Joint Forces (15 page)

Stop. He had to stop if he ever wanted a chance at more. And he definitely wanted more.

He kissed once, again, drawing away in increments, a man addicted to the taste of her and unable to make a clean break. All the more reason to pace himself.

He lifted his head and found a new resting place against the velvet skin where her neck met her shoulder, a spot he happened to know turned
her
inside out.

Her fingers threaded through his hair, her touch anchoring him and making him fly all at once. She pressed her cheek against his head. "I'd forgotten what a great kisser you are until you reminded me this afternoon. And now."

"I'm not sure whether to be complimented or insulted, babe."

"Definitely complimented."

"If I was that great you wouldn't have forgotten."

"It's just been so long."

"Only three months." And he remembered everything about her from that time. The shape of her hip under his palm. The taste of her skin. The flowery scent of her shampoo that reminded him of all her flowers filling the dark, empty places in their lives.

"We stopped kissing a long time before that, J.T."

Hell. Turbulence ahead. And he didn't have a clue what to say next. He'd pretty much blown his wad on sensitivity with the comment just before she'd kissed him. "I kissed you, damn it."

Crap. Sergeant Sensitivity? Not.

She stiffened under him, shoved against his shoulders. "Obligatory pecks on the cheek on your way out the door don't count. And when we had sex, we pretty much went from smoldering looks to clothes off in under two seconds."

Time to shift tactics. Humor maybe. He angled up and off her. "Hey lady, are you accusing me of being a quick trigger?"

"You know better than that and don't try to change the subject." She smoothed her skirt back into place, running her thumb along the waistband. "I'm actually having a bit of an epiphany moment here and I would like to play it through if you don't mind. Besides, weren't you the one who said you wanted to talk today?"

Bitten on the ass by his own good intentions. Why the hell had he thought he wanted to talk in the first place? He should have gone straight for the one way he always managed to get through to this woman.

With sex.

Except damned if she wasn't in the process of telling him how he'd screwed that up, too. "Okay, so you're saying I didn't kiss you enough. I thought I had the foreplay thing covered, but I'm sorry if I—"

"Good God, J.T., would you get your testosterone out of this conversation for a second and listen? I'm not accusing you of anything. I'm saying we stopped kissing a long time ago. You know full well you're an incredible lover, generous, sexy."

"Okay, Cro-Magnon level lowering, returning to the modern age." Tension waning, he winked. "And thanks."

"You're welcome." A smile quirked her kissed-poofy lips. "All I'm saying is that in some ways kissing is much more intimate than sex, and somewhere along the line we let that get away from us. It scares me to realize that because then I have to accept that we started falling apart a long time before I saw it coming, which means there's even less hope."

She was hoping?

"Rena, babe, I'm going to be straight up with you. We have our problems. I know that. But damn it, I want us to give it another try. I'm not saying we should jump right back into things. We can take it slow.

Keep on like we are for a while. Cokes, circus peanuts and family dinners. More kisses."

"More kisses?"

Ah, he'd breached the defenses. He could read her so well sometimes. He leaned to kiss her again because she'd made her wishes on that clear, even for a dense male like himself. And kissing his beautiful wife was sure as hell no hardship. Her lips moved under his.

Bullet dodged. He could already envision his boots marching across the hall to their rightful place beside her heels lying lopsided, cast off beside their bed.

He skimmed a hand down her satiny arm, linked their fingers, curved them forward to rest on the slight swell of her stomach. "It's gonna be okay, Rena. We'll work it out, make it right, this kid's going to be a new start for us. We'll be there for it just like we were there for Nikki and Chris."

She stiffened against him, even more rigid than before when she'd shoved him off her. "You want to come home for the baby."

What a damn odd question. "Of course."

Her fingers untwined from his. The fading sunset rays cast shadows across her face while somehow showcasing the ones in her eyes. "Did you ever really love me?"

* * *

Rena wasn't sure who was more shocked by the question, her or her immobile husband.

He recovered faster, though. "I told you I did."

The tide shushed along the shore, reminding her she should have kept her mouth shut.

"Forget I asked." She'd known he was coming home for the baby, but hearing it confirmed seconds ago hurt even more than she'd expected. "I'm being a hormonal, sentimental pregnant woman. I just want to eat my circus peanuts and go home."

How could she trust his answer now that he knew what she expected to hear? She'd given away her whole hand of cards because of a few kisses. Some things never changed.

She hooked her elbow on the open window and popped a circus peanut in her mouth just as the first stars overcame the setting sun.

"No way, babe." He tipped her chin toward him, his touch gentle, his gray eyes filling with storm clouds, all the more powerful considering how rarely her controlled husband lost his cool. "You brought this up and there's not a chance you can deny that I said the words. I know I told you. I may not have said it every time I walked in the room, but I know what came out of my mouth."

Rena swallowed down the lump of sugar too thick for her constricting throat. Did he have to sound so harsh? Pain, betrayal, frustration shifted to anger, mostly with herself for laying her emotions bare before this man. Again. "Oh, get real, J.T. 'I love you, babe, please, please let me get in your pants' doesn't carry much of a romantic punch once the horniness wears off a couple of hours later."

"But it worked," he snapped, then cursed. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

She bit back the urge to call him a bastard, since she'd been the one to lash out first with the "getting into her pants" comment. Totally unfair since she'd been just as eager to get into his then—now, too.

His chest rose and fell with regulated frequency. Back in control. Overly so. "I'll try to translate this manspeak into something you'll understand. I gave you the best I had. I know you deserve better, but this baby limits our choices."

"This is exactly why it won't work, J.T. We haven't even been in the house together for two weeks and already we're tearing each other up again."

"And about your question…" He plowed ahead without acknowledging her point.

She didn't want to know. Either way, yes or no, truth or lie, the answer would slice through her. "I said never mind."

"But you said something else after that. Yeah, there was nothing I wanted more than to be inside you, and I intended to make damn sure once you let me get there, you wouldn't be sorry or left wanting. And then when we were together, I found all that locker-room wisdom didn't matter. I didn't need it, not when I had those breathy little sighs of yours guiding me if I just listened." He dipped his head to her neck. "Do you still like it when I kiss you right here?"

The edge dulled on her anger, and God, but she resented him, herself, for the predictability of her body's betrayal.

He sketched higher to her ear. "Or when I do this? You usually purr for me when I do that."

J.T. nipped the lobe, continued to vulnerable patches of skin too long neglected. His hands traveled down her spine in a sensual massage that sent her bowing against him again until finally he cupped her bottom and brought her even closer. "And what about that?"

She whimper-purred her assent and frustration.

"Yeah, babe. I heard you." He stared down with narrowed eyes. Pissed. Insistent, and yes, even aroused. "And maybe I was just meeting some elemental itch you had, and I missed the big picture. But at least I was listening and trying my damnedest."

He withdrew his hands, his body, moving away, the muggy air suddenly chilly in comparison to her overheated flesh.

Her muddled brain shouted at her to process his words while her aching heart told her to run. Her flaming body urged her to just jump him so her brain and heart would shut up because everything was crumbling around her.

"I listened to you, Rena, and maybe I'm not as good at understanding out of bed as I am in bed. But I am trying, damn it."

As much as she wanted to cry or rage, at least they were talking and she wouldn't let temper or tears shut that down.

She stared into stormy gray eyes usually so steady, constant, ever honorable, and the truth deluged over her like those storm clouds opening up. In his manspeak way, J.T. had answered her question after all.

J.T. didn't lie. He gave sparse accountings, but his words counted. He'd told her he loved her then. She'd just never listened.

The truth raining over her chilled to a deeper realization of icy, sheeting sleet. He'd said loved. Past tense.

Today, he hadn't said a thing about loving her still. In fact, he hadn't said those words for a long time.

And she couldn't help but notice his love had stopped right about the same time as the kisses.

* * *

J.T. lifted the crutches out of the back of the truck in their driveway, sidestepped a bush of pink flowers

… azaleas maybe? Or wisteria? Hell he couldn't keep all her plants straight. Or her needs.

He passed the crutches to his silent wife, crickets sawing in the background, night traffic in the neighborhood slow and sporadic. Damn it, he shouldn't have lost his cool. He still wasn't sure exactly where he'd slid off course, but no doubt, his plan to woo Rena had been shot down.

"Thanks," she said without looking at him. She swung trim calves out of the truck, hopped on one foot taking the crutches from him.

He followed while she worked her way down the flagstone path, ready to catch her if a crutch went rogue in the soft lawn. Why did she have to make this so difficult? Everything from a simple trip inside to where he parked his boots.

Not that he intended to ask her. He kept his yap shut, because if she questioned whether he'd said he loved her all those years ago then he must have messed up worse than even he'd imagined. He'd done something seriously wrong and still he couldn't pinpoint what. He'd tried his best to keep the darker parts of his job and himself the hell out of an already strained marriage.

Opening the side door, J.T. followed her into the kitchen. "Son, we're home," he called.

Too bad he wasn't announcing the coming-home deal for real.

Stenciled ivy bordering the walls mocked him with reminders of the time he'd interrupted her painting. He could read her lingering arousal from their kisses in the truck. They could have been upstairs in bed now, together.

Rena rested her crutches against the counter and dragged out a chair at the table. A sign she didn't want to go upstairs with him? Or that she didn't want their evening to end?

She dropped into one chair, propped her foot on another. She slipped her hand into a side pocket on her skirt and pulled out a package … of peanuts. Honey roasted. She tore open the corner with her teeth, poured half the minipack into her palm.

Quiet echoed through the house, dishes on the counter. Two glasses?

One with glittery lip gloss kissing the rim. God, he couldn't be everywhere at once checking on his family.

Chris's footsteps thudded down the second set of stairs leading into the kitchen. "Hey, Mom. Dad. Have fun?"

"Yeah, we had a nice drive." J.T. tucked one glass into the dishwasher, then the other. "Have someone over while we were gone?"

Rena looked up from her snack. "Chris?"

He shrugged, shuffled across the tile floor into the pantry. "Just a friend."

Twisting the setting knob, J.T. started the dishwasher and flipped the magnet from "dirty dishes" to

"clean." "A female friend, I'd say, based on the lip gloss on the second glass."

"Just a friend," Chris repeated over the sound of a chip bag tearing open.

Rena nudged peanuts around on the table. "Hon, you know I prefer you not have girls over when no one's here."

"Sure. Sorry."

The phone rang. Lucky Chris.

J.T. yanked the receiver off the wall. "Hello?"

"Hi," a female voice crooned. "Could I speak to Chris, please? Tell him it's Miranda."

At least now he didn't have to make a room search for the girl upstairs. "Son, it's a girl for you."

Chris charged toward the phone.

"Someone named Miranda."

The boy stopped in his tracks, gym shoes shrieking on tile. He shook his head.

Cupping his palm over the mouthpiece, J.T. said, "Your mother and I will leave the room."

And go upstairs where maybe he could regain ground. Chris stumbled back, tripping over his dragging shoelaces before righting himself.

J.T. raised the phone to his ear again. "I'm sorry, but he just stepped out. I couldn't catch him in time. Do you want to leave a message?"

"Just tell him he needs to come in to work an hour early tomorrow and run deliveries."

"Will do." He replaced the receiver. "She says you're supposed to come in an hour early to run deliveries."

Chris's face paled until acne shone double. Females could do that to a man.

"So you work with her?"

"Yeah, she's one of the hostesses." His gaze ping-ponged from one smiling parent to the other. "It's not like that."

"Okay, son. You're entitled to your privacy." J.T. hefted the transparent garbage bag out of the trash can.

"But that doesn't mean I won't be curious as hell."

J.T. started for the door. Rena's gasp stopped him. "What? Is something wrong? The baby?"

"Bring the bag over here," she ordered, standing on one foot. She yanked the clear bag from his hands, tore it open.