Wilde Nights in Paradise (Wilde Security #1)

Chapter Twenty-One

The first week of July, a hurricane churning out near Cuba made the weather turn. Gone were the warm, sun-drenched spring days, replaced with muggy, overcast, and rainy afternoons that seemed endless. Jude was lucky if he got his swim in, but the punishing exercises he’d been putting himself through in the gym were no longer taking the edge off his restlessness and the lack of outside stimulation made him twitchy.

The weather took its toll on Libby, too. With each passing day, she seemed more morose, talking to him, joking with him, less and less. He tried to give her some space, but when he walked into the house from tinkering with Seth’s car in the garage and found her sitting on the couch with tears rolling down her face as she watched TV, that was the final straw. He set aside the rag he’d been wiping his greasy hands on and knelt down in front of her.

“Libs, what’s wrong?”

She sniffled and swiped away the tears with the fingers of one hand. “Nothing.”

“Yeah, I cry over nothing all the time.”

That got him a little smile as he’d hoped it would. “It’s stupid.”

“I’m good with stupid.”

She motioned to the TV with the remote in her hand. On screen, a hot dog commercial showed a happy-happy family passing heaping dishes of food around a packed picnic table. Jude watched until the commercial cut to the next, an advertisement for the local news talking about the possibility of cancelling tomorrow’s firework show.

“Tomorrow’s the Fourth of July,” she said and brushed away another tear. “I’ve never missed one with my family, but now I’m stuck here, and I won’t get to see my parents or any of my aunts, uncles, cousins. My grandparents. I miss them. I won’t be home to celebrate with them.”

Christ, he was a nitwit. Of course she’d been upset—it was a holiday, and she was homesick. Why hadn’t that occurred to him before now?

Holidays had been no big deal in the Wilde family since his parents died. Actually, this was the first year all of his brothers were in the same country for the holiday. Someone had always been overseas, and whoever else was available might get together in a bar for a beer or two, but that was the extent of it. He couldn’t remember having a real family dinner since he was nine…but he suddenly wanted one. With Libby.

He leaned in and gave her a light kiss. “This will be over soon enough. Once my brothers find K-Bar, he’s going back to prison for breaking his parole, and you’ll be safe to go home and see your folks.”

But until then, he had some plans to make.

…

Libby woke later than usual the next morning and lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling fan for a long time, debating whether she should get up. She turned her head on the pillow and looked at the alarm clock. Nearly noon. Really, what was the point? She could hear rain drumming against the roof, so it wasn’t as if she could go outside and soak in some sun.

Boy, she missed the sun.

But she missed her family even more.

“Ugh. Can someone say pity party?” Disgusted with herself, she shoved off the blankets and headed toward the bathroom for a shower. So she was missing her family’s barbeque tonight. At least doing so ensured that she’d be around for next year’s festivities. Better to spend one holiday lonely than spend the rest of her holidays in a grave.

She showered quickly, wrestled her damp hair into a ponytail, and tossed on an oversize T-shirt and cotton shorts. No sense in putting on anything else. She wasn’t going any—

Stepping into the hallway, she stopped in surprise at the delicious scents from the kitchen. Jude stood at the counter, reading the directions on the back of a refrigerated piecrust tin. He was in his favorite basketball shorts, shirtless, his back turned toward her, and that old curiosity about his tattoo pulled her forward. Dammit, why’d she leave her glasses in the bedroom?

Just as she got close enough to make out some of the words on his spine, he turned and grinned. “You’re awake.”

Pretending she hadn’t been trying to read his tattoo again, she casually moved to his side to examine the ingredients he had spread on the counter. “And you’re…baking?”

“Just another of my skills. It’s a long and varied list.”

“Which is why you’re using canned apple filling and a refrigerated crust, I’m sure.”

“Hey now. I’m working with what I have. It wasn’t easy to put this much together on short notice. I now owe Camden’s cop buddy a favor, which, between you and me, freaks me the hell out.”

She laughed and dipped her finger into the pre-made apple filling. Not bad. “Seriously, though, what are you doing?”

His smile faded, and he focused on pressing the crust into a pie plate. “You were so upset yesterday. I figured you couldn’t be at your family’s Fourth of July, so I’d make one for you here. I even got you sparklers.”

Libby stared at him. It wasn’t until he lifted a hand and pressed her jaw closed that she realized her mouth had been hanging open. She scanned the counter again. All of the fixings for a barbeque sat there in a line.

“Jude…” Flustered, she didn’t know what else to say.

“Is it okay?” he asked. “My brothers and I don’t do holidays, so I wasn’t entirely sure—I mean, I know it’s not home, but I just thought—”

Libby stood on her toes, cutting off his rambles with a kiss. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

His grin returned, and he dabbed flour on her chin. “Wanna help?”

“You bet your ass I do. I have been so incredibly bored this week.”

“Oh good. I thought I was the only one.”

…

They ate dinner a little before five, and it was actually quite good for a last-minute, cobbled-together meal. The fact that Jude had even thought to do this for her made everything taste that much better.

She shoved away her half-eaten second slice of pie and sat back. Jude smiled across the table at her. “Eyes bigger than your stomach?”

“Waaay bigger.”

He pulled the plate toward him and cut off a piece. “Mind?”

“No.” She scowled as he made short work of the rest of the pie. “I can’t believe you’re still eating. Where do you put it all?”

“Mm. I could tell you…” He pointed his fork at her. “But then I’d have to eat you, too. Actually, that might not be a bad idea. Like dessert. I love the way you squeak when I go down on—”

“Be good, Jude. We’re at the dinner table.” She laughed when he grinned unapologetically and waggled his brows.

“You know, we haven’t done it on a table yet.”

“The pool table counts.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“You’re nuts.”

“Yeah, I am. Thanks for noticing.” Finishing off the final bite of pie, he licked his fork clean, and then began gathering their plates. “Dining table. I’ll have to keep it in mind for another time, but right now I’m so full the only thing I want to do with you is nap.”

“I’m so on board with that idea.” But, wow, moving anywhere seemed like a chore. “Except you’ll have to carry me to the bedroom.”

From the kitchen behind her, he gave a yeah right snort.

“So is that a no?”

Jude didn’t answer. In fact, she didn’t hear anything from him, no shuffling, no water running over their dishes in the sink. She started to turn to see what he was up to now and found him standing beside her, a cell phone shoved toward her face. She blinked when he dropped it into her hand. It appeared to be midcall, the timer on the screen ticking off seconds as she frowned at it, then up at him.

“What’s this?”

He simply nodded and motioned for her to lift it to her ear.

Confused, she did so and—

At the sound of her mother’s voice on the other end of the line, instant tears blurred her vision. “Mom?”

Oh God. Her parents. He’d called her parents!

Eyes wide, she stared at him in shock. The nerve of the man, standing there grinning like a maniac, all proud of himself for breaking his own rules. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and hug him. The nerve.

And also the heart.

God, he had so much heart it was a wonder it all fit inside his chest.

Libby turned her focus to her mother’s excited chattering. After a few minutes, her father came on the line, less excited but definitely happy to talk to her. Although, as usual, he tried to hide it under a gruff facade. In deference to her safety, it was a short conversation and saying good-bye to them was the hardest thing she’d ever done, but when she hung up the phone, all of the sadness that had been weighing her down this past week had vanished.

Phone still in hand, she turned in her chair and watched Jude as he scrubbed at a stubborn pan in the sink. His jeans hung low on his hips, and he’d taken off the shirt he’d donned before dinner, probably to keep it from getting wet. His muscles flexed with the work, making his tattoo dance along his spine.

Slowly, Libby stood and crossed the kitchen to his side. She touched his arm. “Can please I see it? Your tattoo?”

Exhaling hard, he looked over at her, held her gaze for a long moment.

“Are you ashamed of it?” She couldn’t think of another reason why he’d be so sensitive about it.

“No. Never.” For some reason, his gaze dropped to the cell phone still in her hand, and he stared at it like it was going to give him answers to all of life’s hardest questions. Finally, he shrugged, dried off his hands on a towel, and gave her his back. Her fingers itched to touch him, but she feared he’d shy away and she’d never find out what his tattoo said. She kept her hands to herself and read the words he’d thought important enough to ink permanently into his skin.

Meredith, my love…

She jerked backward in shock. A love letter. He had tattooed a love letter to his spine. Her throat worked, but for a long moment, she couldn’t produce any sound around the surge of pain that froze her vocal chords.

“Who’s Meredith?” she finally choked.

“My mother.”

All the air left her lungs in a burst that was too close to a relieved sob for comfort. “Your mother.” She reached out with trembling fingers and traced the outline of the ballet slippers hanging from one side of the broken angel wings. It was so obvious that she wondered why she hadn’t she made the connection sooner. His mother was a dancer. And the dog tags on the other half of the wings? His father had been career Army.

A memorial to the parents he’d loved and lost far too soon.

“The words—” He stopped, cleared his throat. “My father wrote them. His wedding vow to her.”

“Jude,” she breathed and circled around to face him, but he was staring at the floor. She always accused him of being childish, all that time never forgetting that he was very much a man. But in this moment, he looked so much like the vulnerable child he must have once been, and she wanted nothing more than to hold him close. Comfort him. She touched his cheek and miserable blue eyes lifted, met hers, clung.

“Do you want to tell me about them?”

He shook his head.

How absurd to feel disappointed. He was obviously wrestling with a personal demon that she had no right to help him slay. His problem. His life. It shouldn’t matter to her. She’d spent eight years convincing herself it didn’t matter—that he didn’t matter. And look how that turned out. It took only three weeks with him to negate those eight years.

Despite it all, she still loved him. Had never stopped, probably never would—and she could never tell him. The only thing permanent in Jude Wilde’s life were those tattoos. Hanging on to him would be like trying to hang on to a hummingbird as it darted from flower to flower. Unfair to them both.

On impulse, she set the cell phone on the counter and wound her arms around his waist, laid her cheek against his chest, and held him. Maybe it could only be for the space of a heartbeat, but she held on and let herself enjoy it. He returned her embrace hard, and his whole being seemed to shudder. Whether from relief or something else, she didn’t dare guess.

“I sneaked out that night,” he murmured into her hair. “The night my parents died.”

She squeezed him tighter, but kept her mouth shut. It surprised her that he’d confided even that much, and she didn’t want to seem like she was pressuring him.

“I wanted nothing more than see Jurassic Park ,” he continued after a seemingly endless moment of silence. “I begged them all summer to take me to the theater, but they wouldn’t. Mom said it wasn’t a movie for a ten-year-old. Hell, she wouldn’t even let Reece watch it, and he was thirteen. It seemed so important to me at the time. So important.

“One of my friends got it on video for his birthday, and a group of us planned to sneak over to his house later that night to watch it. I’d seen Greer sneak out enough times to know exactly how it was done, so off I went in my dinosaur PJs, ready to get the shit scared out of me by T-Rex. I never considered what my parents would think when they came to tuck me in and saw my bed empty, my window open, my shoes and coat still in my closet.”

“They thought someone had taken you,” she concluded.

“Yeah. They left Greer at home with Reece and the twins and went to the police. They filed a report, then launched their own search, driving up and down the streets, calling my name, looking for any signs of me. By that point, I was already back in my room, sound asleep. Reece found me, tried to get a hold of them to tell them I was all right…but this was ‘93. Not everyone had cell phones back then.”

He stopped. Libby rubbed her cheek against his chest. “What happened to them?”

Jude blew out a long, slow breath. “They stopped at a gas station to fill up before continuing their search and walked right into an armed robbery. The gunman shot Dad in the head as he went inside to pay for the gas. Yanked Mom out of the car and shot her four times. Left her to bleed out in the parking lot and stole the car. She made it to the hospital before—before she died.”

Libby blinked back tears and held him tighter, offering the comfort she could. “Did they catch the guy?”

“No, but it didn’t matter. There was only one person responsible for their deaths.”

“Jude, no—”

“I envy you,” he said, cutting off her protest. He motioned to the cell phone. “What you have with your parents. Hell, even the fact that you still have your parents. I envy you. I always have.”