I put my hands on his chest and asked softly, “You angry at Roam?”

“I was workin’ my way to that. But seein’ as it worked out in the end, I didn’t see any reason to get in his face about it.

We had a talk though. If there’s a next time, he knows to cal me,” Vance answered. “Anyway, he told me what he did.

They’d checked out the building. No cars, no noises, no people they could see. Tex was in a windowless room and, for obvious reasons, not makin’ a lot of noise. They thought the place was empty. Sniff’s orders were to phone if anyone approached the building. Roam was gonna cal if they had company. There were some errors in judgment but it was good work. He’s learnin’.”

I relaxed into him.

Vance was a patient teacher.

He was going to make an excel ent father.

“You get anything you could use out of Tex?” I asked.

“A little, he was unconscious most of the time. The rest of the time he was alone and makin’ a homemade bomb,” Vance answered.

“I thought you said Carter didn’t mess around.”

“Usual y, he doesn’t. It’s likely they wanted to play with him and wanted him conscious when they did it. They left Tex tied to a chair. He scooted to some metal shelves, used the sharp edge of the shelves to cut through the plastic. They probably didn’t expect him to get loose. They definitely weren’t expecting him to know how to build a bomb. We’re guessin’ they were goin’ back but they got lots of other shit keepin’ them occupied these days.” That was a lucky break. A scary one (in many ways) but lucky al the same.

“Do you think he’l give up?” I asked.

“Carter?” he asked back.

“Yeah,” I answered. “First Shirleen guns down one of his assassins in her living room then Tex blows up one of his buildings,” I explained. “Any sane person would give up.”

“Sidney Carter is a lot of things. I’m not sure sane is one of them.”

This was not good news.

“Eddie and Hank getting anywhere?” I continued my mini-interrogation.

“Yeah, Carter’s operation is in disarray. Some of his men are talkin’, makin’ deals. More warrants are goin’ out.

It’s takin’ time but it’s lookin’ good.”

“So, it’l be over soon?”

“Maybe. They don’t find him, Carter’s gonna start gettin’

desperate. That’s what I’m worried about.” I snuggled closer. “It’l al be okay.”

Vance sighed then shared, “I don’t know if you noticed this, Princess, but we started with Indy getting kidnapped repeatedly. Jet nearly got raped. Roxie got the shit beat out of her. You were shot, twice. Ava was violated and nearly exploded in car. Now everyone’s a target and there’s a man out there who’s desperate. I don’t like it. It does not give me a good feeling.”

“We’l survive,” I whispered.

“Yeah, let’s just hope Hector and Al y get somethin’ on.

That way, we can kil two birds with one f**kin’ stone and be done with this shit.”

At his words, I burst out laughing.

“I wasn’t bein’ funny,” he told me.

I wrapped my arms tight around him. “I hate to disappoint you, honey, but Jet told me that Al y told her that Hector’s like a cousin or something.”

“Fuckin’ great,” he muttered and I let out a smal giggle.

It was his turn for his arms to grow tight.

“Love to hear you laugh,” he muttered and my bel y did a swoop.

We fel into a comfortable silence for several long minutes.

Then I told him, “They accepted the offer on the house.” His arms went even tighter. So did mine.

It was a great house, just a few blocks away, only a couple doors down from where Lee and Indy lived. It had a nice, tidy yard with excel ent landscaping, beautiful plants and mature trees. It had character, warmth and even a white picket fence.

It made me want to laugh.

I used to be a vigilante, head crackin’ mamma jamma who carried a gun, patrol ed the streets and, at one time, took down a bail-jumping pimp and two of his working girls one after the other.

Vance stil was a badass mother.

And we were moving into a house with a white picket fence.

I couldn’t wait.

“I’l cal the agent tomorrow, get him to fast-track it,” he told me.

“What are we gonna do with three bedrooms and two and a half baths?” I asked.

“Fil them with babies,” he answered and the bel y swoop dipped deeper.

Stil , just to be annoying, I said, “This is the only child I’m having. Morning sickness sucks.”

I heard him give a low, soft laugh before he informed me,

“We’re havin’ four kids.”

“Four!” I cried, my head tilting back to look at him in the moonlight.

I loved looking at Vance any time but the best time was in the moonlight, when the planes and angles of his face were shadowed, both hard and soft but al beautiful, like he was to me.

His chin tipped down and he looked at me. “Yeah, four.”

“No way am I gonna have four kids.”

“Four’s a good number.”

“You carry four children in your body, puking every five minutes from morning until noon.”

He grinned then his mouth touched mine. “Okay, then three.”

I thought about it, pressing my lips together then I said,

“Al right. Three.”

I saw, even in the moonlight, the looks of satisfaction and amusement that passed on his face and I realized he’d only ever wanted three kids.

He’d just played me.

“You’re annoying,” I told him.

“You’ve mentioned that before,” he said back.

His hand went up my back and into my hair, tipping my head down and then pressing my face into his throat. It moved away from my head but stayed tangled in my hair and I felt his fingers start to play with a tendril.

We kept our silence and lay stil and comfortable in each other’s arms.

Final y, I asked, “You tired?”

“Wiped,” he answered.

I pressed deeper and kissed his throat.

“Any chance of nighttime sex?” I asked there.

He waited a beat then dropped to his back, taking me with him. In a flash, his hands were on my nightie, going up and then the nightie was gone.

“You want it, you gotta do al the work,” he answered.