Rev It Up (4 page)

Her stomach did another quick flip at the thought of actually coming face-to-face with Jake Sommers.

She should’ve been ready to see him again. She
should
have been.

She wasn’t…

“We’re trying to take Becky’s mind off what happened yesterday evening. She’s still a little shaky,” he continued, and Michelle pushed aside her aversion to the thought of seeing Jake just enough to think a
little
shaky
? Becky Reichert had
shot
and
killed
a villainous, bloodthirsty man not more than twenty-four hours ago, and she was only a
little
shaky
? “Rock says he’s gonna grill up some steaks and brats. And it’s such a beautiful evening for a barbeque.”

There he went again with that loony grin. It was almost eerie. Like attack of the pod-people eerie.

Come on,” he cajoled when her face filled with mutiny. “With Snake back and Rock finally home, it’ll be like old times.”

“You mean the kind of old times that made you hide me away from your coworkers at Black Knights Inc. for the past three and a half years?”

After everything that’d happened in Coronado, after the horror of it, her brother had thought it better to keep her separate from
that
part of his life, the government operator part of it. He’d thought he was protecting her by keeping her a secret from his employees at Black Knights Inc., protecting her from more fear and heartbreak. And maybe he was right. But she’d become sick and tired of being a peripheral figure in his world. So she’d shown up at the hospital after his shoulder surgery and introduced herself to all the Knights who’d been waiting for him to come out of recovery.

Oopsie. My cover’s blown!

Aw, shucks…

“Well, the jig is up anyway, thanks to you,” he scowled and feigned punching her in the shoulder. “So you might as well come out to the shop and see what I’ve been up to.”

“I’ve got to finish rolling out this dough,” she hedged, getting desperate. When Frank got that particular look in his eye—yep, there it was—there was no nay-saying him. Of course, that wasn’t going to stop her from giving it her best effort. “Plus, I’ve got an early appointment in the morning.”

“Well that’s perfect. You two can pack some bags and spend the night.”

“A-are you insane?” she sputtered.
It
just
gets
worse
and
worse.
“First of all, you know I don’t like to mess with Franklin’s schedule. And secondly, do you really want a three-year-old running around your—” she peered into the living room to make sure her little pitcher wasn’t listening in with his big ears, “—super-secret spy shop?”

“I wouldn’t let him go up to the command center.” Her brother’s expression very succinctly conveyed
gimme
some
credit.
“You guys could sleep out in the old foreman’s house. Dan doesn’t use it anymore.”

The thought of seeing everything her brother had built for himself was tempting, but not nearly as tempting as avoiding Jake. “I really can’t. I’ve got some work to finish tonight. Franklin needs a bath. There’s a load of laundry to fold and—”

“Michelle Knight, are you making excuses?”

She glared at him. “I’m Michelle
Carter
, remember? And I don’t understand why you’d want us to come spend the night. It’s preposterous.”

“Like I said, Snake wants to see you. This way, it’ll give you guys plenty of time to catch up.”

“Why would I want to catch up with him?”
After
the
way
he
abandoned
us.
She didn’t need to say that last part. It was there in her tone. Directly after Steven’s funeral—God, Steven’s funeral. She still got sick to her stomach every time she thought of it—Jake had transferred to Alpha Platoon and signed on for a two-year mission that’d taken him to parts unknown. And when he’d finally returned to CONUS—continental U.S.—when she’d swallowed her pride, disregarded her better judgment, and sent him a letter begging him to come back to them, telling him they were his family and they loved him and needed him, what had he done?

He’d completely ignored her, that’s what. Acting as if she was nothing, as if her brother, his
best
friend
, was nothing.

“Shell?” Frank reached forward and placed a hand on her shoulder. She hoped he couldn’t feel the trembling there. “What happened between you two? Did he treat you like he treated all those other—”

“No,” she was quick to interrupt him. Because even though four years ago she’d been determined to be the last notch on Jake’s bedpost—and they’d been close, oh so close that night at the Clover—she couldn’t let her brother go on thinking his best friend had pulled one of his typical Austin Powers moves on her.

Shall
we
shag
now? Or shall we shag later?

Much to her surprise and dismay, Jake’s sense of loyalty and friendship, and whatever other noble notion you could possibly think of, had overcome his libido that night.

“Jake wasn’t like that with me,” she admitted, having lost count of the number of times she’d asked herself how things might’ve been different had they actually
finished
what they’d started in that bathroom.

“Good.” He nodded decisively, his frown turning into that weird pod-person grin again. “So there’s no reason why you can’t come out to the shop and help me welcome him back.”

No reason?
Oh, sweet Lord…

Of course, maybe it was better this way. They say, whoever
they
are, that in order to conquer one’s fears, one first had to face them.

Swallowing, rolling in her lips, she called for Franklin to grab his jacket and tried not to pass out cold on her kitchen tiles as she wrapped up the remaining ball of dough and went to the sink to wash her hands.

The darn things were shaking like gravel on a dirt road during an earthquake.

***

Black
Knights
Inc. Headquarters

Goose
Island, Chicago

“So,
mon
ami
,” Rock murmured in his slow Cajun drawl as the breeze wafted the meaty smell of steaks cooking on the grill and mixed it with the waxy scent of the burning tiki lamps and the slightly fishy aroma of the nearby Chicago River, “ya said you’re here for Shell?”

Uh…yep. That was the first thing Jake blurted upon his arrival the evening before.
I’m here for Shell.

Geez.
Just call him Captain Obvious.

“That’s what I said,” he grumbled uncomfortably, adjusting himself in the brightly painted Adirondack chair.

Rock grinned, his teeth flashing white against his dark goatee as he sat forward in gleeful anticipation. “Tell me, what size must a guy’s balls be in order to walk up to his former commandin’ officer and declare his intent to plant his flag, so to speak, in the man’s baby sister? Texas-sized, maybe? Alaska-sized?”

“Cut it out,” Jake growled, avoiding Rock’s gaze as he took a sip of locally brewed ale and let his eye wander around the enclosed courtyard located behind the motorcycle shop that was the front for Black Knights Inc.

Black Knights Inc…

They’d really done it.

All those years the three of them, him and Rock and Boss, had talked and planned and dreamed of building their own clandestine government defense firm, and they’d really gone and done it.

Without him…

He didn’t know whether to burst with pride for his former Bravo Platoon teammates or break down and cry because he’d missed it all. What he
did
know was he’d made himself sick on the ride from the west coast to Chicago, wondering what his reception might be.

But he shouldn’t have worried. Men who fought wars together had a connection, a soul-deep connection that time and distance and familial affiliation couldn’t touch.

Rock and Boss welcomed him back with open arms. And for the first time in a very long time, glancing at the familiar, sardonic expression on Rock’s face, he felt like he was home.

If home included the pins and needles he was sitting on as he waited for Shell’s arrival, that is…

Because no matter how hard he’d tried—and you better believe there’d been times he’d given it his all—he’d never stopped loving her.

He hadn’t stopped loving her that night in the Clover when, scared out of his mind, after barely stopping himself from nailing her up against the wall of the men’s bathroom, he shoved her in Preacher’s arms and saw the hurt and disbelief fill her eyes. He hadn’t stopped loving her that rainy day when she caught him at the base’s front gates to tell him she’d fallen for Preacher. He hadn’t stopped loving her that afternoon two weeks later when Preacher pulled him aside on the way to mess to softly inform him,
Shell
and
I
are
getting
married.
He hadn’t stopped loving her that day in the mountains of Afghanistan when he learned she was having another man’s baby. And he hadn’t stopped loving her in the long, too long years between then and now. If anything, his love for her had grown, become an overwhelming thing.

And any minute she was going to come through that door. Any minute.

He snatched a glance at the door in question. Did the knob turn?

No. Just his eyes playing tricks on him and,
good
grief
, he was
so
totally losing it.

“And Shell?” the Cajun broke into his spinning thoughts. “How d’ya think she’s gonna feel about havin’ you back around?”

That was the question of the hour, wasn’t it?

He shrugged and stared past Rock’s right ear, the air inside his lungs getting sucked out like he’d stepped into a vacuum.

“Dunno, brohah,” he wheezed, trying and failing to drag in a much-needed mouthful of oxygen. “But I think I’m about to find out.”

***

Why
does
he
still
have
to
look
so
darned
good?

That was Michelle’s first thought as she stepped into the courtyard and set eyes on Jake. He was lounging in a bright red Adirondack chair, sprawled there as if he hadn’t a care in the world. And the audacity of that pose considering… well…
everything
that’d happened, burrowed under her skin like a chigger.

Since this was her first time inside the big gates of Black Knights Inc., she should have been scoping out the place. She should have been overcome with curiosity, checking to see exactly what her brother had been building for himself over the last three and a half years.

And she was…
Sort
of.

With a teeny-tiny portion of her brain, she registered the mammoth, three-story factory building with its aged brick and leaded glass windows. Through the most fleeting of observations, she took in the various outbuildings surrounding the tidy brick courtyard covered by a red-and-white striped canopy. With the most miniscule portion of gray matter, she noticed the unlit fire pit, the mammoth stainless steel grill, the basketball hoop standing next to the furthest outbuilding, and the odd assortment of brightly painted lawn furniture.

But she was able to catalog all of this by using only about 0.1 percent of her brain, because from the moment she set foot inside the courtyard, her eyes were glued to Jake’s ridiculously handsome face and that body of his that could’ve been the model for an anatomy class, and the other 99.9 percent of her mind was wholly occupied with one and only one thought…