and numerous child psychologists later.

“Oh, my God, Josh. That is terrible,” she sympathized. Without thinking, she put her arms around his neck hugging him tightly in support. He locked his arms around her waist accepting this honest gesture. She was being totally open for the first time. So was he.

She stepped back enough to see his face, placing her palm against his cheek. She could not imagine what this family must have gone through. Her own sister was missing in the jungles of the Amazon. At least they got Jesse back. She had her doubts she would ever see Patricia and her daughter Avery alive again.

“I’m sorry the two of you had to ever go through such an experience. No wonder you are so protective of her.” She paused as things began to really sink in for her. “And me.”

“Yes, and you.” Placing his hand over hers he, planted a kiss on the inside of her palm. Then, he released her before he went too far with the physical closeness she was offering. He had no idea what her intentions were toward him. For all he knew, she had a new boyfriend and was just being empathetic to his past plight. There had been, by all accounts, two men off and on at her house. Barbara had been very quiet when questioned about it reemphasizing it was not his concern or business what went on behind Jamie's closed front door. It pissed him off, but he was not going to poach even if Trey Jackson had tried.

“Josh, I’m sorry I have been difficult. It has just been hard for me to accept I needed the security.”

“I’m partly to blame, too. I’m sometimes just a little overbearing where people I care about are concerned. McKinnon men have a tendency to overprotect those within their scope of responsibility, and our women especially are very important to us. Still, even knowing Jackie was a shallow and vain woman, I feel sometimes as if I let her down.”

Jamie was the first person to hear his confession, and it felt good to say it out loud. Maybe, he could start to let the guilt go.

He looked down at the fingers wrapped around his bicep. She gently squeeze as if it was her way of snapping him out of his guilt.

“Don’t beat yourself up. She was a grown woman and made her own choices, Josh. It is not your fault Jacqueline died any more than it is my fault Debbie is dead. You said so yourself. Besides, any mother with the smallest amount of maternal instinct would never have placed her child in such a dangerous situation.”

“I keep telling myself that same thing over and over. I keep wondering how she could have done it, placing our baby in a lifestyle full of criminals.”

“You took Jesse out of it and that is the most important thing.” It was the only thing positive she could think to say.

“Still,” he shrugged still not convinced.

“Josh, listen to me for a moment. It is not your fault. Period. End of discussion. Some women are just insecure with who and what they are, and they feel that having a man and money is the path to happiness. I am probably stepping over boundaries here, but it sounds like Jacqueline was one of those.”

“But not you,” he made the flat statement.

He had no doubt this was a woman confident in life.

She shook her head. “No, I’ve seen too much and lived too long. Besides, I work at a public institution, Lawman. Obviously money is not a driving force for me.” She had learned years ago having money or a man was a double edged sword. “I cover my expenses, and I am very comfortable with who and what I am, with or without a male partner in my life. If I get lonely I deal with it. I do not need a relationship to feel fulfilled.”

“And the male in your life now, tell me, Doc, does he fulfill you?” Josh stepped closer.

“Absolutely!” she answered never hesitating.

That took him back a step. “Really?”

“Yes, Killer is all the male I need,” she smiled playfully.

“Killer?” Josh raised a questioning eyebrow, wondering if he really wanted Jesse out with her if her latest boyfriend was named Killer. He was probably an ex-convict covered in prison tattoos. He must be one of the two men who had been in her house recently. She did not seem the type, but looks could be deceiving. Jacqueline was a prime example of how wrong he could be at reading women.

“Yes, Killer. My three-pound Yorkshire terrier is just the kind of male I need in my life. He is always happy to see me when I come home, never leaves the toilet seat up, and never complains about the food I place in front of him.”

Josh burst out laughing. “How can I compete with that?”

His laughter rang true and her soul was filled for the first time in ages.

She smiled deeply and truly, and Josh felt himself fall the rest of the way. That was all it took.

She took a single step forward. It was all Josh needed to know.

“Well, you do have one thing going for you that Killer does not,” she lowered her voice seductively and playfully, as she placed her hands on his shoulders.

“And that would be?” he asked pulling her against him. She did not resist, finally receptive to his advances.

“You don’t have doggy breath,” she wrapped her arms around his neck stepping fully into his embrace.

“Maybe not, but I must warn you, Doc,” he said going in for the kill. Balling his fingers into her hair, he gently pulled her head back exposing the tender flesh of her throat. “I bite,” he warned as he nipped her neck just below her earlobe sending chills down her spine.

“I’ve had my shots,” she said feeling his warm breath on her lips.

“Then consider yourself warned,” he said just inches from her lips.

“Hey, Daddy, I’m home. Whose truck is that out front?” Jesse yelled from the back door as she made her way through the kitchen.

Josh quickly stepped away as if being caught doing something disgraceful, leaving Jamie feeling unfulfilled and wondering if he was ashamed of her. She knew her reputation was not exactly one of sparkle and shine being called everything from the Voodoo Queen to Physic Nut Doc by the press.