Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“She’s still at your place?” Buck asked. “Is that smart?”
“Zita’s not going to steal anything. Hell, she doesn’t even have a car,” Obi-Wan said, feeling irritated with his copilot.
“No, I meant, is it smart for you to get any closer? It’s obvious you feel something for her, but she lives in California.
It’s already kind of hard to have any kind of relationship with us doing what we do, but with someone who lives on the other side of the country? I’d imagine that’s near impossible.”
His friend was right. A relationship with Zita probably wasn’t smart, but Obi-Wan couldn’t stop the train he was on now even if he wanted to…which he didn’t. He liked Zita. Admired her. Wanted to be around her every moment he could get.
He’d been surprised when he’d woken up in the middle of the night from a sound sleep with Zita still in his lap.
More surprising was how much he’d enjoyed it.
Leaving her to head to the base for PT was actually difficult, which made him realize how much it was going to suck when the movie was done filming and Zita went back to California.
They’d both have some decisions to make about the two of them, but for now, he was going to enjoy her company when and where he could.
“Obi-Wan?” Buck asked, bringing him back to the present. “What are you thinking about the future for you guys?”
“Honestly? I’m just looking forward to next week, when we’re in Fallport for the filming of the rest of the movie.
I like being around Zita. She’s smart, and beautiful, and the more I’m around her, the more I want to be around her.
I have no idea what’s going to happen after that, but I’m not going to back away from the most interesting woman I’ve ever met just because I’m afraid of being hurt. ”
“Wow, that’s grown up of you,” Edge joked.
“Shut it,” Obi-Wan growled.
They were running through the streets of the base; for once, Casper hadn’t made them head to the beach, which everyone was thankful for.
“Casper, you and Laryn okay?” Pyro asked.
“We’re good,” their team leader said. “Finding out she was pregnant was a surprise, but now that we’ve had a bit of time to process it, we’re way more excited than stressed.”
“Good.”
“As you should be.”
“Have you told Nate?”
Nate was Casper’s twin, who was in the Navy. They were as close as brothers could be, having that special “twin connection” a lot of them had.
“Didn’t need to. He knew something was up and called the other night. Wanted to know what was wrong and who he needed to kill.”
Everyone chuckled, knowing the SEAL was probably only half kidding.
“He did ask something we hadn’t even thought about,” Casper added.
“What’s that?” Pyro asked.
“If we’re having twins.”
Everyone went silent for a beat—then as a group, they all burst out laughing.
“Holy shit, that’s right, twins obviously run in the family.”
“Are you?”
“If Laryn was nervous before, she’s probably even more so now.”
“We don’t know yet. It’s still too early. The twelve-week ultrasound is more definitive, so we’ll have to wait and see then,” Casper said, sounding excited about the prospect.
“I take it you wouldn’t be upset if it was twins,” Edge said.
“Not in the least, although it’ll mean more stress on Laryn. Not only her body and the pregnancy, but thinking about childcare and her job after she gives birth,” Casper explained.
He wasn’t wrong. It was scary enough to think about what to do with one child in deployments, but two?
No one wanted to contemplate a future without Laryn as head mechanic on their choppers, but Obi-Wan wasn’t sure what the couple was going to do.
Zita’s suggestion about a live-in nanny was good, but was it actually viable?
He didn’t know. All he knew was that he was glad he wasn’t in his team leader’s shoes.
Or Laryn’s. Having to decide whether or not to give up the job you loved would suck.
But if he and Zita wanted a chance at a relationship, wouldn’t she have to make a similar difficult decision?
It wasn’t as if he could move. Well…he probably could.
If he asked the Army to transfer him to another Night Stalker team.
One that was stationed near the naval base in San Diego.
It would get him closer to LA, where she’d continue to get film work.
But was that something he was willing to do?
He loved his fellow pilots. They’d fought like hell to be together, and to get special permission to be stationed in Virginia. Would he give that up for a woman?
Before meeting Zita, he would have said an empathetic no. But now? He wasn’t sure. And that was a surprising sign that he was already way more serious about her than he was admitting out loud.
The rest of PT went by fairly quickly, although they were all groaning by the end.
But working out was a necessary evil to keep their bodies in tip-top shape.
They had to be ready for anything, in the air and on the ground.
Situations could change on a dime and they had to be ready for whatever was thrown at them.
Obi-Wan had to be back at base by eight for a regular workday, since he wouldn’t be going to a movie set.
He had a week before it was time to head to the small town of Fallport, on the opposite side of the state.
That was where everyone would be staying for the next part of the shoot.
They’d travel about an hour into the woods each day, where they’d film the most intense parts of the movie.
The weather was still a little chilly, which deviated from the original incident the movie was based on.
It was the middle of summer when the Air Force pilot had gone down, forced to traverse the jungle to safety.
But thankfully the director didn’t want to deal with extreme summer conditions, content to film in cooler weather.
Obi-Wan’s anticipation was high as he drove back to his apartment. It felt…nice to know someone was there waiting for him. He’d gotten very used to being alone.
Taking the steps up to his third-floor apartment, Obi-Wan unlocked his door, unsure what he’d find.
Would Zita still be sleeping? It was only six o’clock, after all.
Or would she be up and having second thoughts about staying the night?
Would she be watching TV, having a cup of coffee?
He didn’t know if she was a morning person or not and was looking forward to finding out.
Or had she called a ride-share and left altogether?
The first thing he noticed when he stepped inside was the smell of freshly brewed coffee…which answered his questions about whether Zita was awake and still in his apartment.
He found her sitting at his table, an open book in front of her and a steaming mug of coffee in her hand. Relief at seeing her there made Obi-Wan’s knees weak. She was smiling a little shyly at him when he approached.
“Hi. How was PT?”
Obi-Wan couldn’t stop himself from leaning over and lightly kissing her.
It felt natural. As if he’d done it a million times.
Thankfully, she didn’t rear back or gape at him if he had two heads.
She simply smiled wider…then licked her lips as if she wanted to taste his kiss. Which was a huge turn-on.
Hoping the gray sweats he had on would hide his erection—and doubting it, because he’d seen plenty of memes and videos on social media from women extolling the virtues of how well that particular article of clothing highlighted a man’s dick—he turned and went into the kitchen toward the coffeemaker.
“I hope it’s okay that I made coffee.”
“Of course it is,” Obi-Wan told her. “In fact, it’s welcomed. And to answer your question, PT was good. Casper wasn’t quite as dickfull as he’s been recently.”
“Dickfull?” Zita asked with a chuckle.
He shrugged. “Felt more polite than calling him a power-hungry, taking-out-his-worries-and-stress-on-us asshole.”
She giggled, and the sound went straight to his cock, not doing anything to make the damn thing go down.
“You find everything you need?”
“In your kitchen? Yes. It’s very organized.”
“That, but also in general.”
“Yeah. I appreciate you putting out the toothbrush for me.”
“Of course. I’ll jump in the shower quickly and we can go to breakfast before I take you to the motel and head back to base.”
“Okay.”
Taking another sip of the dark brew, Obi-Wan did his best to keep his out-of-control dick away from Zita’s view as he headed for the hallway and his bedroom.
His shower was fast, but not as quick as usual, since he took the time to jack off. It felt wrong and perverted, especially knowing the object of his lust was in the other room, but if he didn’t relieve the pressure, he’d probably embarrass Zita, which was the last thing he wanted to do.
Finally feeling as if he could walk without hunching over, Obi-Wan quickly got dressed and headed back out to where Zita was still sitting at his table.
“What were you reading?” he asked, noticing the book she’d had earlier was now gone.
“I hope you don’t mind. I looked through your shelves when I got up.”
“Of course not.”
“It was one on Night Stalkers.”
He nodded. “The one by Durant and Hartov? Green cover?”
“Yeah. I didn’t get very far though. I wanted to read more about what you do.”
Obi-Wan walked over to his bookshelf and found the book she’d been reading, pulling it out and handing it to her. “Take it with you. You’ll have some time to read this week, won’t you?”
“Yeah. You don’t mind?”
“Nope.”
“Is it accurate?” she asked with a sparkle in her eye. “I mean, I don’t want to waste my time if it’s all made up to sell books.”
“It’s pretty good.”
She laughed. “I have no idea what that means. But don’t tell me. If I knew half of what you actually did, it would probably terrify me.”
She wasn’t exactly wrong. The book was fairly accurate, but it left out a lot of the more harrowing things Obi-Wan and those like him did on a regular basis. “You hungry?”
“Starving.”