Protecting His Pregnant Lover (Southern Soldiers of Fortune 1)

“Olive?” Levon croaked in disbelief.

“Levon?” Olive’s own whisper was less guttural, but no less harsh or demanding as he withdrew his hand. “What the hell are you doing here?”

The equipment shed back behind the high school was the last place she had ever expected to encounter Levon Asher, yet here the man was: coiled to spring, big enough to fill the tiny structure with his formidable presence alone. She heard a tiny click and the rustle of clothes and a cold chill ran down her spine as she realized he was putting the safety back on his gun and tucking it away. That meant that before that moment, she’d had a gun pointed right at…well. Right at the part of her that he noticed at the same moment, as his hand accidentally brushed her recently swollen belly.

“You’re…” His palm settled heavily on the baby bump, as if confirming, and then he staggered back as if struck. His right shoulder collided with the net of basketballs beside them, and Olive leapt forward to stabilize them before they got loose and cascaded to the floor.

“Yeah. Surprise,” Olive said weakly.

She was seven months pregnant.

She was seven months pregnant with his child, to be precise.

But she had questions of her own. “You didn’t answer me,” she pointed out. “What are you doing back in town, Levon? What are you doing out here?”

“I could ask you the same.” His hand brushed against her stomach again, tentative and quick, as if he thought he could sneak it in without her noticing. She guessed he needed the extra proof. Not that Olive could blame him. It still took her by surprise sometimes when she caught her own reflection in the mirror.

“You could,” she agreed. “But I asked first.”

“I’m here undercover. I took that job in Arlington, and this is my first assignment. I’m staking out a gang here in town.”

“Undercover? A ‘gang’? What?” Olive shook her head in disbelief. This was all too extraordinary… but then again…

Occam’s Razor. The simplest solution was most likely the correct one. And in this instance, under these circumstances, Levon Asher had already supplied the solution for her. In the heat of their night together all those months ago, she recalled he’d mentioned interviewing for a job with some sort of security firm. If he was on assignment, that would explain why he was here. But gang activity? At her high school? There must have been some mistake.

“It’s a long story.” Levon peered past her toward the door, but he had shut it effectively behind him. “But the short version is we’ve teamed up with local law enforcement to investigate some gang-related activity reported in the area. We think that activity is tied to a group calling themselves the Reapers.”

“Well, I’m staking out this shed because I was out on a walk,” Olive said. “Minding my own business. But I saw some people heading out here, looking like they were going to make trouble. I…I thought graffiti, or maybe vandalism, so I figured I would provide an adult presence—just in case—”

“I think graffiti is the least of your concerns here, Liv.” Levon steered her toward the front of the shed, pitching his voice low. “What’s more likely to happen now is a drug deal, or plans for a future drug deal.”

Olive wanted to protest. No way that was possible, not in her town. Yes, she knew it was Levon’s town too, but he hadn’t lived here for years. He wasn’t a teacher at the school they had both attended, interacting with the students every day. He didn’t understand that there was no way something that big would just slip below the radar—especially not her radar—

But as they listened to the muffled voices from their position at the doorway, Olive felt her heart drop into her all-too-noticeably pregnant belly. She didn’t exactly follow the slang being used, but it definitely sounded like the boys collected out on the foggy football field were planning an illicit drop of some kind. “Drugs? Really?” she whispered in true astonishment this time.

“Shhh.” Levon pressed a finger to his lips and craned away from her. He posted himself up on the opposite side of the crack so he could get a better view. Still, Olive had no doubt they were both perfectly concealed in their shared hiding space. No way a former Navy SEAL wasn’t an expert at this sort of thing. “Can you make out what they’re saying?” he surprised her by asking. But then, he knew her hearing had always been especially sharp. He used to tease her about it—good-naturedly, as opposed to the other teasing she got—back when they were in high school together. She had often wondered if he was just using it as an excuse to catch up with her after class and double-check their assignments… but she had filed that away with all her other wistful fantasies about Levon and his intentions towards her.

“Not really,” she admitted. “Bits and pieces here and there. They’re almost too far away, they’re using slang I can’t really follow, and I… this might be above my pay grade, honestly, if it is what you say it is.”

“I can make out enough of it,” Levon replied. “May need you to corroborate what I’m seeing later.”

Seeing? Was it possible he was actually reading their lips as they spoke?

“Levon, I—”

Then Olive heard a list of names spoken by the distant goons. And one particular name that hit her like a live wire. She started forward, fitting herself beneath Levon like the lowest rung of a totem pole; he had no choice but to move out of the way to accommodate her as she list

ened.

“Olive—”

“Shhh.” Now it was her turn to request a silence. “I need to try and hear what they’re saying!”

“They’re discussing recruiting students,” Levon intoned. “Your students.”

“Right. I need to know which students. I swear if they have plans to come anywhere near Franklin Monroe—”

“Do you recognize any of those boys?” Levon asked as she squinted through the crack. Before she could respond in the negative—she was having a hard time making out their faces in the deepening darkness, and while the voices were vaguely familiar, they didn’t bring out the immediate recognition of students she heard every day in the halls or in her classroom—a blaze of light blinded her. Levon pulled her back behind him, shielding her with his body in preparation for an attack.