by MJ Monroe
DATING THE
WHITE S.E.A.L
MJ MONROE
Summary
Tameka can not believe her eyes when she finally gets to meet her best friend Ella's older brother Aaron. He is a Navy SEAL who has finally returned home from duty and he has to be the most incredibly sexy white man she has ever seen in her life.
She wants to date him. He wants to date her. However, they both know that Ella would not be so keen about her brother dating her best friend. They have no choice but to keep their relationship a secret till they can figure something out.
However, keeping this love affair a secret might just be the hardest mission this Navy SEAL has ever had to face! Are they fighting a losing battle?
Copyright Notice
MJ Monroe
Dating The White Seal © 2013, MJ Monroe
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.
Contents
Chapter1
Chapter2
Chapter3
Chapter4
Chapter5
Chapter6
Chapter7
Chapter8
Chapter9
Chapter10
Chapter1
Music pulsed around me; other people were swaying or talking to one another. It was amazing to me that after all of this time, Pink still had a way of getting the party started with her signature song.
“Tameka Anna Grey, you had better not be thinking about that fool again. I swear to God if you are, I will hurt you!”
Isn’t it funny how you know that you are in trouble when someone uses all three of your names?
Of course she would have to mention my douche of an ex-boyfriend. Ella was my best friend, my moral compass, and the voice of reason when I need it. When I decided to break up with my boyfriend, she had watched all of the cheesy romantic movies with me and eaten so much ice cream that people thought we were pregnant together. After she felt enough time had gone by, she stopped and told me that I needed to get back on the horse and start dating again. Such a bad double entendre but I laughed anyway. These days I ate my ice cream and watched the movies alone.
“I’m not thinking about him this time! I was actually thinking about how Pink created a song that still makes people want to dance, after almost 10 years.”
“Why do you lie to me? It’s like you think that I will allow you to get away with it. He wasn’t worth your time when you were with him, and he is most definitely not worth your time now. That is why I think that you need to go out on a date,” Ella glanced around her apartment, her mouth formed a straight line when her eyes settled on a good looking guy talking to a few odd looking men. “I wish that he would leave those fools alone. They are all over 30 and have yet to settle down. The one on the right has three kids with three different women, that is not right. Those kind of influences are not what he needs in his life.”
“Who is he? He looks familiar but I don’t recognize him at all.” The Rolodex in my mind kept flipping but I don’t think that I had ever met him.
He had a body that a woman wouldn’t soon forget. His tight t-shirt hugged his torso and arms, revealing every single muscle. His hair was cut very close to his head, and his smile took up almost his entire face.
A dribble of drool formed at the corner of my mouth, he had the same effect on me that Ryan Gosling did. “He is one fine…”
“That’s my brother, Aaron.” Ella answered as she took off towards the group of men. The look of determination on her face was the same one she used when she tried to bake a cake for the first time. Neither of us was good in the kitchen but Ella’s boyfriend, Eric had asked for a homemade birthday cake. It was his only request and not even God himself could have convinced her not to make it. Somehow I had been dragged into it, I think because I’m black that she had some sort of stereotype in her head that I would be good in the kitchen. The same way she assumes I can sing. We tried four times before we consulted Google for a recipe. Maybe we should have tried that first. From across the room, I could hear her yelling at her brother. “Stay away from these people! I have someone I want you to meet.”
Those words made me cringe a little. While Ella had a great heart and was one of the smartest people I knew, she did have her flaws. One of those flaws was that she thought she could pair people up, the thing was she always got it wrong. Always. No one ever had the heart to tell her that she did not have the skills or the ability to pair people together.
When we first met, as college roommates, she tried to set me up with a butch black lesbian.
A smile crossed my lips as the memory flooded into my head. Ella had excitedly told me all about this person that she thought would be perfect for me, she thought that we would be soul mates. At the time I had been in a slump and Ella had seemed like she knew what she was talking about, so I agreed to have dinner with my match. Both the lesbian and I were surprised when we met, and while we enjoyed a nice dinner with each other we did not end up as a couple. Though we do still talk from time to time as friends, we were hardly a love match.
“Can you believe that Aaron doesn’t want to meet any girl that I want to set him up with?” Ella grabbed my hand and dragged me into the kitchen with her. There were a ton of people at the counter, and she tapped her foot impatiently. “I throw him this welcome home party and he can’t even meet the girl that would be perfect for him. Anyways, that’s enough of my ungrateful brother. I have the best guy for you! He’s smart, he’s cute, and, can you believe it, he has a job!”
“Ella, I don’t want to be fixed up. I am perfectly happy being single; I don’t want a man right now. We have so much going on at work and you know that Dennis will kill me if I don’t get all of those reports done for him.” I was reaching for an excuse not to go out with anybody that Ella thought would be great for me. She knew that I had those reports done already and I knew that she would call me out on it.
“Remember Vic, you thought that she would be great for me too.” I argued.
“OK, so I made one mistake. I mean come on, it’s not like I did it on purpose or anything. I didn’t know that Vic was short for Victoria and not Victor. Anyways, you guys are friends now. That proves my point that you guys would have been a great couple if she was a man or if you were a lesbian!” The crowd moved away from the counter, some of the other party goers were laughing. I had no idea whether they were laughing at Ella or something else going on. I poured a cup of Coca-Cola, and searched the alcohol bottles for some Captain Morgan Spiced Rum. There was one bottle but it was nearly empty, I searched for another one. Ella went into her fridge and handed me a new bottle. “This man will treat you so much better than your ex did. He has a job, he has money, and he wants a relationship, just like you do! His name is Brandon and he is an IT guy. He makes really good money, believe me!”
“Ella, please listen to me. It really is not about the money. I don’t want a relationship; I do not want you to fix me up with anybody! I am happy being single; there is no need for me to be with anybody right now!” My friend’s eyes glazed over and I somehow knew that something bad was about to happen. A chill raced through my body and it dawned on me that she wasn’t just suggesting this guy to me, he was already at the party to meet me. “Please
tell me that he isn’t already here Ella! Look at ME!! Tell me that this man isn’t here!”
“I invited him because I really wanted you guys to meet. I know that you say that you don’t want a relationship but you are lonely and you need to find love. When Eric and I started dating, I didn’t want a boyfriend either but I am so glad that I gave him a chance.”
There was no way that I was going to get out of meeting this guy; she had already made up her mind that this was happening and therefore it would happen. I gulped down some of my drink and let the burn of alcohol soothe my nerves. “Fine. I’ll meet this Brandon guy but don’t think that I am happy about this! I am doing it as a personal favor for you and nothing more.”
“You’re gonna love him! And then we can double date! Eric needs some more guy friends anyway and this will give us a reason to hang out more,” Ella had a way of making everything about her and Eric somehow.
When things went sour with Brandon, she would take it to heart and be as depressed as I was. My most recent ex hadn’t earned Ella’s seal of approval, so she hadn’t been as upset when I told her that I was leaving him. In fact she had wanted to throw a party for it. “And after everything that you have been through the last few months, I really want you to be with a good man who will treat you right.”
Aaron walked into the kitchen, and my attention was back on him. I knew that Ella was talking to me but I didn’t hear anything that was being said. Every part of my mind was focused on her brother; he was the sexiest man that I had ever seen in my life. His muscles seemed to have a life of their own, they rippled and expanded even when he was standing still. I rarely ever go for white guys but he is something else. I am surprised Ella kept her brother a secret for so long. He caught me looking and shot me a smile that would have made the Devil stop dead in his tracks. He walked over to Ella and I, “Who is this pretty lady, sis?”
“This is my best friend Tameka!” Ella happily chirped, hugging me as if to protect me from her brother. Aaron had a musky cologne on that wafted off of him. The result was that he seemed even more manly than he had before. There is something about the way a man smells that turns me on. “Won’t she be perfect for Brandon? He’s the one that I introduced you to earlier. You know the one who told you that he would help you get a job in his company, did you give him your resume?”
“Ella, really? They would have nothing in common!” The way he said it made my heart race. It almost seemed as if he was jealous or something and that meant that he thought that I was hot or something. “That guy is a total nerd. The only thing that they have in common is that they’re both black. If you think that’s enough then you’re racist. And for the final time, I am a Navy SEAL! I don’t need a job, I already have one!”
“I think that Brandon would be a good man for Tameka because he wants to have a large family like she does,” There was a heat between Aaron and I that I had never felt with anyone else before, without alcohol being involved in some way. It dawned on me that Ella thought that I wanted a large family, but the truth was I had never said such a thing to her. Of course I had never asked her to play matchmaker for me and yet she had done so, many times before. “Their race has nothing to do with it. Any more than being white would make me like a girl with you. There have been plenty of your girlfriends that I didn’t like but they never knew.”
“They didn’t know? Are you kidding me? When I was dating Rayna, you made nasty comments about how red heads had STD’s! Then there was Kellie, who for some reason you thought was too skinny and you kept trying to get her treated for an eating disorder!” It was true, when Ella did not like someone she went out of her way to appear helpful. With my ex, she kept asking him if he needed help buying pants because his always sagged. “Then there was Brianna, who you thought needed to be a mother. Instead of letting us get to know one another all you did was talk about us starting a family and getting married.”
“You guys are so picky! I wasn’t being mean to those girls; I was trying to help them. I had heard rumors about her and just wanted you to be very careful with her. Kellie was a wonderful young lady but she didn’t have child bearing hips, and she always ran to the bathroom after we ate. Very dodgy if you ask me.” I sucked in a deep breath.
Ella had told me that she had only one meal with Kellie and Aaron, but she had been allergic to seafood. It made sense to me that she would run to the bathroom after swallowing something that could potentially kill her. “I actually loved Brianna but you guys were moving at the pace of snails. Someone needed to light a fire underneath of you guys!”
Aaron turned to me, his head shaking in disbelief. “At least this time it’s you she’s trying to fix up and not me. The girl that she had wanted for me with didn’t show up, which of course means that I am never allowed to see her now.”
“Brandon, Brandon come over here!” Ella shouted. I wanted to punch her in the throat because Aaron made his escape when she did that. The spell was broken and I was thrown back into the moment. Britney was singing about playing with some poor guy’s heart and how that was so atypical of her.
In front of me stood Steve Urkel, if he were a real person instead of a fictional character. “This is Tameka, isn’t she pretty? Isn’t he handsome, Tam?”
“He sure is.” I said, looking past Brandon and at Ella’s brother. There was something about him that made me lose my mind. It felt like someone slapped me on the head and I realized that she was talking about Brandon and not the GI Joe that she was lucky enough to be related to. I stretched out my hand to him. “It’s nice to meet you, Brandon.”
“Likewise!” He was a bit too excited; his glasses fell down the bridge of his nose. He pushed them up and smiled. Damn Ella, she knew that there was no way that I could say no to him. He was too nice and I hated being mean to the nice guys, even though there was nothing that attracted me to them. “Ella was telling me that you wanted to go out on a date with me. She showed you a picture of me and you thought that I was very cute, yes that is what she told me!”
“My job is done here! Love is in the air!” Ella sing songed as she left me to deal with this on my own. I made a mental note to make sure I made her job even harder, maybe mess up on paperwork that she would get after me or something. Revenge would be mine for this travesty of a date that I would be forced to go on.
“Well she barely said a word about you to me. What do you do for fun?” Mentally I did an eye roll, I expected him to do something dull for fun like chemistry experiments or something. Yes I was stereotyping him and no I didn’t feel guilty about doing it.
“I love playing video games! I just got a PS4 and I’ll be waiting in line for the new X box when it comes out! Are you a gamer? I bet you are, you look like one!”
“Yeah sure, you can read me like a book!” The truth was that I didn’t play any kind of video games and hadn’t even when I was a child because Barbie was more fun and didn’t take as much concentration as the games seemed to need.
“Would you like to grab something to eat with me one time? I think that we can find a good restaurant that serves food that I’m not allergic to and that you will find appealing. Maybe something simple like McDonald’s or something.”
McDonald’s? Really? Ella sure knew how to pick a winner didn’t she.
Chapter2
“Eric isn’t coming over tonight, so it’s just you and I for dinner!” Ella said as she put her cell phone down on the counter. He was working overtime to save up so that he could buy an engagement ring for Ella. He had told me this on the night of the party. He asked me to keep it a secret and also to help keep her preoccupied so that she didn’t get too upset about things. “So do you want pizza or Chinese food?”
“Chinese! I have been craving sweet and sour chicken all week. Plus I know that you’ll get General Tso’s and I can steal some from you!” The best part of having a best friend like Ella is that nothing is off limits with her. Sure you had to deal with bad matches, some worse than others. Brandon happened to be r
eally horrible, we still hadn’t been able to go out because he played a different video game every night, like Call of Duty and World of Warcraft, so I bought McDonald’s for myself. The date was never going to happen and I was fine with that. There had been more of a chance with Vic the lesbian than with Brandon. “Do you have any cheesecake in the freezer or do we need to go grab one?”
“Eric has been working so much lately that I have three in the fridge right now…” I knew that she wanted to complain about her boyfriend but I had to distract her in some way. If it came down to it, I would sacrifice myself and ask her to try setting me up with someone not named Brandon and preferably a man. I said a silent prayer to God that he would have pity on me and it wouldn’t come to that. “And Aaron! I don’t understand how that man can be so ungrateful. I am trying to make his life better by finding him a woman and he just doesn’t seem to want anyone that I find for him. It’s not because he’s gay, I know that he’s not because he’s my brother.”
Crap, on TV whenever someone said something so lame like that, it was usually the case. For a second I thought that the old single straight woman cliché was true; all the good ones are either taken or gay. Then a thought popped into my head and it made me rather excited , “Ella, your brother isn’t gay. He’s had all of those girlfriends, and they weren’t with him because he has a great job. Think about it, as a Navy Seal he probably makes decent money but he is always gone and risking his life. Who wants to put up with that, unless the sex is good and you know there’s love?”
