Grinning, he shook his head. “Keep plucking at random excuses. Maybe you’ll get lucky and eventually find a real one.” He sniffed loudly.
“You reenlisted without speaking to me. How was I supposed to feel?” One corner of those perfectly full lips turned down. “You knew I wouldn’t be happy.”
His heart slammed into his ribs. “I didn’t reenlist. I joined a Special Ops unit so I could continue my work overseas, but with less missions.” Why was he wasting his breath? They’d been through this rigmarole a dozen times and nothing he ever said made a difference. There was a lot of truth in how he had let her take on too much responsibility at home, but she was dead wrong when it came to believing he enjoyed being gone.
“Excuse me that my terminology is a bit off. I guess it shouldn’t matter since you didn’t care what I thought of you re-joining.”
“You think you’re pretty damn smart, don’t you?”
She gave a half-shrug. “Not a lot about a lot of things but when it comes to you, and perfume and lipstick on a collar, I think I can connect the dots.”
He leaned in slightly, so close he inhaled her scent that left his balls tingling. “Says the person who is receiving expensive gifts from the boss. Connect your own dots, sweetheart. If you think for a minute that his note didn’t have “Fuck me” written between every line then you’re choosing to play dumb.”
There was a flash of sadness in her pretty eyes. “Is that what this is about? Revenge? Were you trying to make me jealous?”
The intensity of her words drove a stake through his chest. “You don’t know me at all, do you?”
“And neither do you with me. I told you there’s nothing between Peter and me.”
“Oh, is it Peter now?” He swallowed hard, feeling another a stab to his gut.
“I-I…okay, I shouldn’t have accepted the presents. It was inappropriate, but at that moment, I don’t know, I just felt like I was deserving because I gave up my weekend with Fin to come here.”
Some relief came to him. “Why don’t we just get to the core of this issue. This has nothing to do with either of the Langleys, or our jobs, and it’s all about you and me.”
“What are you talking about?” She’d lost some of the anger to her tone.
“There’s still chemistry between us, baby, and it rages like a forest fire. The more we deny it, the more we pretend it’s not there, the hotter the desire gets.” He wished he could go back and do their marriage all again, fix the issues before they became irreconcilable craters. He’d been stubborn and stuck in his own bubble. He should have worried more about Novah’s feelings and less about his own. Now it was too late so what could he do with all the tension he carried in his body? “I fucked up. I know I did.”
“Unfortunately, there are no take backs on shitty decisions.”
“Yeah, I’m glad you see your terrible decisions too.”
Her lip curled but he saw the flash of humor in her eyes. “What did I do?”
“Do you ever listen?”
“I listen just fine when I need to,” she said softly.
Her voice lifted the hairs on his neck. He’d never allowed anyone inside until he met her, and she’d found her way through all the rock, granite, and iron of his exterior walls straight into his heart. Instead of feeling weakened by her invasion he’d felt like a giant of a man. Then Finley was born, and the second the doctor placed his tiny human in his arms he’d been willing to soften up—and had softened up under love’s hypnotic spell. He was a different man now. Egan had grown emotionally by leaps and bounds. Being a husband and father had made him who he was today. He tried scooping out his desire to protect Novah, but after all, she was the mother of his child and he’d always want her to be happy and safe. “How does it feel to always be right?”
She stood rigid and strong, her bottom lip was no longer quivering, and her eyes turned aloof. She took a step around him, brushing his arm as she passed to investigate the water. “I wonder how long it’d take to swim back to the resort.”
“Being that you’re not a strong swimmer you’d probably drown first.”
“I guess then you’d have one less problem, right?” she snapped.
He rubbed the ache taking up residence in his temples. “Stop talking shit, Novah. You know I’ve never wanted anything bad to happen to you, ever.” He practically ripped his tie from his collar and tossed it aside. The temperature had risen outside and inside his body.
“What has become of us? Arguing like we’re married again.”
The wind could have knocked him over. His chest was on fire and he could barely breathe. “My God, are you really this silly? Sure, maybe I wouldn’t have won a best husband award, or father for that matter, but I would have crawled across the Sahara then laid on a bed of hot coals for my family. You chose to be single and I gave you that, but I won’t give you the last thread of hope that I have. I don’t think I can ever really let you completely go.”
“Let’s not repeat this.” There was a quiver in her tone.
“Yeah, how about we don’t. What good would it do?” he grumbled, stomped to the steering wheel and started the engine for a second time. He pulled down on the throttle and the boat jerked as it moved forward. The quicker he got away from her the better. “After I check out the perimeter, I’ll get you
