All Perry could do was nod because she couldn’t think of a more perfect word. Jack. A hero. Her hero. Her eyes filled with tears. Her throat ached and burned. The last thing she wanted to do was cry, but her emotions wouldn’t have it any other way.
“It’s been an extraordinary few days, Perry,” Della said softly as Perry sobbed. “And he’s an extraordinary man, doing what men of his nature do. As is Book. They may try a woman’s resolve, but they are men worth loving that much more because of who they are.”
Perry swiped the back of her hand over her eyes and, desperately needing a distraction, considered her aunt. “You love him, don’t you? You love Book. I’ve wondered for a long time, but it’s all over your face.”
Della pressed her fingers to her cheek, then reached for her teacup. She didn’t try to hide any of her smile. “I certainly didn’t mean it to be so obvious. I hope I didn’t embarrass him.”
“Embarrass Book Franklin?” Why did that make Perry want to laugh? “Is that even possible?”
“Of course it is.” Della frowned. “What sort of question is that?”
Sighing again, Perry slouched back in her chair and crossed her arms. “I don’t know. It’s a man question. A species I know nothing about.”
“And now whose feelings are written all over her face?” Della teased, lifting her cup to sip.
“I never believed this would happen.” Perry closed her eyes, dropped her head back. It felt so heavy she wondered if she’d be able to lift it again. “And I don’t just mean that it would never happen to me. I didn’t think it happened at all.”
“What, love at first sight?”
“Funny. And here I thought it was heartburn.”
Della chuckled. “You haven’t been exposed much to romance, Perry.”
Oops. Not sure this was a conversation she wanted to have, she leaned forward and reached for her tea while changing the focus to Della. “What about you?”
“What about me?” Della hedged.
“Do you know why you haven’t? And do you know how horrible I’m going to feel if it has anything to do with your responsibility to me?”
“Truthfully? You’ve always been a consideration, but never a burden,” she hurried to add when Perry groaned. “You’ve always been a very welcome part of my life. Having you would never have kept me from a relationship if I’d found a man who could deal with my gift. I never did. I’m still not sure that I have.”
“Book doesn’t seem to have any problem dealing with it.”
“The problem is more mine,” Della said, her fingers growing white where she gripped her cup. “It’s hard to respond only to what he wants me to know, and not to what I know he feels. There are times I’m not sure I can tell the difference. And it seems easier not to try.”
“And so you’re going to give up? Give him up?”
She dropped her gaze, smiled softly to herself. “You don’t think I’m too old?”
“To do what? Live? Love?”
“To start over.”
Perry suddenly felt like the wise, experienced one when she was nothing of the sort. “It’s not about starting over, Della. It’s about starting again. It’s about change. Who said we have to pick where we live and how we make a living and who we let into our lives, and stick with that plan forever?”
“Good.” Della’s hand came down flat on the table so hard that her teacup rattled. “Because now that you’ve said it aloud, I’m going to hold you to it.”
Sneaky woman. Perry narrowed her eyes. “We’re talking about you and Book. Not about me and…whoever.”
“You and Jack. And yes we are. Like I said. Extraordinary. The days. The man. The whole world out there waiting for you to embrace it. The only thing tying you to New Orleans is familiarity.”
“You’re here. Sugar Blues is here. This is my home. And…” She groaned as her own words came back to haunt her. “I’m in trouble, aren’t I?”
“That’s something only you can figure out. But what I know is that you’re thirty years old, Perry. It’s time for you to step outside your comfort zone and give life, and love, a chance.”
JACK HAD NEVER given the prospect of dying much thought. Hell, he’d almost died of frostbite hunting down a group of Chechen rebels who’d blown up a school, killing over two hundred children. He’d almost expired from heatstroke rescuing aid workers captured by the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. But all that was before he had Perry.
Now all he wanted was to get the hell up off the ground, and get back to Perry ASAP.
He had no idea how long he’d been lying alone in the dark in the dirt with a gash pouring blood from his head, but it was long enough that he was almost too stiff to move.
In the end, Kelly did nothing more to him than drive off and leave him to his fate there with Dayton. That was it. Did they freak out? Chicken out? He would’ve laughed if he’d had the energy.
He’d heard the engine of Kevin’s car sputter twice before turning over, followed by the sound of what had to be Chris’s Jeep. Ten minutes later, all that was left was silence. Ten minutes after that, what few night creatures didn’t mind singing in the cold had started up.
Knowing it was going to be a hell of a long time until he saw the sun, he decided not to waste it. He hadn’t taken but a quick look around while the light was on for Kelly’s visit, but he had seen enough to know he and his chair were the only things on the porch. Meaning his best bet was to get off and find something—a broken bottle, a crushed can, a sharp edge on the generator, a gator’s jaws—to cut through his ropes.
The one piece of metal he knew he could use if he broke it just right was his chair. Options weighed, he’d busted loose one section of railing with his shoulder, then rocked himself right off the porch.
He was out for a while. He didn’t know how long, only that he came to feeling like an almost corpse. His head ached like a burst watermelon, his joints like seized gears, and his balls had never been so cold.
He flexed toes, then ankles, then knees, then hips, finding the lower half of his body working. His hands seemed okay, and he didn’t seem to have dislocated either shoulder, or busted his elbows—a mean feat since his wrists were bound behind him.
But it wasn’t until he rolled to his side and up onto his knees that he realized how badly bruised he was going to be in the morning.
And then the knees thing didn’t seem like such a good plan at all because the chair on his back knocked him forward, and the ground came rushing up to meet his face. He lay there, hands sagging from the chair frame, and recovered his breath.
What a way to find out you were truly an ex in the special ops biz.
In the past, survival had been about getting back to his unit, getting hooked up with another operation, getting his ass back out in the field.
Now, surviving was about getting back to his woman. He would’ve laughed, but he already had enough dirt in his mouth as it was. Four days—five days?—and that was exactly how he thought of her. It had been a hell of a wake-up call to discover what he’d been missing.
He really didn’t want to have to miss out on any more. And so he crunched his abs—his only muscles that didn’t ache—and pulled himself up to sit on his knees, then made it all the way up to his feet. He swayed to one side, stumbled looking for his balance, but finally found it.
Walking with the monkey of a chair on his back and one eye caked shut with dried blood kept him on a pretty short leash. The hulk of the house loomed in shadow, and he headed toward it, catching his foot on a tree root and crashing to the ground with a rib-crushing oomph.
Hell on a crutch. He did not want to lay here like alligator bait until morning. He closed his eyes, screwed them tight, and concentrated on Della, hoping there was some psychic tide flowing out there in the ether, and that she could catch his wave.
Thirty seconds later he realized the sharp stabbing pain in his back wasn’t a broken rib but a piece of the chair. Finally! His trip to the ground had busted the frame. He was lying on one hand, so he twisted the other, tugging until the rope slipped free from the broken end of the metal tubing.
He used his teeth to undo the knots at his wrist, then sat up and swung the rest of the chair around in front of him. By the time his other hand was free, he felt as if he’d mainlined adrenaline. He needed a lantern. A flashlight. A canoe or a raft, and a paddle.
And he was on his way to find them when he heard the first car. He felt like an island castaway, wanting to jump up and down and wave his arms. But he didn’t. He hurt too much. And the headlights—two sets of them now, no three—were cutting through the trees.
So he leaned against the porch and waited, raising a hand to the level of his good eye and squinting into the glare. The first car threw up rooster tails of gravel and dirt as it screamed to a stop. The door slammed open. Book Franklin charged out.
“Montgomery!” he yelled.
Jack lifted his other hand in acknowledgment, saving his breath and waiting for the detective to get close. “You’re looking for a Jeep and a Civic hatchback. Not sure on the Jeep, but the Civic’s white. Early nineties.”