Hard as Stone(114)

Harmony froze, her breaths coming fast as white puffs of air formed in front of her lips. “You’re what?” she whisper screamed at him as she finally came unglued from her seat and hopped to her feet.

Slowly reaching inside the back pocket of his jeans, Jacob kept his eyes on her face and pulled out his wallet. Flipping it open, he passed her his credentials. “I’m an agent with the DEA, babe.”

“You… what… how is that…” Harmony floundered as she stared down at the badge in her hand. “Are you for real?” she finally managed to ask, lifting her head to stare at him with suspicious eyes.

“To make you understand everything, I need to start at the beginning,” he explained gently. “Please, Harmony, sit down and give me that chance.”





Chapter Thirty-six



“I gave you a chance. In fact, you had six weeks of chances, Jake,” Harmony whispered, her blue eyes troubled and confused as she faced him. “You wasted them all.”

“You’re wrong, darlin’,” Jake replied calmly. “I took those six weeks of chances to show you who I am, not what I do. I wanted you to know me. The real me, not the DEA’s fabled star agent. Me.”

“You said you were in security,” Harmony retorted, her hands dropping to her hips as she narrowed her eyes on him.

“I am in security. Security for our nation against the drug trade. That wasn’t a lie,” he stated adamantly. “I also do plan on opening a private security firm in Paradise. Doing what I’ve done for the last twenty years, I got pretty good at being a private investigator. I’ve already talked to Abel, and his office is chomping at the bit to throw some business my way. So, that wasn’t a lie either. Again, I have not lied to you. I just haven’t shared everything. Yet.”

Blowing out an irritated breath, Harmony glared at him. “You get that a sin by omission is still a sin, right?”

“Yeah, I do,” he agreed with a guilty wince. “But, I had my reasons. Let me explain them to you, baby. Give me that much,” he encouraged her softly, holding at a hand to her.

Harmony ignored his hand, but she did sit – as far away from him as she could get on the narrow bench- but she still sat. “Talk,” she demanded, balling her fists in her lap as she stiffly settled against her seat.

“Okay, babe, I’ll talk. It’s kind of a long story, but it’s important you hear it all and that you hear it from me,” he began, draping an arm across the back of the bench. “I started my career nearly a quarter century ago in the Army.”

“The Army?” Harmony questioned, turning her head toward him and furrowing her eyebrows.

Nodding, Jacob murmured, “101st Airborne. I’d just graduated high school, Desert Storm had just started, and I was ready to get the hell out of my hometown. It was selfish, really. My mother had just lost my father the year before and my sister was still in school, but I couldn’t wait to get the fuck out of our little town. There were too many memories. Everywhere I looked I saw my dad. We were close and I missed him. So, I signed up to serve our country on the day I got my diploma. I figured it was a way out and I’d get to see the world. The next week, I was at boot camp at Fort Benning, Georgia. That lasted about ten weeks then I was assigned my first duty station out of Fort Campbell. Next thing I knew, I was in a dry, dusty shithole called Kuwait. I don’t regret signing up though things might have turned out a lot differently for me if I’d gone another route. But, I didn’t and I’ve made my peace with that. The military laid the foundation for the man I’d become. They taught me control and discipline. I learned about brotherhood. I learned that some fights are worth the blood, sweat and tears a man has to shed to win it.”

It wasn’t hard for Harmony to believe that Jake had served their country; he had that way about him. What she couldn’t believe was that he had a sibling she’d never heard about before now. “Wait, you have a sister?” Harmony questioned. She remembered him mentioning his mother in passing and knew the woman was still alive, and he’d shared that his father had passed, but this was the first time she’d ever heard him talk about his sister.

“I had a sister,” Jacob corrected softly, his jaw clamping as he felt his throat get tight. “She died while I was in Kuwait.”

Harmony inhaled sharply. She knew too well what it felt like to nearly lose a sister, but to actually have to bury one? She couldn’t imagine anything worse. “Jake, I’m so sorry,” she whispered, involuntarily reaching out to clasp his hand in hers.