by Cindy Dees
“Loser buys a bottle of whiskey for the winner.”
“I’ll do you one better,” she challenged. “Loser buys a limited edition hogshead of Glengoyne single-malt aged scotch for the winner.”
Trevor whistled from behind them and commented in his crisp British accent. “The lady knows her fine spirits.”
“You’re turning me on, talking dirty like that, Tate.” Griffin flashed her a grin so hot it made her miss a step.
The man. Had. Dimples. Tactical nuclear dimples.
Damn, damn, damn. She was a total sucker for them.
She barely righted herself in time to avoid face-planting on the gravel path.
Returning his insolent smile, she let her gaze slide down his magnificent body and back up to his face, where his grin faded, replaced by a smoking-hot stare that would have incinerated a lesser woman.
Her right eyebrow arched. “You think you’re man enough to keep up with me, Caldwell?”
Chapter 2
Griffin was here to hate these women. Hell, to break them. Kettering had made that clear without saying it in so many words. Grif had no time for reluctant admiration. But the oh-so-hot Miss Tate had guts to challenge him openly like that.
He drawled, “Darlin’, I know I’m more man than you can handle. So, are you gonna take the bet or not?”
“You’re on,” she ground out. “And don’t call me ‘darling.’”
He laughed quietly at her elbow. “Oh, this is going to be fun.”
Griffin had to give it to Blondie. She ran like a SEAL. Her stride was long and steady and relaxed. But then, the woman was built like a freaking cheetah, all long limbs and lean, slinky body, and she moved with the grace of one. She looked like she could keep up this blistering pace all day long. Her breathing was deep and easy. Nice control she had. Not many amateur athletes had it. Must have had some marathon training.
The three stooges—Kenny, Sam, and Jojo—kept up a running commentary in the back of the formation.
“Nice view out here, man.”
“Trees are skinnier than I expected.”
“That’s not bad in my book.”
“I dunno. I like a bit of trunk on a tree, as long as the bark is smooth.”
Anna finally commented from behind Griffin. “I had no idea SEALs were so dumb.”
Lily jumped in with, “Maybe it’s just the fact that women are so much smarter that makes guys seem dim-witted.”
Kenny broke out in song, belting, “Call me dim, call me dumb, but baby, baby, throw me a crumb. Gimme a hug, gimme a kiss. I promise I’ll make you groan like this.” He then let out a protracted groan that simulated an orgasm.
Anna commented, “Lily, did you hear that? I think a cat just yowled and then barfed up a hair ball.”
Lily’s laughter chimed, and Sherri chuckled beside Griffin.
He smiled to himself. Kenny had walked right into that one. These women weren’t likely to be dazzled by the mere fact of Ken being a good-looking SEAL who could sing and hence be dying to leap into bed with him.
Sam and Jojo had the good sense to fall silent in the back of the formation, at any rate. Both guys were in their early twenties—too young and horny to have figured out how to finesse a woman.
Trevor, on the other hand, had probably been born to charm the ladies. Griffin was convinced it was the upper-crust British accent that did the trick. And for some reason that eluded Griffin, women crawled all over Axel with his tough-guy biker vibe. It had something to do with leather and motorcycles, apparently.
Griffin was interested to note that Sherri didn’t participate in the ribbing now flying back and forth between the other women and the boys. Did she consider herself above such things? If so, she was in for a rude shock when she hit the unfiltered locker-room humor of the SEAL teams. As it went, the Reapers were taking it easy on these women. Silently, he was proud of their gentlemanly restraint and made a mental note to thank them later.
By the time the formation turned around to head back to base, several miles down an abandoned road, he was startled to realize he was sucking a little wind. Of course, he was more hungover than a drunkard in a distillery.
Miss Priss looked cool as a cucumber beside him, completely unconcerned about the pace. Fine. So she could run. He would break her when it came time to survive hypothermia or make SEAL swim times. Or in the gym where no woman could match the upper-body strength of a hyperfit SEAL. Or just through the sheer mental and emotional pressure that broke even the toughest men.
“What does being swim buddies entail?” Sherri asked him, admirably not out of breath.
“We’ll do everything together in training. It’ll be my job to let someone know when you drown or otherwise die,” he answered, startlingly huffing for breath.
“Gee. Thanks. I’ll make sure to actually save you.”
A crack of laughter escaped him. “You think you could save me from drowning?”
“I know I could. I just have to convince you.”
He snorted. “Good luck with that.”
She smiled slyly at him, and it was his turn to nearly fall on his face. Her sky-blue eyes practically glowed against her golden tan. Her lashes were long and luxurious as she gazed sidelong at him through them. The sculpted curve of her cheek caught his attention. The slender length of her neck. The satin perfection of her smooth skin—
Cripes.
How in the hell was he supposed to focus on his job when his “teammate” was so damned beautiful he couldn’t take his eyes off her? She was stunning for real. As in mesmerizing.
He shook his head. No way could women work on the teams if they were this distracting. When the bullets started flying, his first impulse would be to throw himself on top of her to protect her.
The idea of her body beneath his, warm and sleek, her slender limbs wrapped around him, made him stumble yet again. Whoa! Where did that come from?
“You okay over there, Caldwell?” Sherri asked mildly. “You seem to be having trouble with your balance.”
The woman was mocking him.
His mental balance was all kinds of messed up. But he damned well wasn’t about to admit that to her. He scowled and paid closer attention to his footing, vowing not to look at her again.
Except, out of the corner of his eye, her ponytail was driving him a little bit crazy, swinging back and forth jauntily, all silky and blond and girlie. What the hell was something like that doing out here in the dust and heat with a bunch of SEALs? It didn’t help that the ponytail’s owner was every bit as perky, chatting about the history of the abandoned military base as they toured it.
Sherri Tate had a mean streak in her, all right. She knew he and his guys felt like death warmed over, and she was relishing bebopping along, all chipper and cheerful.
Give them one decent night’s sleep to recover from Leo’s wedding, and he and his brothers would grind these wannabes into dust. It was all well and good for the girls to have one fast run in them, but they would never keep up with SEALs twenty-four seven.
That said, his skull was going to split in two if he didn’t get some water soon. And some relief from the relentless sunlight reflecting off white sand. Only years of ingrained discipline, along with a crap-ton of experience with pushing through pain, kept him going. That and the stubborn refusal to be shown up by a girl.
He’d never been gladder to see anything than that decrepit cluster of buildings as it came into view ahead, marking the end of the run. He needed fluids, a hot shower, food, and sleep, in that order.
“That was the short route,” Sherri announced brightly. “We’ve mapped out a 15K loop, too.”
She sounded entirely too pleased with herself.
“Wanna show that to us after lunch?” Griffin asked casually.
“Sure. Sounds great.”
Anna and Lily were equ
ally enthusiastic about the idea. Meanwhile, his teammates threw him baleful glares behind the ladies’ backs.
Well, hell. That had backfired spectacularly. He scowled as Sherri smirked knowingly at him. That smile of hers was a lethal weapon.
“Fall out,” Kettering called from the front porch of his office as they came to a halt between the Quonset huts.
Griffin bit back a groan of relief as he took a liter of water from the cooler standing in front of the instructors’ hut and slugged it down. “Where can a guy get a shower around here?” he asked no one in particular.
“Only showers are at the gym,” Sherri answered, chiming in to laugh with the other women.
What was so blasted funny about that?
He tossed clean clothes, towel, shampoo, and a razor in a bag and headed for the gym. When he stepped through the men’s locker room into the shower, he pulled up short. There was only one big room, with six showerheads. Down the middle was a freshly built wooden wall no more than five feet tall partitioning the space into three showers for the ladies and three for the men.
And all three women were already bathing on the other side…soapy and naked…
He averted his eyes quickly, catching only the barest glimpse of glistening skin, tanned arms, and sudsy hair.
“We won’t look if you won’t,” Sherri called out as Axel plowed into Griffin from behind, obviously gobsmacked by their shower mates.
Griffin grunted. “Watch it, Axe.”
“I am watching.” Axel breathed in awe. “Day-umm. I’m gonna like having girls in the SEALs.”
Using his open palm, Trevor smacked Axe on the back of the head. “Don’t stare like an uncouth lout. Be a gentleman, for fuck’s sake.”
Griffin moved to the far showerhead and turned on the water. Right across that wall, Sherri Tate was buck naked, covered in slippery suds, with rivulets of water coursing down her body. What did her breasts look like, freed from a running bra mashing them down? He already knew her legs were a mile long, sleek and smooth. Did she have tan lines? If so, where?
It would be so easy to peek over that wall. Hell, to walk around it. To draw her slender body against his, loop her leg over his hip, and bury himself in her heat while the water pounded down on them—
Whoa there, soldier!
He was no fan of the idea of women SEALs, but he had to at least try to be professional about it. Which meant the hard-on throbbing painfully between his legs was probably not appropriate. At all.
If he’d had a shower stall to himself, he would have taken care of the problem. But no way was he jerking off in front of Axel and Trevor, let alone where Sherri could overhear him or, heaven forbid, watch him do it.
Crap. The idea of her watching him jerk off made him even harder.
“Do you guys have soap and razors over there?” Sherri called. “We’ll share if you need some.”
Oh, he needed some, all right. Griffin choked a little. “They’re standard in our go-bags.”
“That was a fun jog, wasn’t it?” Sherri commented. “It felt good to get out and stretch my legs.”
Lily and Anna agreed readily. The short, blond one, Lily, said, “After lunch, we should do some yoga. Limber up a little.”
Aww, hell. Now he was picturing Sherri making like a pretzel. The kinky possibilities were endless. At the next showerhead, Trevor groaned under his breath. Griffin knew the feeling. At least he wasn’t the only one struggling to keep his mind on business.
He tilted his head back to rinse the shampoo out of his hair, and the suds slipped down his body like Sherri’s hands would, soft and quick. His erection leaped and throbbed, jutting out from his groin uncontrollably.
Fuckety fuck fuck.
He spun to face the wall lest his brothers spy his predicament and choose this place, in front of the ladies, with his boner swinging in the breeze, to rib him about it.
Teeth gritted, Griffin reached for the heat control on his shower and yanked it to full cold. The shock of the icy cascade wrung a gasp out of him as his entire body clenched painfully.
“You okay over there, Sparky?” Sherri asked.
Did she have to be so observant? Couldn’t a guy freeze his pecker into submission in peace around here? He ground out, “I’m good, thanks. How about you? Need me to scrub your back, Tate?”
“Anna or Lily can get it for me, thanks,” came her chirpy reply.
All three men groaned at that. No doubt his buddies were also envisioning the three naked women, only feet away, erotically washing each other. Both Trevor and Axel had their backs turned and seemed more tense than usual. Maybe he wasn’t the only one having a hard time controlling his body’s autonomic reactions to being naked and in close proximity to three smoking-hot women.
What the hell was this world coming to? He was in the freaking shower with women. Women who thought they were going to be SEALs.
Over his dead, shriveled…body.
* * *
Okay, so it was definitely weird showering with men. Sherri was relieved the guys had the decency to turn their backs. She didn’t linger in the shower, for darned sure. She got clean and got out.
On her way back to the barracks, she grabbed a couple of sandwiches, an electrolyte drink, and an apple from the cafeteria. A local woman named Sue came in each morning and cooked for the day, leaving behind grab-and-go snacks and big kettles full of Cajun yumminess.
When she arrived in the Quonset hut, Lily and Anna already had their heads together. Anna said without preamble, “What do you think of this arrangement where only two of us get to be real SEALs?”
Sherri flopped onto her bed, leaned against the wall, and unwrapped the sandwich. “I think it’s inevitable. The public’s going to be ragingly curious about the first woman SEAL, and the military will channel and control that curiosity by feeding the press what they want it to know. If I were in Kettering’s shoes, I would do the same thing.”
Lily added, “Well, I think it stinks.”
“Me too,” Sherri replied glumly.
After inhaling her lunch, Sherri stretched out for a quick nap. Now that the SEALs were here, she suspected chances to rest were going to be few and far between.
It was midafternoon before Kettering poked his head in the door and told them to suit up in fatigues and combat boots.
As the heat of an Indian summer afternoon baked them, she fell in behind Caldwell. This time the men led the way. Apparently, Kettering had shown the guys the perimeter road around the artillery range, which measured a little over nine miles long.
The pace was slightly slower, slightly being the operative word. Given that she would have to sustain it longer, Sherri did her best to relax and conserve energy.
Except her gaze kept straying to Caldwell’s broad shoulders, narrow waist, and the steady pumping of his muscular legs. And that caboose of his. Wowsers. It was high and tight, promising driving power and all-night stamina—annnd there went her pulse again. Shoot. She couldn’t afford to hyperventilate every time she looked at her swim buddy’s butt.
She tried to take interest in the towering cypress trees festooned with long ropes of Spanish moss. Nope. The moss swayed in perfect time with the deep, steady breaths he took. How about the clouds? Surely, they had interesting shapes today. Indeed, the building thunderheads reminded her of the way Griffin’s hard muscles bunched and flexed across his arms and shoulders. Well, fudge.
She finally gave in and lost herself in fantasies of what it would be like to sleep with a man like Griffin Caldwell. If she couldn’t fight her imagination, she might as well let it distract her. Not that she envisioned sleeping with him specifically, of course. Just someone vaguely similar in size, build, looks, and general smart-assery. It wasn’t ideal for maintaining a steady running stride and slow, even breathing, but it was better than falling on her face.
“You
okay in the rear?” Caldwell called out to the folks in the back of the formation.
Kenny yelled back, “Loving the rears, Grif!”
Sherri rolled her eyes. Men. They were all just overgrown adolescent hormone monsters.
Sam piped up, “Give us a song to run to, Kenny.”
Lily jumped in immediately. “Please, no obscene marching songs about picking up women in bars.”
Sherri shook her head. Lily was shouting into a hurricane to ask a bunch of SEALs to behave themselves and be tasteful.
Kenny belted out, “Came to town to run with girls. Worked ’em out until they hurled. Picked them up and ran again. Turned them into manly men.”
The guys laughed, and Sherri snorted. Never in her adult life had any man looked at her and seen a “manly” woman.
Anna sang out, “Came to town to train with SEALs. Got drunks instead, what is the deal? Asked the boss where is the beef? He looked at me in disbelief. These SEALs, I said, they aren’t real men. We’ll run their asses off again.”
Sherri burst out laughing, in spite of doubting it was a good idea to taunt their trainers. But even shy Lily laughed in delight.
No surprise, Griffin picked up the pace. Considerably.
Anna, ever the outgoing flirt, asked Trevor, “So how does a hot Brit end up running around with a bunch of SEALs?”
He responded, “I came on a training exchange with the Reapers, but I’ve applied to stay permanently with these reprobates. They couldn’t survive without me.”
Which, of course, prompted guffaws from the other men.
Sherri asked no one in particular, “What are your field handles?”
When no one answered right away, she said lightly, “If you won’t tell us yours, we ladies will give you our own handles.”
“Oh yeah?” Griffin challenged. “Like what?”
She considered his back as they ran. “I’d have to go with Sir Grumpy Pants for you.”
He snorted. “I’ll stick with Grif, thanks.”
She tsked. “So unoriginal. I’ll bet that handle doesn’t last too long once we women come on board permanently.” He glanced at her, and she didn’t miss the way his jaw rippled. Clenching his teeth in disgust over that idea, was he?
