And he missed his son.
Yeah, he missed Ty, but he yearned for Piper.
Yearned? God! Whatever label he gave the emotion—yearning, pining, longing—he was feeling it every miserable second. His head and heart ached. He wanted to go back to Park Slope, to that red Victorian, and beat on her door until she let him inside.
Because he was a man, his fantasy included skipping the talking and taking her straight to bed. After he’d reacquainted himself with every inch of her body, through mental telepathy she’d understand that they belonged together, that she was his, that Ty was his and that they were in it for the long haul.
Yeah, and he had more chance of finding the missing Kashmir Blues.
He loved her.
He loved her because she was funny and smart and had legs that made his mouth water. Because she was an amazing mother, a wild lover and a loyal friend. He loved her because he now understood her better, thanks to the pithy, and direct, lecture he’d endured from her acerbic elderly cousin.
It turned out Mick Shuttle wasn’t only a criminal, he’d also been a crappy father. According to Maeve, Shuttle had been an utter bastard to Piper and her mom, starting with the deal he’d struck with Piper’s mom when she’d told him she was pregnant.
After kicking her out of their apartment in a rage, Mick waited for more than two months before tracking Gail down at Maeve’s house. Mick, the bastard, made a deal with Gail: she could have full custody of the baby if she sold two of her sapphires and gave him the money to set up his business. Mick would keep her on as his mistress, would house and clothe and support her as long as she lived, but he wanted nothing to do with Piper. Ever.
It was a stance he’d never deviated from. Knowing that, and taking into account Jaeger’s own oft-repeated statements about not wanting a wife or children, Jaeger now better understood why Piper had kept Ty from him. She’d wanted to protect Ty from a father who’d openly admitted he wasn’t interested in children. She’d thought he was like Mick—the thought turned his stomach—and she didn’t want Ty to go through what she did. Jaeger wasn’t anything like Mick, but how was she to know that?
She’d been protecting his son; he couldn’t fault her for that.
Piper, Maeve informed him, was a Mills, and Mills women loved hard and loved fast. Their men never, not for a fraction of a second, questioned that love. It was just there, a living, breathing, tangible entity.
He wanted that love, Piper’s love. But he’d been too damn scared or too busy protecting himself to realize he’d been given a second chance at being happy. If he didn’t fix this, he might never know what being loved by Piper would feel like.
He’d lost his daughter, lost Andy and lost his parents. He’d lost Connor and a month of memories. Every loss rocked his world, but the thought of not having Piper and Ty in his life froze the blood in his veins.
He’d crawled through jungles, braved blizzards, talked his way past thieves and bargained with warlords to acquire the gemstones he wanted, but Piper and Ty were his biggest treasures, his ultimate find. He’d do anything to become part of their world, to share their lives. Ty allowed his shoulders to drop, and he stretched his spine to work out some tension.
It might take some swift negotiating, some smooth talking and fast thinking, but they were his biggest quest.
This had all started because Piper wanted to sell her stones to keep her house, and just like that, Jaeger knew what he had to do to win her back.
He smiled.
Oh, yeah, this was going to be fun.
* * *
Piper, convinced that she was about to burst a blood vessel in her brain, kept one hand on the handle of Ty’s stroller and slapped her other hand on the expensive counter between her and a robot wearing a black suit. She peered at the robot’s badge. Johnson, Chief of Security, Ballantyne and Co. “Mr. Johnson—”
“Just Johnson, ma’am.”
“I’m sure if you just call Jaeger and tell him I am here, why I am here—”
“Why are you here, ma’am?”
Because Simms told me to come!
Because the lawyer representing Mick’s estate now, for some odd reason, wouldn’t take her money, wouldn’t allow her to buy her house. Simms had told her to talk to Jaeger Ballantyne and to get back to him when she had.