His Secret Past by Katie Reus Page B

squeezed harder. Her silent support made him feel even shittier. Why wasn’t she judging him?
    He stood, breaking the contact, and suddenly he could breathe again. “Do you want to take a walk along the beach? Bring Jonathan with us?” he asked. On the beach it would be pretty damn hard for a sniper to hide in the sand. There were no tall buildings and everything was fairly open.
    If they had Jonathan with them, she’d be a little distracted and he could put some distance between the two of them. When she was so understanding about all this crap it made him want to shake her and tell her exactly what kind of man he was. Spell out for her all the things he’d done. All the men he’d killed. The weapons he’d sold. Then she wouldn’t look at him with understanding. It would be horror, and that would make it a hell of a lot easier to walk away from her later. If she loathed him, he’d be able to leave knowing he’d given her that closure she deserved.
    “Sure.” Her lips pursed into a thin line before she turned and left the room.
    The sounds of laughter coming from the direction of the stairs jerked him out of his thoughts. Around Jonathan he had to act like nothing was wrong. He’d already displayed a gun in the kid’s presence. He didn’t want to have to make a choice like that again. Even if he couldn’t be in his son’s life after this, he wanted to leave him with some decent memories. Not memories of a gun-wielding father.
     
     
    Alexis slipped on the leather gloves she’d tucked in the back pocket of her jeans. A brisk wind blew up over the Atlantic and she instinctively moved closer to Hunter.
    Jonathan was only a few yards in front of them, picking up shells and dumping them in his pail as they strolled along the beach. The cold wasn’t biting, but she planned to get him back inside soon.
    “Remember the walks we used to take by the beach?” Hunter shot her a guarded look and butterflies took flight in her stomach.
    Of course she remembered those walks. That was when they’d first been getting to know each other and hadn’t been able to keep their hands off one another. They’d made love under the moonlight too many times to count. With him standing so close, his familiar spicy scent twined around her. Much the same way his strong arms had years ago when she’d admitted to him what life had been like growing up with a codependent mother and an abusive stepfather. He’d held her while she cried and kissed away her long pent-up tears. He’d been strong, comforting, loving, everything she’d ever wanted and needed. Opening up to him had been better than therapy. She’d finally let someone—a man—into her life. Then he’d left.
    Sighing, she kicked a shell in front of her. She couldn’t do anything about the past now, and thinking about it only made her feel worse.
    Jonathan suddenly whipped around and ran toward them like a mini-tornado, kicking up sand and holding out his small pail. “Look how many shells I’ve got, Hunter.”
    Hunter knelt down and peered inside. He shot her a nervous look before focusing on Jonathan. “That’s great, buddy.”
    “This one’s for you.” He held out a shiny pink shell in his tiny hand.
    “Ah, thank you.” Hunter’s voice was gravelly and thick as he tucked the shell into his pocket.
    Jonathan beamed at him, then took off running in front of them.
    Alexis cleared her throat, forcing Hunter to look at her. “So, what are we going to do? Are you going to meet with your old boss, Carl Connor?”
    He nodded. “Yes, but it’ll be on my terms.”
    “Do you think it’s safe?”
    “I don’t know what to think anymore, but Alan’s right. If he’d wanted me dead, he could have killed me a year ago.”
    “Why do you think he didn’t?”
    His shoulders lifted slightly. “Could be for any number of reasons. Maybe they wanted to see where I was going before they killed me. Connor might be worried I had dirt on him too. He might even be working