Charlotte Hawkes - The Army Doc's Baby Secret

And if that was true, then surely it meant she still felt something for him?

There was still hope.

‘I see you aren’t denying it.’ He grinned, enjoying the way her eyes sparked with anger.

‘Denying what?’ she challenged. ‘Denying wanting to appear in the newspapers with you as your desperate ex-wife?’

‘Not ex,’ he gritted out. ‘We’re still married.’

‘Fine.’ She exhaled deeply, but her voice was that bit tighter, thicker than before. ‘Estranged for the last five years, then. Either way, I’m confused.’

‘And why is that?’

‘Well, let’s see.’ She lifted her hand as though to tick off her points one at a time. ‘First you say I’m in Delburn Bay because I thought it was far enough from Westlake for you not to know I was here. Then you declare that I’ve come because I’ve read the papers and wanted a piece of your new-found fame. So which is it to be, Zeke? Because even you can’t have it both ways.’

It was that flash of temper, her refusal to cower, which he had fallen in love with all those years ago. And which clawed their way inside him right now. It made him want to pull her to him when he knew he should be taking things slowly.

But it was proving impossible to hold back when she had essentially returned to him after so many years of absence. Especially when she looked at him the way she was doing right now, even if he doubted she realised it. As if she still wanted him, too.

‘You didn’t answer my question,’ he pointed out smoothly.

Tia merely cocked an eyebrow.

‘Fancy that.’

The need to claim her as his once more swirled inside him, pounding at him, eroding him. His arms actually ached with the effort of not reaching out to touch her. To place his hands on her shoulders and draw her in. To see if her body still fitted his with as flawlessly as ever. To discover if she was every bit the Tia he remembered.

Would she think he was still the same Zeke who she had married over fifteen years ago? She was certainly the same Tia. Despite that...edge, which he couldn’t quite pinpoint.

‘You haven’t changed,’ he told her, taking a step closer.

Unable to stop himself.

She braced herself, though he noted she didn’t try to move away.

‘Don’t, Zeke. I have changed, as it happens.’ And again, something shot through him too fast for him to grasp. ‘More than you can imagine. As, I’ve no doubt, have you.’

Zeke faltered for a moment, then caught himself. She couldn’t be back for the money. Tia couldn’t know that he was now a multimillionaire thanks to his company, Z-Black, along with Zane—another of his former marine brothers-in-arms—and Zane’s investment mogul brother, Frazer.

He took another step towards her.

‘Meaning?’

This time, she did edge away, if only a fraction. And as though her body didn’t want to but her head was telling her she had to. She squeezed her eyes shut.

‘Meaning, you can’t drop me, like you did, and now pick me back up again and expect me to just fall into your arms.’

‘I didn’t drop you.’

‘As good as,’ she argued shakily. ‘We were meant to be partners, Zeke. Husband and wife. But you pushed me away. You didn’t trust me.’

He resisted the urge to squeeze his eyes shut; it only made the memories all the more vivid. Real. Even now, very occasionally, he would still wake up in a sweat, reliving that final mission. A mission that had gone south so quickly that his team had had no chance to extract themselves.

The torpedo. The explosion. Then blood in the water all around him, just before everything had gone black. He hadn’t even felt the pain at that point.

‘I lost everything that night,’ he growled, abruptly.

‘Yes.’ Tia tilted her head up determinedly and met his gaze for the very first time. ‘And so did I.’

‘Don’t go there, Tia.’

Anyone else would have heeded the warning note in his voice. Tia merely swallowed hard, but she stood her ground.

‘Why not? Because only you get to own that pain? You don’t think I carried it, too?’

‘Why do you think I told you to leave?’ he bit out. This was insane. It wasn’t how he’d imagined things going in any version of meeting up with Tia again. ‘I wanted you to be free of it. I released you so that you could walk away and never look back. I’ve carried it with me for these past five years so that you didn’t have to.’

‘And yet I have,’ she matched him, her eyes shimmering unexpectedly.

Deep within him alarm bells rang, but he couldn’t heed them. Couldn’t stop himself.

‘What? What have you carried, Tia?’

She stopped. Glowering. Emotions charging all over her face. And then, just as suddenly as her temper had flared, she reined it in. The loss was unbearable. He felt her withdrawing and he had no idea how to stop it from happening.

It hurt. Far more than it had any right to.

‘I’m sorry,’ she choked out, as though she knew how his chest was tightening excruciatingly.

Zeke didn’t realise he’d crossed the room to her until she tilted her head to look up at him, her eyes growing darker, her mouth opening just a fraction, her breathing quickening.

And still, Zeke didn’t stop himself.

‘This can’t be why you came home, Tia. It certainly isn’t why I drove up here tonight.’

His voice was huskier than it had any right to be. He needed to leave. Now. Tia needed space to think, and he needed to get out of there before he broke all his rules about taking things slowly if they were to stand a chance of piecing their relationship back together.

So why, instead of moving away, was he reaching to take her chin in his fingers, his entire body revelling in the way her breath caught sharply?

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