Hot & Bothered

So why, then, couldn’t she shake the feeling that she’d just sealed a deal with the devil?

JOHN WAS PISSED. SERIOUSLY steamed. “I apologize,” he snarled in a high-pitched falsetto. “That wasn’t civil.” He climbed into his car, fired it up and reversed in a hard, tight U out of his parking spot. Well, screw Tori’s weak foray into sarcasm. Slamming the gearshift into First, he aimed the car down the drive. Not telling him he had a kid the minute he walked through the door was uncivil.

Fury and frustration boiled in his gut, enticing him to strike out. He wanted to hit someone, to feel the satisfaction of flesh giving way beneath his pounding fists. And, frankly, right this minute he wasn’t particular about whose flesh it was.

That was just too freaking reminiscent of his old man in one of his drunken rages, though, so John sucked it up and contented himself with punching the accelerator instead to send the car shooting through the closing estate gates with barely an inch of clearance on either side. His car fishtailed onto the road before he straightened it out and laid rubber down the highway. He was damned if he’d allow Tori’s betrayal to flush years of hard-earned self-discipline down the toilet.

Still. He had to do something or he’d explode. Letting up on the gas until he had the speed down to a more reasonable level, he reached for his cell phone and punched an auto-number.

He was grateful when Zach answered so he didn’t have to go through his friend’s wife. John adored Lily, but small talk was simply beyond him at the moment, and without any preliminaries, he snarled, “Pass out the cigars. I’m a daddy.”

There was a brief hesitation, then Zach said, “Rocket?”

“Yeah. Hang on a sec. I want to see if I can get Coop, too. I have a real need to vent, but I’m afraid blood’s gonna flow if I have to explain this twice.”

“Take your time, buddy. I’ll be right here.”

That cooled John’s temper by several degrees and he turned his attention to reaching the other number. Within moments he had a three-way connection going with Cooper Blackstock and Zach Taylor, former team members from his reconnaissance days in the Marines and his two closest friends. As succinctly and unemotionally as he could manage, he told them he had a daughter, then laid out the details of how he’d come to learn of her existence.

There was a moment of silence when he concluded his story. Then Zach breathed, “Holy shit,” at the same time Coop said, “I don’t believe it. The Muzzler finally has a real name.”

“Victoria,” Zach concurred. “The timing fits.”

“Huh?” Brow furrowing, John lifted his foot off the gas pedal. “What the hell are you two babbling about?”

“Marines don’t babble, chief,” Zach said. “Did you think it somehow skipped our attention that six years ago you suddenly embraced total discretion after more than a decade spent regaling us in pornographic detail about whatever girl had ridden the rocket the night before?”

“Give us some credit,” Coop agreed. “The transition was too abrupt not to note.”

“I don’t recall either of you ever asking me why.”

“We might have, but you were so damn close-mouthed about it we didn’t feel we could. It was so out of character for you to keep time spent with a woman under wraps.”

“Gotta admit, we would have appreciated just a couple of details, though,” Zach added. “Ice and I spent a lot of time speculating on who could have taken the bite out of the dog.”

“Great.” The car drifted to a stop on the shoulder of the road, and he slapped the gearshift into Neutral, then yanked on the brake. “That’s fucking swell. A pivotal moment in my life and the two of you were giving it a funky label and yukking it up.”

“No,” Coop said flatly. “We weren’t. Your silence told us it must be important, so we never laughed, John. But we were curious and we needed to call your sudden change of heart or epiphany or whatever the hell you want to call it something, so The Muzzler was born. It seemed appropriate.”

“Yeah.” Burying his frustration with the adeptness of lifelong habit, he looked at it from their point of view. “I guess it was. Something about Tori made me realize there was more to my identity than being good in the sack.”

“Hell, man, I never realized you assumed there wasn’t,” Coop said. “You were one of the few, the proud.”

A bitter bark of laughter escaped John. “You met my old man—you didn’t think growing up with him might have tilted my thinking a little left of center?” He could still vividly remember his father showing up at Camp Lejeune, drunk on his ass and belligerently vocal about his son’s decision to join the corps. “Before I discovered my ability with the ladies, I was just the pitiable kid of that crazy noncom who was always being busted back to seaman first class.”

“Navy asshole,” Coop said scornfully.

“Fuckin’ A,” Zach agreed. “The navy is for pussies who can’t get into the corps.”

Tactfully neither of his friends mentioned the vitriol his old man had spewed at him that night, or how John had allowed the elder Miglionni to shove him around until he’d finally lost his temper and flattened him. But the truth was, it wasn’t the Marines he’d glommed onto to validate his sense of self-worth. He’d liked knowing he had something in his pants that most guys would kill for.

“So now it turns out you’ve got a kid, too,” Zach said. “Aside from being hacked off over the way you found out about her, how do you feel about that? You always swore you’d never have one.”

“Yeah, but now that the choice has been taken out of my hands, I don’t know—I feel like I’ve gotta get to know her. At the same time, I’m scared shitless to get too close. Jesus, Midnight, she’s got a British accent. She sounds like the frigging queen of England!”

“Yeah, I can see where that would unnerve a guy.”

“Is your Victoria a Brit, then?” Coop asked.

“She is not my anyth—” He cut himself off, knowing how merciless his friends would be if he protested too much. “No. Tori’s not a Brit. She took Esme there to get her away from her father’s influence.”

“That’s your daughter’s name? Esme?”

“Yeah.”

“Pretty,” Coop said. “What’s she look like?”

“Little. Sweet. A real girly-girl. She has this wild head of hair like her mother used to have back when I knew her before.” She’s got my eyes. That just blew him away every time he thought of it.

“Sounds like a cutie to me. Little girls are awesome. I never realized just how cool until I met my niece Lizzy. Get your hands on a camera, pal, and send me a picture.”

They talked a while longer without saying anything of real consequence. John felt better, though, and more in control when he finally disconnected. But as he sat in his car on the side of the road, staring out at the trees, he admitted he was still as confused as ever about his new status as a parent.

Luckily, he had a job to do. When things were out of whack, it was comforting to have something to do that you did well. Figuring out puzzles was something he did very well. So he took off the brake and put the car in gear.

Then he headed down the road to talk to Jared’s high-school coach.

CHAPTER FOUR

“I WAS INFORMED YOURteam lost its game.”

Jared Hamilton looked up to see his father in the library doorway. The great Ford Hamilton didn’t usually instigate a conversation with him unless it was to catalog his faults, but he appeared almost…interested. He must be to have pulled himself away from the dinner party that Jared could hear going on in the dining room. Stealthily sliding the brandy bottle from which he’d been sipping behind his backpack, he straightened from his dejected slouch, an optimistic kernel of hope unfurling in his chest. Maybe he didn’t have to drown his sorrows after all. “Yeah.”

“And I understand it was you striking out that ended the game.”

The hope shriveled and Jared’s stomach began to churn, but he rose to his feet and gave his father the bored, insolent sneer he’d perfected years ago. “Yeah, well, what can I say? Shit happens.”

Ford gave him a look of disgust. “Shit does not just ‘happen,’ young man. It’s a result of sloppy preparation.”

He shrugged, but his gut roiled harder and fiercer. Wouldn’t it be something if just once his father didn’t take the opportunity to tell him what a huge disappointment he’d turned out to be? Other guys had dads who actually tossed balls around with them. He had Ford Evans Hamilton, who tossed his son’s every mistake in his face. His chin jutted out. “And who do you see giving me a hand with these preparations? You?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Exuding polish from his expensively barbered hair to his gleaming loafers, the older man strode across the room until he loomed over Jared. “You’re seventeen years old—call a baseball camp or hire yourself a coach. Exert yourself for once in your life. A Hamilton strives to excel.”

“Maybe I am striving! How would you know? You’ve never even seen me play.”

Ford shot his cuffs impatiently. “Is this going to be another whine because I didn’t attend your little game? How many times do I have to tell you that business—”

“Takes precedence over sports.” Jared completed the familiar litany in unison with his father’s cultured tones. “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” A thought popped into his head and left his mouth before he had time to censor it. “Man, you are such a hypocrite.”