“But no foolishness,” Alex scolded.
“Who, me?” Jameson answered, the sly dog.
“We’d never. Promise, Boss,” Maddie said more seriously. Just like Kelsey. So serious and no doubt as honest as Kelsey, too. Damn. Did she have any idea what she was getting herself into with a spec operator like Jameson? Probably not.
Alex turned on his heel, pissed that he couldn’t control his agents, and just as pissed that, a few years back, his wife had looked at him the exact same way Maddie had just looked at Jameson. That Kelsey still looked at him that way today. And he understood, he truly did. Son of a bitch! He’d even hugged Mother tonight, and he’d only done that because he’d recognized himself in her pain. Because that broken something inside of him was suddenly fixed, and it had to do with the little boy he’d been able to give Kelsey, and the little girl she’d given him. When the hell had he gotten so damned sensitive?
His world was changing. Alex just hadn’t expected to change with it.
Chapter Sixteen
By the time Jameson hit the front steps of the safe house in Arlington, Virginia, he was dog-tired, without glasses or cane. It was nearly time to go to work—if he’d been allowed to. Which he wasn’t. Maddie had stuck by his side, so he’d kept one hand on her shoulder as she’d led him inside to the kitchen, where she left him sitting on a stool at the breakfast bar. Then, she hurried down the hall and returned with his jacket on her fingertips. “I’ll get this dry-cleaned for you, but I changed into a clean shirt and—”
He reached out and fumbled for the jacket. “No, you won’t,” he answered as he folded it over his arm. “I might never wash this thing. Why erase a perfectly good memory?”
“Ah… err… Omelet?” she asked amidst a clatter of pans and lids, an obvious attempt to change the subject.
He’d embarrassed her. He could tell. “You don’t have to cook for me.”
“If she doesn’t, I will,” a hearty voice said behind him, as an arm reached over his shoulder and grabbed his hand. “Harley Mortimer, at your service. Sorry I didn’t make it to the scene tonight, Junior Agent Tenney. Had an emergency delivery. Couldn’t get away.”
That explained Maddie’s sudden need to distance herself. She was back in Protocol Officer mode, but he was still in holding, kissing, I-want-to-know-you-a-whole-lot-better mode.
“Good to meet you,” Jameson replied, shaking that callused hand and wondering why a covert operator would be making an emergency delivery. “Pizza or baby?”
Harley cuffed Jameson’s back. “Ha, good one. No, I was the on-call vet for the emergency animal clinic in Arlington tonight. Spent an hour on my hands and knees, waiting for the last in a twelve pup litter. He was stuck. Had to take him by forceps.”
“You’re a veterinarian?”
“Was. This was my last night. Something had to give.”
“It’s about time,” Eric said as he cleared the front entrance, then bolted a noisy series of locks. Jameson counted three. “Holding down two full-time jobs is stupid.”
“Yeah, it was,” Harley admitted, as he fell into the seat at Jameson’s left. Stringent scents of disinfectant and soap drifted between them.
“Honestly, I loved what I was doing, but I missed my wife and my twin boys more. Judy’s been patient, but I didn’t want her raising the monsters alone. And no way was I quitting The TEAM. You need help, darlin’?”
“With omelets?” Maddie asked. “No, thank you. I’m sure I can handle breaking a few eggs. Eric, would you like breakfast?”
“Sure, thanks,” he replied, his gear dropping to the floor. “Got something for you, Jameson. Hold out your hand.”
A long collapsible cane bumped into his waiting palm. “You got me a new cane?”
“Harley picked it up when he bought groceries. Just figured you’d like knowing it was here.”
“Thanks,” Jameson told his benefactors.
“Adam tells me you’re pretty good without it.”
“When I have to be,” he admitted. “But in unfamiliar places, it comes in handy. So you and Harley got stuck babysitting.”
Eric offered a throaty chuckle. He had one of those no-holds-barred kind of voices that belied a love for life, as if he could throw back a cold one, then belly laugh with the best of them. “This’ll be easy duty. Guarding a Navy SEAL. Pretty lady fixing breakfast. Doesn’t sound like work to me.”
“No triplets keeping you up at night, either,” Harley added. He was the one who sounded tired.
“My girls never bother me,” Eric purred, his voice mellow and tender. “Shea’s got help with childcare, remember. Plus her mother’s in town this week. Five women in my house. Figured they didn’t need me hanging around, getting in their way.”
“Those babies love their daddy,” Maddie added wistfully. “I saw that look in your eye when Shea popped into the office with your birthday cake the other day. She and those triplets have you wrapped around their little fingers.”
Eric plopped down at Jameson’s right. “Yeah, well…” he grumbled in that quiet way of men who adored their wives and children. “What can I say? I’m a helluva lucky guy.”
Jameson smiled to himself, content to be sitting among men who felt more like old friends than new acquaintances.
After a quick breakfast, Harley steered him through a tour of the safe house. “Once you about face from the kitchen, stick to your left, and you’ve got a clear shot past the sofa and chairs to the hall. Two rooms on each side, but the first on your right’s the safe room. Had a couple houses explode a few years back. Had to install better protection. Here’s how it works.”
Harley led Jameson forward, then, as if he were dealing with one of his twin boys, he took Jameson’s hand and placed it on a cool glass pad beside a doorjamb. “Mother’s already got your palm print on record.”
The door
