Jameson (In the Company of Snipers #22) - Irish Winters Page 0,72
lifted his fist to his lips, his course for the day already set in stone, plotted, and ruined. “I guess that means you want me to take Mel to see this doctor, this geriatrician.”
Of course. Kelsey had just had a C-section. She should be in their bed, sleeping with that little boy she’d delivered yesterday moring, while Lexie hovered and fussed about. Not traipsing across town, dragging an ornery old cuss who might get handsy with her between here and there, to a doctor’s appointment.
“I think he’ll feel more comfortable with his son at his side instead of a woman he barely knows, don’t you? I know you’re tired, but this is important.”
Damn it. Kelsey was formidable when she set her mind to any task. But talk about having the rug pulled out from under his feet. This was not how Alex saw this morning going. He’d been up the night before last with Kelsey, then all last night with his TEAM. He was tired, and now he was pissed. But never at Kelsey.
“Whisper and Smoke should be inside the house with you,” he told his dearly beloved. They were his former Army EOD canines. His guard dogs. The beefy four-legged fellows that adored Kelsey and Lexie, would die for them. Would kill for them, too.
“I’ve already fed them. The boys are fine. Will you go with your dad?”
“Yes, sweetheart,” Alex replied reluctantly, pressing his lips to the center of her forehead, behind which was a very intelligent brain. So much for reining in the thunder. He closed his eyes, his migraine starting up all over again. Usually, the moment he came through his garage door and into his kitchen, it backed off. But seeing Mel at the table had brought everything crashing back. And now this…
“Libby brought a complete turkey dinner over for us. She knows how much you like stuffing, gravy, and cranberries.”
“So I heard.”
“She made pecan and pumpkin pies, too,” Kelsey wheedled.
Alex looked down into the deep brown eyes of the woman he adored. He prided himself on having very few weaknesses, but Kelsey was his greatest. So was pecan pie. “With whipped cream?”
“Whipped cream with nutmeg…” She said with plenty of sexual innuendo.
His stomach growled and his body hardened. “Breakfast first, then I might indulge.”
Kelsey could read him like a book. “You can’t indulge for two more months, sweetheart, but I’d let you have all the pie you want today.”
“You will, huh?” God, he loved this woman. “I almost laughed out loud back there,” he confessed. “That little girl of yours gets smarter every day. She’s just like you.”
“Uh uh. She’s more like her dad.”
“No, Kelsey. She’s you all over again, and someday, she’s going to bring some guy home, and I’m going to have to kick his ass.”
“I can see the fight now,” Kelsey breathed into the hollow of his neck. “Who do you think will win, Lexie or you?”
He had to laugh even as his mouth descended over Kelsey’s. “I have a feeling I’ve already lost.” And didn’t that make him the winner?
Chapter Twenty
Maddie slipped out from under Jameson’s arm, out of his room, and back into hers. She showered and dressed, combed her long hair out, and twisted it while it was still wet into a loose chignon. Morning was long gone, but these men would need food and she meant to serve. In the kitchen, she made a large pot of coffee, then decided they needed breakfast again instead of lunch. It was early afternoon, but she knew these guys. So, she whipped up a batch of easy bake cinnamon rolls and put them in the oven, then lined up two pounds of bacon on the side-by-side built-in griddles. She whipped up two dozen eggs and had everything smelling good and herself looking perfectly innocent and normal, by the time Harley yawned his way to the coffee pot.
“You’re my kind of girl,” he mumbled as he poured a cup, his sandy colored hair sticking out at every angle but smooth. “Mmmm, is that bacon? You sure know a way to a man’s heart, darlin’.”
Harley slipped into a Texas accent every so often. He’d served at Fort Hood after he’d joined the Army. Was a professional dog handler, then. But he raised Malinois and German Shepherds now, even trained them to be service dogs for other veterans. And he adored his wife, Judy. She brought their twin boys into the office whenever she came into Alexandria. Little A and Georgie, one redheaded like