Free Navy SEAL Seduction by Bonnie Vanak Page B

space. I let you talk when you needed to, and let you party with your SEAL buddies because they were your family as much as I was. But the one time I asked you to stay, to talk with me after we lost our baby, you clammed up. You couldn’t give me what I needed and I had no faith you’d change, Jarrett.”
    She fell back onto the sofa, wiping her forehead. Jarrett stared down at his hands, the scarred knuckles and the closely trimmed nails. Big hands, big heart, she’d teased him in the past. Hands that had pulled the trigger too many times to count, had snapped the necks of the enemy. Hands that had stroked and caressed Lacey in the dark of night, and held her as she’d sobbed in the hospital.
    But they were the same hands that saluted his CO after Lacey’s miscarriage and then hours later quietly turned the front doorknob in the gray hours of dawn as he picked up his duffel and left to go downrange yet again.
    “I deserve that,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry, Lace. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you what you needed at the time.”
    Her lower lip wobbled again, that precarious little tremble hinting of her raging emotions. “It’s in the past, Jarrett. I’ve made a new life here and I’m so damn scared for my daughter.”
    He covered her hand with his. “Then let me help you. I’ll drive her to school tomorrow, check out this guy and we’ll go together to pick her up in the afternoon.”
    Lacey rubbed circles on her knee, and he could see her mind working. “Fleur has a test tomorrow.”
    “In kindergarten?”
    “The test is to put her into a higher level of learning class. I’ve been working with her on learning to read in French.”
    Bemused, he shook his head. Kids these days were brighter and learned quicker than he ever did. “At her age I was finger-painting and pulling little girls’ pigtails.” Playfully, he tugged on her ponytail, hoping to coax a smile to her solemn face.
    She went to the window, pulling aside the curtains. He regarded his ex. She’d done well for herself and struck out on her own. He was mighty proud of her, but didn’t quite know how to say it. Didn’t quite know how to reconnect. Once sex had been the answer, and hell, he’d gladly pick her up, sling her over one shoulder and carry her into the bedroom to explore what they’d had in bed, but first he had to gain her trust.
    She’d left him because he hadn’t communicated in the past. Time to start talking.
    “Lace, how about we...”
    “I have an early day tomorrow. I’m going to bed.” Lacey tugged the band off her ponytail and her hair spilled around her. Loose, and wild, a little like her. He hungered to see her like that in bed once more, her silky locks spread out on the pillow as she lay back, naked, her body bared exclusively for him...
    Stop thinking about sex. Yeah, right. Tell me to stop breathing. That would be easier around her.
    Frowning, Lacey stared at the window.
    “It’s too quiet. Usually the roosters are crowing.”
    Instantly he pulled away, his body on full alert. He noticed the quiet, as well. Roosters, contrary to myth, crowed whenever they felt like it, not just in the morning. Jarrett snapped off the living room lamp. “Step away from the window.”
    Standing to one side, he lifted the curtain with the back of one hand. He peered into the blackness. Every cell in his body warned something was wrong. Jarrett spotted movement by the storage shed and heard glass breaking.
    And then he heard a loud pop , like a firecracker going off. All the hairs on his nape saluted the air and his body went cold. Suddenly, an orange glow erupted inside the shed, followed by thick black tongues of smoke curling into the moonlit sky.
    The shed was on fire and the flames were headed for the jam they’d packed this afternoon.

CHAPTER 6
    L acey saw the fire and her stomach clenched hard. But she knew how to handle this.
    Her ex drew his pistol and started for the door. “Stay here. Call the fire