Page 27 of Frog Hog

Hutch closes his eyes and pulls his hand away. “Valen,” he says, shaking his head. “Talking would be fabulous, but seeing you after all this time only forces one singular thought to mind. Fucking you. That is definitely not talking. I came here for the sole reason to make sure you wanted me here.”

I take a step back and then another and put up my palms. “My car is too small to have sex in. It’s quiet and we can have privacy.” Looking around, he realizes I’m right. With a sigh, he follows me out to my car and gets into the passenger side. “God, Hutch, I miss you,” I whisper. Looking at him would be a catastrophe when he’s this close, so I keep my face down. “I’m so sorry.”

“You’ve apologized already for that night. Please stop.” His voice is booming in the small space and it sends a shockwave directly between my legs. “I should have told you sooner. The only reason I didn’t was because I wanted to make sure it was going to stick before I introduced you to Briar.” His daughter’s name. It makes her more real than when I saw her holding his hand on the street.

He takes my hand in his. “She’s my world, you see? I had to think about her feelings first. She’s a great girl—six years old and extremely smart. A spitting image of Tabitha.” His voice breaks on the last word. His wife’s name. My chest burns.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I cry out, my heart aching at the sight of his obvious pain. “I would have understood. We could have set boundaries, if you’d just told me up front. Seeing you with them,” I say, voice trembling. “Out of context, out of state, was awful. I thought I was the other woman.”Just a child. Not a wife. Not one alive anyways. I can deal with this. For Hutch, I can work through this.

“You’re my only woman, Valen. You weren’t supposed to see us. Darla, her aunt, was going to meet you first and then Briar. I had a plan. I’d decided how I wanted it to happen. I’m sorry you saw what you did. If I thought for a second it was going to go down the way it did I would have told you sooner. Briar is my world. When you started stealing oxygen in that world, I panicked.”

Air pushes through my lips quickly as I try to catch my breath. “You’re an asshole for keeping that from me.”

He sighs. “Don’t swear. I apologized for it. When you’re a parent you’ll understand why it’s important to…guard what’s yours.”

He speaks like a man with an undying love and devotion to his child and I can’t fault him for that which I don’t understand. The question is can I deal with it? “When does she live with you?”

He seems pleased I’ve asked about her—like maybe he’s out of hot water for being a secret hoarder. “She stays with me all the time when I’m not in a work-up or deployed and I visit as frequently as I can when I am in those phases. Darla is working on getting a job transfer out here and that would make life a little easier and I’d get to see Briar more.” He looks at me, questioning how much he should say. I nod for him to continue. It’s all out now. Might as well learn the specifics.

“Tabitha and I lived in Virginia Beach when we first got married. I was a SEAL at Team 5. She was my high school sweetheart—the only woman I’d ever been with. We had Briar and everything was falling into place. After the accident and her death, I had to get out of there, had to switch Teams. Everything reminded me of her and the life I almost had.” He looks out the window and avoids my gaze completely. “A part of me died with her. I moved to Coronado with Briar soon after and had to hire nannies to help me because I was gone so much. I knew Tab wouldn’t want her to grow up like that.”

I shake my head. What an awful situation to be in. It breaks my heart even more. “It would have been easier if I stayed, but it’s still hard to be there even to this day. Briar started school this year and it was easier for her to be with Darla because I’m about to deploy.”

“She needs to be with you,” I say, nodding. It’s logical. It makes the most sense. “Bring her here.”

“Ah. It’s not that simple. Think about how many trips I’ve been on since we’ve met.” I swallow down the initial shock that Briar has to live with her aunt, as the reality of his situation hits me full force. “She needs stability. Not nannies. Stability is Tab’s sister. It’s what she would have wanted. I pay the price for my career more than most.” He quirks a brow. “This is how the military works. A lot of kids are in the same position with single parents.”

“How completely awful. We need to work out a way that she can be here full time. Okay?”

“We?” he asks, smiling.

I didn’t even catch the slip. “Yes. Of course. You have me now. I don’t know a hill of beans about kids but I love you Hutch, and I want to make you happy and you won’t be happy here with me…without her.”

Tears prick my eyes. “I can share you with her,” I say. He can take that however he wants and I mean it in a couple different ways, because he never fell out of love with an ex-wife. His fatal flaw is loving too much.

He leans over, presses his forehead against mine and says, “You don’t have to share me with anyone. That’s not the way this works. You’ll see.”

“I just wish you told me about her. I understand your reservations, but I would have accepted the situation. I’ll do my best, okay? I can promise you that. I’m so sorry about the mess this turned into. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you to make the right decisions. I’m just sorry,” I say.

“As happy as I am to hear that, and as much as I miss Briar, right now, I miss you, Valen. Your house or mine?”

I laugh through a face full of wet tears. He wipes under my eyes with his thumbs. “Didn’t think you’d catch a DILF while Frog Hogging, did ya’?”

Our laughs fill the car and when the silence descends, I say “Yours.”

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