At that, he laughed—and stepped back from her. “Don’t tempt me.”
She looked at him then, and damn near blushed—no, she did blush, heat reddening her cheeks on this cool February day. This senior army officer, with her overseas stripes on her sleeve and her chest full of ribbons and medals, was blushing.
She kept her chin up and her eyes on him. Not a blush; she was flushed. That note in her voice hadn’t sounded familiar because it held arousal, the anticipation of passion, and she’d never spoken to him that way in college. Everything in him tightened in response, but he was standing in his battalion’s parking lot.
“I looked it up, and the courthouse is open until five,” Juliet said, but despite any flush of desire, her tone had already changed. More practical, less passionate. “But they stop issuing marriage licenses at four thirty. We’d have to rush.”
“You’re serious.”
“There’s a three-day waiting period in Texas, but they’ll waive it because we’re active-duty military.”
The caveman part of him wanted to rush her into the car and take her to the nearest judge to claim her as his, permanently, but he was too experienced, too well trained by the army to do anything but think coolly when emotions were running hot. Something was off. “What about your son?”
Her jaw clenched. Her fist clenched. “He’s in a phase that can be... It might be just as easy to simply let Matthew know it’s a done deal.”
“You want to go to the courthouse with me and then pick up your son and introduce me as the man who just married his mother?”
“Yes.” She dropped her hand, relief written all over her face. “Do you think we have time?”
“Juliet, that’s insane.”
“All of this is insane. I already said so in your office.” She laughed.
He didn’t. She’d forced that laugh.
It was her turn to check her watch. “If we took my car instead, we could go from the courthouse straight to the school. As long as there isn’t a line at the county clerk’s office, there might be enough time that way.”
It was his turn to frown. He’d bet she had no idea how anxious she sounded. “It’s been a long time since I was eleven, but I don’t think I would have been too happy to be left out like that. You wanted me to meet him first. What changed while we walked from my office to my parking lot?”
She dropped her too-determined smile. “There’s a chance that when you meet Matthew, you’ll change your mind.”
Not a chance. “I already told you kids don’t scare me.”
“Mine might. He was wonderful this morning, pinning on my rank. I just never know from day to day if I’ll get the wonderful Matthew or...or not.” Her frown was genuine, her next declaration emphatic. “It’s just a phase.”
“Are we talking about a phase like he’s gotten into drugs or he’s been sucked into a gang?”
“No, nothing like that. That was a very military police kind of thing to ask, by the way.”
“It happens.” Eleven years old. What had it felt like to be eleven years old?
“He can just be so difficult. Deliberately contrary.” Juliet ducked her chin a bit and peeked up at him from under the brim of her hat. “He’s been hard to live with, admittedly, but I’m certain it’s just a—”
“A phase. I got that. So, we’re talking about a kid whose dad doesn’t come to see him and who got sent to live at a new post by the US Army. He’s been living at the Holiday Inn for two weeks, and he had to change schools in the middle of the year. That kind of phase?”
She stilled, eyes wide like a deer caught in the headlights. A very beautiful deer with golden glints in her brown eyes, which he let himself remember for the first time in years how much he’d always admired. He’d noticed it one day in their junior year, when he’d made fun of her safety goggles in a chemistry lab. He’d never told her that he saw gold in her eyes.
“Are you sure you’re not a parent?” she asked.
“You don’t have to be a parent to realize that’s a lot on a kid’s plate. This is a bad idea. I don’t want to make things harder for him.” He opened the car door to get his sunglasses.
“You’d like him if you met him.” She blurted out the words.
He snapped his attention back to those golden-brown eyes. The way she’d taken a step closer, the way her hands almost reached to stop him—did she think he was going to get in the Corvette and drive off without her? Was she afraid he’d drive off without her?
It was hard to imagine Juliet Grayson afraid of anything. Evan grabbed his sunglasses, shut the car door and silently cursed the impossibility of having this conversation in his battalion parking lot. In uniform. He wished he could hold her, hug her against his chest until some of the tension that was humming through her subsided.
“I think you would,” she said more quietly.
He could only reassure her with his words. “I’m sure I’ll like him. He’s your kid.”
“And Rob’s.”
“I know he is. I know Rob, and I know you were married to Rob. This isn’t news to me.” Evan felt a touch of relief that she wasn’t afraid to bring up potentially difficult subjects. That was the Juliet he knew.
“It doesn’t bother you?” she asked.
“No.” An incredible lie, but now was not the time to confess how jealousy had nearly eaten him alive. “That has nothing to do with anything. When I said it’s a bad idea, I meant it’s a bad idea to spring a marriage on any child as a done deal. We can get married when the courthouse opens on Monday as easily as today. Matthew and I can meet under a little less pressure. You and I can spend the weekend catching up.”
He wasn’t going to say they’d spend the weekend getting to know each other, because they knew each other. They’d always known one another. Time had passed, and they’d had separate experiences during that time, but nothing had changed them. He was still Evan. She was still Juliet.
“You have a roundtable scheduled for Monday,” she said. “I’ve only been at Fort Hood for two weeks. I can’t show up Monday morning and ask for the day off. I can’t ask for any day off next week.”
“Next Friday afternoon, then, so we’ll have the weekend afterward. I’ll wear my blues to work. We’ll go straight to the courthouse.”
She clasped her hands behind her back—had they been shaking like his?—but she didn’t nod or agree.
“Why today? Is there some legality I need to know about?” Evan tried to imagine what that could be. The army could be a minefield of legalities that affected soldiers’ lives. “Are your household goods going to be put into long-term storage if you don’t give them a delivery address today? Are your orders for Fort Hood going to be changed if you’re not married?”
“I hadn’t even thought of those things. Stop, or I’ll have even more to worry about.”
“Then why do you want to go to the judge right this minute?”
“Because you said...” The flush was back—no, a blush. This time, she looked embarrassed, not aroused. She turned away from him, just slightly, and fixed her gaze on the colorful sign in front of the building that was painted with the battalion’s crest. The green shield depicted a gold gauntlet in a fist, enforcing order.
“Because I said what?” He watched her face