#2
My phone vibrates with a message from one of our East Coast medical contacts confirming availability.
I forward the details to Victor.
Medical support ready.
One piece of the extraction solved from right here.
Across the table, Steve catches my eye again.
This time I smile at him.
He still looks suspicious.
I’ll deal with my husband and his damn detective instincts tonight.
Right now, we have a missing woman to find.
***
Blackstone Ventures HQ, San Francisco. 1230 hours.
I was going to wait until tonight.
That lasted less than two hours.
Every time Steve looks at me, I want to tell him. Every time we make another decision about Charity and the operation taking shape in Washington, DC, I think about the decision I’ve already made about my own role.
By lunchtime, I’m done pretending I can sit beside my husband for another eight hours with the biggest news of our lives hidden in my bag.
I wait until the Charity search is moving before catching Steve’s hand as he passes my chair.
“Come with me, love.”
He stops. “Everything okay?”
“No.”
His expression changes.
“Nothing bad,” I add.
“That would’ve been useful before the no.”
I lead him into Victor’s empty office and close the door.
Steve turns to face me. “All right, then. What’s going on? You’ve been weird all bloody morning.”
“I have not been weird.”
“I bought you coffee and you didn’t drink it, disappeared into the bathroom, then came back drinking water like it had personally offended you.”
Damn detective.
I reach into my bag and hand him the wrapped pregnancy test.
His eyes drop to it. Then lift to mine.
He unwraps it and stares at the two lines.
“Jan?”
“I’m pregnant.”
His gaze drops to the test again, and the biggest smile I’ve ever seen spreads across his face.
“You’re pregnant?”
“Unless three tests are lying to me.”
“Three?”
“I believe in verification.”
He laughs, pulls me into his arms and kisses me.
“A baby,” he murmurs.
“Our baby.”
He kisses me again, then rests his forehead against mine, his smile so happy my eyes start filling all over again.
“We’re going to be parents, Jan.”
“We are.”
“Jesus!”
A laugh breaks out of him and he wraps me up again. “Your mum’s going to lose her mind.”
“So’s yours.”
“First grandchild on both sides.”
“Yep.”
“Bloody hell, darls.”
I laugh against him. “You’re happy, then?”
He pulls back far enough to look at me. “Are you kidding? I’m fucking ecstatic!”
Then something shifts in his expression.
“Hang on.”
I know that look.
“What?”
“Your implant.”
“Oh, that.”
“Jan.”
“With the rush to Scotland because Mum and Dad were in danger, I forgot all about getting it replaced.”
He stares at me. “You were due to have it changed?”
“Yes.”
“And you forgot?”
“There was quite a lot happening.”
“Then Manitoba.”
“Yes.”
“And Napa.”
I give him a look. “I remember Napa.”
His mouth twitches. “So do I.”
“I also remember the trip back from the pub at Loch Lomond, which is precisely where you impregnated me, I believe.”
“Behind a rock out in the open too!” he says, grinning.
I laugh. “Romantic, aren’t you?”
“Got the job done, didn’t I?”
I laugh, then glance at the test in his hand.
“This changes things.”
His expression sobers. “Yeah.”
“I’m not leaving HAVEN.”
“I wasn’t going to ask you to.”
“I know. But I’m not going into the field the way I have either.”
That surprises him.
“I’ve been thinking about it all morning. Strategic command, medical planning, intelligence, logistics, coordinating the teams. I can still do what HAVEN needs from somewhere secure.”
“You love field work.”
“I do.”
The answer comes out quieter than I mean it to.
“But I can’t walk into an extraction and pretend I’m only making that decision for myself anymore.”
He takes my hand.
“I don’t want you giving up who you are because we’re having a baby.”
“I’m not.”
I finally know that now.
“I’m changing where I fight from.”
His thumb moves across my fingers.
“And after the baby’s born?”
“We work that out when we get there.”
A smile returns. “Reckon Angus babysits?”
“Only if we want the baby’s first word to be obscene.”
“Could be Australian.”
“That narrows it down to ripper or bewdy.”
He laughs and pulls me close again.
Beyond the office door, HAVEN is searching for Charity Washington and whatever Senator Davis Ellison died protecting.
I think about Westbrook. Ashford. Lockhart. All the Legacy families who believed money and power put them beyond consequence.
Then I think about the tiny beginning growing inside me.
“I want to keep fighting, Steve.”
“I know.”
“I’m building a world where our child doesn’t have to fight this fight.”
His smile fades into something more determined.
“Then we’d better get back to work, darls.”
“Yeah.”
We’ve got a baby coming.
And a world that needs some serious work before it gets here.
A knock hits the office door.
“Steve. Jan.”
Victor.
Steve opens it.
Victor’s expression tells me our ten minutes are over.
“G found Charity’s trail.”
“Where?”
“Washington.”
He glances at Steve.
“And Antoine’s the closest person we have.”
***