Page 10 of Renegade

When Miguel took off after the guy he’d called John, I admit, I was scared. It was so out of character for him. In the last three months we’d grown closer than two men could, except in one area. It was especially frustrating when he talked about his military service. Honestly, he’d told me most of the work he’d done in the Marine Corps was classified and, though, I understood the limitations placed on him on anintellectuallevel, it felt like a massive valley between us at times.

There were couples who shared everything. Judy and her husband Luis were a living example of it. They didn’t have to hide their past from each other. Judy had told me she’d once given Luis a free pass for a whole night where he was allowed to tell her all about his past. She’d promised he could have until dawn the next morning to lay it all out on the table and suffer no judgment or recriminations from her. So, he’d told her all about his past relationships, all about his girlfriends before they’d met.

I supposed the trust involved in that had to be tremendous. I’d never had a serious relationship with a guy, so it was a foreign concept to me, but I could still relate to the trust. I supposed I was going to have to grow a thicker skin when it came to certain things my Marine could share and try to accept those he couldn’t.

But it was hard and it happened at the most intimate of times. Sometimes, as we lay in bed in the afterglow of a fantastic round or two of lovemaking, I expected more conversation about ourlives prior to meeting each other. He’d told me all about his life as a kid and I already knew all about the death of his parents. How Cassidy had driven him down to Camp Pendelton to start his Marine Corps training. But there was a gap there. Miguel had served from the tender age of eighteen until he was twenty-six, only three years younger than I am now…and he could tell me almost nothing about it.

I understood. At least I tried. Miguel’s secrets didn’t involve old girlfriends or boyfriends. He could go to prison if he sharedhissecrets. They didn’t involve him alone. Miguel kept national security secrets, and they were classified for a reason.

He’d hinted about certain things like sleeping in a bed as luxurious as mine on a mission once, but he’d never filled in details. I just assumed he couldn’t, but I wanted to know. Who had he been with? Had he shared the bed? Had there been other men in the service? He was gay. There had to have been, but he’d never told me about boyfriends. Eight years was a long time to be celibate, especially at the age when a stiff breeze could get a man hard. So now I almost dreaded knowing something about the man we’d run after. Had he been a lover?

The haunted look in Miguel’s beautiful brown eyes had been telling. He’d said he recognized him, calling him John. As he fell asleep, I drove home feeling sick inside, fighting back jealousy and dread. What was he going to tell me? Show me? He didn’t have much…clothes and…the footlocker he kept locked all the time. As I pictured it now, I likened it to a Pandora’s box sitting in my garage collecting dust. What if I hated what he had in there? What if it ruined what we had together? Or whatever it was triggered bad memories for Miguel, which is why he’d kept it locked?

As I turned all these thoughts over in my mind, I realized everything was coming from a place of fear and my owninsecurities. Though I had many reasons to feel the way I did, I had to stop my anxiety, or it would destroy me…destroy us. I loved him, so I would trust that whatever it was, I’d accept it. And if it meant that much to him to keep it safely inside, then I’d go along with the program. I’d try my best to be a supportive partner…no matter what it was.

It was late afternoon by the time I parked in front of the house. All my silent ponderings and all the L.A. traffic had exhausted me. I wasn’t looking forward to seeing what he wanted to show me now. I’d gotten all worked up about this man when rationally, I knew hearing Miguel’s explanation probably wouldn’t be so mysterious after all. As if he felt my gaze studying his face, he roused from his lean against the passenger window and glanced over at me before checking his watch. Blinking several times, he reached up and wiped away drool from the side of his face before smiling bashfully.

“Well, that’s sexy.”

I swallowed my anxiety, leaned toward him, and kissed the side of his mouth. “No worries.” My lips lingered a moment before I slid them over and kissed him softly. He reached up and held the back of my head, slanting his lips and opening up for me. In an instant, I was on fire for this beautiful man. He kissed me deeply, longingly, and I went with it, letting him take me away on the tide. By the time he finally let me go, my cock was throbbing inside my suit pants and I was panting. His eyes twinkled. They actually twinkled. I sat back behind the wheel and decided it was time to change the subject.

“I don’t know about you but I’m a little peckish,” I said as I rubbed my belly and we got out of the truck to walk up the paver path.

“Peckish?” He chuckled.

“You know, hungry.”

He slung an arm over my shoulder as we stopped at the door, and I pulled out keys to unlock it. “I know what peckish means, Raven, but I’ve just never heard it said by an American before. You’ve clearly been reading too much lit—ra—ture,” he said in a mocking British accent.

I barked out a laugh before I could stop it. “Shut up. Are you hungry or not?”

“In answer to your question, yeah, I could eat. Staring at those tortilla chips and salsa at the restaurant was making me crazy.”

“Well, let’s see what we can rustle up before you show me whatever it is you want to show me.” The minute I opened the door, my nostrils were hit with the aroma of something heavenly.

“Oh, what’s that?” Miguel asked.

“Don’t know but it smells delicious.” I felt my stomach growl as I hung my keys on the hook by the door and toed out of the dress shoes for the meeting. Dolly stepped out of my nana’s bedroom and came walking down the hall, smiling widely, all white teeth in a sweet, plump face.

“Oh, I hope you boys are hungry,” she drawled. Her home cooking was amazing and if I didn’t work out so hard, sometimes running five miles with Miguel in the morning, I knew I could grow just as pleasingly round as Dolly.

“We were just talking about the way it smells in this house,” I said. “What’d you make?”

“Come and see,” she said, reaching out to squeeze my bicep through the suit coat. “I’ve decided you’re much too skinny and since your grandmother sleeps a lot of the time, I made some soup. I hope you don’t mind me usin’ your kitchen.”

“Of course not,” I reassured her. “You’re a wonderful cook, Dolly.”

“Soup?” Miguel asked, already in forward motion, heading toward the kitchen.

I followed Miguel with Dolly by my side. By the time I’d turned the corner to the kitchen, he was already standing at the stove with the lid of the stockpot in his hands, bending over and sniffing its contents. When he looked up, he was smiling. “Is thisalbondigas?”

She smiled. “Yes, it is. I hope you like it. I made soup since it’s easy for Angelica to eat.”

I reached over and put an arm around her shoulders, conscious of the holster on the opposite arm when it pulled. I dropped my arm quickly, having forgotten the gun was there. I frankly hated the thing. I couldn’t wait to take it off. Dolly was always doing kind things for my nana. She was always gentle and kind, laughed a great deal, and my grandmother’s entire demeanor had changed since I’d fired Ned and hired her in his place.

Nana had never been one to complain about anything, so the change in her was noticeable. It’d taken me months to get over the guilt I felt over having not noticed their everyday interactions until after Ned had been fired. Not only was my nana much happier but healthier as well. Dolly had completely changed her diet, using only fresh produce instead of anything canned. She’d cut out processed foods almost entirely and made sure that whenever she cooked, the meals were nutritious, and plant based whenever possible. That was a good thing since I constantly worried about her choking. and my nana seemed to tolerate the food much better. Her appetite had improved and she had color back in her cheeks which grew rosier by the day.

“I know she likes her veggies, so I substituted the meat in the rice meatballs with tofu,” Dolly said. “It’s high in protein and it’s identical to the pot I made for you two.” She pointed to another, larger pot. “That’s for you and Miguel. It has the ground meat.” I lifted the lid of that pot. The Mexican rice meatballs were small, floating in a delicate tomato base with tons of vegetables.

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