Closer to My Heart (16 page)
She nodded.
“Well, that was the first—and the last—undercover assignment I ever had. I couldn’t take it.” He told her about his years as an Army Ranger and a member of the Los Angeles S.W.A.T. team, and then his undercover assignment with the Gacha Cartel in Mexico.
He spoke quietly, staring out at the bank on the other side of the river. The breeze was blowing and it rustled through the trees. “It took me a couple of months to get a foothold in the organization, with the Gachas, but once I was in…I was
in
.
God, I spent the better part of a year of sheer hell operating between Oaxaca, Columbia and LA.”
“The Gachas were different than the Medellin Cartel, which held the power in the early 70s. They ruled by sheer terror, and the Cali Cartel, who swept in under the radar in the 80s, with more businesslike practices—hell, they were still as murderous and violent. But the Gachas Cartel combined the same Marxist guerilla tactics of kidnapping, drug trafficking and murder. And they also included child prostitution and resale. They were a bunch of bastards.”
“In the beginning it was pretty easy,” he said. He smiled sadly at her. “I mean, I knew Gacha was this big drug lord, but he had a wicked sense of humor and was pretty interesting. He was full of charisma…well, dotted in with murdering people and drug trafficking…but his charisma covered up a lot. It’s important to me that you know that I never crossed the line between law-abiding and criminal—even though I blurred it at times.”
“I liked his wife, Cecilia, too. They had two children who were fun and full of life. It’s their picture you saw in the box. She was pretty instrumental in helping the task force bring down Gacha, as a matter of fact.”
“Whoa,” Jane said. “She must’ve had balls of steel.”
He snickered humorlessly. “Yeah, that’s what she had. When the shit hit the fan, after Gacha ordered me to assassinate the DEA chief stationed in Columbia and I refused, it was Cecilia who ferreted me away through one of the passageways that headed down the mountainside.”
He gestured to his ribs, where the bad scarring wrapped around. “Obviously, I didn’t make it in time. I saw Cecilia and her children gunned down. I can still hear their screaming in my dreams.”
“Oh, Luke, I’m so sorry.” She moved to sit next to him and wrapped her arm around his waist. “How did you get out of there?”
“One of the agents got to me and they evacuated me by helicopter. But you know what? Cecilia didn’t die.”
She gasped. Lucas’s whole body tensed up and he squeezed his fingers into fists so strong she thought his bones would snap.
To his horror, again, he started to cry. “That whore mother of those children had slaughtered them for her own freedom. Christ, she didn’t even let the sheets cool before welcoming the head of the next cartel into her bed.”
“How did you find out?”
“I was in the hospital for about two months, and then in a rehab facility for another four. One of the first things I did when I got out was to go to the Renoir exhibit at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art with my buddy and his wife. And who did I see…that fucking bitch, Cecilia.”
“Oh, no. Did she come after you? Had she known you were undercover?”
“In the end, she had figured out I was undercover and I think that’s why she helped me escape. But in the six months I’d been out, the Gachas Cartel had dissipated. Cecilia wasn’t interested in retribution because she was living the life of freedom she’d been after all along.”
“So you just walked away?”
He sat quietly for a minute, and a bright blush crept up to his cheeks from his neck. “No. I got my private investigator’s license and found out her local connections in LA. And then—” He choked a little and cleared his throat. “And then I turned her name over to my Army buddy—he’s a sniper.”
“Oh!” An uncomfortable silence fell, but through it all she held him tightly, and he got it all out. Purged all of the poison from his body. She didn’t recoil or gag or cry with him. She didn’t call him a monster or scramble to point the blame on him. She just loved him and offered her strength for him to use as an anchor.
Lucas finally calmed down a few minutes later. His big body shuttered with the after effects of a crying jag. She figured he’d never had one before, and it made her smile. He moved away from her and walked into the river to splash cool water over his face and chest. And, she suspected, to regain his control. She sat quietly and waited patiently. He’d been just as strong for her when she talked about Sam.
Finally, when he came back to her, he was calm and looked at peace. Finally. The ghosts of the past were leaving him. He stopped in front of her and reached into his wet trunks. He pulled out another small, white leather box and held it tightly in his fist. He pulled Jane to her feet and he stole a quick, but well placed and boiling kiss on her mouth.
“Jane, I love you so much. You were right about getting it out. I’ve never told anyone about the sniper, that it was my information that caused the death of Cecilia and her new lover. I just—” he looked away for a minute. His actions had disgusted and embarrassed him, but he didn’t need to point that out.
“Thank you for listening to me.”
Now the tears came to her eyes. Her heart was beating so fast that she felt a little feint.
“I love you, Lucas. Nothing you could have done would soil that for me. I think you’re the bravest, noblest, most wonderful man I’ve ever known.”
“Ah, Jane,” he sighed in reverence. He held her lightly against his large frame, close to his heart. She hadn’t put her shorts back on yet, so he enjoyed the feel of her sun-warmed skin beneath his fingers as he stroked her slim, supple back. “You always have the right words to say.”
Another wave of tears broke forth when he used Sam’s phrase. It was appropriate, she guessed, in both cases. She loved both of them more than anyone else in the world. It was fitting that they should share the same words.
Jane was quiet while he broke down their makeshift camp. She was lost in thought, watching the shallow water of the river trickle over a grouping of rocks a little further up the bank.
Lucas watched her out of the corner of his eye, wondering what was running through that beautiful head of hers. He finished stuffing the blanket into the rucksack on top of the bagged trash. He tossed it into his kayak berth and walked over to Jane. He knelt down onto one knee and grabbed her by the hips, his small white box in still in one hand.
“You are so beautiful,” she said wistfully. Then realized she’d said it out loud when he blushed and looked away, and laughed in embarrassment. “I suppose you’d rather hear that you’re handsome. Because you are, you know. But you’re also beautiful.” She brushed his hair back from his forehead.
He turned his face to kiss her palm. “It’s okay. I’m glad you like to look at me. Whatever you call me is fine by me.” His fingers flexed on her bottom.
She looked nervous and her whole body had a fine tremble. He let her sweat it out for a minute.
He took a deep breath before he lost his nerve. “I hope I can find the right words to tell you how much I love you. You are the woman of my dreams. You’re the last thing I think of before I fall asleep at night and you’re the first thought in my mind when I wake. You have become my best friend. I love spending time with you and talking to you and laughing with you.”
“I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want you to be my woman, and I want to be your man. I want to live with you in your Gran’s house. I want you to give me beautiful babies, and then I want to coach little league and bake cupcakes for school. And I want to sit with you in front of the fireplace and let you read your stories to me. I want your crazy dog Penny and her cat Pop Tart. And I always want you to have the right words for me.”
Jane was back to crying now, and she was holding his head with her empty hand. The more he said to her, the tighter she squeezed his hair. It brought tears to his eyes. . .almost as much as finally getting his list of wants out in the open. He turned his face and laid his cheek low on her belly, his chin nudging the bottom of her bikini a little.
While his face was averted he asked, “Will you spend your life with me, Janie, as my wife? Will you love me forever?”
He waited patiently for her to answer, and after a minute he leaned back to look up at her. She was quietly crying, which he already knew. But she was also nodding her head, emphatically, up and down.
“Jane?” he asked, waiting for the one word he longed to hear.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “Yes!”
— The End —
Becky Moore
is tall and buxom, highly educated, and culturally savvy. Well … three outta four ain’t bad. She’s a world traveler, problem solver, and crusader. Thankful for the love of reading she inherited from her mom, mother to a superbly cool kid, wife to the world’s most handsome man. A mental-marathon runner, freelance photographer, faithful companion to Magnolia May the beagle, and a prolific reader and writer. She’s a freelance writer for MacMillan Publishing’s
Heroes & Heartbreakers blog
, under the name Dolly Sickles. She’s also a member of the
Romance Writers of America
and her local chapter, the
Heart of Carolina Romance Writers
.
In her down time, and in the real world, Becky loves to spend time with her husband and son. They live in the urban wilds of central North Carolina. Becky is an avid gardener, biker, kayaker, bicyclist, knitter, and community volunteer. She spent over a dozen years working as a writer, graphic artist, photographer and PR whiz in the pharmaceutical advertising, hi-tech, performing arts, and HIV/AIDS (grantwriting) fields before venturing into her current status of full-time author. And like her favorite characters, when you close her books, Becky will be just be a fond memory.
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