The baby stirred. Zach grasped Julia's elbow to drag her across the hall into the study.
Shutting the door behind them, he spun her to face him. "Julia, I'm just a man, as clueless as the rest of them when it comes to understanding how a woman's mind works."
Exhaustion be damned, he would keep at this all night if that's what it took to make her understand.
She darted a pointed stare at his hand on her elbow. "Let go of me, please. I can't think straight when you touch me."
An endorsement for putting his hands all over her if ever he'd heard one, but he respected Julia too much to play that game, even if every fiber in him shouted to use any weapon to keep her.
He raised his hands, palms up.
"You want direction for this conversation? Fine then. Here it is, Colonel."
Sparks showered from her eyes. Zach prepped for anything.
"I love you."
Anything except that.
Just when he thought she'd thrown her last surprise at him, Julia flipped his world again, this time in a good way. Relief chugged through him. She loved him. He wanted to pump a fist through the air, shout...until he saw the defeated slump of her shoulders.
Zach reached to gather her close. "Ah, Jules—''
She batted his arms away. "Do not touch me! I may love you, but that doesn't change anything. It doesn't change the fact that, hell yes, I'm scared this won't work. I'm scared of being hurt again." Her voice cracked on the last word.
"Jules, you know I would never cheat on you."
"That's not what I'm talking about." She backed, her hand between them. "Yes, Lance cheated on me. Not just once. Over and over again he lied about where he was, who he was with. But he didn't just cheat with his body. He cheated with his heart. He loved someone else. He loved her, the kind of woman he should have married. Sure, we patched it up, but I'm not so certain anymore that it would have lasted. I want it all this time. I want to be everything to a man, to be his first thought in the morning, the reason he smiles in the middle of some important meeting."
Julia looked at him waiting, but he didn't know what the hell to say to reassure her.
"Zach, you asked me to help you with the answer, so here it is. I wasn't first in Lance's heart. Ever. I can't live that way again. I need you to love me as much as I love you."
She stared at him with such wary hope he wondered why couldn't he just make himself say the words. Time was running out and he knew they were seconds from smacking the mountain that would end it all. "I've shown you in a hundred different ways how much I want you to stay, and that's what counts. What we do. Not what we say. Lance's actions proved that."
She winced, but he wouldn't stop now. He had a point, damn it, even if it hurt. He needed to make her understand how much she meant to him. "Explain to me, Julia, how a bunch of insubstantial words makes a commitment."
Frustration knotted his gut. Forget playing fair.
He pulled her close, chest to chest, legs tucking between each other by instinct, and let the inevitable heat, sparks and need sear them together. "Pam spouted to heaven and back how much she loved me as she walked out that door. My father pounded us one minute and said he loved us the next."
Everything went still inside him.
What the hell had he just said? Apparently Julia had heard every word. Tears streaked down her face, just like the ones she'd shed in his office over his POW days.
No way did he want her staying out of pity.
Her hand drifted up. He clasped her wrist before she could touch his face. Emotions revved within him like an engine drone, faster, harder, without any hope that a simple flip of a switch would shut it all down.
He could feel every ounce of Julia's compassion pulsing through her. She was weakening.
He could take advantage of that weakness, press, convince her to stay a little longer as he'd done for years with Pam.
But damn it, Julia wasn't settling? Well, neither was he. He'd thought she was the one person he didn't need to jump through hoops for, the one person who didn't need him to put on a commander show.
He tightened his grip on her wrist. "If you want to prove all that love you say you have for me, then have the guts to stay."
Zach dropped her hand.