Page 61 of Rescuing Erin

“How do you feel about grilling some steaks tonight?” He shook his head and put his finger to his lips.

All righty, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out he didn’t want to talk about his meeting. He’d been so forthcoming lately, something new must’ve happened, and the swift change worried me.

“That sounds good.”

“How did it go with Olivia?”

“Good. I tried to talk to her about why I’d been so distant, but she dismissed me and said it wasn’t a big deal and she understood.”

“I told you she wasn’t mad.”

“Yeah, well, I was still nervous. Ivy and Violet are really great. It’s still so strange to see my cousin with kids. She’s changed a lot.”

“How so?”

I tried to think about how to explain the change in Jasmin. My cousin was hard as nails and just as tough as the men on her team. I suppose that came from her time in the Army. The only time I’d ever seen her break was when Linc had been presumed dead. She was at the White House monitoring a mission the guys were going on and she’d watched the house Linc was supposed to be in blow up. She’d lost it. My mom spent hours with her, trying to calm her down. Thankfully, Linc had escaped and he’d been rescued. But Jasmin had been a mess.

“I can’t say she’s gone soft, because that’s not exactly it, but she only said fuck about fifty-two times instead of her normal five hundred. And when she found out Ivy and Violet were both pregnant, she didn’t roll her eyes. She smiled and congratulated them.”

“Wait. What? Ivy’s pregnant, too?”

Shit. I hadn’t meant to tell him that.

“Um, forget I said that.”

“No shit. That’s great.”

“I’m already breaking the girl code and telling you secrets. Please don’t tell Zane I spilled. I don’t want Ivy mad at me. We had a really great time, and I want to be invited out with them again.”

“Sunshine, neither would be mad. You’re going to learn there are no such things as secrets in this group. But I wouldn’t say anything. I’ll wait for Zane to make the announcement.”

“Really? I know a secret, and it’s a really big one.”

“Zane and Ivy got married yesterday at the courthouse?” he asked.

“Dammit. How’d you know?”

Colin reached over and placed his hand on my thigh. It was amazing how comforting his touch was.

“I know all.” He chuckled.

“Come on. Really? How’d you know?”

“You know my job isn’t exactly safe.”

“I know.”

“So, we have contingency plans in the event we don’t come home from an op.” That was a nice way of saying in case they died. I wasn’t sure I liked where this conversation was headed or if I wanted to know the information he was about to tell me. “One is the company will financially take care of our spouse and children. Zane added Ivy to the policy yesterday and today the rest of us had to sign the paperwork. Each team has their own policy and Zane is covered by my teams’.”

“Is it like life insurance?”

“Kinda. But better. We all have death benefits. This fund is for the extras. A little peace of mind knowing our families won’t go without.”

“How many teams are there?”

“Three. Blue, Gold, and us.”

“Which one came to . . . get us?”