Jason (Kings of Guardian #4) (25 page)

“I surrendered to you the first time I saw you, soaking wet trying to keep a hyper dog, a little boy and yourself out of the mud.” He dropped for a sweet kiss that lingered like a breath against her lips.

“Go to sleep, princess. Tomorrow you become my queen.”

Jason followed his nose through the massive ranch house to the kitchen where the delectable aroma of fresh-baked cookies originated. His mom had Reece on a chair at the counter so he could help her finish what appeared to be at least the twentieth batch of peanut butter cookies.

“Now what do we do?” Amanda asked Reece.

“Crisscross it with the fork, Gramma.” Reece beamed a smile at Jason’s mom. Jason swallowed hard at that happy smile.

“That’s right. Dip it in the sugar, then press.” Amanda glanced over her shoulder at Jason and winked.

Reece turned with her. “Daddy! Look, we made cookies. We had to make a lot ‘cause Uncle Dicks and Uncle Drake eats a lot.” Jason laughed at Reece’s continued mispronunciation of Dixon’s name. Drake had gotten hours of entertainment out of Reece’s inability to say his brother’s name. Go figure, mentally the twins were only two or three years older than Reece anyway.

Frank came into the kitchen, grabbed Reece from the chair and slung him over his shoulder. Reece shrieked and giggled as he hung upside down over his grandpa’s back. “Come on boy, ole Lightning needs someone to exercise her.”

Frank grabbed a handful of cookies and kissed Amanda soundly on the lips before he hitched a laughing four-year-old up more securely and nodded to Jason. “See ya.”

The laughter of both man and boy as they left the ranch house echoed in the air, infusing a lighthearted feel into the room.

“He is such a good boy. Faith has done a fantastic job raising him.” Amanda picked up the fork from the counter where Reece had dropped it and finished scoring the top of the cookies.

Jason grabbed a couple of the cookies and leaned against the counter, watching his mom do something he’d seen a hundred times growing up. “She has. Mom, can I talk to you about something?”

Amanda paused and looked over her shoulder at him. Her eyebrows arched and she nodded. “Anything, you know that, honey.”

Jason looked down at the cookies in his hand. The one in his mouth turned to dust as he tried to speak the words he’d asked himself a million times. “How… I mean, would…” Jason blinked away the tears that formed in his eyes and swallowed several times to force back the emotion that threatened to overtake his need to finally ask his mother for forgiveness. He looked up at the ceiling. God, what would she do? How could she?

A warm hand pulled his attention down and to his mom, who stood directly in front of him. “What is it, Jason? What do you need to ask me?” Amanda cupped his cheek and he leaned into it. When she found out, would she ever touch him like this again?

“The night Dad was killed.” Jason closed his eyes at the flash of pain reflected in his mom’s. “It was my fault. It was our night. I wanted to go to the movies with the guys. If I hadn’t gone with them to a damn show, he’d be alive.” Jason drew a deep breath and opened his eyes. His mom had tears in hers and she was shaking her head. Fuck, he knew it. She didn’t know.

“Oh, baby. No. Oh God, have you been living with this since your dad died?” Amanda pulled him into her arms and ran her hands up and down his back like she used to do when he was upset as a kid. “Jason, your dad called me. We were going to go out, but I asked him to swing by Mr. Jensen’s farm and pick up a crate of blueberries he’d put aside for me. He was on his way there when he saw the car that had been reported stolen. He pulled the guy over and he was killed. You didn’t do anything wrong, baby. Sometimes life isn’t fair, but nothing we did made that bastard do what he did.” Jason stiffened. That was the second time in his life he’d heard his mom swear.

“If I hadn’t gone to the movie…”

“What ifs and wishes, baby. If Joseph hadn’t switched weeks with you, if your dad hadn’t wanted to have blueberry pie the next day, if it was raining, if… if… if. The only ‘if’ I’m willing to entertain is if you’d told me all those years ago, I would have been able to tell you it wasn’t your fault.” She pulled away and cupped his cheeks with both of her hands. “Do you understand?”

Jason took a moment. He’d forgotten that he and Joseph had switched weeks. That explained so much about the way Joseph lost it, of what he did and what he had become. “Joseph?”

Amanda nodded. “He has always blamed himself.”

“But he had nothing to do with what happened.” Jason pulled his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“And neither did you.” Amanda’s soft reprimand held iron.

“I’d like to believe that, Mom.”

“Believe it. I do. While I miss your dad, the love we had, and I regret the fact my children lost their father, we can’t live in the past. Look what you have right here and now—a beautiful wife and a little boy who adores you. Living with the shadow of what might have been is a poisonous, lonely life. Don’t bring that into what you have now. There is no need and there is no blame.”

Jason nodded and sniffed back the tears that hadn’t fallen. He pulled his mom into a hug and she squeaked when he flexed that hold just a little bit. He laughed and allowed her to step back.

“Son, you do not know your own strength.” Amanda sniffed the air and spun. “Oh no! The cookies!” She pulled the cookie sheets out of the oven and breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness! Grab that plate of cookies over there and head over to the office. Chief, Dixon and Drake haven’t had any yet. Keelee and Faith just took two plates to the clinic, so you only have to play deliveryman once.”

Jason snorted. “You’re lucky I have to go over there for a video conference, otherwise I’d balk at being your delivery boy.”

“Oh, that’s right, you’re the CEO now. Well, let me tell you something, mister, you are never too old or too good to do a favor for your mother.” Amanda pointed her spatula at him, but the smile on her face voided any attempt at a scolding.

Jason grabbed the foil-covered plate and started toward the door. He paused as he reached for the handle. “Hey, Mom?”

Amanda looked over and made eye contact with him. “Yeah, baby?”

“I love you.” Jason opened the screen door and walked out. His mother’s voice trailed after him, “Never more than I could love you, Jason.”

“Daddy! Look at me!”

Mike White Cloud glanced across the compound to the corral. Jason’s little boy was riding a Welsh pony. Both the boy and the pony preened as Reece rode the sweet old gelding.

“I see you, buddy. Great job. Make sure you listen to Grandpa.” Jason King’s deep, raspy voice carried across the open space. The boy waved and immediately returned his attention to Frank Marshall, who sat on the corral fence and watched his grandson. Chief felt the older man’s pride and satisfaction a football field away.

“Chief, are you sure?” Jason’s voice pulled him from the family happiness back to the business at hand.

Chief nodded. He’d said his piece. It was time for him to move on. Do different things. The training complex planning was done, and Dixon and Drake could take his position without missing a beat. “The twins will do a good job, they’ll manage just fine without me. Just bring another trainer on staff to fill in when they’re busy.”

“What makes you think they’ll stay if you leave?” Jason sat back on one of the many chairs scattered across the porch of the administration building.

“Your folks, Frank and Amanda. They’re the family those two never had. Besides, they have their eye on a woman.”

Jason chuckled. “Must be one hell of a woman to take on both of them.” Chief gave Jason a sidelong glance.

“You’re not going to tell me who they have in their sights, are you?”

Chief shifted in his chair so he was looking directly at the new CEO of Guardian and lifted one eyebrow.

“I figured. So tell me why you want to leave the ranch.” Jason took a drink of his ever-present soda.

“I was burned out when I came here. The team was fractured. This, for me, was never a long-term plan. Doc is happy here. Dixon and Drake will be once they figure out how to catch their woman. Jacob is in D.C.” Chief shrugged. “It’s time. I don’t want to go to another team, but I can be useful in the operation you’re planning.”

“You realize you’d be undercover, and I mean so far under it could consume you?”

“Yes. I’m a ghost anyway. I have no past, so the Engineer can do his magic. I trust him to ensure I won’t be detected.”

“It won’t be easy, Mike, and if you’re caught, there will be no team to pull you out. You realize what you’d have to do? This isn’t a simple go in, get the info and get out operation. You’d be buying people—people who’ve been drugged, beaten, and as they call it… trained for complete compliance.” Acid tinged the words Jason spat.

Mike nodded. “I assumed, and I understand what I’m volunteering for. I get in, get involved, deep, become a pipeline and learn their system, so when the time is right we can take them down.”

“This operation could take years to develop, Mike. I already have the Russians on my ass, and after talking with Gabriel, we’ve decided to change the way we are approaching this one. Basically, Guardian will appear to pull back. Let the Russians settle down while I get my operatives and resources in place. As much as it sickens me, going at this half-assed with the Russians on alert will only allow them to move operations and we’ll be at ground zero.”

“You’re doing what’s best.” Chief watched Jason’s new wife and Keelee walking across the gravel parking lot from the clinic, going toward the corral. The woman and her child had been with Jason at the ranch for a week. Amanda and Frank had opened their arms and hearts to Jason’s new family. Chief liked the woman. She softened the big man, gave him a purpose, and that was a good thing. Jason had always held too much inside, allowed his anger to turn into rage or self-hatred. It was easy to see how this woman grounded him and brought out his protective qualities.

Jason’s eyes found his wife as she climbed the fence and sat with her father-in-law. Her laughter put a smile on the big man’s face. That happiness was something Chief had never thought he’d see. Jason’s demons ran deep, but that woman had performed an exorcism.

“The people I can’t save now, the knowledge of what is happening to them as we speak, is killing me.” Jason’s low words carried one hell of a punch.

“If we take down the entire system we will save thousands. From the briefings I’ve been in on, the Russians’ operations are expanding. Putting a Band-Aid on a hemorrhaging bleed won’t help. Moving in now is just that.” Chief had to focus on the endgame, and so did Jason. “That is what you remember when you need to calm the storm that rages inside.”

“I will take them down.”

“We will take them down. You have other priorities to consider. Don’t let this become a poison in your life.”

“She wouldn’t allow it.” Jason shook his head and added, “I never would have found her if Gabriel hadn’t forced me to look back and find closure.”

“A man has many paths he must walk in his life. Your path has not always been easy, but your rewards… they’re bountiful. Would you have been ready to love as deep as you love her if you hadn’t experienced the valleys you’ve walked through?”

“I honestly don’t know, and I thank God I won’t ever have to find out. And when the hell did you become so talkative?” Jason chided.

Chief chuckled and stood. “When I have something to say that I believe needs to be said, I can speak volumes.”

Jason chugged the remainder of his soda and crushed the can before he tossed it into a trashcan. “I’ll start the process. Clear things up here, and let me know when you’re ready to walk away. Make sure this is what you want, Mike. This won’t be an easy assignment.” Jason offered his hand, and in gratitude, he accepted the big man’s offer.

“What I want is irrelevant. It is what I need. My destiny isn’t going to be found at this ranch.” Jason nodded and stepped off the porch.

Mike knew he needed to leave South Dakota. The empty feeling inside him ached to be filled. He’d come back, but when he did he’d be complete.

He watched as Jason strode across the distance to his wife and son. The setting sun cast a warm golden glow on the small family, turning them into silhouettes against the backdrop of the magnificent beauty of the Black Hills. Mike lifted his face to the heavens. No, his destiny wasn’t here, but he’d be back because those people were his family, and this land was in his soul.

The End