The Sweetest Package Read online

  “Sure, Ginge, we were given shit circumstances to deal with and we did the best we could, but we’ve been given a second chance. I’m not squandering that. I’m not going to let you do that, either!”

  “Good luck to you, then!” she hollers and with that she’s gone, being the same feisty Ginger I remember.

  4

  Sasha

  I came here with one agenda. My little girl, my little Davis, but if I’m being honest, my first Davis has never truly left my heart. As he took me in his arms, I wanted to fight but his warm embrace is the home I have been running from for three long years. Every time I thought I’d be able to share our daughter with him, some sort of intel would come to Sylvie and we’d be forced into hiding.

  Thank fuck Sylvie still had all the medical records on Jake. I’m not sure why she would have the information on whether he’d be a match for my Little Davis, but she said they had every sort of contingency plan on her operatives, and as thorough as she is, it didn’t surprise me.

  Back in the kitchen, I see the food and the fucking tiramisu he made. This was not some normal meal, he’s with someone that warrants this treatment and all I got three years ago was a note on the door.

  Sure, Sylvie was honest with me that she left him no choice at all. As ruthless as she was, still is, it doesn’t surprise me. She left me little choice because she used Jake against me just as she used me against him. Granted, over the years, she has wormed her way into my heart and Little Davis adores her.

  As I finish with the plates and load them in the dishwasher then clean the table, I take a piece of the sinful-looking tiramisu and sit down, both mentally and physically exhausted from today.

  Jake appears in the kitchen with a duffle bag and has changed. Fuck, he looks good. I can tell he has aged with a little of his hair graying but not anything that would indicate him being thirty-nine years old. He only smirks at me. “I like seeing you in my kitchen, enjoying my food. Better get used to it.”

  I’m not letting him swoon me with his sweet talk. I slam down my heaven on a plate, standing then stampeding toward him. “Yes, I kept Little Davis from you! That is something I never wanted, but you let me go. And now I come to your house. You have this wonderful meal I know you were making someone special. Probably a third date sort of thing, where you were going to sleep with her, when you just let me go three years ago. You fucking let me go!” I slam my fists into his chest. “I know what Sylvie told me but at the end of the day, you still let me go. I thought we were special and you discarded me like this fucking garbage you have to take out.” I point to the bag I changed near his door.

  I stop when I realize he’s letting me pound on his chest like he’s one of those sledgehammer games from a carnival. I look up, tears in my eyes and he’s wiping them away again. “Ah, fuck, Ginger, is that what you thought? Well shit, that is what I let the note make you think. I never thought of it from your point of view, Ginge. Even if you knew the whole story. I’m sorry, Ginge.”

  But he won’t let me go. I fight against the back of his arms and they are no match for me, especially when I feel the muscles of his upper body grip me harder. He has really bulked up in the past three years, not that he was small to begin with.

  “Jake, what are you doing.”

  Pulling a piece of my hair back, he starts, “Shhh, sugar. I’m just seeing if you still fit perfectly in my arms.”

  I stop fighting when I ask, “What is the verdict?”

  “Um, it’s like you never left. And by the way, cupcake, we will talk more later. Sylvie is probably shitting her pants and I don’t want my child around that bitch more than she has to be.”

  Sylvie warned me that Jake didn’t like her and I think that may be an understatement. He finally releases me and I see a shit-eating grin on his face. “What?” I ask.

  “I love the name Little Davis, but I have another idea I’m mulling over. I need to wait to see her.”

  I shake my head, throwing the tiramisu away and say, “You would, you and your nicknames.” When he hands me his duffle, he grabs the trash, the last part of the puzzle to make sure it looks like he left planned. Parking his car in his garage, we head to my car.

  “I’ll drive,” he says, coming to my modest Toyota Camry that I’ll have to ditch after the rendezvous with Sylvie. I don’t fight Jake, it’s pointless in almost every aspect of my life.

  Five minutes on the road, I receive a message from Sylvie telling me to meet her at the house we are staying at. Her sweeping team, which is not the technical term and who I don’t know that well, tells her it’s safe. Jake’s face is forward, watching the road and looking in the rearview mirror, navigating the car in the same way Sylvie does when we are on the run.

  “Davis?” I ask.

  He doesn’t take his eyes off the road when he responds, “Ginge, unless you are going to admit that what we have is not over, I’m busy here!”

  “I know, you and Sylvie do a lot of the same things, I guess that makes sense since she trained you.” He physically winces as if I hurt him with this statement. “No, I was going to say I’m sorry you missed out on Little Davis’s life for the past two and a half years.”

  He doesn’t say a word and I continue, “I was going to find you until I found out there was another person inside of me. Then it was all I could do to make sure she was safe.”

  “Ginge,” his voice is stern, almost angry, and I’ve never heard his voice this hard. “I want to meet LD and get us to safety.” Of course, he’s already nicknamed her. “I love you and we will sort it out. But now, I have one thing in mind and that is to get you to our daughter.”

  “LD?” I ask and he only shrugs. This is when all the nicknames will begin. I wonder if she’ll have as many nicknames as he has given me. I grab his hand and he immediately laces his fingers into mine. Bringing my hand to his mouth, he kisses it. I’m fucked.

  5

  Jake

  I’ve never lost my moves, in training that is. I maneuver the streets to make sure we are not being trailed and when I’m secure in this, I take the address that Sasha has written down for me and make my way to the small town of Davenport, thirty minutes from my house.

  Laughing, I’m not surprised Sylvie is in the middle of nowhere. “Why in the small town of Davenport? It’s not near any major interstate.”

  “I have learned after three years not to question the workings of Sylvie.”

  “I worked for her for ten years and I questioned that bitch at every move.”

  Ginger laughs and I find her hand is still in mine. “Somehow, Davis, I don’t doubt that about you and her.”

  We are pulling up to the farmhouse that Sylvie and my daughter are at. Instantly, I spot Sylvie’s team and they give me a sign, they are friendly. “Who is on Sylvie’s team?”

  Taking a deep breath, she finally replies, “I know just Burbank and another man I see often is Morry. Burbank has a team of men, but he, sometimes Morry, and the doctor we use, Luchen, are the only ones Sylvie lets get close to me and Little Davis.”

  That name, Luchen, I hate more than Sylvie. I can’t think of him now, though. I concentrate on just fucking Sylvie and fucking Burbank. He’s the leverage I used against her when I quit and it stuck. She didn’t come after me. Although maybe I should be happy it’s Burbank, she can trust him. I mean, after all, he’s her husband.

  “You know who Burbank is to her, right?” I ask.

  I look over and my confident Ginger is biting her cheek. “I know a little. Sylvie is private about her life, very private, but I have seen a couple stolen moments between them. It made me trust him a bit more.”

  I only nod but I say nothing else as I drive down the long path to the house and to the first peak of my daughter. I need to concentrate but at the same time, I’m freaking out at the idea of meeting this little girl who is a part of me. I finally look at Sasha and ask, “Tell me something about Audrey Margaret.”

  “Well, the first thing never to do is call her
Audrey Margaret. Burbank calls her Miss Audrey but that is all.” I wince at the idea of a strange man with access to my daughter, not that Burbank isn’t a standup guy. Considering he’s married to fucking Sylvie, he’s not too bad.

  “She has wavy red hair and she talks better than most ten-year-olds.”

  “She’s two and a half?” I clarify.

  “Um, not quite. She’s twenty-eight months.” I gasp aloud and I don’t give a shit right now. I mean, I understand, but she has just said the number of months my daughter has lived on this earth without me knowing.

  “I’m sorry, Jake, everything I did has been only for our girl, no one else.”

  I know this in my heart. I do, but it fucking sucks.

  6

  Sasha

  Looking over as Davis puts the car in park, he’s shaking, visibly. He’s nervous, not about seeing Sylvie for the first time in three years, but about meeting his daughter. Pausing, he keeps his hand on the gearshift until my touch makes his trembling body stop. “Davis, she’ll love you. I see so much of you in her.”

  He turns, the fucker won’t let me see his vulnerability, but I know it’s there. In the few days we had fallen in love, I saw more of Jake Davis than the whole world has seen combined, minus just maybe that of his sister.

  “I don’t have it in me to go tit for tat with Sylvie right now.”

  Earlier, I asked her to keep herself scarce. She mentioned she would find Burbank when we pulled into the drive and to let Jake know this. “Yes, she wanted me to mention you are on deck and that you would know what that means.”

  Reaching into the back seat, he pulls out a gun, checks the rounds and secures it back into his duffle bag. I guess that is what she meant, for him to be ready for anything.

  Getting out of the car, I don’t have a chance to think when my little girl comes running out, which I almost cringe at. I don’t want her to out do herself. She’s supposed to be resting. Looking into the green eyes that are her father’s, I can’t believe she’s sick. She certainly doesn’t look like a kid who is ill.

  Turning to watch Jake as I take Little Davis into my arms, he reaches for the car, holding on for dear life. “Hey, baby, Mommy missed you!”

  Putting her down, I watch her put her hands on her hips as she cocks her head to the side. “You were gone too long, Mommy.”

  Gotta love the inquisition of a toddler, I think to myself. She turns to watch Jake as he’s watching her. “Take a picture, it last longer,” she spits and I know she has heard this from Sylvie. I try to gasp as her dad only laughs.

  “The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.”

  “That, unfortunately, is all Sylvie.”

  Jake shakes his head at me, “The words maybe but the gusto and feistiness are all you, Ginger.”

  My sweet but sassy girl looks at me and says, “We change names ’gain, Mommy?”

  My heart hurts for her. All of this hiding, she’s not living a normal life. She has never had a playdate with another child and her big concern at two and a half is that she’ll have to change her name again.

  “No, sweetie, this is a friend of mine that calls me Ginger because of my red hair.”

  Little Davis looks at him and asks, still that arm cocked on her hip, “I have red hair, you call me dat, too?”

  He kneels down in front of her, looking right into her eyes, well, actually they are his eyes. “You have very red hair, similar to my sisters and it’s curly. I’ll call you whatever you would like me to. But I’m also very good at coming up with nicknames for people.” Catching me in his peripheral vision, my head bobs up and down in agreement and Jake laughs. He knows I’m a sucker for anything he calls me.

  Little Davis cocks her one eyebrow as it’s evident to me she’s trying to process everything. “Aunt Sylvie calls me Murada.”

  Looking at me for clarification, I interpret, “It is Merida.”

  Jake winces at the word aunt and I knew he would. But before I can clarify, he asks, “Who is Merida?” And I realize he’s not up to speed with his Disney princesses. Why would he be?

  She scoffs loud, opening her mouth, her outraged signature stance when the world doesn’t look right in the eyes of my two-year-old.

  She looks at me, “Who you brought us, Mommy? He not know Murada?”

  Jake is laughing his ass off when he looks around our girl and asks, “Are you sure she’s only two and a half?”

  “Awe, she came out speaking in full sentences,” I clarify.

  “So, misser, you a name?” She now cocks her head and putting on the stern face is proving difficult with my sassy but funny daughter.

  “Audrey Margaret Davis, I suggest you watch your tone,” I warn.

  Jake still laughs as my girl only says, “When Mommy say my big name, I in trouble. I sorry.”

  In his face, I see his heart physically melting at the sight and sound of her. “It’s okay, honey. But you asked me a question and I haven’t answered. Your mommy calls me Davis, too.”

  She pulls back and looks at me and I only shake my head. “Are you my daddy? Mommy tell me Daddy have my name.”

  Jake looks at me for permission and I nod at him, too. “Yes, sweetie, I’m your daddy.”

  She turns to me before Jake can take her in his hands. “Woman, you toll me he a friend.”

  Before I can correct her, Jake takes her in his arms, “Come here and give me a hug before your mommy gets you.”

  7

  Jake

  My daughter is in my arms. Four hours ago I had no idea I had a daughter and now, she’s wrapped as close to my heart as she can get. The second she opened her mouth, there was no doubt she’s Sasha’s daughter. She’s the spitting image of her mother with one exception; she has my eyes.

  She leans back and takes her little hands and cups them around the clean shave of my face and says, “Where you be all my life?”

  I look at Sasha again and she interprets the question I have already asked, “She’s quite articulate for her age.”

  “And nothing like you, either,” I add. I should be freaking out. Hell, this little girl stole my heart the second I saw her and I understand I have missed so much. But as scared as I am of this two-foot doppelganger of Sasha’s, she wants me and has missed me. I realize now how much I’ve missed her. Forgetting for a second that we are in danger, I lift LD, my nickname for her for now, up and give her a kiss on the cheek.

  “I have missed you, too, Little Davis, but just so you know, I’ll be coming up with a nickname for you that only your mama and I’ll call you.”

  “He’s good at nicknames, too, honey.” Sasha’s face is close to mine when she talks to LD and I can’t help but feel complete with the presence of these two near me.

  Hoisting her light little body up over my shoulders, she squeals as I give her a piggyback ride into the ranch house in the middle of nowhere.

  Once in the house, I place my daughter in my arms as I take in my surroundings. Call it a job hazard but I’m still on call, especially when my family is in danger. This is my family and I’ll be damned if anyone tells me otherwise.

  “So, Ginger, what’s the plan?”

  Little Davis is laughing, “I yike dat.”

  “Good, you can be Ginger Junior,” I mention and then it comes to me, what I’m going to call our daughter! But I skip it for now because in a matter of five minutes of knowing this little girl, I have a feeling, like her mom, she’ll have a comment on any name I may want to call her. Looking back at my Ginger, I say, “I want to know what the plan is.” No, it’s more than that. I need to know.

  Sasha is checking her phone as I continue to soak in everything that is our little girl. Before she can answer me, I hear someone approaching and before I know it, I have Little Davis behind me. I reach for the gun I placed on my ankle before we left the car.

  However, there’s no reason to pull a gun. No, if I’m going to pull a gun on the person standing in front of me, it will be for a different reason.
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br />   Before I can say a word, Little Davis has leaped into Sylvie’s fucking arms.

  “Jacob,” the person in front of me says, with very little emotion but holding my daughter, which I fucking hate.

  “Sylvie.” Her name on my tongue is enough to make me vomit. Holding her hand is Burbank.

  “Davis, it’s good to see you again,” Burbank says and his tone has more emotion to it, unlike his wife.

  “Let’s just skip the formalities. What is the plan?” I ask, missing the weight of my daughter in my arms. I reach for her and she comes without coaxing and I feel a small victory taking her from the grips of her “Aunt Sylvie.”

  Sylvie brushes her almost white hair out of her face, and I smell she has just had a cigarette. “We have a doctor, someone from the old unit, someone we can trust. But he’s not a specialist in hematology like Merida needs.” She points to Little Davis as she only giggles at Sylvie’s nickname. “We are driving to Portland, Oregon.” She thinks she’s being smooth but I know the doctor is fucking Luchen, he sets me off worse than Sylvie but for different reasons.

  “Doernbecher Children’s Hospital is one of the best places for pediatrics on the West Coast and we want to be outside of Washington State. If anything, the first place anyone goes to search…” Sylvie trails off when I see Sasha reach for our girl.

  “Let me take Little Davis here while you all talk.” She has to pry our girl out of my arms and truth be told, I don’t want to let her go.”

  When they leave, I realize I have a chance to let Sylvie have it but before I can, she continues where she left off. “If anyone searches for us, it will most likely be in Seattle. We’ve been off the grid for a while, without any fear of detection.”

  I want to know everything, from the beginning to the end and every decision that has been made to keep my daughter from me. I’m about to start when Burbank interrupts, “Your questions will be answered but for now, we need to move to our next spot. Sasha took a large risk coming to you today. We begged her to let myself or Sylvie reach out to you.”