Title: Stripping Her Defenses (Ex Ops, #2)
Author: Jessie Lane
Released Date: October 31, 2014
Book Trailer: http://youtu.be/qmRmh30oAl0
Blurb
He can’t change the scars on her body…
but fate will give him a second chance to mend the scars he put on her heart.
Riley Sullivan and the Ex Ops Team are headed to Miami undercover… as bikers. Following up a lead, the men will perform their investigation acting as members of the Regulators Motorcycle Club with the club’s permission. Surrounded by hardcore bikers and investigating missing strippers, Riley finds the last person he ever expected to see again—his ex-wife.
Kara Sullivan left the man she loved after a tragic accident cost them their unborn son. After years of therapy, she’s come to grips with the loss and has re-emerged from the pain a brand new person. That doesn’t mean she’s ready to face the man who inadvertently broke her heart, and who she’s hurt in return.
Riley has never stopped loving her and he never will. He’s ready to fix their marriage and move on with their lives, however Kara’s reluctance to renew their relationship isn’t their only problem. Danger lurks just around the corner… and there’s a chance she could disappear permanently.
Chapter One
Kara
Life was good. I’m talking about, can’t stop smiling,
singing in the shower, and an added bounce in your step kind of good. Ever
since I’d told my husband, Riley, the news five months ago—that we were
unexpectedly pregnant—the problems plaguing my marriage had seemingly
disappeared.
I couldn’t help smiling down at my small, protruding belly. He was the
reason everything was better, after all. Little Riley Sullivan Jr. wasn’t going
to be here for another three months, but he was already a miracle baby.
Hearing
a sound from the direction of our kitchen, I looked back over my shoulder.
Riley was walking towards where I was sitting on the living room couch, with
two glasses of sweet iced tea in his hands. When he saw me watching him, his
lips spread into that boyish grin of his that had always melted my heart since
the first day of our junior year of high school.
Setting
our glasses down on the coffee table, he eased down on the couch, trying not to
jostle me too much, and then slipped his arm around my shoulders. I cuddled
into my husband’s side so I could lay my head on his chest. While the movie
we’d been watching started to play again, Riley started running his fingers
through my short hair.
Yes,
life was practically perfect now. Perhaps Jr. was an ‘oops baby’ because the
condom broke, but he was still very much wanted by his parents. This was a
relief because my husband had planned our life out before he’d shipped off for
Navy boot camp, and a baby at this point in our lives had not been in his grand
plan. He’d wanted to be further along in his military career and expected me to
at least have graduated from college before we started trying to have children.
Therefore,
when my period had never shown up, fear had hit me like a ton of bricks. Not
because I was afraid my husband would ask me to do anything drastic, like get
an abortion, but because, as far as I was concerned, our marriage was already
in the danger zone. A baby could metaphorically shoot us from the level of
‘rocking the boat’ to proportions similar to that of the Titanic hitting the
iceberg.
Riley
never said anything about the precarious state of our relationship, but his
actions had been the reason I knew we had problems. He didn’t cheat. He didn’t
lie, steal, or abuse me in anyway. He just left all the time. He was never
home.
As
a military wife, especially one of a Navy seal,
it was expected of me to understand that when my husband had to go, he had to
go. It wasn’t his assigned missions that bothered me, though. It was the
unassigned ones. The missions he volunteered for. seals deployed for six months and then came home for a
period of time between six and eighteen months, depending on when they were
needed.
Being
back in the U.S. didn’t always mean that he was home with me, though. Some of that
time was spent training elsewhere. So, in other words, Riley was gone a lot for
his job. Add in the missions he volunteered for, and Riley was gone all of the time. And if a man was happy
at home, would he really want to be
gone from his wife? This led me to start to wonder, is my husband no longer happily married to me?
I
had thought I was a good wife.
After
growing up with a single mother, who was a Vegas showgirl, I’d been determined
to be everything my mother was not. Instead of my mom’s sassy, free-spirited
attitude, I’d strived to have a more conservative outlook on life. Mom
showcased her pinup girl body, loving the way men followed, begging for a few
seconds of her time, while I worked my butt off to fight her sultry genetics. I
constantly watched what I ate, exercised religiously to keep my weight as low
as possible without looking like a walking skeleton, lifted light weights, and
bent myself into sideshow carnival contortionist yoga positions to try and keep
my breasts and hips small instead of the hourglass figure they wanted to be.
Mom was Ginger from Gilligan’s Island, and I’d forced myself into a Mary Ann
mold to avoid becoming her.
Riley
thought all of it was ridiculous, but told me he understood my fear of turning
into my mother. With the way he’d been acting the last couple of years, I
wondered if he really did understand, or if he was simply telling me what he
thought I wanted to hear.
Honestly,
I thought the two of us had been on the same page about all of my hang ups
since we’d started dating in high school. Riley had even helped me pick out a
career to pursue when I’d explained to him that I wanted: something as far from
my mother’s profession as possible. He’d suggested I be a kindergarten teacher
because, as eighteen-year-old Riley had put it, “Seriously, babe, what’s more
wholesome than being a kindergarten teacher? You can work with little kids and
that will keep you busy while I’m deployed. It’s perfect for you.” Then with an
eyebrow wiggle, he’d added, “And we can play teacher. That’s hot.”
After
I had smacked him for his joke, I’d realized he was right. It was perfect for
my goal to be as normal as possible, compared to the insanity my mom had raised
me in behind the curtains of her Vegas shows. Therefore, after the two of us
had moved to his first duty station, I had started college. It had ended up
taking me six years to complete a four year Bachelor’s Degree in Education, due
to moving from one base to the next, but I was almost done.
My
final exams were tomorrow, and then I would finally graduate in a week. The
fact that Riley would actually be here to see me walk across that stage for my
diploma, instead of on a mission, was like a dream come true. Even my mother
was flying in two days from now so she could see me accept my diploma, which
was like icing on the cake for me. I might be determined to not be my mother,
but that didn’t mean I didn’t love her.
My
mom was an amazing woman. At forty-five, she was still drop-dead gorgeous. She
was also intelligent and resourceful. I loved that she had raised me with an
abundance of affection, always making time for me when I had needed her. I just
hadn’t loved growing up behind the spotlights of Vegas with half-naked dancers
and the revolving door of men who followed them.
Men,
such as my father, who were attracted to the Sin City living that was abundant
under the bright lights of Vegas. The problem with men like my father: they
were never happy. They were also looking for more. More good times. The next
big gamble that could pay off. The newest gorgeous showgirl. And men who liked
living like that didn’t want to stick around with a wife and a kid.
After
growing up with that, I wanted a normal life. I wanted any future children of
mine to have the kind of family life you saw on Leave It To Beaver. Add in my hidden fears of Riley leaving me, as
my father had left my mother, and you could say I was determined to be the next
June Cleaver. I hadn’t realized that might bother anyone until Riley had
started acting funny, which, unbeknownst to him, had only caused my fear of him
leaving me to worsen.
Over
time, he’d volunteered for more and more missions until, finally, he was gone
all the time. On several occasions, I tried to talk to him about it, but if he
didn’t brush off my concerns, we ended up in an argument.
The
day I had heard him mutter under his breath that I was acting crazy and too
obsessed with my appearance and our lifestyle, my heart had broken in two. Why
would he say those things after I’d explained to him about how I felt? Didn’t
he understand how lucky he was to have a solid home life? Didn’t he understand
my desire for trying to create that for myself? For us? Was he that unhappy
with me?
Did
he not love me anymore?
His
love for me used to be such a tangible thing. I felt it every time he touched
me, stroked my body with his hands, kissed me in slow, worshipping sweeps of
his lips, made love to me with such a sweet tenacity that every inch of me
tingled from his possession. All of those beautiful validations of his feelings
for me had been lacking lately. I missed those displays of affection. I needed
my Riley back, desperately. I felt lost.
In
fear of losing my husband, the man I loved beyond measure, I stopped asking
questions. Even though every mission he took, that he didn’t have to, broke my
heart a little each time, I didn’t say a word. Instead, I kissed him goodbye,
told him I loved him, and said I’d be waiting for him to come back to me. I
carried on with school, kept up with some of the other military wives on base,
and continued my workout routines to stay busy.
If
I was lucky, Riley would come home only weeks later, but it usually ended up
being months. I would tell him how much I missed him, using my hands, mouth and
body to show him. Hoping that, if I stayed quiet—didn’t voice my displeasure
over his missions or bring up any of the topics that he’d dubbed my
‘craziness’—Riley would eventually give up the voluntary missions.
But
he didn’t.
Over
time, my hope was smothered. I woke up each day knowing that I was one step
closer to losing my husband forever, to being a failure as a wife. One day
closer to the point that he wouldn’t come home to me at all. It didn’t matter
if it was because he was killed in the line of duty on some mission or because
he wanted a divorce. Either way, I would know that I had driven him to that
point. When my husband left me for good, it would be my fault. I would have
nothing but an empty existence before me as a consequence of it. I slid into a
depression that eventually led me to my doctor and prescriptions—all of which I
hid from my husband.
Then
Jr. happened. One condom mishap during a ‘Welcome Home Riley’ session had led
us to the revelation of my sweet baby boy. The minute I’d told Riley about the
baby, everything had changed. His happiness and excitement about our child had
waylaid my fears of him feeling like this had messed up his grand scheme of
plans.
The
best part? He stayed home. No more voluntary missions, just the ones that were
assigned to him. He told me he was determined to be an active father, despite
his love for his career. I knew it was wrong to depend on a child to fix my
marriage, but it was the first real hope I’d possessed in years.
However,
my fears didn’t disappear overnight. We’d been living in an unhappy marriage
for at least the last three years. Half our marriage. Apprehensive didn’t even
begin to describe how I felt about his change in attitude. Yet, as the months
went by and he was still by my side, hope had grown inside me again. Everyone
might say that a baby couldn’t fix a relationship, but perhaps we were the
exception to the rule.
Now
I was happily cuddled with the man I loved, practically purring in contentment
as he ran his fingers through my hair. With my hope back and Jr. on the way to
give us a new chance, I just knew I could do it right this time. I’d be the
perfect wife. The perfect mother. And Riley would never want to spend any time
that he didn’t have to away from my side again.
~~~
Riley
I concentrated on the feeling of Kara’s
soft breaths as she napped against my chest. She had made it thirty minutes
after I re-started the movie before falling asleep. Pregnancy seemed to zap all
of her energy. It was amazing she’d been able to stay awake during her classes
this last semester.
Lethargy
wasn’t the only side effect my wife had experienced. After the morning sickness
had passed, she’d finally started to put on some weight. Now she was
twenty-five pounds heavier, and I was drooling over the perks of it. Not that
Kara had looked skeletal skinny before, but she’d been too close to it in my
opinion. Not every woman was meant to be that small. My Kara was one of them.
After
meeting her mother for the first time, I’d understood why the beautiful, new
girl at school had looked slightly… off. Kara was meant to have curves. And I
loved curves on a woman. Although she counted calories like some scary ass,
food psycho, she couldn’t get rid of all of her other attributes. Kara still
had a healthy C cup bust. Her mother had been blessed with a set of breasts
that I’d bet my left nut were DDs. Not that I’d looked at them too long or too
closely, but you’d have to be blind not to see them. Fuck, I could barely hug
my mother-in-law on her rare visits without worrying that her large breast were
going to pop out of her push-up bra and give me a black eye.
The
only thing better than my mother-in-law’s breasts were her hips. How many times
had I wished that Kara would eat a couple of cheeseburgers to plump out her
hips and ass? My wife didn’t have much in the hips department, like her mother
did, because she ran all the time. I’d hoped that, over time, she’d calm down
and put some weight on, but she never had. By the time I had realized that my
girl had some serious issues over this, it was too late. I was already in love
with her—burgeoning crazy, health nut obsession, and all.
There
were times, over the years, I’d wondered if I should have just walked away. Her
unnecessarily strict diet could be annoying when I saw absolutely nothing wrong
with the way her mother was built. The way Kara was meant to be built—all tits,
hips, and ass. I preferred a woman with soft curves. It was better than feeling
nothing except bones when you were fucking them.
But
as I kissed the top of her head, running my fingers through her perfectly
styled short hair, I couldn’t help remembering the woman underneath all of that
mess. The person I kept praying would come back to me.
In
high school, she’d been spirited; a tough girl who had refused to take shit
from the kids who would pick on her for being born out of wedlock to a Vegas
Showgirl, single mother. Kara was proud of her mom; she just didn’t want to be
her.
I
could still see flashes of that girl I’d admired in high school from time to
time. I was hoping that, when the baby got here, she’d be too busy to worry
about counting every fucking calorie on her ridiculous mission to be something
she wasn’t meant to be.
Maybe
the baby would open her eyes; let her see that she didn’t have to strive to be
Ms. Perfect. How could she not see that she was fucking perfect exactly the way
she was when she let herself just be? I only wanted my girl back.
I
loved her no matter what, but there were times when I felt like I was now
married to a stranger instead of the Kara I used to know. Grandpa Pat had said
all I had to do was keep the faith and stick by my wife, she’d eventually come
around. Man, I hoped the old man was right.
My
cell phone started to ring from the counter in the kitchen; as a result, I
disentangled myself from Kara and laid her gently on the couch. Snatching the
phone up before it shut off, I flipped it quickly open when I saw that it was
my Commanding Officer on the caller ID. Quietly slipping into our bedroom, I
closed the door then answered with, “Sullivan.”
“There’s
a situation. Are you available?”
Looking
back through the small crack between the bedroom door and its frame, I watched
Kara sleeping for a few silent seconds. Things had been good lately. Her
pregnancy was going fine, and my CO wouldn’t call to ask my availability for a
voluntary mission unless it was dire circumstances and operators were badly
needed. I might miss her graduation, and I hated the thought of doing that to
her, but I hated the thought of not being by my fellow seals’ sides when they needed me more. Not to mention the
possibility that innocent lives might be on the line. Life and death situations
trumped happy moments at home. Kara’s graduation would be one small point in
time I missed. I could make it up for her down the road somehow, couldn’t I?
Decision
made, I turned my back to the bedroom door as I answered, “Affirmative.”
“Report
to base at sixteen hundred hours.” Dial tone.
Looking
down at my watch, I calculated I had roughly forty minutes to pack my bag and
report in. Not much time since the drive alone took fifteen minutes. Guess I’d
better get my ass in gear.
~~~
Kara
It was the chill that woke me. Since
the last thing I remembered was being cuddled up to my husband’s delicious
warmth, the chill I felt now made no sense. Forcing my heavy eyelids open, I
turned my head to look at my surroundings, searching for Riley.
Realizing
he was nowhere to be found in the living room, I used my arms to push myself up
when I heard a sound coming from behind the closed door of our bedroom. What
was he doing in there?
The
closer I came to our bedroom door, the more my stomach started to twist in
knots. For whatever reason, I just knew I wasn’t going to like what was going
on behind that door.
Pushing
the door open with my hand, my eyes came to rest immediately on my husband’s
back as he stood at the foot of our bed, shoving stuff into his bag. My stomach
stopped doing somersaults and promptly dropped to somewhere down by my feet. He was leaving?
The
fact that the muscles in his back and shoulders were now obviously tense,
causing him to stand a little straighter than he’d been before, clued me in
that he wasn’t looking forward to whatever it was he thought I was going to
say.
Just
when I had let myself truly hope that things were getting better, reality had
felt the need to slap me in the face with this wake up call.
My
shoulders drooped as resignation set in. The only thing I could hope for now
was that his team had been activated, and he wasn’t leaving me right before my
college graduation voluntarily.
Clasping
my hands tightly underneath the swell of my belly, I softly asked, “You get
called in, sweetheart?”
His
shoulder stiffened as he paused in his motions to stuff something else in his
bag. “Something like that.”
He
started to move again, faster this time, almost rushing to finish his
preparations. That renewed vigor, that motivation of what must be ‘Hurry the
hell up before she starts her ridiculous hysterics’ was probably the death of
my tenuous faith that my marriage was taking a turn for the better. As if
someone had come along and smacked me square in the forehead, everything became
crystal clear for me. The state of my marriage had never improved; the problems
had just been put on pause.
Riley
hadn’t left for a voluntary mission these past few months because there hadn’t
been a need for him. There was no doubt in my mind that this was a voluntary
mission. His vague answer had confirmed it for me. If his team had been called
in, his response would have been a straight forward ‘yes.’ Instead, he’d given
me a lie, painted in pretty half-words in the hopes I wouldn’t make a scene
before he left.
As
my eyes pricked with the threat of tears, I nodded my head in acceptance. I
wouldn’t make a scene. In fact, I wouldn’t say a negative word about it. While
he was gone, I would sit down and think it all over again. Perhaps there was
something I hadn’t thought of yet that would help me reconnect with my husband.
Someway, somehow, I would find a way to confirm that the love of my life—the
man who owned me heart and soul—still, in fact, loved me.
When
feet came into my view on the floor, I looked up into his eyes as he stood just
inches from me. He eyed me warily, looking as if he was bracing for an impact
of some sort. And it made me wonder, how
could someone be so close to you physically, yet still so out of reach
emotionally?
Refusing
to make a scene, I stayed silent and chose to simply watch him. Run my eyes
over him, memorizing his features in case something happened on this mission
and I never saw him again.
“I’ll
try to make it back by your graduation, but if I miss it, I’m sorry.” His
muscles tensed again, as if waiting for a strike of some sort.
I
realized I just didn’t have it in me to fight back. At least, not right now.
Not when I was dealing with my heart feeling like it was lying in brutalized,
little pieces on the floor; more likely next to my stomach that might not
regain its regular appetite for days.
Not
knowing what else to say, I nodded in understanding.
My
lack of response seemed to confound him. Maybe I’d been a bit more of a raging
bitch about this issue than I’d thought?
I
watched him reach out a tentative hand towards my face as if he wanted to
caress it, but he stopped just short of actually touching me, faltering before
dropping it back to his side. Turning around, he walked back to the bed, picked
up his bag, and then walked over to give me a kiss on the cheek.
“I
love you, and I’ll be home as soon as I can.”
Not
bothering to wait for a response, he walked past me. Seconds later, I heard the
front door close.
Standing
in a bedroom as empty as I felt, I whispered back to absolutely no one, “I love
you, too.”
Once
again, the man who was my everything had left me. 
Stripping Her Defenses (Ex Ops, #2)
Secret Maneuvers (Ex Ops, #1)
About the Author
Giveaway!
Coming Soon from Jessie Lane and Chelsea Camaron
![Pageflex Persona [document: PRS0000040_00014]](http://www.readlovelust.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/JL_bikercover_front-1.jpg)
ICE (Regulators MC, #1)
Release Date: December 8, 2014
Model: Shawn Dawson
Photographer: Golden Czermak/Furious Fotog
Cover Designer: Mina Carter
Loosely attached to Chelsea Camaron's Hellions Series and Jessie Lane's Ex Ops Series.
She's an investment banker.
He's an outlaw biker.
A little bit of heaven is about to meet a whole lot of hell.
Morgan Powell was raised to be perfect, to set an example for her sisters to follow. Her life has been dedicated to making something of her career, so she wouldn’t know what to do with a man even if you gave her an instruction manual.
Brett 'Ice' Grady spends his days trying to keep up with his teenage daughter, his nights consumed in Regulators’ MC business. He has no time for anything more than a casual hookup.
Two worlds collide when the dangers of his life crash into the calm of hers.
Can she go beyond her own boundaries and chip her way through to the man known to be as cold as ice?
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