Unexpected Love

by KaLyn Cooper

  Instead, he picked up his knife and fork and cut into the rare beef on his plate and tried to talk his erection down. “You’re right. It’s delicious.” Four words. He’d managed to say four whole words. And she was right, his slice had been cooked to perfection.

  Grace broke the silence. “Where did you go to high school?”

  Thank God for an easy question. “Aquinas, same as my father. They have one of the best high school football programs in the state as well as a high standard of academics. I took several advanced placement classes so I was able to exempt out of quite a few courses and concentrate on football my first year at the University of Georgia.”

  “Were you in the ROTC?” Grace dug into her twice baked potato.

  “No. I didn’t have time. When you play football for a big-name school like that, it’s almost like working a full-time job.” He cut off another hunk of steak. “Even though you only play in the fall, you’re expected to work out constantly, and keep up with all your schoolwork. During the season, that’s tougher than you might think. Our games were almost always on Saturday, but it wasn’t unusual for us to travel on Thursday. As soon as the game was over, we’d be back on a bus and an airplane within hours. Sometimes you were just too exhausted to do homework.”

  “How old were you when you decided to go into the Navy?” Her question sounded simple enough the answer certainly wasn’t.

  Griffin took his time chewing. Tell the truth, he reminded himself. “I knew since childhood that I didn’t want to go into politics. I hated that life. Everyone expected me to be an attorney just like my father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and most of the Mitchell men before them. Hell, even my brothers-in-law are attorneys.” He set down his fork so he could watch her reaction. “I have a law degree. I passed the bar in Georgia, first time I ever took the test.”

  Seeing no reaction of surprise, he noted, “You knew that.” It was a statement, not a question.

  Sheepishly, she looked up at him from under reddish eyelashes lightly coated with mascara. “I read the file on you at Section 7.” She quickly added, “I check out everyone I work with.”

  Okay. He’d give her that because he’d done the same. Although he had only seen her scrubbed military file, he’d run enough covert ops to be able to read between the lines. But he found he wanted to know even more about Grace, the woman, not the highly trained naval officer.

  He threw the question back at her, “When did you decide to join the military?”

  She paused as though to consider. “Kevin had always wanted to fly. I often went with him when he talked to the recruiters. Sometimes, I found myself getting even more excited about a military career than he did. Even though I grew up in the Midwest, I loved the water. I was on the school swim team, captain of the girls my senior year. The Navy just made sense to both of us.”

  “So you knew Kevin in high school?” Griffin really didn’t want to talk about her dead husband but he’d been an important part of her life so he needed to know everything about the man.

  “We actually met in junior high when my dad took over the church in Ames, Iowa.” She gave him a small smile. “His parents had been very active in the church and the community and they showed up to help us move in. From that day on, Kevin and I were practically inseparable.” She stared at her plate of half eaten food. “Until God decided he needed my husband more than I did.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s obvious you loved him very much.” Griffin watched her swallow hard.

  Her gaze met his. “I did. But he’s gone, and I’m still here, so that means God still has more for me to do on this earth. Like rescuing those children.” She reached across the table and grabbed his hand. “We rescued those children from what would’ve been a life of unbearable atrocities. We did that. Those kids now have a better chance at a good life. You know what our team does. We eliminate the most dangerous men on the planet, making the world a better place. I’m convinced that’s why I'm here.”

  When she let go of his hand, he immediately missed her touch. It was as though they had been exchanging an electrical flow and the plug had suddenly been pulled.

  She shrugged. “I guess God figured I’d be better doing that alone rather than with a man in my life. A few weeks after Kevin was killed in a plane crash in Afghanistan, I found out I’d been accepted for special operations training.” She glanced away then returned her gaze to him. “I never told him I’d put in for the program.”

  Griffin wasn’t sure what to make of that information. “Grace, I’m not a deeply religious man, but I do believe things happen for a reason. Whether Kevin knew you are interested in more than flight school or not doesn’t change the fact that he’s gone and you’re here. You’re young. You have plenty of time to fall in love again. Look at Katlin and Alex.”

  Her sweet smile made her whole face glow with delight. “I’m so glad those two found each other again.”

  “If Katlin can do it, so can you.” Griffin hoped his words were encouraging. Grace deserved a long happy life with a good man, as many kids as she wanted and a great career if she wanted that, too. He only knew two things: first, he wasn’t that man; second, he wanted her more than he had ever wanted a woman in his life.

  Chapter 7

  “I love walking around the monuments at night.” Grace excitedly headed up the steps to the Lincoln Memorial from the plaza level. “At the end of our first month of training at JAFSOS—”

  “What the fuck is that?” Griffin hadn’t been all that excited about seeing the monuments on the National Mall, but Grace wasn’t ready to call it a night. Mostly, she wasn’t sure where she wanted that night to end, in bed with Griffin or back at the condo, alone, again.

  They had lingered over supper, finishing her list of questions for him. He’d had a few of his own for her. More comfortable now that she knew some basics about him, it still felt more like a first date. She had never slept with a man on the first date. Or the second. Or the third. But tonight had not been their first meal together.

  They’d sat on the ground, side-by-side in the desert eating MREs, military meals in a bag. Conversely, they had sat in some of the most expensive restaurants in Miami, dressed to the nines, dining on delicacies from all over the world. True, on most of those occasions her team had been beside her. But she and Griffin had also shared quiet moments over coffee and ice cream.

  Tonight, she’d been too stuffed for dessert at the restaurant. She wanted to walk some of the calories off, so she had insisted they play tourist and visit the monuments.

  “Is the acronym top-secret or something?” Griffin’s question brought her back to the present.

  A quick glance around the area showed that they were alone, or at least far enough away from anyone else to answer his question. “Actually, yes. The Joint All-Female Special Operations School was, and probably still is, top-secret.” She quickly explained then moved on with her story. “There were one hundred women selected from all branches of service for the test program. I have no idea whether there are other women currently in the program or not, but knowing the military, one successful test program isn’t going to be enough.” She returned to her story. “The stars brought us all down here at midnight—”

  “Stars? You mean like movie stars?” His interruptions were getting aggravating but that teasing smile of his tugged at her heart. She could fall for this man’s southern charm, but that would be a mistake. His track record did not bode well. There was no way he was the right man for her for forever, but he might be perfect for tonight.

  “No, dingleberry, we just called them the stars because they wear stars on their collars.” She strode across the terrace to the next set of steps, vigilant of everyone around her. She’d pegged the teenager lurking in the shadows and had watched his eyes shift to Griffin before he drew back.

  Good choice, young man, although I could kick your skinny butt just as fast as he could.

  “A bunch of generals brought you down here in the middle of the ni
ght? Who the hell were these guys?” Griffin had caught sight of the kid, too, and gave her a knowing grin when she glanced over her shoulder at him.

  Grace stopped on the step above him so she could be face-to-face with Griffin. She quickly glanced around, thankful no one was near. “Marine Corps Brigadier General Ava Standish, Army Major General Nancy Burkhoff, Air Force Brigadier General Janet Nichols, and Rear Admiral Betsy Willet.”

  He stared at her for a long moment, then raised one eyebrow. “Those are some mighty powerful women.”

  She stepped close to him and spoke in a very low voice. “They’re the highest ranking women in each of the four services. They created and oversaw our testing.” She leaned in and brushed her lips over his. The jolt that went through her body from that small connection made her want to do it again, but this time make the tingles last for hours. She wanted to run her hands over his broad bare chest and explore every inch of him with her mouth, teasing them both until they couldn’t catch their breath.

  Later. Maybe.

  She licked her lips. “Can I now continue with my story?”

  When he tried to pull her in, she slipped out of his grasp and headed for the final white steps to where Lincoln sat stately overlooking the reflection pool named in his honor.

  “We were required to learn all kinds of little details about each monument and be able to tell any one of the stars about it whenever asked, and believe me they asked at the most inopportune times. In the middle of the obstacle course one morning, General Burkhoff stopped me and asked me how many steps led to Lincoln.”

  “How many are there?” His voice was a bit husky and she could feel the heat from his body as he stepped behind her and put his hands on her shoulders.

  Proud to know the answer, she glanced up at him and spouted, “Depends where you start. There are fifty-seven steps from the plaza level to the chamber, but technically the monument includes the reflecting pool so there are eighty-seven steps from the pool to this level.”

  He grinned as he gazed at the statue. “Lincoln was president number…”

  She rolled her eyes. “Sixteen. Far too easy. Try again.”

  “Okay, how tall is that statue?” He glanced at her before returning his gaze to the bearded man in the chair.

  “Nineteen feet from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head.” Then she added, “Originally it was only supposed to be ten feet tall but it was decided the statue needed to be much larger given this center chamber is sixty feet wide by seventy-four feet deep and sixty feet high.” They both looked up as though to measure the height. “Those are panels of Alabama marble. Did you know they saturated them with paraffin to make them more translucent? The girders are bronze and decorated with floral and oak leaves.”

  His grin was sardonic. “Fun facts to know and tell.”

  “Oh, we’ve barely scraped the surface of what I know about each one of these monuments,” she confessed. “For the Lincoln Memorial, the materials were brought in from several different states. The walls and columns in here are made from Indiana limestone. The statue is white marble…” She suddenly couldn’t remember where that came from, so she breezed over it. “The pedestal and chamber floor are Tennessee pink marble, not to be confused with the lower steps and terrace walls that are made from pink Milford granite that came from Massachusetts. But the upper steps, outside walls, and the gorgeous carved frieze across the top, were all made from marble shipped all the way from Colorado.”

  “Sounds like a whole lot of pork belly politics to me,” Griffin said with a sneer.

  “Probably so,” she admitted. “Even back in 1914, I’m sure congressmen had to guarantee their home state got a little piece of that federal money.”

  Grace wandered over to look at the wall where the Gettysburg Address had been carved. “Our fourth grade teacher made us memorize this whole thing, then we had to stand in front of the class and repeat it.”

  “Which was the hardest part?” His deep voice echoed through the empty chambers as he stood beside her.

  “I would say neither was difficult for me. I’ve always been good at memorizing, and I’ve never had a problem standing in front of a class.” After a second thought, she decided to tell him about her degree. “It makes sense because I always wanted to be a teacher.”

  He stared at her for a long moment then smiled. “I can see you as a teacher. Little kids. Although you wouldn’t put up with any shit from teenagers either.”

  “My degree is actually in preschool education. But I can also teach elementary school. I got those certifications as well. Someday I’ll eventually leave the Navy.” She looked back up at the short speech then remembered, “The carvers made a mistake, did you know that?”

  “Nope. I had no idea.” He started to read the inscription aloud.

  She grabbed his arm. “It’s over here in Lincoln's 1865 Presidential Inauguration speech.” She practically dragged him to the other chamber on the far side. “See the word future? They originally carved the F as an E. You can see where they patched it.”

  Griffin glanced around the chamber level. “They got a whole lot of letters right, I guess we can give them one fuck up.”

  “It’s not like our job,” Grace noted. “If we screw up, somebody could die.”

  He grabbed her and crushed her against his chest holding her tight. Lowering his head so his mouth was next to her ear, his words sounded like a confession. “Back over there, a few days ago, it could have been you. I wanted to be in your sniper hide, protecting you.” She heard him swallow. “One mistake is all it takes.”

  Loving this new concern he seemed to have for her and her safety, she reveled in the heat of his body as he held her. It had been far too long since a man had been this protective of her. She had no problem being the strong confident woman, sometimes it was nice to know someone else had that level of concern for her. Grace wasn’t sure how long they stood like that, hidden off in the side chamber. She finally leaned back to look at his face, still covered in concern.

  “How about I ask for you to be my spotter next time?” She offered.

  “How about there not be a next time that you’re half a mile away from the rest of us with no one covering your six?” he threw back. Working with a small team of only five, Grace was accustomed to watching for activity behind her.

  To distract him, Grace went up on tiptoes and kissed his lips. She kept it brief and stepped back. Sliding her hand into his, he gave it a little squeeze. “Let’s get down to the Vietnam Memorial,” she suggested.

  “What about the Korean Memorial on the other side?” he proposed as they trotted down the steps.

  “I don’t like that one, especially at night.” She did a whole body shiver. “Those nineteen oversized stainless steel statues of men sneaking through an open field give me the creeps. With the lights on, their eyes glow. Then there’s the eerie reflection in that shiny wall. No. Thank. You. Hard pass on that one.”

  He pulled her in the opposite direction. “So, how many names are on the Vietnam Wall?”

  “The number I had to learn was 58,318 over the eighteen years of the war.” She was really proud she still remembered those numbers, then wondered if more bodies had been recovered.

  They took an interior path that wound through the grassy lawn under trees a half-century old.

  Grace pointed to two statues off to the right side. “The first one down there is called The Three Serviceman and the next one is the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Statue.”

  Griffin slowed as they neared a path that would take them that direction. “Do you want to go see them?”

  “No, I’m good.” She checked her watch. “I don’t want to be out too late. I have a run in the morning.”

  Griffin’s response was little more than a grunt of notation.

  They started down the sloping sidewalk in front of the black memorial wall. “Do you know of anyone who died in this war? An uncle? Childhood friend of your parents?” Her voice was reverent, just
above a mumble. To Grace, this monument almost felt holy, maybe because it was dug into the ground, as though the names were buried.

  “No. My dad missed the draft by a couple of years, and my grandfather was too old. Besides, the Governor would never have allowed him to be put in harm’s way,” he said referring to his great-grandfather.

  “Me neither. But the stars required us to take one of those pieces of paper and a pencil to etch over one of the names. Then we had to find out everything about that person, from his service to his family and even identify all current living relatives.” At the time she’d thought it was an exercise in futility but in retrospect, it had taught her to use many sources to find people. She was constantly in awe of how much public information was out there.

  As her gaze swept over name after name after name, she hadn’t noticed that Griffin had released her hand until they had come almost to the end on the other side. He had his phone out, thumbs flying over the tiny keys.

  Must be something happened at work he had to handle.

  When they’d reached the top, back on street level, Griffin suggested, “Let’s head on over to The Ellipse.”

  Once again, they chose not to walk next to Constitution Avenue, but to wander the paths through the National Mall. Walking next to the lake at Constitution Gardens, Griffin pulled her off the path and into the shadows behind a great oak tree.

  He yanked her to him and took her mouth in a kiss that was long and deep. He ran his hand around the back of her neck then tilted her head the way he wanted it before readjusting the kiss. When she wrapped her arms around his neck, his hands skimmed down her body then back up to her ribs. His thumbs caressed the underside of her breasts.

  Grace drew in a ragged breath and her panties went wet. It had been a long, long time since that had happened to her. She didn’t realize how much she wanted this man.