Holiday at Magnolia Bay

by Tracy Solheim

  “Or any more arrogant,” Jenna said as she scooped the chamomile tea into the steeper.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Macy said as she poured the hot water in. “I’ve heard alpha guys like that can be very task-oriented when they set their mind to it. Especially in the bedroom.”

  Jenna winced as she nearly dumped the scalding tea down the front of her. “Have you not been living here for the past three months? The last thing I need in my life is to get involved with another man. Especially one who exudes testosterone like Lieutenant Commander Drew Lanham. I don’t care if his eyes are all like tell me your secrets and his mouth is sending out sonar to my tongue. Or that his body looks like it was meant for a blind woman to learn Braille on it.”

  Too late, she realized she’d said all that out loud. Macy looked as though her panties might ignite right there in the kitchen.

  “Wow. If you’re not interested, can I have him?”

  The sound of the doorbell saved her from shouting out the “No!” that had risen to the back of her throat.

  Both women looked at one another warily. “It’s ten thirty,” Macy said. “Who could that be?”

  “Maybe it’s Kristin,” Jenna said as she headed for the door. Their friend, Kristin Largent, was an artist with a gallery in town who worked when the mood suited her. She often got consumed in her work, losing track of time and would stop by the beach house at odd hours. “She’s been working on a new Christmas ornament for the Center to use as a fundraiser. No doubt she just finished and wants me to see it right away.”

  Jenna pulled open the door, but it wasn’t Kristin on the other side.

  “Do you always open your door this late at night without asking who it is?”

  She nearly spilled her tea a second time at the sight of Drew leaning against the porch railing as if he belonged there. Looking dark and dangerous in a pair of form-fitting Levis and a black hoodie with USNA emblazoned across the front, Drew met her stare head on. His expression was hard to make out on the darkened porch, especially with his delicious five o’clock shadow enhancing the bad boy persona. But one glance into his green eyes and Jenna feared Macy’s panties weren’t the only ones in danger of spontaneously combusting.

  “Yum,” her roommate whispered at her shoulder. It was enough to rouse Jenna to her senses.

  “What are you doing here?” Jenna asked a little abruptly.

  He settled in against the railing, crossing his sneaker-clad feet at the ankles. “Apparently I’m here to give you ladies a clinic on self-protection.”

  “Oh, I’m so up for that,” Macy murmured.

  Jenna huffed in aggravation at both of them. “We’re perfectly able to protect ourselves. This is Magnolia Bay. Everyone knows everyone else here. It’s quite safe.”

  “Tell that to the house full of frat boys at the end of the block who are just looking for trouble. Two beautiful women alone on a secluded end of the bay might sound pretty attractive to them after a couple rounds of beer pong.”

  Macy sighed beside her. He was being ridiculous and her roommate was buying it hook, line and sinker. While she had to agree the college boys renting the bungalow up the street were a bit of a nuisance some nights, she didn’t feel threatened by them. Not as threatened as her senses felt around Drew.

  She finally found the gracious charm her mother had paid so dearly for. “Thank you so much for your concern. We’ll be sure to lock the door securely now. Good night.”

  “What are you doing?” Macy hissed as Jenna began to close the door right in Drew’s face, extinguishing his unsettling green-eyed stare.

  He moved so quickly she barely saw him insert a muscular shoulder before she could get the door closed, though. “Not so fast.”

  Jenna leaned her forehead against the doorjamb in frustration. God, how she wanted this day to be over. She didn’t want to think about the awful lunch, or Perry and his fiancée. Or the larger-than-life man with the beautiful eyes standing two inches from her. The problem was she didn’t think she’d be able to get Drew out of her mind even when she closed her own eyes tonight. The scent of him filled her nostrils and that aroused her even further. He smelled like the ocean, salty and fresh as though he’d just come off the beach. She mustered up the remains of her courage and tried once again to get rid of him.

  “Look, I know you think I’m part of some crazy plot to steal money from your godmother, but nothing could be further from the truth. I love and respect Miss Evie tremendously. I’m happy to show you the plans for the hatchery that she helped to develop. Just not tonight. So maybe you could dial back the military hit man thing you’ve got going and let me go to bed now.”

  Drew groaned softly, his warm breath fanning her cheek. “As much as I find the idea of you in bed pretty damn enticing, I’m not here about that. At least not tonight.”

  Macy chuckled, reminding Jenna that they weren’t alone. She took a step back, opening the door wider. Drew moved to fill the space with his massive shoulders, a triumphant grin on his face.

  “Ahem,” Macy whispered and Jenna forced herself not to roll her eyes.

  “Macy, this is Lieutenant Commander Lanham,” Jenna said. “Drew this is Macy Hallis, my roommate.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Macy said, the picture of politeness, in sharp contrast to Jenna’s hit-or-miss manners.

  Drew gave Macy his most charming smile. “The pleasure is all mine.”

  Macy peeked out of the door to look behind him. “Oh, please tell me there are more of you waiting outside.”

  His laughter bounced off the walls and Jenna felt both her arousal and anger ratchet up at the same time. If he’d come here to flirt with Macy, she was definitely going to bed right now. Alone.

  Jenna crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “Why are you here, Drew?”

  Drew fixed his stare back on Jenna. His nostrils flared and his expression hardened, making Jenna feel a little dizzy. “Turtles,” he finally said. “And by turtles, I mean a three hundred pounder that’s beached itself just beneath the bluff behind Aunt Evie’s.”

  Jenna pulled her cell phone out of her pocket, quickly scanning it for any texts from the local police or Fish and Wildlife. Turtles didn’t strand themselves too often in areas that were as densely populated as Magnolia Bay. But when they did, she or another member of the team of biologists researching the behavior of sea turtles was dispatched to gather some basic tissue samples. They would be analyzed in the turtle center laboratory and the results are then shared with the National Fish and Wildlife Service. Seeing no texts, she slipped into her Sperry’s that were lined up beside the front door.

  “Dead or alive?” she asked.

  “Oh, no. I’m not the scientist here. I didn’t get close enough to find out. I figured that’s a job for the turtle goddess.”

  Macy chuckled before taking a sip of her tea to hide the sound.

  “Don’t tell me a big bad Navy SEAL is scared of a sea turtle?” Jenna couldn’t resist teasing him right back while she pulled a chambray shirt over her cotton tank top. “Was it tagged?”

  “Tagged?”

  “She means was there neon spray paint on its back,” Macy explained. As a native to Magnolia Bay, she knew the protocol as well as Jenna did. Once a team member had gathered the necessary samples, the turtle was tagged with a swipe of spray paint and left to be disposed of via the circle of life.

  “No.”

  “Then it hasn’t been reported. The tide will be at its lowest for another hour. I should get out there before something else gets a hold of it.” Jenna grabbed her keys out of the ceramic bowl Kristin had made for them last Christmas. She scooped up her backpack with the other hand. “Tell me again where it is?”

  “I’ll do better than that, I’ll show you.” He steered her toward a Jeep Wrangler Jenna recognized from Miss Evie’s extensive collection of cars that she never drove.

  “You two kids have fun,” Macy called cheekily from the porch.

  “Lock the doo
r behind you,” Drew commanded as he slid into the driver’s seat and cranked the ignition.

  Jenna gripped the handrail tightly. As she suspected he would, Drew drove full throttle down toward the sandy beach. “I always wondered why Miss Evie had a Jeep. Is it yours?”

  “My brother’s.”

  The wind carried away the loud music from the party going on at the bungalow until the only sound in the late night air was the Jeep’s engine and the crash of the waves.

  “I’m still trying to figure out why Miss Evie never mentioned you. Or your brother.”

  He took his eyes off the road to give her a smug grin. “Parents, too. Contrary to what you might think, I’m not some military machine sent from the future.”

  “Actually, I have only your word on that, don’t I?”

  His rich laughter filled the night air as he drove the jeep over the small embankment and onto the sand.

  *

  Forty minutes later Drew held up the lantern he’d found in the back of the Jeep and watched as Jenna peeled off a pair of latex gloves then sealed them up in a plastic bag. She’d carefully collected samples from the turtle’s muscles and skin as well as the flipper bone. Because the turtle had only been dead a few hours, she said, it was necessary to take samples from its eyes, lungs, kidneys and other organs.

  “We don’t always get to a stranded turtle before other scavengers do,” she explained. “So these samples are helpful to the overall research that’s being done. They’ll be analyzed here locally, before I send them off to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service who are responsible for compiling the data nationally.” She then pulled out a tape measure and used it to determine the turtle’s size before carefully checking its shell. “If this guy has been in a research lab or a rehab center like ours, he’ll have a tag on him, but I don’t see anything.”

  Jenna was efficient in her work, keeping up a running dialog as though she were a professor and Drew a student. He found himself not only fascinated by her lecture, but impressed with her composure; she wasn’t the least bit squeamish or emotional. She’d make one hell of a Navy SEAL, he thought.

  A strand of hair had escaped her ponytail and she pushed it off her face. “Okay, that’s everything, I guess.” She was solemn for a moment, the first trickle of emotion she’d shown all night evidenced by her rough intake of breath. Then she pulled a small canister of spray paint out of her backpack. Looking over at Drew as though she once again just realized he was with her, she extended the paint can. “Would you like to do the honors since you discovered him?”

  Drew’s chest squeezed up. “We’re just gonna leave him here?”

  He wasn’t sure why the thought unnerved him so much, but the roar of the ocean was suddenly ten decibels louder in his ears. Never leave a man down, the DI’s had screamed at them throughout months of BUD training. It was the Navy SEAL’s code. Except he had left a man behind. He’d left Atkins behind, his body resting in the sand just like this stinking turtle.

  Suddenly Drew was on his ass on the beach, struggling to get air into his lungs as the memories of that night played in real time behind his eyes. Six years in special forces, and he’d never left a team member to the enemy. Sure, he’d lost guys from his unit before, but he hadn’t deserted their lifeless bodies in an Afghan desert.

  “Commander, get in this chopper now! That’s an order!” The Army jockey piloting the helicopter shouted over the sound of the whirling blades punctuated by the scream of mortar shells coming from the foothills. “I need to take this bird up before we all end up as sand castles!”

  He recalled his boots feeling as though they were filled with cement as he scrambled to the chopper, his mind warring with the anguish of leaving a fallen comrade or saving his own sorry ass. Drew’s sorry ass had won the round, but his mind wouldn’t let him forget. And he feared it never would.

  “Hey,” Jenna’s soft voice permeated the fog of emotion threatening to overwhelm him. It’s only a damn turtle, he told himself, trying to regain his composure and not embarrass himself further. Her hand was on his back, gently rubbing between his shoulder blades. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

  Except he wasn’t, and he was scared shitless he’d never be okay again. She kept rubbing, and he felt like a total pervert as his heart slowed down and the rest of his body revved up. His buddies were right; sex was definitely the answer to his problems. All he needed to do was convince a certain goddess of the turtles to play along. Once he was right in the head again—both of them—his nightmares would be over, and he could get back to duty and the life he was best suited for.

  He glanced over at Jenna. Concern clouded her eyes, but her hand never ceased its confident stroking.

  “What can I do to help you?” she asked, her lips hypnotizing him as much as her rhythmic back rub. “My father is in the military, so I’m not a stranger to what combat can do to a person.”

  Yeah, but did she know what her touch was doing to him? Or where he wanted those sinful lips to go? He needed to get both of them out of there before he did something stupid. Like take her right there in the sand.

  “Drew, talk to me,” she pleaded as her hand slid over his back. “Tell me what to do.”

  Ignoring the warning bells going off in his head, he reached out and cupped a sandy hand behind her neck pulling her in closer. The hand on his back stilled, but Jenna didn’t resist him, leaning in until her mouth was a fraction away from his. “You could kiss me,” he said, trying not to sound as desperate as he felt.

  She arched a delicate eyebrow as their breath mingled in the salty night air.

  “Think of it as your patriotic duty, seeing how you’re a military brat,” he urged her.

  “Seriously? How many times have you used that line?”

  Drew took it as a very good sign that she was still sitting so close to him with her hand now tangled in his hood. “Actually, you’re the first. Most women don’t take a lot of persuading once they see the uniform.”

  She did roll her eyes at that but they were the only part of her that moved. “I don’t think I can kiss you after that sap,” those luscious lips finally said.

  “No problem, I’ll do all the kissing. You just sit back and enjoy the ride.”

  Mercifully, the sounds of battle had died down in his head and the only thing Drew heard was the sound of the ocean and Jenna’s soft sigh as he laid her down in the sand. He caught a brief glimpse of pity in her eyes before his mouth settled over the delicate skin on her neck, but he didn’t let her look stop him.

  She tasted like summer: fruity and warm. Thankfully her hand had begun to move again, skimming the back of his head while her other one made its way beneath his sweatshirt. He swallowed a groan as her fingers met his bare skin. Jenna shifted her hips in the sand, rolling them forward when his lips found the shell of her ear. His jeans were now unbearably tight.

  “Drew,” she sighed. “What are we doing?”

  He knew what he wanted to be doing, but answering her question meant he needed to engage his brain. Instead he kissed his way along the soft line of her jaw towards her mouth.

  “Do you want me to stop?” he murmured against the corner of her lips. She didn’t answer right away so he flexed his hips into hers. She let out a pleasant moan that he took as a green light, so he covered her mouth with his own.

  His tongue slid past her lips and he tried his damnedest to take things slow but the taste and feel of her was driving him crazy. Drew feasted on her mouth for what seemed like hours, and Jenna returned his attention with playful abandon. A breathy sound escaped the back of her throat and he pulled back only to have her tug him closer. Wrapping her legs around his thighs, she trailed her tongue along his and all Drew could hear now was the roar of blood leaving his brain and heading for his crotch. Her fingertips breached the waistband of his jeans, and he cupped her face between his hands.

  “Jenna,” he whispered, giving her head a slight shake.

  Her eyes slowly opened and Drew for
ced his gaze upwards from her swollen lips. Damn! The pity was still there. As much he wanted this right now, even in the sand, he couldn’t—wouldn’t—use Jenna like that. She was a compassionate woman, who likely would consider a pity fuck her patriotic duty. Not that she’d agreed to anything more than a few kisses, but things were getting way out of hand on his side of the sand.

  Drew swore savagely as he rolled off her. Grabbing the keys from the pocket of his painfully constricting jeans, he dropped them into Jenna’s stunned hand.

  “Go home, Jenna,” he growled. “Take the Jeep.” He heard her sit up behind him as he leaped to his feet.

  “Drew?” His name came out on what sounded like a sob that the night wind wasn’t strong enough to carry away and he felt like an even bigger ass.

  “Go now, Jenna,” he commanded, the words rough in his throat. “Before we do something you’ll regret later.” He headed toward the surf and began walking toward the north. Drew listened until he heard the sound of the Jeep’s engine fire up before it disappeared in the other direction. Then, he pulled his T-shirt and sweatshirt off in one swift move, toeing off his sneakers before he climbed out of his underwear and jeans. Thankfully, the beach was dark and deserted, with no one to witness his striptease.

  He shouldn’t have kissed her. He’d already resolved not to fool around with anyone in Magnolia Bay so as not to embarrass his godmother. And if the rest of the women in town were off limits, Jenna Huntley would be even more so given Aunt Evie’s fondness for her. Not to mention Jenna’s tender heart for all things, including, apparently, messed-up Navy SEALS. But he had kissed her and his body was screaming at him for ending it when he did. So he did the only thing he could think of; he waded up to his knees before diving into the ocean for a mind-numbing swim.

  Chapter Four

  ‡

  Jenna sipped her coffee as Miss Evie scanned the prospectus Dr. Scott had brought with her from Melbourne. The turtle hatchery was still Jenna’s top priority and nothing—not her boss, his stealthy fiancée or a sexy military man—was going to divert her from seeing it to fruition. Besides being an asset to a species facing extinction, the hatchery would bring business and notoriety to Magnolia Bay, her adopted home. It would also finally garner her some respect from her parents.