The SEAL’s Surprise Baby (12 page)

The Marine looked at Jack, his gaze dropping briefly to the SEAL emblem on his chest. “Glad to have you aboard, sir.” He gestured to the duffel. “I can stow that for you if you’d like some more time with your lady, sir.”

Jack nodded, handing over the bag. The Marine spun around and trotted back to the plane.

Jack looked at Melanie. “I have to get on board. Hate to have them dogging me because I held up the flight.”

Melanie bit her lip, refusing to embarrass him with tears. But with each passing second she felt she was being drained of life.

His lips quirked in a smile. “This is about the only time I’m allowed to kiss you in public, you know.”

She smiled weakly. “No public displays of affection, I know.”

He held her gaze, his blue eyes going dark with emotion. He brushed a kiss to her lips and whis
pered, “I love you, Melanie.” Then he turned and walked away.

She blinked and swallowed. “Don’t you drop a bomb like that and think you can walk away, Singer.”

He stopped, but didn’t turn around.

“You really love me?”

He turned, and with an unreadable expression, strode back to her, gathered her in his arms and kissed her senseless. Absolutely senseless.

“Yes, I really do.” He scraped her hair back off her face and cupped her jaw. His gaze was dark and intense. “You’ve been in my mind and heart from that first day, Melanie. Sure I love our daughter, but I loved you first.
You.
Because you’re still the woman who knocked me over at my sister’s wedding. That’s the woman I fell in love with.”

Melanie stared into his ice-blue eyes and saw only cool calm seas. The distrust and fear she held unwound like a velvet ribbon. Her heart no longer struggled and the words tumbled off her lips. “Oh, Jack,” she whispered, “I love you, too.”

His grin was slow and wide. “About time you said it.”

“Excuse me?”

She gave him an affronted look and he laughed softly. “I knew you did. You were just too scared to say it.”

Her anger left her before it had the chance to boil. “You’re right, I was scared. I’ve been so happy these past weeks that I was terrified it wasn’t real, that I wanted it so badly that I couldn’t trust what I already knew. But it doesn’t matter. Scared is okay. Fear
keeps you sharp.” She repeated his own words back at him. “Nothing, not even fear or our being apart is going to ever change my love for you, Jack Singer.” Now she cupped his face, her confession giving her the freedom she’d always wanted. “Not the date on a license or certificate, either. It doesn’t matter how we started this marriage, only how we live it.”

The plane’s engine revved.

“Oh, Jack.”

“I love you, Melanie. I was a goner the moment you called me Sir Galahad.”

She grinned through a teary smile. “My hero,” she said, and he kissed her deeply.

The Marines watching them hung out of the transport, howling like Comanche raiders. Someone called out and the engine noise grew louder.

“I have to go.”

“Go then. I’ll be here. I’ll hold down the fort, waiting for you to come home to me.”

He brushed her lips with his fingers and stole one more kiss.

“This time and forever, Jack.”

Jack’s chest locked with emotion, and defying the pilot’s orders to get aboard, Jack grabbed her and kissed her again, then let her go and walked to the plane, happiness lighting his face.

Once inside, he gripped a strap, then looked back to see her smiling. A smile that lit her entire body and shouted back at him,
I love you!

Then just before the hydraulic door stole her from his sight, she yelled, “Hoo-yahh!”

Lt. Jack Singer, U.S. Navy SEAL, would always
remember this moment as the day Melanie brought him to his knees with her declaration.

A surprise baby had given him the love of his lifetime. His soul knew it the first time he saw Melanie. And nothing was ever going to keep him from having the pleasure of proving it to her for the rest of her life.

Three years later

J
ack stepped into the kitchen. Melanie didn’t look at all pleased and Juliana was sitting in a chair pouting and sniffling.

He set his briefcase down and said, “Hey, what’s up?”

Melanie spun around, then came over to him and kissed him.

“Hi, Daddy,” Juliana said sullenly.

“Hey, princess.”

Melanie said clearly, “We’ve had a difference of opinion. I thought she shouldn’t be messing with the scissors, and she thought she could give herself a haircut.”

Jack groaned, just now noticing that Juliana’s hair
was much shorter. He squatted down in front of his daughter. “Oh, man.” He touched the shortened locks. He eyed her darkly.

“I’m sorry,” his little girl blubbered, her lip quivering, and Jack felt himself about to cave.

Melanie cleared her throat, and when he looked at her, she inclined her head. Jack knew better than to go soft on his daughter right now. Even when she stared at him with those soulful blue eyes.

“I want you to think about what disobeying me has cost you, honey.” Melanie hated punishing Juliana. “Go to your room.”

Juliana slipped off the chair and clomped toward her room.

As soon as she was gone, Melanie’s face broke into a smile. “You should have seen the haircut. Thank heaven that Dara next door is a hairdresser. I was about to scalp that child with a Marine regulation high and tight I was so mad.”

Laughing, Jack crossed to her. “Anyway I can ease the tension?” He wrapped his arms around her.

“Yeah, you can.” She sighed into his arms, feeling his strength and drawing it into her. “I want chocolate and a bubble bath.”

“Easy enough.”

He kissed her warmly, wanting more and wondering if their daughter would stay in her room as she was told. He’d only just returned from a short deployment a couple of weeks ago, and he and Melanie still had some catching up to do.

They parted and she went to the stove, stirring a pot of homemade soup. Jack let his gaze wander over
her. Every day he thanked God for that night after his sister’s wedding.

“Can you come over to the Command tomorrow at nine?” He snatched a carrot from the cutting board and munched.

“Sure, why?”

“I’d like you to pin on my oak leaves.”

She whipped around, her eyes wide. “You got the promotion!”

He just grinned and her smile went hundred-watt bright.

“Oh, Jack!” Melanie dropped the spoon and launched herself at him, jumping into his arms and wrapping her legs around his waist. “I’m so proud of you!”

Jack laughed and didn’t think he could feel any better, but he did. “Is this the behavior of the wife of a lieutenant commander?”

“Have I ever been politically correct?” She kissed him hard and met his gaze. “This is so great. And we’ll need the money.”

He frowned. “Anything specific you have in mind?”

“Saving for two college educations.”

He just stared at her.

She tipped her head to the side and said, “You know for a lieutenant commander selectee you’re slow on the uptake.”

His eyes flew wide. “We’re pregnant.”

She smiled. “If you want to have this baby, I’ll see if it can be arranged.”

“Oh, Lord,” he said softly, and swung her into his arms, then sank into a chair.

“Happy?”

“Yes!” He rained kisses over her face, squeezing her. He was going to get the chance to see her pregnant, and although he’d viewed the videotape and had seen the pictures of her last delivery, it was not the same as being there. Thoughts of putting in for a SEAL-instructor position for a while popped into his mind.

“We might get a boy this time.”

He lifted his gaze to hers, and Melanie was unhinged by the look in his eyes.

“I don’t care.”

A woman couldn’t ask for more, she thought. Jack never failed to surprise her. “I love you, Jack.”

“I love you, too, baby,” he murmured, and stood up with her in his arms, carrying her from the kitchen into the living room and settling comfortably on the sofa. He never let her go. “How do you feel?”

“Ask me in the morning,” she said, grinning. “This promotion means orders, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, very likely.”

“To where?”

He shrugged. “California. Maybe West PAC.”

She waved off the Navy installations he suggested, not really caring where they went, as long as they were together. “When?”

“A few weeks to a few months.”

Hurry up and wait, she thought, and looked around at their darling house and all the work she’d put into it. Oh, well, she thought and sighed into his arms.

His hand slid down to her belly, slipping under the band of her jeans, his palm warm and teasing on her skin. She studied his expression, the awe in it, and
was glad she’d get to experience this baby with him near this time.

“I want to know everything,” he told her.

“Oh, swollen ankles, barfing at the crack of dawn…oh, so sexy,” she said.

His expression remained serious. “It is to me, Melanie. Everything about you is.”

“Daddy,” his daughter called from the hallway.

Melanie arched a brow.

“Yes, Juliana,” he said in a tone that reminded her that he was not pleased with her behavior this afternoon.

“Can I come out?”

He looked at Melanie. She nodded.

“Sure, honey.”

Juliana stepped around the corner, her eyes red-rimmed and downcast.

“Come on, munchkin,” Melanie said, and her daughter leapt onto the sofa, instantly snuggling up to her father and mother.

Melanie didn’t tell her that she was going to have a brother or sister. She’d save it for later and savor the private knowledge with Jack a bit longer. She lifted her gaze to his, touching the side of his face. Gently he kissed her, whispered his love, then looked down at Juliana.

While Jack bestowed one of his lessons about disobedience on their daughter, Melanie shifted into the cushions, listening, watching the way Juliana looked at her father with complete trust and adoration.

Melanie smiled, thinking of the new life inside her, the new branch of strength that would be her family. In her arms was all she loved. All that mattered to
her. They’d travel the world together, face whatever the Navy threw their way. Jack called them his homeport, his anchor, when in reality, they were hers.

Long ago Melanie had admitted that she’d been lost to the pain in her heart, filled with distrust and sinking fast. Then Jack stepped through the door. Her future had started with a velvety look and a wonderful man in Navy dress whites.

Sir Galahad had definitely ridden to the rescue that night, she thought, and he’d stolen away with her heart.