3. Soledad
3
SOLEDAD
I shut my laptop and looked out the front window of Alex’s house. Summer sunshine coated the lawn and the street. People ran, biked, and walked past, enjoying the day. Heck, even the cars looked happy to be glistening in the warmth. And I was stuck inside, as I had been far too much in the six weeks since Luke’s birth.
“Mama’s got the stir-crazies,” I murmured to Luke. After I fed him, he’d been content to be awake and look around, so I’d spread out the quilt on the living room floor and put him in the center.
Trying to combat my restlessness, I’d turned to a task that always made me happy: updating my blog about hot-air balloons. I’d been fascinated with them ever since I was a little girl and had gone with my mother to a festival. Even though I’d never been up in one and the thought of doing so made my knees shake and stomach roil, I tracked festivals and balloon races on my blog. One of my favorite parts of the blog was writing reviews of books that featured hot-air balloons. They showed up in books —both fiction and nonfiction—more often than people thought. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who found them fascinating.
Finding time to read the books, let alone blog about them, had been nearly impossible since Luke’s birth. I looked at my adorable boy. He was curling up his legs and working on getting his toes to his mouth. When I leaned over him, he stopped, blinking up at me with dark blue eyes just like his daddy’s.
“You’re going to be a heartbreaker, you know,” I said, making him smile. “Another thing you’ve got in common with your daddy.”
Luke was worth all the lost sleep and worry of the past weeks, but I still felt a bit like a caged animal. I needed to get outside, feel the breeze on my face and warmth on my shoulders. Maybe even stretch my legs. I’d done yoga nearly daily over the past month and felt my body was returning to its pre-baby shape, but I’d lost my endurance. Maybe a walk—a fast one—and if that went well, I could try running soon. Frankie could do with some exercise, too.
I found my sneakers and sunglasses, excited about the opportunity to go out on my own.
“Come on, baby,” I said to Luke as I leaned down to scoop him up. “Let’s go find your daddy.”
I had no qualms about leaving Luke with Alex. For a man wary of commitments, he’d shown himself to be dedicated to fatherhood, even in the tough moments. A few nights before, Luke hadn’t been able to settle. Alex had patiently walked the floor with him for hours, insisting that I get some rest. I’d found them the next morning, Luke in his crib and Alex asleep on the floor next to it. I’d tiptoed out of the nursery smiling, absolutely joyful at how father and son had bonded. Truth be told, I felt a connection to Alex, too—even stronger than the one we’d shared while dating, and I’d thought that had been pretty terrific. But before, we’d been so intent on keeping things “casual” and “fun” that we’d made a point not to spend all our time together. There was so much of our lives that we’d kept separate. Being parents together was a whole new experience. It felt like we were really in the trenches together, trusting and relying on each other in a way that was like nothing I’d ever experienced before. Was this what it was like for him when he was on a mission? It made it a little easier for me to understand why he was so committed to being a SEAL.
I shook off my thoughts. With Luke in my arms, I made my way to the back door. Alex and Frankie were in the fenced yard, where Alex was planting a garden. I’d known he had a knack for gardening, but in the past weeks he’d been putting his landscaping skills to work and beginning a transformation from just grass to something more interesting.
Alex looked up as I stepped through the door. Despite myself, my heart leaped a little in my chest. He was hot, of course, with his muscular build and square jaw, but he was more than that. He’d treated me with respect and kindness, making no suggestion that he was angry about me commandeering his house and taking over his leave with a baby he didn’t expect.
It didn’t surprise me that he wouldn’t put me and Luke out on the street, but even if we hadn’t been so desperate for housing, I got the impression that he’d want us together. At least for now, while Luke was so little.
I waved to him, staying in the shade of the back porch for Luke’s sake. Alex smiled and started toward me with Frankie on his heels.
“Hi, I wanted—” I said, cutting myself off when his phone rang.
“Shoot,” he said. “Let me see who it is.” He yanked it from his pocket to read the display. He grimaced and answered. “Vale here.”
He looked hard at me, as if I’d done something to him, before pivoting on his heel and stalking across the yard. What was that about? I’d never seen him quite like that. Not even on the day we’d broken up or the day he arrived home from a mission to find me—literally—having his baby. He’d been scarily calm, even matter-of-fact both those times, but this was a different sort of emotion, a tension I couldn’t fathom.
Whatever it was, he didn’t want me to hear his conversation. His voice was low, inaudible, but his body language conveyed stress. I could take Luke in the house, but I waited, wanting to speak with Alex as soon as the call was over. Maybe he’d confide in me what the problem was—if, in fact, there was one.
Alex
“Sorry about that,” I said, shoving my phone in my pocket and burying the desire to pitch it across the lawn as I made my way back to Soledad.
“Something wrong?” she asked, her eyes on my face.
“No,” I lied, earning a raised eyebrow. Everything was wrong. From the look on her face, I could tell that she didn’t believe my answer, but her glare wasn’t going to change my mind. I wasn’t burdening her with the information Travis had just shared with me. It wasn’t her problem. But it posed one for me. Fortunately, Luke reached up and grasped a lock of Soledad’s hair, drawing her attention away and giving me a moment to process the intel I’d just received.
Bruce Lewis’s family had used their connections to get his misconduct reduced in degree to something considered non-judicial, which lessened the severity of his sentence. It was still bad, but it wasn’t the dishonorable discharge and prison sentence it could have been. Should have been, I thought. Bruce forfeited pay, was placed under restriction, and lost one grade in rank. Those were the short-term punishments—he’d be able to work his way back from all of that, in theory. But the truth was a little more complicated. The formal letter of reprimand placed in his permanent personnel file was a career-killer, a guarantee that Bruce wouldn’t be following in the illustrious footsteps of his father and grandfather. No promotions would come his way.
And, according to Travis, Bruce wasn’t taking it well, despite the fact that he was free and still employed when he deserved to be in jail. He was looking for revenge and pointing his finger straight at me, the one who had supposedly “ruined his life.” The situation worried me. I wouldn’t have played it any other way—his actions weren’t something I could have ignored and still been able to look my family in the eye—but that didn’t help me in the immediate future.
“I was about to say,” Soledad started, and I swung my eyes back to her, “that I’d like to take Frankie for a walk. I need some sunshine and exercise. Can you take care of Luke for a while? I’ll be back before his next feeding.”
If Travis hadn’t called, I would have happily agreed to her request. Now, though, my inborn sense of caution stopped me. She probably needed some time to herself, but I couldn’t let her take it outside the house, out on her own like that. Soldiers win wars by hitting their enemies at weak points. To me, that meant Soledad and Luke. If Bruce had it in for me, he’d find out about my former girlfriend and my baby son. It’s not like they’d be hard to discover, since they were living in my house. Bruce would have no qualms targeting them to take his revenge on me. As Travis had said, he was a snake—and now he had little left to lose, which made him a very dangerous one.
“Why don’t we all go?” I suggested. “We can make it Luke’s first official walk and try out the stroller Zach and Carolyn got us.”
“Oh,” she said after a moment’s hesitation. “I guess that would be okay.”
I could tell it wasn’t what she wanted. She probably thought I feared being left alone with our son. That was mildly frustrating, but I’d have to deal with it, since I wasn’t prepared to explain myself.
“Go for a walk, Frankie,” Soledad said to the dog, who wagged her tail and pranced around the yard.
“Sit,” I commanded, and the dog sat instantly. We’d been working on some basic commands. She was still at a good age for training, since Frankie was little more than a puppy. She seemed quick to learn, eager to please. I had a sudden thought. Could Frankie be trained to protect Soledad and Luke if the need arose? She was smaller than the average guard dog, but she’d be better than nothing. I knew a little about that type of K-9 training, and I pledged to look into it more. It might be another way of keeping my little family safe.
“I’ll put Luke in the stroller,” Soledad said and disappeared back into the house.
“Heel,” I said, and the dog responded. “Good girl. We’ve got some work to do.”
A few minutes later we set out to walk to a nearby park. Soledad pushed the stroller, and I held Frankie on a leash. It did feel good to be out, but I was still watchful, scanning our surroundings. Lots of people were out due to the nice weather. Quite a few cars were parked along the street. How easy would it be for Bruce to have my house under surveillance? It was a small town, so strangers tended to stick out—but he was a trained SEAL. He knew how to set up surveillance without drawing attention to himself.
“Hi, Gina,” Soledad called to our neighbor, who had been over several times to visit Luke, bringing meals for the adults and gifts for the infant. I owed her a huge thank you.
“Lovely to see you all out,” Gina said, pausing to peek into the stroller at Luke. “So cute. Have fun.”
“Good to see you, Mr. Crandall,” Soledad said to a gray-haired man who came out of a house to pick up his newspaper. He waved before going back in.
Soledad nodded or commented to three other people before we reached the first corner.
“Do you know everybody?” I asked as we turned onto the next street. I’d grown up in this town and knew almost no one, except to recognize them vaguely in passing. I knew most of the people in town by sight, but knowing them by name? No. Not unless they were someone I knew from school. But that was Soledad for you. She wasn’t even from here originally—she’d moved to town just a couple of years ago. But she was friendly and trusting—which, in my experience, meant that people took advantage of you. If nothing else, those qualities made you vulnerable, something I was never willing to be.
“I don’t think so. Why?” She smiled at me.
“No reason,” I said, letting it go but acutely aware of the differences between us. From the outside, we looked like the perfect young family. Mom, dad, baby, dog. For a second, I allowed myself to consider the possibility. What if that’s what we truly were? What if I had a relationship with Soledad beyond being her baby daddy? What if we planned to raise our son together as a couple?
We were doing that for now, but I couldn’t say how long it would last. Everything was so up in the air. I’d shoved my re-enlistment paperwork aside, planning to wait until the last minute to make the decision. But with Luke in my life, I was leaning toward not agreeing to another four-year hitch. I would miss too much of Luke’s childhood if I was gone on long missions as I had been in the past. I might not know how to be a dad, but I knew enough to know that a big part of being a good parent was being around—making sure my kid knew I was there for him, no matter what. My mom hadn’t pulled that part off, and I still struggled to forgive her for it, even all these years later.
Soledad, on the other hand, was an amazing mom. And she deserved to be co-parenting with someone who would pull his weight rather than leaving everything on her. She had always hated it when I was gone and out of touch, and I could only imagine it would bother even more now that Luke was in the picture.
I pulled myself back to reality and shoved away an impossible “what if” daydream. In the long run, Soledad and I would have to figure out a way to share Luke. I wasn’t sure what that would look like, but for now, with the Bruce Lewis situation what it was, I knew for sure that I couldn’t leave them unprotected. They were only in danger because of me. But if Bruce wanted to get to them, he’d have to go through me first.
“This is where I found Frankie.” Soledad pointed to a spot along the curb, interrupting my worries. “I still don’t understand how someone could be so heartless.” She bent over Frankie, rubbing her head. “We were both lucky that day, weren’t we, girl? You got a second chance, and I got the best dog in the world.”
“She does appear to be a good one,” I commented when Soledad straightened.
“She’s awesome.” Understanding a compliment when she heard one, Frankie cozied up to Soledad, wagging her tail and begging for more attention. Soledad bent down again, her hair falling to one side and exposing the line of her long neck. She turned to me, giving me a smile, and my breath hitched. Somehow, she was more beautiful than she’d been when we were dating. Time and circumstances hadn’t dimmed any of my desire for her. I wanted to reach for her.
“We should head home,” I said, snapping myself away from thoughts that had no business being in my head.
“Sure, that’s probably far enough for Luke’s first time in a stroller. I think he likes it, though,” Soledad said.
Luke had looked around as we walked, making happy gurgling sounds. But all of the excitement must have tired him out, because by the time we returned to the house, he had fallen asleep. Soledad put a finger to her lips before gently lifting him from the stroller and carrying him upstairs.
“Some water for you,” I said to Frankie after watching Soledad climb the stairs, her lean, athletic body keeping my attention until she went into the nursery. My thoughts from a few minutes before came back in full force. Frankie’s damp nose nudging me brought me back to reality, and I took her to the kitchen and gave her a fresh bowl of water, which she noisily lapped up.
“Back porch?” Soledad suggested, coming into the room with the portable baby monitor in her hand. “I think he’ll sleep a little longer, and it’s so beautiful out.”
“Sure,” I agreed. “I’ll get us some drinks and meet you out there.”
She went past me and outside. I couldn’t stop myself from watching her through the screen door. She stretched her arms over her head, exposing the skin of her midriff, and lifted her face to the sun before settling a hip on the railing. I needed something to cool myself off. From the fridge I grabbed a craft ginger ale she liked and a beer for myself.
“Thanks,” she said, when I joined her on the porch and handed over the bottle.
Without hesitation, she closed her eyes, tipped the bottle back, and took a long drink. I couldn’t tear my gaze from the way the muscles worked in her throat. God, I wanted to kiss down her neck, to the edge of her shirt and beyond. But things were in a strange limbo between us. We’d broken up, gone our separate ways. When I’d headed off for that last mission, I had assumed that I’d probably only ever see her again in passing. It was too much of a small town to hope that our paths would never cross, but I certainly hadn’t imagined that I’d come back home and end up living with her. In some ways, our relationship was more intimate than it had ever been. In others, it was like we were just roommates who happened to share a kid. It was confusing as hell, and I had no idea what she wanted.
She opened her eyes and set the bottle aside, but I couldn’t stop looking at her. I didn’t care when she caught me and her lips tipped up in a tiny, flirtatious smile that filled me with hope. Maybe I wasn’t the only one who wanted back a little of what we’d had before. I stepped closer, raising my hand to trail my fingers from her angular cheekbone to the line of her jaw. And because I’d lost all control of myself, I continued the caress down her exposed neck. Her breath quickened as I leaned in slowly until my lips met hers.
Everything good between us came back to me in an instant. I ran my tongue along her lush lower lip, teasing her to open for me. Before she did, I felt her hands on my chest, stroking over my pecs. I nearly moaned with desire but instead poured my energy into the kiss when her mouth opened for me and her tongue tangled with mine.
With my hands low on her waist, bringing her closer to me, I changed the angle of our kiss, deepening it and wanting more. She gave in, meeting my tongue stroke for stroke, and I felt her soften in my arms. I was lost to the sensation until something squeezed between us. Frankie. With a gasp of surprise, Soledad pushed back, putting distance between us. Her head was tipped down, looking at the dog, so I couldn’t read her expression, but we were both panting. The desire wasn’t all on my side. The kiss had made that clear. But desire didn’t mean a damn thing if she wasn’t willing to act on it anymore.
“I…uh…need to get a shower,” she said as she sidestepped me and went into the house without a backward glance.
My heart was hammering, and my dick had gone hard. I needed a shower, too, an ice-cold one.