Forge of War (Jack of Harts) (29 page)

“I’d also wager that
none
of them have measured up to what either you or her demand and deserve.”

Her father chuckled and reached for a drink on the table next to him.  “You do have a silver tongue, Jack,” he said and took a sip of the drink.

Jack spread his arms out wide.  “I’ve always found it better to talk nice, Sir.  It’s saved me from getting shot more than once.”

Her father laughed in between sips.  “You, Jack, are a scoundrel.”

Jack smiled.  “Yes, Sir.”

Samantha’s father placed the drink down and rubbed his jaw before giving Jack a speculative look.  “I was quite the scoundrel in my youth.  I had a lot of fun with the girls.  Tell me, Jack, have
you
had a lot of fun?”

Jack recognized the minefield being laid before him and decided to jump right over it.  “Sir, life would not be worth living if it wasn’t fun.”

Her father scratched his chin with one thumb and aimed a shrewd look at Jack.  “My daughter’s very attractive, isn’t she?”

“Yes, Sir,” Jack answered with a nod.

Her father leaned forward in his chair and stared at Jack.  “Do you know how many guys latch onto her just because they want to get in her pants?”

“Daddy,” Samantha growled through pursed lips.  Her father ignored her attempt to derail him and continued to stare at Jack.

Jack raised one finger.  “Probably many, Sir.  Though I’d like to note for the record that she wears skirts.”  Her father’s eyes flashed and Jack figured he should hurry up with the second point.  “But I can assure you that my ultimate goal is
not
to get inside her skirts.”

Samantha shifted in her chair, and he knew she was staring at him.  Her father simply cocked his head to the side and raised a disbelieving eyebrow at Jack.  “So…what?  I’m supposed to believe you’re a harmless poofter?”

“Daddy!” Samantha shouted in a far more aggrieved tone.

Jack just cleared his throat though.  “No, Sir.  I’d never expect you to be that foolish.”  Her father aimed a measuring look at him and waved for him to continue.

“Don’t answer him, Jack!” Samantha shouted at him

Jack looked at her and smiled.  “What I mean to say is, I don’t do casual affairs,” he whispered, and her eyes opened wide.  “They always end badly, with a lot of pain spread around.  And pain’s the last thing I want for you.”

Samantha’s breath escaped and she leaned back in her chair again, a soft smile appearing on her face.

But when Jack turned to her father, the man’s eyes were narrowed.  “You would not be the first young man to come in saying that.”

Jack smiled.  “But I bet I’m the first who
meant
it, Sir.”

“And what make you think that some other boy never did?” her father said with narrowed eyes.

“Because I’m here, and he’s not,” Jack said, raising his palms to the man to show that he was being utterly truthful.

Her father leaned back in his chair and considered Jack for a long time.  “OK,” he finally said in a gruff tone.  “What
do
you think of my daughter?”

Jack smiled and sucked in a deep breath.  It was time to impress the man.  “Sir, you raised a lively and intelligent young lady.  She’s got a wit that is fun to spar with.  She knows she’s amazing and that she’s worth a good man.  She’s not going to take the first young punk off the street, which I suppose is why I’m here right now.  She’s smart enough to know what she wants, she’s proud enough to demand it, she’s strong enough to grab it, and she’s stubborn enough not to let go.”

Her father nodded slowly.  “How do you
feel
towards my daughter?”

Jack sighed.  “Well, Sir, I like her.  I enjoy spending time with her, and
love
the feel of her arm in mine.  And I’m attracted to her in ways that I’m certain you understand, Sir.”  He chewed his lip and looked away for a moment before looking her father in the eyes again.

“I want to wake up a hundred years from now, Sir, knowing I’ve never wasted my time with someone I didn’t really care about.  You’ve got an
amazing
daughter, and I want to spend my time with her, Sir.  I want to know her favorite color, the name of the first boy she kissed, her favorite teacher.  I want to be there, not for this,” he said, waving his hand at the library, “but…because
she
would rather spend time
with
me than
without
.”

Her father leaned back in his chair again and rubbed his jaw.  “You are not what I expected.”

Jack shifted to the side with a smile.  “I get that a lot, Sir.”

Her father’s eyes narrowed and he grabbed his drink again.  “So what should I do with you?” he asked and took another sip.

Jack looked at Samantha and saw her smirking at him.  He remembered his answer to a very similar question from her.  He doubted the same answer would work with her father.  He smiled back at her father.

“Sir, you have raised a very smart and lively young woman.  I think that you should trust her and respect her enough to give your blessing to her choice of men to spend time with.”

Her father pursed his lips, flicked his eyes over to Samantha for a moment, and turned back to Jack with a grunt.  “And what should I do if she turns out to be wrong about this young upstart?  What if he’s just a really good liar with a silver tongue that is really good at getting what he wants before he leaves town?”

Jack let out a long breath and spread both arms out again.  “That’s a risk we all take, Sir, when we seek to enjoy the time of another.  Are they who they seem to be?  Most of us make ourselves better than we are to attract someone, and then when we don’t need to anymore, we drop that mask and show them who we really are.  It is often not the person we claimed to be.  How many marriages have you seen break up because of this, Sir?”

Samantha’s father chewed on that for a few seconds.  “Too many,” he finally said and looked at her again.  “And I don’t want to see her hurt like that.”

Jack looked him full in the eye and smiled.  “Neither do I, Sir.”

Her father pursed his lips and frowned at Jack.  “Tell me, what would you do if I told you to leave and never come back and to never see my daughter again?”

Jack let out another long breath, and judged that now was not the time to stop telling the full truth.  “Well, Sir, I would leave your home, your property, and I would never come back.  And I would see your daughter whenever and wherever she wanted to see me
outside
your property.”  He looked at the man and smiled.  “I will respect your property and your wishes, Sir.  And I will respect
her
, and
her
wishes.”

Her father mulled that over in his mind for a few seconds before answering.  “Have you ever regretted flaunting a father’s wishes like that?”

Jack sighed and shook his head.  “No, Sir.  Oh, it’s not always ended well, and I have the scars to prove it.”  Jack cleared his throat and his face darkened.  “But there was one case.  There was this girl who was…
amazing
.”  He chewed his lip and shook his head.  “She had so much talent it was scary.  First time she saw me, I was plucking away at some stupid tune on my guitar that I just couldn’t make sound the way I meant it to.  I could hear the note in my head but I couldn’t
make
it.  She grabbed the guitar out of my hands and played the tune the way it sounded in here,” he said with a tap of a finger against his temple.  “She had a natural talent that blew my mind, and her father wouldn’t let her use it.”

Jack shook his head again.  “We played during every study period, and she snuck out at night to see me, and at least once he waved a shotgun in my face when he caught me with her.  We got…close…and one day she trusted me enough to show me why she always wore long sleeve shirts and jeans.”  Jack pulled in a deep breath and tried to keep the flash of anger from taking over.  He breathed in and breathed out, felt it fade, and the present snapped back into focus.

Her father leaned back and rubbed his jaw.  He glanced at Samantha for a moment.  “I see.”

Jack sighed and shook his head.  “That’s not the end, Sir.  We skipped school the next day while he was at work and I helped her move out and drove her to her aunt’s house.  She was free to sing with her cousin there, and soon she started wearing short-sleeved shirts and shorts, sundresses, or whatever else she wanted.  She was…away…when Yosemite fell and killed everyone in International Falls.”  Jack released a long breath before continuing.  “If I’d let her father chase me away, I never would have seen the bruises under her shirt, she’d be dead today, and nobody but me and a few others would even remember that she ever lived.”

Samantha’s farther nodded with an impressed look on his face.  “So you saved her life,” he said, and Jack knew he had the man.  It wasn’t done.  It would never really be done, but the man knew at least a bit of what to expect now, and was willing to live with it.

Jack smiled at him.  “No, Sir.  She saved her
own
life.”  The father frowned and Jack smiled.  “She knew what she was doing when she let me see those bruises.  She wasn’t looking for someone to save her.  She knew what needed doing.  She just needed some
help
to do it.  Like I said, Sir, she was…
amazing
.  And because of her, I will never,
ever
, regret the fact that I have ignored fathers’ wishes when it comes to their daughters.”

Samantha’s father shook his head slowly and glanced at her for a moment.  “You stood by this girl when it counted.”

Jack glanced at Samantha to see her looking at him in calm acceptance.  He turned back to her father with a smile.  “And I always will, Sir.”

Her father chuckled and extended his hand.  “I never thought I’d be approving of a man who just told me to my face that he would ignore me if I told him to never see my daughter again.”

Jack took his hand and smiled back.  “We live in a strange world, Sir.”

“That we do.”

Her father shook his head once and released it.  “You know, Son, I have this whole song and dance speech about what I’m going to do if you hurt her.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Her father furrowed his brow.  “I have a feeling you’ve heard it all before,” he said and took another sip of his drink.

Jack smiled.  “Possibly, Sir.  There’s lots of versions of the speech, Sir.”

Her father grunted.  “Well, I’m not going to bother with the speech, Son.  If you live up to your speech, I’ll be real happy.  If you don’t…” he trailed off with a wicked smile and placed the drink on the table.

“You’ve got a shotgun, Sir,” Jack filled in.

Her father laughed and reached behind his chair.  “Better than that, Son,” he said and pulled out a drum-fed shotgun for Jack to see.  “I’ve got an
automatic
shotgun, with full recoil suppression so I can
use
it at full auto.”

Jack whistled.  “That’s a
beautiful
machine, Sir.”

‘Yes it is, Son,” he said and slipped it back out of sight.  “Beats a double-barreled shotgun any day of the week.”

Jack chuckled.  “Absolutely, Sir.”

Her father nodded towards Samantha.  “Now you two go and have fun.”  He raised one finger in the air.  “Just not
too
much fun, you hear?”

“Like crystal, Sir,” Jack said with a smile.

Samantha sprang out of her chair and tackled her father with a hug, her previous anger obviously shelved for the moment.  Jack watched, thoroughly enjoying the sight of her stretching out to hug her father.  She was…
amazing
.  “Thanks, Daddy,” she whispered into his neck.

“Always, Peaches,” her father whispered back.

She pushed herself off him, stepped over to Jack’s chair, and pulled his hat off it.  She gave it a mischievous smile, passed it back and forth between both hands for a few seconds, and then placed it on his head.  Then she grabbed the scarf by both ends and pulled.

He came to his feet and she nodded in approval.  “Let’s go, Cowboy,” she murmured and turned to pull him towards the door.

“Yes, Ma’am,” he answered and let her guide him out of the library.

She aimed a sly smile at him.  “Would you like a tour of the house, Jack?”

He pulled in a deep breath and smiled back.  “I would
love
a tour, Ma’am.”  He stepped up beside her and crooked his arm out for her.

She looked down at the arm, slipped her arm in it, and gave it a gentle pat.  “The first thing you’ll see here is…” she began, guiding him through the house.  He paid rapt attention to her the whole time, but later would never remember a word she said.  It was a beautiful house, one of the first built on New Earth when the British came, and it had a long history, for New Earth.  It was all a blur though, indistinct images and words fading behind the amazing young lady he walked with.

The pool he loved though.  It was a great big Olympic-sized pool, though deeper, and slides and diving boards dominated one end.  They had a great deal of fun using that for its intended purpose, and that was one part of the night that he remembered in vivid, living color.