missed you at the Red Sox game.” Darn it. She hadn’t meant to say we.
“I wish I could have been there. I…hate to disappoint Jesse.”
Jesse. Always Jesse. But what about her?
Guilt tugged at her. She had to put Jesse first and forget about her selfish needs. She hated to hurt their son. And they were both letting him down now, taking the easy way out.
But really, their marriage had ended some time ago.
And now she had the possibility of someone else in her life. In their lives. Someone in L.A. Someone stable. A man who’d taken enough interest in Jesse to volunteer to be his Little League coach.
Ethan couldn’t even make a Sox game on the rare occasion when she and Jesse flew to Boston.
“Is Jesse okay?” Ethan asked.
She nodded. “A little grumpy from the heat. He didn’t sleep well last night.”
A pained look crossed Ethan’s face. “Still afraid of the dark?”
“Yes. He thinks monsters are hiding in the corners.” Her voice wavered. “I tried to convince him there aren’t.”
“I’m sorry…” His voice trailed off, but his words held a wealth of meaning, and she knew he meant it to be a blanket apology.
She had to cut him a break. Ethan never meant to disappoint or hurt them. He had important work, was almost obsessive about achieving success, and was driven by the pain of his childhood. A pain he refused to speak of or share. Maybe if he had, they wouldn’t be here now; they’d still be together. “I guess the blackout created a multitude of problems for you.”
He gave a clipped nod. “I spent all night doing damage control.”
Instead of comforting their son. Or her.
She didn’t want to blame him anymore. Ethan was who he was. His work ethic was one thing that had attracted her to him. She admired his commitment to his software company, as well as his work for Eclipse.
It was time to move on for all of them. Better not to drag out the inevitable. She and Ethan could be friends for their son’s sake. But anything else… The chemistry, the heat, the sex had always been explosive, but it wasn’t enough to sustain them for life.
Sucking in a sharp breath, she removed the divorce papers from her purse and spread them on a table. Ethan’s dark eyes met hers, turmoil clouding the depths.
She would survive this day and the divorce. And so would Jesse.
Then they could all go on with their lives.
IT WAS TIME TO TAKE THE BOY.
Finn’s mouth watered as he watched Jesse Matalon approach Frog Pond, intent on wading in the water. Child’s play.
Finn didn’t remember ever being a child.
All he remembered was the pain of his father’s arrest. The shame. The move. The bitterness. The need for justice and revenge.
He studied the crowd of people hovering nearby. Mothers and fathers who’d left work for the day to venture outside in the light. Babysitters and nannies of Boston’s elite who talked among themselves. Teenagers who strolled hand in hand, grateful for the summer break and unconcerned about who saw them making out in public or sneaking a smoke.
Jesse kicked off his shoes and jumped in to play chase in the water with the other kids as if he’d been penned up for days. He was a precocious kid who Finn might have liked had he not belonged to the enemy.
The nanny was distracted. Rebecca was nowhere to be found. Off to meet Ethan, the man who’d let her down.
Rebecca was such a babe. He wanted her, too, wished he could kidnap them both. It would be double torture for Ethan to know that his former wife had been in Finn’s bed.
But kidnapping her didn’t fit into the plan right now. And he had to stick to the plan with no variations. Variations might mean mistakes, and Finn couldn’t fail. He’d waited too long for this moment.
Hell, six months ago, he’d moved to L.A. to ingratiate himself into Rebecca’s life. First, he’d set in waiting for his father to implement his plan. But he’d finally grown impatient and had orchestrated his own meeting. He’d come on to Rebecca, and she’d responded with interest, although she’d initially turned down his request.
But in time he would have seduced her.
Pity now that he wouldn’t get to bed her. He had to take care of the kid.
Tugging his own ball cap down over his head to hide his face, he slipped through the crowd. Jesse would never see him coming, and neither would the nanny or anyone else. There were too many people in the park, too many distractions.
All he had to do was make his move, and Jesse was his.
Chapter Two
Ethan had taken out terrorists worldwide, maneuvered his way in and out of life-and-death situations that would make some people’s hair curl and had nearly died of gunshot wounds twice.
But Rebecca still had a way of robbing the air from his lungs. Just the sight of her made him feel as if he’d stepped onto a landmine. His heart was racing, his palms were sweaty and the blood rushed to his head.
In spite of the heat and the sleepless night she’d obviously spent, she looked gorgeous today, light and airy in her pale clothing with her sun-kissed skin glowing from the L.A. weather, and her silky hair lifted off her neck. Normally he preferred her hair down, flowing around her shoulders, so the up-do should have put him off. Instead he appreciated the tantalizing view of the sensitive spot behind her ear that he liked to kiss. The spot that drove her wild and turned her into putty in his hands.
His lips puckered at the mere thought, and he almost forgot why they were there and dropped a juicy one on her neck. But the sound of papers crinkling as she spread them on the table jarred him back to reality.
His feet felt like lead weights as he forced himself to cross the room. He had survived countless dangerous missions—he could certainly sign divorce papers. After all, his marriage to Rebecca hadn’t been a real marriage in over two years. He was an adult. Life had to go on.
“You seem in a hurry to get this over with,” he said in a gruff voice.
Her startled gaze swung back to him. “In a hurry? Ethan, I moved to L.A. two years ago.”
He sucked in a sharp breath. “So why today?”
Eyes narrowed, she chewed on her bottom lip and glanced at the window, avoiding eye contact.
His lungs tightened. “You’re involved with someone else?”
Tension rattled between them in the thick air. “Ethan…”
He winced. “So you have met another man?”
She slowly turned back to face him. Her hazel eyes glimmered with emotions. An apology? Regrets? Indecision?
