Rev It Up (34 page)

She beat back a sharp sob and wondered, now that they were about to check out of the hospital and take Franklin home, what he would do?

Tell Franklin the truth?

Demand custody?

What was he thinking in that head of his?
What?

She couldn’t stand this…this…not knowing.

But she couldn’t confront him, couldn’t demand he tell her his intentions before he was ready to make them known, because that just might push him to the edge, make him act rashly.

No. She had to keep on doing exactly what she’d been doing. Staying calm. Staying patient.

Even if it killed her…

“Jake,” she whispered his name, and he glanced up from the out-of-date
Hot
Rod
magazine he’d been reading for the last two hours. “Can I—” she had to swallow past the lump in her throat. “Can I borrow your cell phone? Mine is dead, and Lisa was supposed to be here twenty minutes ago. I’m…I’m getting worried.”

In answer, he absently dug into the hip pocket of his jeans and tossed her his iPhone before immediately going back to his magazine.

And
the
silent
treatment
continues…

She shook her head, resisting the urge to burst into tears as she thumbed on the phone and quickly dialed Lisa’s number. She listened to it ring on the other end and gnawed anxiously on a hangnail before she was forced to leave a voice mail.

“No go?” he asked after she clicked off.

They were the first words he’d spoken to her in hours, and the sound of his voice, even brusque and unyielding as it was, made her chest ache.

“No,” she pushed up from the little love seat to circle the foot of Franklin’s hospital bed and return his phone.

Her fingers brushed his as she handed back the device, and she was forced to subdue the accompanying shiver. Even after everything, after all the disappointment and betrayal, the mere touch of his skin made her long for…things she shouldn’t long for. Things that could never be.

“She’s not picking up,” she continued, ignoring the desire to fall to her knees and beg his forgiveness, beg him to understand that she’d done what was right, beg him to remember how he’d been, beg him to see that it’d killed her to keep Franklin a secret, but he’d given her no choice. But she knew he was in no mood to accept his part in all this. And, for her part, she had just enough pride left to remain on her feet. “And it’s not like her to say she’ll be somewhere and then not show up. I’ll give it a few minutes just in case she’s stuck in traffic or something, and then I’ll try her again.” She was amazed at how steady her voice sounded given her insides were spinning like a ferris wheel. “By the way, your phone only has three percent battery life left.”

He shrugged and went back to reading, and she stood there in front of him, heart in her throat, staring down at the crown of his shaggy, sun-kissed head.

“You’re going to have to talk to me eventually,” she whispered. “It’s the only way to sort everything out.”

He rolled in his lips, a muscle ticking in his jaw as he shrugged again, still refusing to look at her, continuing to pretend like he was reading that stupid car magazine.

Heat began to burn over her scalp, but she did her best to ignore it, to maintain her composure.

“You know I’m right, don’t you?” she asked.

But when he shrugged
again
, that did it.

She jammed a palm down on each of his big shoulders. “Stop shrugging!” she hissed into his surprised face, surprising herself as well. She was obviously losing it, but she was helpless to stop herself. She couldn’t stand this vicious silence a moment longer. Not when each second sliced into her heart like broken glass.

“Please, Jake,” she beseeched him, taking a deep breath to try to calm herself. It didn’t seem to work. “Please say something. Say
anything
.”

And then she got her wish, because the question she’d been waiting to hear for hours, suddenly flew from his lips like he’d spit out bad sushi.

“
Why?
”

“Why didn’t you tell me I had a son!” Jake demanded, ignoring the stricken look that contorted Shell’s face right before she slowly turned and made her way back to the love seat.

When she took a seat, folding her arms around herself protectively, the move pushed her breasts together until her cleavage looked like it could adequately conceal a Colt .45.

He’d been face-first in that cleavage just last night. And even after all that’d happened, even after all her lies, he was disgusted to discover he was more than ready to dive in again.

He still wanted her. Still yearned for her in a way that made his blood run hot and his heart beat double-time.

It was completely ridiculous, and he was turning into a totally masochistic moron.

“Answer the question,” he demanded, disgusted with himself. Disgusted with her. Disgusted with life in general at this point.

Her expression softened as she searched his face.

Oh, and great, now his heart wasn’t only galloping, it was breaking just a little bit, too.

Perfect.

“Do you remember that day I came to see you at the base?”

He swallowed, nodding, the entire sordid scene flashing in front of his eyes. He’d been so callus. So cruel. And then it suddenly occurred to him…

“Is
that
what you came to tell me that day? That you were pregnant?”

One large tear spilled down her smooth cheek. She didn’t reach up to wipe it away, instead allowing it to roll off her chin and land on her collarbone where it caught the overhead lights and sparkled like a sad little diamond.

“Yes,” she whispered, her gaze steady on his face despite the fact that he knew the memory had to be as painful for her as it was for him.

“I…” he swallowed, cursing himself for being a blind, jealous idiot. “I thought you’d…I thought you were coming to tell me about you and Preacher.”

She laughed, the sound full of bitterness and regret. “At that point there was no me and Preacher.”

He looked at her sharply. “But…by that time you two had been connected at the hip for what? A month? Ever since that night at the Clover—”

“Six weeks,” she smiled sadly. “For six weeks, Steven held my hand, patted my back, and told me just to give you time. He said you were going through a rough patch, and I needed to give you a chance to work through it.”

“Goddamn,” he glanced away, shaking his head when he thought of how different it all could’ve been if only he’d—

“Steven was my only friend,” she continued, cutting into his thoughts. “The only one I could talk to. Any of the other guys would’ve run to Frank and spilled the beans about what was happening between you and me. And then Frank would’ve killed you. But you remember how Steven was. If you swore him to secrecy, he’d die before breaking his word. Of course, when I found out I was pregnant, that really put his loyalty to the test…”

It was a good thing his “man card” had already been revoked, because tears gathered behind Jake’s eyes. “And when you came to tell me you were pregnant, I accused you of being a gold-digging slut. Which, in retrospect was more than ridiculous, huh? Yo, how many rich Naval officers do you know?”

She reached up to thumb away another tear. “I was hurting too badly to recognize what you were going through. I took your vicious words and the fact that you’d ignored my phone calls for a month and half to mean you didn’t love me anymore, if you’d ever loved me at all.”

He dug his fingers into the arms of the chair. Just as he’d feared, her answer to the question of
why
made him face the fact that she wasn’t the only one to blame for how things had turned out.

Oh, she’d made a mistake by not telling him she was pregnant with his child. There was no question of that. But she wouldn’t have done it had he not treated her like garbage, like something that belonged on the bottom of his shoe.

Goddamn him. Goddamn them both.

“And so you turned to Preacher…”

“No,” she shook her head. “I decided to get rid of the baby.”

His chin jerked back, and she turned to gaze at Franklin’s sweet face, the love in her own so bright and clear it was almost like the emotion was distilled down to its purest form.

“I knew what it was to grow up in a broken home, to grow up fatherless,” she whispered. “I didn’t want that for my child.”

“But how—”

“Steven went with me to the clinic that day, still holding my hand, still patting my back.” She shook her head and wiped away more tears. “I was a mess. I was crying so hard, I couldn’t fill out the paperwork. He had to do it for me. And then, when the nurse called my name, he looked at me…” she turned to him then, her smile watery, “… and he grabbed my hand and ran with me out the front door. You see, he knew me better than I knew myself. He knew I’d regret that decision for the rest of my life. And Steven being Steven, he offered me a solution.”

“He offered to marry you, to give you the home and family you’d been dreaming of your entire life.”
And
it
should’ve been me.
His heart ached so badly it was a wonder the thing still managed to pump blood.

She nodded.

“Did you love him?” He didn’t know if he hoped her answer was yes or no. The selfish, jealous part of him wanted her to say
he’d
been the only man to touch her heart. But Preacher deserved so much more than that…

“I loved him,” she said, shaking her head sadly, “but I wasn’t
in
love with him. Steven knew that, I was honest with him about that, but he swore I’d eventually
fall
in love with him.”

“Yeah,” he nodded his head as a slideshow of memories of Preacher flashed through his brain. “Preacher may’ve been a saint among sailors, but he was still a SEAL, cocky as hell. He probably figured there was no way in hell you wouldn’t eventually fall for him.”

She sighed. “I like to think he was right. I like to think that if we’d gotten the chance…” She trailed off, gathered herself, then continued quietly, “I’ve struggled every day with the guilt of that decision, wondering if I did the right thing. Wishing I could’ve given him more.”

“You gave him enough,” Jake told her, sadness and remorse making his heart feel as if it weighed as much as a B-52 bomber.

“I hope so,” she whispered. “I hope I was a good wife to him in the time we had together. I’ve always—” She stopped and hastily wiped away the last of her tears when the doctor strolled into the room with a clipboard under one arm.

***

Vanessa kicked off her ridiculous high-heeled shoes and raced down the smoky hall, digging into the cleavage of her halter top to pull out her room key.

In her excitement, she dropped it on the floor and nearly split the ass of her miniskirt bending to pick it up. Straightening, she fumbled with the lock and finally burst into the hotel room with, “You’re never going to believe this!”

“
Oui
.” Rock sat by the window, gazing down at his phone as if he’d never seen it before. And even watching him do something as simple as thumb off the device, the tendons in his forearm shifting under his tattoos, made her need to catch her breath. Or maybe it was just the fact that she’d run up the four flights of stairs instead of taking the ultraslow elevator that had her lungs working overtime. Yeah, that had to be it. “Who told you?” he asked. “Was it Becky?”

“Huh?”

“That Franklin is Snake’s son? I just got off the phone with Steady who found out from Ozzie. Apparently there was a big to-do at the hospital last night involvin’ blood, brawls, and bombs of the big-honkin’ secret variety.” He shook his head in disbelief. “So which grape on the Black Knights’ gossip vine spilled the beans to you?”

She was totally confused, and it wasn’t just the alliteration and mixed metaphors. “Nobody. It was obvious the other night when I saw all three of them together, but that’s not what—”

“Is
that
what you meant with that whole cryptic statement about all of us keepin’ secrets from each other?”

“
Yes
,” she huffed, tossing her platform stripper shoes aside. “But that’s beside the point. Listen, I was downstairs getting clean towels when I ran into Candy who said she saw Johnny come in last night!”

Rock had spent quite a bit of time over at In the Mood Lounge after the first night when he’d questioned the bartender and the guy said he remembered seeing someone who matched Johnny’s description. But Rock had turned up a big ol’ handful of nothing on that front. And you can bet Vanessa was more than a little happy to be the one to net them some actionable intel.