Page 47 of Cowboy SEAL Christmas

“Not curious about the baby?” Jack said in awhat the helltone that had Gabe wincing.

“Ah, right, yeah. Baby. So, what’s it going to be?”

Jack dug something out of his coat pocket. One of those black-and-white ultrasound things people were supposed tooohandaahover. Mom had shoved three in his face, and Gabe hadn’t known what to do back then when he’d been a lonely, isolated teen. He really didn’t know what to do about them now.

“A girl,” Jack said, foisting the picture at him. “We’re having a girl.”

Gabe took the proffered picture, though it looked mostly like blobs with a little arrow at something that was supposed to be proof of a girl.

A little baby girl. Jack and Rose’s baby girl. Blob or not, those words certainly made it all so real. Too real. Time marching on. People moving on. Building things and lives, and here he was doing what exactly?

Hiding from all that. What else was there to do? Face it? How did you face that kind of promise? That kind of possibility?

He handed Jack the picture and grinned. “Let me be the first to suggest the name Gabriella.” He went to grab the pitchfork he’d need to loosen up the hay.

“We talked about it.”

Gabe nearly dropped the pitchfork as he whirled to face Jack, because Jack was not joking. That voice was all serious, and Jack just wasn’t that good of an actor.

“Gabriella Alexandra Armstrong has a nice enough ring. Rose can’t name her after any of her sisters because it’d only be confusing or someone would get jealous, so she said. She suggested this.”

Gabe swallowed. His chest felt tight as panic settled in, heavy and solid. “You can’t…”

Jack raised his eyebrows. “Can’t what?”

“You can’t name your kid after me, man.” He tried to laugh. Tried to do anything other than breathe a little too hard.

“Why not? Way I see it, you’re half the reason I’m alive and here and maybe even with Rose. So. You get the first name. Alex’ll be the godfather and the middle name.”

“Jack…”

But Jack just stood there as if it was a done deal. There’d be some little girl out there in the world named afterhim.

“I really didn’t know how you’d react, but I have to say, this wasn’t what I expected.”

“Never had a kid named after me.”

“Here’s a tip, act excited or interested or something not like I’ve lobbed a grenade at you.”

It felt a little bit like that grenade. The moment of impact. The heat, the burn, the panic. The way time slowed down, sped up, slowed back down. But Jack was standing there through it all, looking calm and patient. But not in that old soldier way that might have given Gabe some ounce of comfort.

He looked like a man. Like any man. Bundled up against the cold, ultrasound picture in his hand, a handful of years ahead of him to build a family and a life that had nothing to do with uniforms, grenades or old SEAL brothers.

Except that ultrasound picture was unbelievably going to carry some version of Gabe’s name, as if he was a part of it all—that future and that family.

“Thank you,” he managed to croak out.

“I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it because of you. But you’re welcome.”

They both stood there, and Gabe wasn’t sure how long that moment of silence stretched. He wasn’t sure how to benormalafter that, and he didn’t have any asshole comments or distancing jokes. All he had was this too-much feeling.

“If I told you something,” Gabe began, having no clue why he was doing this, but the words tumbled out, “could you promise not to tell anyone? Including the nosy ass mother of your child?”

Jack considered. “I guess it would depend on the secret and if it would affect her in any way.”

“It’s got nothing to do with anyone. Except me. And…well, Monica.”

“Okay, I won’t tell anyone,” Jack said quickly. Too quickly.

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