Sharpshooter (Shadow Agents 3)

“Until I was ten, I kept hoping that one day he’d come back. That he’d realize he wanted me and Slade. That he would try to make us into a family.”

Her heart ached because she could only imagine the pain he’d felt then.

“But at ten, on my birthday, when another year passed and there was no letter, no phone call, I knew it wasn’t happening. He didn’t care about me. He never would.”

She reached for his hand and twined her fingers through his. “That’s his loss.”

“That’s what my grandfather said.” The ghost of a smile lifted his lips. “But when you’re ten and your father can’t be bothered to find out if you’re alive or dead, it can still make you feel worthless.”

“You’re not—”

His fingers pulled from hers and then pressed over the covers that shielded her stomach. “I don’t ever want this baby to feel the way I did.”

She had to blink away tears. “She won’t.” She? He?

“I don’t want to be like him.”

“You aren’t.” He had to see that.

“I want to be there, in this baby’s life.”

Why hadn’t she told him sooner? This man before her, the man whose fingers were trembling as he stroked her stomach, he wasn’t a man who’d run from fatherhood. He was a man who seemed to want it almost desperately.

“I don’t want the baby to feel... I don’t want the baby to be like me.”

He was breaking her heart. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled Gunner down onto the bed with her. She just...held him. “This baby is wanted. Loved already.”

He held her tighter.

She hadn’t expected this from Gunner. He’d—

He kissed her. She shouldn’t kiss him back, not with everything that was going on between them, but she did.

Because she still wanted him.

The nightmare memory of his death was too strong in her mind.

So her lips parted beneath his. She tasted him as he tasted her. The kiss wasn’t rough or wild, but sensual and heavy with need.

As if he were savoring her.

Her body shifted restlessly against his. She’d thought about him so many nights in the past few weeks. Every night. Wanted, and been afraid that she’d never have him close like this again.

It had just taken the little matter of fire and near death to get them together again.

He kept kissing her. He held her carefully, as if he were worried that she’d break.

She was the one to push down the boxers that he wore. She was the one to stroke his body.

He kept kissing her.

Then, still so carefully, his hands began to trail down her body. His mouth went to her neck. Licked, sucked and then he found the sensitive spot just behind her ear....

She squeezed her eyes shut and moaned.

He tossed aside her T-shirt. Licked and kissed her breasts. The touch of his mouth on her nipples, with their increased sensitivity, had her trembling.

Sydney lifted her hips. Helped him to ditch her shorts and underwear, and then she parted her thighs.