Chapter 18
“Hatch was right,” Jacksonsaid, his arm wrapped around Essie and her leg twined with his. He could stay like this forever and be perfectly content. “You can never go wrong with Bruce Campbell.”
Leprechauns had been cast aside in favor of theEvil Deadtrilogy. They’d already played the first two movies—though they’d only watched bits and pieces of them—and now they were halfway throughArmy of Darkness, Jackson’s favorite film in the franchise.
On-screen, reluctant hero Ash Williams blasted a Deadite with his “boomstick,” resulting in Ash getting sprayed with enough red-dyed corn syrup to fill a swimming pool. It was the perfect movie to watch when you really didn’t want to pay a whole lot of attention, which was always hard to do with Essie snuggled beside him in bed, naked as the day she was born.
She traced a scar on the left side of his rib cage, the one he’d tried to conceal with a tattoo of an eagle with its talons extended. “This one’s new. How’d you get it?”
“Souvenir from Mexico. Something bit me in the jungle and it got infected.”
Her fingers drifted down to another scar just above his hip bone. “How about this one?”
“Shrapnel. I got tagged during my last tour overseas. Suicide bomber blew himself up in a village where we were working. It took out fourteen villagers and the other two Jacksons. I didn’t even realize I was hit until after we returned to base.”
She gave him a puzzled look. “The other two Jacksons?”
“I never told you about them?”
She shook her head.
That wasn’t surprising. Due to the nature of his work in the military, he hadn’t been at liberty to share most of the details, including the names of the men he worked with. Aside from Navarre, she’d never met any of them. “There were three of us with the same last name, so the rest of the unit gave us nicknames to tell us apart. Jared was Pee Wee, Roger was Biggie, and I was Supersize. But then the blast killed Pee Wee and Biggie, and I went back to being just Jackson.”
“Were you close to them?” she asked.
“Yeah, we were tight. It’s hard not to be when you’re counting on each other in highly volatile situations. We saved each other’s butts more times than I can count.” As he skimmed one hand down the length of her back, a sigh escaped his lips. Talking about his unit reminded him of the conversation he didn’t want to have. But sooner or later, it needed to happen, so they might as well get it over with. “What is it with you and Navarre? Seriously, I want a straight answer.”
Her muscles tensed beneath his fingertips. “I’ve told you before; he thinks I’m bad for you. To be fair, he’s probably right.”
“He doesn’t get a say in what’s good for me.”
Essie pushed herself up on one elbow. “You two share a bond; I totally get that. I can’t fault him for wanting to protect you; it’s one of his better qualities. But I can fault him for being a dick about it.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
She made a low sound of dismissal. “Don’t worry about it. I can handle him.”
“I know you can, but here’s the thing: you and Navarre are two of the most important people in my life. I can’t imagine my life without either of you in it. But I don’t like bracing for World War III every time you two are in the same room. I know it’s asking a lot, but do you think you could find a way to make peace with the man? It would make my life a lot easier.”
She watched him for a long moment, her spy face firmly in place. Experience taught him a long time ago that she disliked promising things she wasn’t sure she could deliver. “I’ll do what I can from my end. The rest is up to him.”
“That’s all I can ask for. Thank you.”
He kissed her then, sinking into her taste, and molten need stole through his veins at the sound of her soft, throaty moan. Movie forgotten, he rolled her onto her back, though what he really wanted was her on her knees with her ass high in the air.
“Hungry?” he asked when they came up for air.
“Starving, but I need food first.”
“Fair enough. How about I whip up some omelets?”
Her gaze went to the clock on the nightstand. “It’s five thirty in the afternoon.”
“What’s your point?”
“It’s closer to dinner than breakfast.”
“We’re adults; we can eat what we want, when we want.”
