“Gabriel?” I asked. “Fuck no. I wouldn’t have any of my family within ten feet of your ass if it weren’t necessary.”
“Ace,” Tricia gasped.
“We can nix the offended face and all of that shit.” I waved her off with my hand. I pointed at her. “I told you not to fuck with my wife, didn’t I say that? I told you to keep her name out of your damn mouth, and what did your ass decide to do?”
I didn’t give her a chance to respond.
“You take your scheming ass up to her job and lie to her face.”
Tricia shook her head as her eyes watered. “I-I’m not lying.”
“Quit it.” I swiped my hand across my throat. “I’m sick of your fucking voice. It’s making me want to hurl right now. Just being this close to you.”
“Daaamn,” Micah said under his breath.
“Here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to resign from your job at the base. Effective immediately. No one will miss you. Then you’re going to find a place far away from Harlington. I’m talking outside of the fucking state of Texas. Alaska might be far enough. Settle down there, with your kid and therealfather of that baby, if he’ll have you.”
“Tricia?” Another voice interrupted us.
“Speaking of the devil,” Micah said, standing. He placed a hand on the guy’s shoulder. At six-foot-three, Micah towered over the man, who couldn’t have been taller than five-seven.
“Charles?” Tricia asked. “What are you doing here?”
“Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” I asked before he could say anything. “Did you think I was dumb enough to take your word that that was my kid without asking questions?”
Tricia, like most people, didn’t know that I’d purposefully prevented my ability to have another child. Micah was the only one who knew, since he was the personal contact I’d had pick me up after the surgery.
Savannah was the second person to know, outside of my doctors and healthcare team.
“Ace, this baby is yours,” she said, looking desperately between the real father of her child and me.
“Tricia, how could you say that?” Charles asked, taking the seat next to her. “We’ve been together for years. And we don’t use protection. I thought you wanted children with me.” He sounded as desperate as she did.
I looked away, unable to watch him grovel pitifully over this woman. Once I found out that Tricia had gone to confront Savannah, I called Micah. And just like he always did, he came through quickly.
He’d found out that Tricia had years’ long, off-and-on relationship with Charles McGee. McGee had been an enlisted Airman but had done his original term and decided not to re-up.
Two days earlier, when the three of us sat in Micah’s office, he told us that the two of them had been together for the past year, but over the past few months, she’d all but ghosted him.
Charles worked up in Alaska and was away at sea for months, which was why it was easy for her to act single. Not that any of it made a difference to me, but I would’ve advised Charles to do his damnedest to get full custody of his kid and get the hell away from Tricia.
But he was in love.
“No, no, no. You’re messing everything up,” Tricia yelled so loudly, a few of the customers from around the bar turned our way.
I nudged Micah with my elbow. “That’s our cue to head out.”
Micah stood, and I moved to stand.
“Ace, wait.” She reached for me from across the table, but I moved out of her reach. “Hand in your resignation letter first thing in the morning,” I said with a tone that was hard as stone. “Your landlord has already been told that you’re breaking your lease to move away. Go with your kid’s father and have a nice life. Or don’t. Either way, this is the nicest I’m ever going to be to you again.
“You don’t want to see me any more pissed off than this. Trust me.” I gave her one last glare before turning and following Micah out of the bar.
“You were mean as hell in there,” Micah said with a chuckle in his voice as we entered the parking lot.
I frowned. “No more than she deserved.”
He shrugged. “That might be true. She might not have tried that bullshit if you would’ve told her from the beginning that you went and got yourself fixed.”
