Jenna’s belly twisted. “No, we aren’t a couple.”
“If you need help with Alice while Noah’s gone, call me,” Brooke said. “I don’t mind helping so you can have some personal time.”
“Thank you. I will.”
“I’ll tell Noah to give you my number.”
“Okay, y’all,” Scarlett interrupted, looking at the food on the grill. “I’ve timed this perfectly. The meat is done. Strike Team 2,” she yelled over her shoulder. “Get your shirts back on and let’s eat!”
It was after eight when they climbed into Noah’s Jeep to head home. Alice was sound asleep in her car seat, and Jenna was quiet as they drove toward Mystic Cove. The sun had set a little while before, but pink still tinged the sky in the west. It was a typically beautiful Maryland summer’s night, and Noah was feeling pensive and restless.
“I’m sorry we’re later than I thought we’d be,” he said. “I thought we’d be home in time to bathe her and put her to bed.”
Jenna turned toward him. “It’s okay. It was a fun evening. She’s sound asleep, so I’ll just put her to bed and give her a bath in the morning.”
“Did you like hanging out with everyone? Or should I put an X beside this activity for the future?”
He wanted her to like his friends. His brothers-in-arms and their women. It mattered more than he’d thought it would. He also wanted them to like her, but he thought he was good on that score.
“Your friends are great, Noah. The women—they made me feel like one of them. I think they were careful not to say too much, but I gleaned a little from the conversation. About what you do, I mean.”
“Oh.” He’d expected that might happen. Jenna wasn’t dumb.
“Haylee mentioned a jungle adventure the night she met Wolf, and a swim in a piranha-infested river. Not your typical meet cute.”
“Meet cute?”
“It’s the scene where a couple meets for the first time in a movie or novel. It’s not always cute, but it’s called that. I don’t know why.”
“Okay. Something I did not know.”
“Maybe read a romance novel or two. Or watch just about any Sandra Bullock film.”
“You mean it’s a meet cute when she meets Keanu on a bus that can’t stop or it’ll blow up?”
“Yep, you got it. Great movie, by the way.”
“Hell yes, it is. Set my expectations for the kind of girl I wanted to meet someday.”
She was laughing now. He loved hearing her laugh. “Oh, you wanted to meet the kind of girl who could jump a bus over a giant gap in a bridge and successfully land it?”
He aimed a finger gun at her. “Got it in one.”
“You’re hilarious, Noah Cross. But you didn’t distract me a bit. Haylee and Wolf met when your team rescued her from a jungle in South America.”
No use denying it. Jenna knew better because she knew more about the military than the average person. It’d be hard to fool her. “Yeah, that’s about right.”
“Not a Green Beret. Delta Force?”
“No.”
“What then? I’m at a loss.”
“Saint said this might happen.” He sighed. Saint had told him to tell her what he had to in order to make her understand. And to keep it quiet. “I can’t tell you much, but I work for the Hostile Operations Team. It’s a Black Ops organization that works directly for the president—much like Delta. You go around talking about it though, and you’re going to find yourself in a windowless room with a light shining in your face and some angry people interrogating you about your loyalties.”
“Wow. Okay. Don’t want that experience, thankyouverymuch.”
“Nobody does.”
“I won’t talk, Noah. Dad was in civil engineering, but Mom was an Intel officer. I understand better than most what to say and what not to say. OPSEC is a word I grew up with,” she said, using the military abbreviation for operational security, “so you don’t have to worry about me.”
“That’s good. We used to be so deep nobody knew our name. But congressional budgets and all that crap—well, we’re known like Delta is known. But who’s in, where we go, the things we do—top secret. Haylee should have known better, probably, but that kind of thing is an open secret among the women who love a HOT operator. She wasn’t thinking about how you differ.”
“Right.”
She dropped her gaze to her lap and didn’t say anything else. He began to wonder if he’d said something wrong, but then they were in Mystic Cove and he didn’t know how to get her to talk again. A few minutes later, he pulled into the driveway and shut off the engine.
He unbuckled Alice and carried her upstairs while Jenna brought up the rear with the gear. They undressed her and tucked her in bed, and his heart twisted at the feelings swirling inside him at the sight of a sleeping toddler. Alice was work, but she was also innocent, adorable, and she didn’t deserve anything less than everything he could give her.
The idea of finding a family for her died a quiet death as a shaft of moonlight crept across the bed and onto her sleeping form. The baby powder and diaper smells of her room invaded his senses as confusion and a tentative happiness blossomed in his heart.
He didn’t have a single fucking clue how to make this work. Not one. But he knew he had to. Somehow.
Jenna touched his shoulder, and warmth flooded him. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Fine.”
He stood, towering over her, but she didn’t back away. She gazed up at him with concern and—maybe?—anticipation.
“This is the moment when I tell you that you should go to your room,” he said in a deep, growly voice. “Because if you stay, I plan to kiss you. And if I kiss you, I plan to get inside you and make you come as many times as I can. I can’t deny it’s what I want any longer. If you don’t want it too, then walk away now and I won’t mention it again. Because I need you, Jenna. Alice needs you. But right now, I need you in ways that aren’t a part of what I asked you to come here for. Walk away if it’s not what you want too.”
He thought she was trembling, but he wasn’t sure. Another moment, and she stepped into him, wrapping her arms around his waist and tilting her head back to meet his gaze. “Kiss me, Noah. Kiss me and make me forget everything but you.”
Chapter Fifteen
His mouth met hers, and Jenna sighed. She wasn’t the kind of woman who hopped into bed with a man, never had been, but she knew herself well enough to know she’d regret it if she didn’t go there with Noah.
Probably didn’t help that she’d watched him playing volleyball, sweat glistening against his rippling muscles as he jumped into the air. He and the other guys had hosed off when they were done, and he’d come to the table with wet hair and sparkling eyes as he’d laughed with his friends.
They’d eaten good food, shared stories, and laughed until Alice cuddled up in Jenna’s lap and fell asleep. Noah had announced it was time for them to go, and everyone got up to hug them and walk them to the Jeep.