Page 107 of Finding Carly
He felt her sigh in relief against him, her warm breath caressing his neck.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” Jag asked, wanting to make sure she wasn’t just humoring him.
“Yeah. I want to put Shawn, and Gideon, and everything about that damn relationship behind me. I want to move on. To marry you, to get back to the person I was before all this happened. I made some mistakes, but I didn’t deserve what happened to me.”
“No, you didn’t,” Jag agreed.
She tilted her head back. “Are you and the others going to be headed out on a mission soon?”
Jag frowned in confusion. “No, why?”
“Because you were in all those meetings. Something major was happening, and I just figured you’d be leaving soon. You told me that’s how it works, that sometimes you guys spend hours and hours going over intel, then you’d be deployed.”
Jag nodded. It was hard to believe that forty-eight hours previously, the only thing on his mind was the kidnapped boys in Nigeria. That seemed like a lifetime ago. “I can never guarantee we won’t be sent out at a moment’s notice, but the thing we were researching was resolved without us having to lend our assistance.”
Carly sagged against him. Jag hadn’t realized how worried she was about him leaving until right that moment.
“Good.”
Jag brought a hand up and smoothed it gently over her head. “I love you,” he said softly. “I swear I lost ten years off my life when I realized you hadn’t texted to let me know you got home safely.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“No,” Jag told her with a shake of his head. “Don’t be sorry. What happened wasn’t your fault. It was that asshole’s.”
“We need to watch that movie. Soon,” Carly said.
Jag chuckled lightly and nodded. “Okay.”
“Is Baker okay?” she asked after a minute.
Jag sighed. “I don’t know.”
“He didn’t do anything wrong. I know for a fact he worked his ass off to find me.”
“He did,” Jag agreed. “But he doesn’t like to fail.”
“Oh, good Lord, he didn’t fail,” Carly protested. “He was the one who found that footage of Gideon hitting me and stuffing me in his trunk!”
“He doesn’t see it that way.”
“I’m gonna talk to him,” she said firmly. Then her voice softened, and she added, “But not right now. I’m comfortable.”
Jag nodded against her. He’d been afraid he’d never have this again. Never be able to hold her. Sparks could have terrorized her much more than he had. Could’ve assaulted her. The last thing he ever wanted was for her to go through whathedid. The helplessness, the degradation, the pain. What had happened to Carly was bad enough. If Sparks had touched her, Jag knew neither of them would be dealing with what happened as calmly as they were right now.
“I’m looking forward to the barbeque at Kenna and Aleck’s place this weekend.”
Jag smiled. That was such a…normal topic of conversation. Carly had just gotten out of the hospital, she was probably still in a good deal of pain, and yet she was putting what happened behind her. She was fucking amazing.
“Me too.”
“Elodie said she was going to go all out,” Carly said.
Jag could feel her smile against him. “Which means we’re all gonna eat extremely well.”
“I can’t wait to taste those burgers the guys are always talking about.”
