Page 55 of Dirty Gambit

He lightly squeezed her hand when the panic in her eyes drifted into her trembling words. “I promise you, I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”

She started to shake her head. “Jaxon—”

“Are you two just going to stand there?” Aunt Frankie interrupted, never taking her attention away from the toddler squishing her cheeks together between pudgy hands.

“Please sit,” he murmured to Lena.

Rather than listen, she pulled away from him and moved to the mantel littered with a dozen photos. He wasn’t sure if she was genuinely interested in the pictures or using them as an excuse not to face the rest of the room, but he left her to it and made his way to the nearest sofa.

“Where’s Uncle Henri?” he asked his aunt.

The woman rolled her eyes and made a flapping motion with one hand. “Had some fashion emergency in New York. He should be back tomorrow morning.” She dipped her face and nuzzled Jessie’s nose with hers. “Tell me, what brings you two all the way over here to see me in that hideous car, wearing clothes I can only assume you robbed a homeless man for and sporting whatever is happening on your face right now. And what happened to your wrists?”

Jaxon was careful not to glance in Lena’s direction or rub the raw skin under the gauze that needed changing. “It’s a very long story. Have you talked to my parents?”

Frankie shook her head. “Was I supposed to?” Her dark eyes lifted over Jessie’s head and fixed Jaxon to his seat. “Is everything all right?”

This time, he couldn’t avoid the glance he flicked Lena’s way. Aunt Frankie caught it, despite his subtle attempts. A finely penciled eyebrow lifted, but there was no humor in her stare. It was the look of a soldier.

“Jaxon?”

“Yeah,” Jaxon lied. “We were just driving by and thought we’d visit.”

Lying to a former military pilot with twenty years of tactical training under her belt was a talent he’d never mastered. He knew she didn’t believe him, but she kept her suspicions to herself.

“Who’s your friend?” she asked instead.

“Lena,” Lena answered without taking her eyes off a gilded frame capturing a grinning Frankie next to a CF-18 Hornet. “We’re not friends.”

Jaxon bit the inside of his cheek to keep his grin in check. Frankie cocked her head in his direction, waiting for an explanation.

“It’s part of that long story,” he said.

“Is this you?” Lena interrupted, pointing at a photo of Frankie in her full military gear.

Frankie shifted in her seat, but her voice was level when she replied, “It is.”

“Do you still fly planes?”

“I do.”

“Aunt Frankie has three planes outback,” Jaxon piped in. “She’s been teaching me to fly since I was Jessie’s age.”

“To your mother’s eternal horror,” Frankie teased, sharing a grin with Jaxon over Jessie’s head.

“Hey, she didn’t say no when I asked to get my PPL. I thought that was great progress.”

Lena glanced back at him. “PPL?”

“Private pilot license,” Frankie supplied. “Jaxon is the only person I trust to handle my babies.”

It was clear the topic wasn’t one that interested Lena, but she still bobbed her head and went back to her surveying. She moved down a few frames of family and friends and stopped at another one of Frankie. It was slightly larger than the others and sat a few inches apart, prominent in its display, a portrait of a thin man with dark hair and sharp features. He wore a suit of lush pink and stared a bit too intensely at the camera with dark eyes made darker by the encompassing shadows.

It wasn’t a secret. Frankie was open about her transition and her experiences over the years. She was a vocal member of her community and still displayed her past with equal pride. Yet it was always a tense moment when a newcomer put the two together. There was always a second where the room grew just a little quieter and everyone seemed to be holding their breaths. That was the case now as they watched Lena survey Frankie’s history on display.

“Whose side are you from?” Lena glanced over her shoulder to where Frankie sat waiting for the inevitable question. “Nicole or Robert?”

Jaxon hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath until it poured out in a slow trickle through his nostrils. Frankie must have been doing the same because he watched her shoulders relax a fraction. Her gaze hopped to Jaxon for a pulse of a second before fixing on Lena once more.

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