Falling for Her (24 page)

She wasn’t going to need a divorce because he was going to kill the bastard.

“If I’d been . . .” she took a shuddering breath. “If I’d been Sugar then, I would’ve run to the kitchen, grabbed a knife, and killed him.” As if she couldn’t meet his gaze, her eyes lifted to the monitor. “Hannah though, she knew he would kill her, too, if he caught her watching, so she slipped away and obediently waited in the car for him. She was so scared.”

Turning back to him, a spark of defiance in her eyes, she said, “It was the day Sugar was born. The day the seed was planted to get revenge for what he had done to my friend, and then disappear.”

“Oh, baby,” Jamie whispered, and gently rocked her as more tears flowed. She was amazing! Young, alone, and without any of the skills most would need to go up against a man who thought nothing of taking an old woman’s life, Sugar had managed to deliver a serious blow to a bully of the worst kind.

She pushed away and turned to face him. Her eyes lowered to his chest, and she touched his damp shirt. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to cry and get you all wet.”

“You can get me wet anytime you want, Sugar.”

“I love it when you talk dirty.”

He hadn’t intended the double entendre, but when she gave him a wavering smile, light returning to her eyes, he grinned. “If that’s what turns you on, I can talk even dirtier, trust me.”

“I do trust you, Jamie.”

He trailed the back of his knuckles down her damp cheek. “I have things to say to you, Sugar Darling, but not here. When I say them, I want your undivided attention.” Unable to resist those lush lips, he kissed her.

“Jamie,” she breathed into his mouth.

Even as he mentally thanked Kincaid for arranging for her to be in a private room, he remembered they were in a hospital. “Wicked girl,” he said. “Another minute and we’re going to set off every alarm on that machine hooked up to you. We keep going, and we’re gonna have an audience.”

“Can we charge admission?” she asked, merriment dancing in her beautiful eyes.

“No, I’m not a sharing kind of man.” He was toast, burned to a crisp by an amazing woman. To keep from taking her in a narrow bed where any one of a dozen people could walk in on them, he let go of her and lowered his feet to the floor. “Sugar, there are some things we need to talk—”

“Did she agree?” Kincaid asked, striding into the room. Maria scooted around him and went straight to Sugar.

Sugar kept her gaze on him, ignoring Kincaid. “Agree to what?”

“To how we can end this,” Jamie answered, taking her hand. He’d argued against Kincaid’s plan, not wanting to put Sugar anywhere near the monster calling himself her husband. “We have good intel that he’s back home, and we could have him arrested today for the assault on you. What we want, and I know you want, however, is for him to go to prison for the rest of his life, and a murder charge will do that. We have a plan, but you—”

“Wait.” Her gaze shifted from him, to the boss, then back to him. “I have a plan, too. I want you to show me how to wear a wire, then I’m going to arrange a meeting with my . . . with Rodney.”

She’d almost said
my husband
, and he wished she’d just refer to the man how she often did, as
bad cop
.

“That’s what we were going to ask you to do, Sugar,” Kincaid said. “We need you to get him to admit he killed Mrs. Lederman.”

“I still don’t agree with this,” Jamie said, trying one last time to stop the inevitable.

Kincaid and Sugar ignored him as they settled something between them without words.

“It’s the only way,” the woman he loved said.

It wasn’t. He could always steal her away and take her to a foreign country where no one would ever find them. He had the know-how, the contacts to make it happen. But she’d hate him for taking away her courage to stand up to the man who had stolen her innocence, who had decided a fifteen-year-old girl was fair game for his proclivities.

“It is the only way,” he said, ignoring the urge to forbid her getting anywhere near Vanders.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

S
ugar sat in what Jamie had told her was the war room, ready to hear the details of Operation Free Sugar, a mission name that she really, really liked. She tried not to stare all wide-eyed at the various large screens and digital maps, and especially not at the men sitting at the conference room table—Mr. Kincaid, Jamie, Jake Buchanan, and Ryan O’Connor. They were, for sure, a badass bunch of men, and they were there for her.

Everything was happening so fast that she wouldn’t be surprised if Jamie leaned over and whispered into her ear that her head was literally spinning. Instead, he slipped his fingers through hers, the top of the table hiding their joined hands from the others. That settled her like nothing else would have.

“Why did you call the FBI?” she asked, suddenly remembering something Mr. Kincaid had said at the hospital. Rodney would kill her if he knew that, because of her, the Feds now had his name.

“Because they can call off the local cops and let us take care of this for you,” Mr. Kincaid—the man who so intimidated her that she couldn’t think of him without a Mr. in front of his name—said. “And, Sugar, there is no one you want on your side more than
the men at this table. We will take Vanders down, and then we’ll turn him over to the FBI where he will be prosecuted to the fullest by federal authorities.”

The hard glimmer in his dark eyes that told her he spoke the truth won her over. “Okay, how are we going to do it?”

As Jamie squeezed her hand in what she took as approval, Mr. Kincaid smiled a rare smile. She wasn’t quite as afraid of him after that.

“Isn’t there some other way than putting her anywhere near that bastard?” Jamie said.

Before anyone else could answer, she shook her head. “No. It has to be me.” She lifted her gaze to his. “I know you’re worried, but it really is the only way.”

At Jamie’s resigned nod, Kincaid said, “Then let’s get to work.”

“I’m going to have to wear a wire, aren’t I?” That was what frightened her the most. If Rodney found a wire on her, he would kill her before any of them could get to her, no matter how badass they were.

“He will never find it, sweetheart,” Jamie said, as if he understood her greatest fear. He took the watch Mr. Kincaid slid across the table and held it in front of her. “Hold out your arm and let me put it on you. You need to get used to wearing it so that by the time you see him, you’ll forget you have it on.”

The silver watch Jamie slid over her hand and clasped at her wrist was pretty, and she would never have guessed there was a wire in it.

The screen on the far wall flicked on, startling Sugar. She glanced over to see that Mr. Kincaid had a tablet open in front of him, and he tapped his finger on it. Just like that, the house she had lived in with Rodney was there on the wall. As she watched, she was taken on a tour, starting with a view of the outside and the sidewalk leading up to the front door.

“We have the blueprint of the inside, Sugar, but tell us what we’re not seeing. Describe each room, the furniture, the floors,” Jamie said. “Are they hardwood or carpet? Is there anything I might trip over?”

It was hard to breathe. That house held her worst memories . . . no, they held Hannah’s memories, not hers. She straightened in her chair, and with her hand clutched tightly around Jamie’s, she answered all their questions about the p
lace she’d hoped never to see again—where the sofa was, the coffee table, which wall the bed was near, and on and on. By the time they were satisfied with room sizes and where every single piece of furniture was located, she felt numb and in a strange way, removed from the house she’d once called home.

Perhaps that had been intentional, and if so, she didn’t have the words to tell the men how much she appreciated it.

“You did good, sweetheart,” Jamie said, leaning over and giving her a soft kiss near her eye.

Mr. Kincaid closed his tablet. “Tomorrow, I want you to wear the exact clothes you will have on when you knock on Vanders’s door.”

That was strange, and she glanced at Jamie, getting only a mysterious smile from him. “You’ll see,” he said.

For the second day in a row, Sugar was wide-eyed. These people were freakin’ scary and just plain amazing. Covered from her neck to below the knee in a long-sleeved, dark blue dress with a white Peter Pan collar, she stood at the entrance of a warehouse in the back of K2 that she hadn’t even known existed. Who were these people? Although she understood they were involved in things not to be talked about, she’d not had a clue of what they were capable.

In front of her was a replica of Rodney’s house that, as far as she could see, was as real as she remembered. There was even a gouge at the bottom of the door where Rodney had once kicked it in anger. Her stomach rolled, and she turned to leave.

“Easy, sweetheart.”

Jamie wrapped his arms around her, and she sank into his protective warmth. “I don’t think I can do this.”

“Is that Hannah talking or Sugar?”

A hammer to her head wouldn’t have gotten through to her any better than Jamie’s question. With a renewed sense of determination, she turned and faced the house of her nightmares.

“That was Hannah,” Sugar said as she marched toward the door.

For the remainder of the day, they had her knocking on that door over and over, and when Mr. Kincaid opened it, playing the role of Rodney, which he did frighteningly well, they acted out different scenarios.

By the time night fell and she was deemed as prepared as possible, she was exhausted and considered kissing every one of them in thankfulness. Mr. Kincaid still intimidated her too much to even try to plant a smack on him, and she figured Jamie wouldn’t appreciate her kissing Jake and Ryan, so she settled for sinking into Jamie’s arms and letting him hold her.

“Thank you, all of you,” she said. The words were inadequate for what they were doing for her, and she tried to blink away her tears of gratitude. Ryan winked at her as he left, Jake saluted her as he followed Ryan out, and Mr. Kincaid came to a stop in front of her.

“I’ve told you this before, Sugar, but it bears repeating. We take care of our own, and you are one of ours now. This won’t be nearly as hard as living with that bastard, so remember that.” He dipped his head at her, then strode away.

“I’m almost getting over shakin’ in my boots whenever he’s around,” she said when she and Jamie were alone.

Jamie laughed. “Took me years to accomplish that. Whadda you say we go home, order a pizza, and then snuggle up?”

“Sounds like heaven.”

Since she’d been out of the hospital, Jamie had constantly been by her side, whether at K2 or at his place, jumping to take care of her every need. She couldn’t go to the bathroom without him breathing down her neck. More than once, she’d bitten her tongue to keep from snapping at him. Like now.

“You know, I really can go pee without you standing outside the door.”

“What if you fall or something?”

“Then I’ll just get back up.” He sighed when she bypassed the bed he wanted her to get into and headed for the living room. If the man and cat didn’t stop shadowing her, she’d scare them both when she started screaming for them to give her room to breathe. It was like the two were afraid to let her out of their sight.

It really was sweet the way Jamie worried over her, but he’d also refused to touch her out of fear of hurting her. Installing her in his bed because it was bigger and more comfortable, he’d spent his nights in the guest bedroom. As much as she loved Junior, he wasn’t the male she wanted next to her when the sun set.

At the hospital, he’d mentioned he had things to say to her. Apparently, he was in no hurry to have the promised conversation. Although it was driving her crazy not knowing what was on his mind and how he felt about her, she’d managed to be patient. So far.

Her tolerance for his silence was at an end, however. The following day, she and Jamie would travel to South Carolina, and she would walk into a house she had hoped to never enter again. Before confronting Rodney, she wanted . . . needed . . . things settled between her and Jamie. If she had his love, she could face anything, even her snake of a husband. If not, she had plans to make.

As soon as she sat on the couch, Junior jumped onto her lap and bumped her arm with his head. “You,” then she glanced up at Jamie, “and you should have a guy’s night out, and give me an hour or two of peace.” Damn, she’d meant it as a tease but at the flash of hurt in Jamie’s eyes, she realized how grouchy she sounded.

“You gave us both a scare,” he said from the other side of the sofa.

She really was acting as if she were ungrateful, but she wasn’t. Not by a long shot. “I’m sorry, that didn’t come out right. It’s just that I can’t take two steps without you two panicking that something’s going to happen. At least Junior’s willing to touch me.” She glared at Jamie. “But you sit as far away from me as possible because you’re afraid you’re going to hurt me. I’m fine, really. The stitches are out, and my side doesn’t hurt. Not two hours ago, you said we were going to have pizza and then we’d snuggle. We’ve had the pizza, now I want the snuggling.”

“You took a bullet meant for me, Sugar. First, don’t do that again. Ever.” His eyes glittered an I-mean-business stare at her before his gaze slid away. “I thought I’d lost you,” he whispered.

“I’m here forever, if that’s what you want.” Would he finally tell her how he felt?

He eyed the purring cat curled up on her lap. “When you were crumbled into a heap on the floor, your life bleeding out of you, Junior wrapped himself around your neck and gave the saddest cry I’ve ever heard. I thought it was a death cry, that somehow he knew you were gone.” Beautiful blue eyes that were suspiciously watery lifted to meet hers. “I thought I’d killed another person I loved.”

It all tumbled out of him then, the story she’d already pieced together. By the time he finished, tears streamed down both their cheeks. How had he been so broken and yet been able to hide it so well? His SEAL training and discipline, she supposed. But that had also allowed him to lie to himself. The last thing he needed was the kind of women he had dated, the kind who would meekly stand aside while he continued to wallow in his own misery. He needed someone like her, who wouldn’t stand for anything but him being the real Jamie, like the boy who had laughed and enjoyed life to its fullest.

She lowered Junior to the floor, slid across the couch, and straddled Jamie. Unsure what to say, she circled her arms around his shoulders, and he pulled her hard against him, burying his face against her neck.

She just held him and cried with him while wondering if this was the first time he’d allowed his grief to surface. “Did you cry for them when it happened,” she asked when he quieted.

“No, I got stoned.” He wiped a hand over his face. “I-I’m sorry. I don’t know what just happened. It’s been ten years. I should be over it by now.”

“Oh, Jamie. One never gets over losing a parent. Believe me, I know.” She leaned away and cradled his cheeks with her palms. “Hush, baby. Your parents are together this very minute, sitting on a fluffy white cloud, looking down at you. And ya know what? They’re prouder than a peacock with a tail full of flamboyant feathers. If you really want to honor them, then be happy. That’s what they’d want for you.”