Risking It All

by Stephanie Tyler

  “Classified,” he said and stared straight ahead as they walked past groups of Marines, occasionally giving a curt nod. “But I thought we were talking about your inability to control your emotions.”

  She ignored the last comment and pressed on. “Do you get hurt a lot?”

  “Classified.”

  “Is that going to be your favorite phrase during the next ten days?” she asked, stopping in her tracks. He took a few steps forward without her before stopping and backtracking.

  “I’ll answer what I can, when I can,” he said. “It’s not up to me to make this film work. That’s your job. I’ve already got mine.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “No problem. This arrogant jerk who ruined your life, and your last film, is currently on Mac’s most wanted list, and is now at your beck and call.”

  Ah, nice. Mac had told him everything. She’d only mentioned the screwup with the release form to Jenny, hadn’t given any further details beyond that.

  “I was still really upset…” she began, but he held up a hand.

  “Yeah, I know. Another hissy fit. You’re good at those. But I suggest not throwing them around my team. Or flipping them off. They won’t take well to that,” he said calmly.

  “I know what you want, and I’ll comply with the rules. And I think we’re done for the day, Lieutenant. I’ll see you in the morning,” she said with a calm she didn’t feel, because there was no way she was able to prove him right.

  She began to walk to the car, forgetting to get the directions from him.

  “You’re angry that I didn’t call you,” he said from behind her, and oh, God, he knew. She could easily just keep walking to the car and ignore him. Except she didn’t want to ignore him.

  She turned back to face him. “Why didn’t you?”

  “I thought you were going out of the country.”

  “It was a cell phone.”

  He stuffed his hands in his pockets. “You told me you only wanted one night.”

  “A woman’s allowed to change her mind. And you told me you only wanted one night, too.”

  “Did I really ruin your film?” he asked.

  “Not the film. But your clip was going to be part of my grant proposal. When you bowed out—”

  “You didn’t submit the film,” he finished and she shrugged, as if it didn’t matter all that much, even though her chest tightened a little.

  “It’s not your fault,” she said. “I mean, I get it. Mac already talked about only showing your faces when they’re covered with camouflage paint.”

  He nodded, stared at her with those incredible blue eyes. “I’m in a truly bad position here.”

  “I know that. I’ll try to make it as easy as I can,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say. And she got in to her car and left him standing in the parking lot, watching her drive away. And she knew that because she checked the rearview mirror several times, until he’d faded from sight.

  RINA MANAGED to retrace her steps and get to Jenny and Mac’s house without a problem. Mac had a long night at work and, since her crew wasn’t coming in until late, she and Jenny were having a relaxing evening together.

  Except there was no way Rina was going to be able to relax tonight. She was wound so tight she was sure the muscles in her neck and shoulders would scream with pain in the morning if she didn’t find some way to release the tension.She gave a quick knock on the door and heard her aunt yell for her to come on in. She found her aunt in the kitchen, finishing up a beef stew that smelled delicious, despite the fact that her stomach was in knots.

  “Good, you got here early. Dinner will be ready in about an hour. How about a glass of wine?” Jenny said, turning from the stove. She wore her blond hair long, straight down her back, and she could easily pass for thirty, if not younger. Today, she was wearing an old T-shirt of Mac’s over a pair of grey sweatpants, and her feet were bare, except for the toe rings.

  “I’ll need the bottle,” Rina said, and without hesitation, Jenny grabbed a bottle of white wine from the fridge, uncorked and poured it into a beautiful wineglass Rina recognized as her grandmother’s.

  “So, tell me what’s going on?” Jenny asked, taking a sip from her own glass.

  “Um, nothing,” she said, stared into the cut crystal as if it held the secrets of the world. If only.

  Jenny sat across from her, tucked her legs under her in the chair and smiled. “You’re so much like your mom sometimes, it’s scary.”

  “I don’t know if that’s such a compliment.”

  “It is, I promise. It’s just that, growing up, your mom was never ever able to hide her feelings. Every emotion she felt was right there on her face for the whole world to see.”

  “Great, that’s where that comes from,” she muttered.

  “It’s not a bad thing. I was always the opposite, which is why, whenever we got into trouble I had to kind of push her behind me while I lied to our parents. If I let her open her mouth, we’d be instantly found out.”

  “According to my mom, she was a complete angel and you were always the one in trouble. Although nobody compared with David.”

  “That’s true. Anyone after my brother was no angel by default.” Jenny took a bite from one of the crackers she’d put out with the wine and for a few minutes, there was a comfortable silence. “Anyway,” she started again. “What I was trying to say was, that you can tell me anything. Because you’re a woman with a secret, and I’m good at keeping secrets.”

  “I’m nervous about starting to film tomorrow, that’s all.”

  “The guys giving you a hard time already?”

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  “One hint, hon. None of them really see themselves as special, so that hero thing doesn’t always sit well with them. Avoid it. Oh, and if you want to get them talking, threaten their egos a little bit. Mention that you heard that so-and-so on another team did some fantastic feat and watch the fish stories begin.”

  Rina felt the tension in her neck loosening. The second glass of wine hadn’t hurt, either. “Thanks for the tip.”

  “Anytime. Now spill. The whole truth.”

  Rina sighed and put her head on the table for a second. “It’s bad, Jenny. Really, really bad.”

  “Honey, nothing’s ever as bad as you think….” Jenny advised, and Rina picked her head up and talked over her.

  “I slept with Cash,” she said. And watched Jenny’s mouth fall open. Granted, she pulled herself together quickly, and in a second she was in the chair next to Rina.

  “Will you expand on this?”

  “I didn’t think I’d need to draw you a picture,” she replied and when Jenny started to laugh, she joined her. “Jenny, you can’t say anything to Mac about this.”

  “Trust me, I wouldn’t. I like Cash. A lot, and I’d like to see him stay alive past his twenty-eighth birthday.” Jenny paused. “You met him a few hours ago. I mean, I know he’s handsome, but…”

  Rina shook her head, and told Jenny the story about Hawaii.

  “He’s the jerk who wouldn’t sign the release?”

  “That’s him.”

  “So, let me get this straight. He was a complete jerk, ruined your film, so you decided to sleep with him?”

  “I know it doesn’t make much sense. Okay, any sense.”

  “Things like this never do,” Jenny assured her. “What will you do?”

  “I’m doing this film, then forgetting all about him.”

  “Uh-huh,” her aunt said, apparently unconvinced.

  Well, that made two of them. “I didn’t think I’d ever see him again,” Rina groaned.

  “But did you want to see him again?” Jenny asked, and Rina felt her cheeks redden. She decided not to mention the copy of the videotape to Jenny, or the fact that she’d indeed seen Cash several times since she’d seen him.

  She’d tried to tell herself that it was all about learning new film techniques, but she stopped short of believing her
own lies. At least that meant she was semi-sane. “I guess I did hope that we’d meet up again. I even left my number at the surf shop in Hawaii. How juvenile is that? I mean, if he wanted to see me again, he would’ve given me his number. Instead, he snuck out before I even woke up,” she said.

  “Maybe he had a good reason for leaving. Maybe he got called in or something.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Just because he didn’t try to find you doesn’t mean he wasn’t thinking about you. Men process things differently, don’t forget.” The stove timer beeped and Jenny stood. “We’ll have some food, some more wine and we’ll think up a strategy to get you through this.”

  “It has to work out.”

  Her aunt smiled. “Things always do have a way of doing that, even though it might not seem like it at first. And think of the bright side.”

  “There’s a bright side?”

  Jenny nodded. “After all this, telling your mom about your grant proposal to shoot in Africa should be a piece of cake.”

  Rina groaned and dropped her head back on the table.

  FROM BED TO WED, Jenny’s friends used to joke and, actually, she couldn’t argue with that. And going to bed with Mac had been amazing, just like she’d known it would be.

  He always was so handsome, and seemed to get even more so each year. The touch of silver in his dark hair only intensified his looks, made her want him every chance they had together. Which was still infrequent, considering his still frequent travels. At least, for now, most of those trips weren’t anything like his travels with the SEALs, since now she was allowed to know where he was and had a way to get in touch with him.Not like when they’d first met. That night, he’d taken her back to his small apartment on the outskirts of town and they’d talked and made love until sunrise. And when Mac dropped her off and proposed, right in the car, she’d been nineteen and he’d been thirty-five and somehow, she knew that marrying him was the best thing she could do.

  So that night, she’d packed a bag and snuck out the window of her sister’s house, where she’d been staying for months, down the trellis without leaving so much as a note because she knew her sister wouldn’t understand.

  She wasn’t ever going to give her blessing, and that made Jenny very sad. They’d been so close at one point, despite the fact that they were opposites in everything from looks to politics. Ten years later, their relationship was still more than uneasy, but at least they’d started speaking on the phone more than once a year. Jenny was just grateful that she’d remained in contact with Rina, because that girl was something special. She loved Rina’s brother and sister, but they were much more like Rina’s mother, and Rina had all of David’s spirit in her.

  But getting involved with a SEAL, well, that wasn’t something she was sure Rina was ready to handle. Besides, her niece was jump-starting her career. Jenny knew how important a career was in these situations. If she hadn’t had her nonfiction writing career, her own interests, she never would’ve made it through those long, lonely months not knowing where Mac was.

  Yes, Rina needed to think of herself and her work now, and Jenny would do everything to guide her in the right direction.

  8

  WHEN RINA SWUNG open the door of the SEALs meeting room at five the next morning, she was surprised to see Cash, along with the three men she’d met yesterday, already there and looking as if they’d just come back from some kind of hike in the mountains. And the mud. They were covered in it, pretty much from head to toe, and they seemed happy about it, too.

  Happy, until they saw her, and then the mood changed.“Sorry. I should have knocked,” she said, trying to juggle the equipment and her apology.

  “Oh, hi, Miss Calhoun,” the man who’d introduced himself as Etienne drawled with what she thought to be a heavy Louisiana accent as he came forward to help with her gear.

  “Thank you. And please, guys, call me Rina, okay?”

  They all nodded. From the far corner of the room where he was parked on the edge of the table, Cash watched her intently. He held a bottle of Gatorade and it took her a second to realize that his shirt was off. His torso was covered with streaks of mud, but it was the white bandages wrapped around his ribs that made her look again.

  “What happened?” she asked, and wondered if he’d refuse to tell her again.

  “He bruised some ribs. And he bitched about them all morning on the run,” Justin said and ducked in the nick of time to miss the flying Gatorade bottle.

  And still, Cash hadn’t said a word.

  “So, Rina, what exactly are we supposed to do?” Justin asked, his dulcet Southern tones couched with the inherent suspicion she’d begun to assume they all probably had when anyone tried to pin them down. Especially a woman with a camera who was on a mission.

  “You’re supposed to go about your normal day,” she explained. “But actually, to ease you into this, I’d like to start with the interviews.” She registered the horror on the faces of the four men who stood in front of her and sighed. “Interview, not firing squad.”

  “Same thing,” Etienne muttered.

  “I’m out,” Hunt said. Cash continued to stare at her, and that’s when her panic set in.

  The interviews would be the most crucial moments. Interspersed with the wild, full-on action, the men talking off-camera about their experiences, why they did what they did and how it made them feel, was going to bring this video home. It was what would sell it to the Navy, to any young man watching and wondering if they had what it took to become SEAL warriors.

  The interviews were going to kill her.

  And finally, finally, Cash spoke. “Worst time this morning is the first one up,” he said. “And, since it’s not me, I’m hitting the showers.”

  He smiled as he walked past her and opened the door. And then he paused and backed up a step to let Stella inside.

  Her friend’s timing had always been impeccable, but today it was beyond perfect.

  The SEALs stared at Stella, except for Cash, who merely glanced at her before turning his gaze back on Rina, which she was gratified to see. But still, she couldn’t blame any of them.

  Her friend had on a pair of worn Levi’s and a white tunic top embroidered with black trim. Her hair was long and loose and she wore a pair of dangling silver-hoop earrings to complement the silver bangle bracelets that jangled up her arm.

  Adding to the picture, Stella wore a pair of camouflage flip-flops. For effect, she’d told Rina that morning when they’d climbed into the car at oh-dark-hundred. To show I’m in full support of the troops, even though I’m a complete pacifist.

  She hoped Stella wouldn’t go into her whole diatribe on war in front of the men because frankly that wouldn’t go over so well. But it was time to bring in the big guns and, because the men already thought of Rina as the enemy, it didn’t matter how cute she was. She was Mac’s niece, off-limits and the one to watch out for. But Stella, tall, blond Stella, could possibly bring this film to new heights. And Rina wasn’t beyond pulling out all the stops to get what she needed.

  “I know you’re pimping me out,” Stella murmured to her as they set up some equipment along the table they’d been given to work at.

  “You don’t seem to have a problem with it,” Rina said.

  “Whatever gets us to Africa, hon. Then again, I don’t know why you needed me. You’re the one in control here.”

  “Yeah, don’t I wish.”

  “Well, you’re in control of at least one of them because Cash couldn’t keep his eyes off you.”

  “It’s not lust—it’s suspicion. He thinks I’m wired for sound and visual at all times.”

  “And you’re not?” Stella asked, and Rina smiled, because they both knew she was. Since all was fair in love and war and SEAL-land, the worst that could happen was that he’d catch her with a back-up tape. After having some footage disappear mysteriously in Hawaii, she’d begun to realize how important having back-ups were.

  “Who’s that
?” Stella asked as another broad, handsome man walked through the door and got everyone’s attention without a single word.

  “Must be the elusive CO,” she whispered back.

  “Now there’s an aura I can get behind,” Stella murmured.

  “Don’t you dare pull out your tarot cards,” Rina warned her as she tried to watch the men’s impromptu meeting without appearing too interested. “And it’s your job to keep them busy while I work on the interviews.”

  Listening to these men talk wouldn’t make or break the film, but it was going to give her some insight into how to approach filming the men, since Mac was called away for the week and unable to give her much time. This team could lose her easily during training exercises—she had to give them a reason not to run from her. Between the interviews and the articles that Jenny promised to dig up for her on commandos and their psychology, Rina was going to be prepared for anything.

  ACROSS THE DESK from Rina, Lieutenant Junior Grade Justin Brandt shifted in his seat, visibly uncomfortable. He was a good-looking man, blond hair, brown eyes and chiseled cheeks, and he had a sort of refined air, which seemed in conflict with the bad-boy persona he wore.

  “How long have you been in the Navy?” she asked. Start slow, ease him into the idea of talking in front of the camera. But still, he kept staring at its red light.“You’re not showing me in the final version, right?” he asked her as she stood next to the camera and prepared to turn it on.

  Rina looked up, away from the viewfinder. “Yes. But even your voice will be changed.”

  “But not on that tape.”

  “Correct. I’ve got to do that in the editing room,” she said, but he was shaking his head, pushing his chair back and starting to walk out the door. “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know about this. That means there’ll be a real copy of this tape lying around….”

  “I won’t leave it lying around. And it’s not like I’m asking you to reveal government secrets,” she joked.

  “No, that would be better. Easier,” he muttered.