“Telling tales out of school isn’t something I usually go along with. But in this case, I’ll make an exception.”
IN THE SEALs meeting room, Cash posted instructions for the morning and afternoon drills. He’d added a line about which member of the documentary crew would be working the camera, figured things would be a lot smoother if that was all spelled out.
Of course, his men assumed he’d have discovered a way out of this by now. Justin knew Cash didn’t have a clue as to how to do that, and he wanted the hell out of Dodge before the rest of them came in to call him on it.He took a step away from the bulletin board and backed into someone. Fuck. He turned, found Hunt standing there, and saw he was surrounded by his team.
Killed by your own men. What a way to go.
He needed a strategy, so he immediately went on the offensive, although drawing his weapon would’ve worked, too. “What are you guys doing?”
“What are you doing? I thought you were on our side,” Hunt said, ripping the schedule down and staring at it. “This doesn’t look like you’re on our side, Cash. It looks like we’re completely cooperating.”
“I was. I am,” Cash insisted. “Trust me, I’m keeping her in line.” He thought, for just a second, about telling them how good the footage actually looked, about how the interview she had of Justin really did add to it, and how he knew he didn’t have a snowball’s chance against her, but he reconsidered.
“It’s a problem,” Rev drawled. “She keeps asking all these questions and she’s good at it.”
“I told you you wouldn’t be able to get out of being interviewed,” Hunt said to Rev, and then, to the rest of them, “She had him talking about his childhood, for god sakes. Even Justin didn’t do that.”
“And then he told her a story about you,” Justin added, pointing at Cash. “You know, about that time you lost your way home and had to hitch a lift with that chicken farmer in Russia and he made you ride in the coop and how you mixed up the language and ended up agreeing to marry his daughter before he ran you off with a shotgun.”
Rev shoved Justin and while Justin and Rev started arguing, Hunt rolled his eyes at Cash and Cash cursed inwardly. When had everything gone off the rails he asked himself. The slow skid in Hawaii was nothing compared to this. His men were ready to lynch him, Mac trusted him and Rina was only drawing closer to him, closer than he’d ever let anyone get.
Was it her master stroke to make the video amazing by using sex to distract him from thinking? Because that would be par for the course for him.
So, why didn’t he feel that in his gut?
You’re losing your touch, dude.
“All right, look, I’ve got a plan,” he said.
“Another plan that involves us spilling our guts to the nice lady behind the camera?” Hunt asked.
“It involves Rina. And I don’t think it’s going to make her happy,” Cash promised. The sun hadn’t come out yet, which meant rock portage was cancelled for the day. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t do other training exercises. And Rina would be very involved in every single one.
12
“WHAT ARE YOU GOING to do out here?” Stella asked with horror in her voice. She was eyeing the wall of rope to Rina’s left, which had to be at least thirty feet high. Rina had already done the mental calculations. “Are they climbing that?”
“I’m not sure,” Rina replied. “Rev just told me that the day’s training would start this way.” She adjusted the tripod and checked the lighting. The day remained overcast, but at least the threatening thunderstorms continued to hold off.“Want me to call Zoot and Keith? They’re not supposed to be here until two, but I’m sure they’d come right over,” Stella offered.
“No big deal. I like having the chance to film.”
“Well. If you’re sure you’ve got this under control, I should review this timetable a little more.”
“Go for it. I’ll be fine. Cash will be here soon,” Rina said. Cash would make sure they went easier on her—she was sure of it, no matter how he’d insisted last night that she wasn’t going to get any favors from him.
She was beginning to be able to read him very, very well. And when she saw him walking across the field toward her, her heart skipped a beat.
She’d have to pull it together a lot better than this. No strings meant no strings, no matter what kind of lecture Stella had given her before she’d gone over to Cash’s. And she’d been disappointed when Cash agreed to it so readily, but he didn’t hold her as if he felt nothing.
“As long as you’re taken care of, I’ll head back to the hotel. Call me when you need a ride.” Stella gave her a small wave, and yes, Rina could stand for some taking care of.
Her cheeks got hot, and she bent down to fiddle with the camera so she wouldn’t have to stand there like a complete idiot when he reached her.
“Hey,” Cash said. She looked up from the viewfinder into his eyes and realized that wasn’t such a good idea. Everybody had to deal with the consequences of a morning after, but she had the pure joy of doing it in front of the five men who’d suddenly appeared out of nowhere behind Cash.
“Hey,” she said. “I’m all set up, so whenever you guys are ready, go for it. I’ll blend into the background and catch you at what you do best.”
She looked through the viewfinder again, panned toward the ropes, expecting to see their backs as they walked toward the training equipment. But all she got was a wall of rope and dark gray sky. She glanced up and saw that they were still standing around her. None of them had moved.
“Do you need me to move? If I’m in the way, I can easily switch places,” she said, holding up the camera to pan the men standing before her. They, of course, immediately lowered their faces. Except Cash.
“You’re not in the way. You’re up,” he said. She dropped the camera, watched him motion between her and the ropes and she wished Stella had stuck around.
“What are you talking about? You guys climb and I film. That’s how this works.”
But Cash shook his head even as he took the camera away from her and handed it to Justin.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey, yourself. We decided we don’t really like how it works. And we want a few changes.”
The four men standing behind Cash all crossed their arms and waited.
“I assumed you guys would be easier to work with than actors, but you’re just as high maintenance,” she muttered. “What, you want your own dressing rooms and purified French water?”
“I think she might’ve just insulted us,” Rev drawled.
“I think her job just got a lot harder,” Cash said, without taking his eyes off her, and why did he have to be so incredible to look at? Why did his forearms have to be so muscular and defined, with a dusting of blond hair over golden skin?
It took a special man to look good in camo, and khaki was most definitely his color.
“Listen, as a filmmaker, it’s part of my job not to be involved in what you guys are doing. Putting me into the action compromises the realism of the film,” she said. “You have to let me do my job.”
“But we want you to experience some of our training firsthand. We think it will enhance your experience,” Cash explained.
“You still think I’m just doing some flashy video that’ll lead young boys astray, don’t you?” she asked, trying to retain her calm, the way Cash was. Easy for him, since he was used to scaling rope walls that seemed to reach the sky.
“I think having some of these experiences for yourself will help your film.”
“I can’t do this.”
“Maybe not at first, but we’ll be happy to help you,” Rev interjected. He smiled, and somehow the troop of men wasn’t getting any friendlier.
“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “It’s important that I be unobtrusive. No involvement. I’m not like the reporter on the local news who tries out crazy things and lets herself get filmed. That’s not the way I work.”
�
�We’ve been pretty flexible with you,” Hunt said, and she bit her lip so she didn’t point out that he’d out and out refused the interview process. That wouldn’t exactly endear her any further to this team.
When Cash had said she wasn’t getting any special favors, he hadn’t been kidding.
“You can change in the barracks,” Cash said, and she stopped arguing. If anything, she could take a few minutes away from them to cool down and think of her next move.
She nodded calmly and headed across the field. “I’ll be back in five,” she called over her shoulder, then caught sight of Cash’s broad strides behind her. “I can find my way back. I don’t need an escort.”
“Actually, you do. You don’t have free rein of the base, even though you’ve been acting like it. I’m supposed to be with you at all times.”
“I wonder if this is what Uncle Mac meant by cooperating?” she asked once they’d cleared the field and entered the meeting room. She stood next to the scarred oak table, saw the neatly folded gear and wondered if Cash really expected her to change into camouflage fatigues.
Cash grabbed a bottle of water from the small refrigerator in the corner and took a long swig before he answered. “Are you going to run to Mac and ask for his help?”
“I didn’t say that. Besides, you know as well as I do that he’s away this week. Convenient for you.”
“You’re being uncooperative.”
“And you didn’t mention anything about this last night,” she said.
“I was too busy to talk.”
“So was I. You made sure of that.”
“You were the one who came to me.”
“And you didn’t seem to mind.”
“No, I didn’t. But we also said we’d keep this professional when we were on base. You know where my loyalties lie when we’re both on the job,” Cash said. “So why don’t you get suited up and we’ll go back out and let you film.”
“I don’t get it. Why are you doing this? I’ve already explained why it’s not a good idea for me to get involved with my subjects.”
“I think you’ve already crossed that line.”
She sighed in frustration and grabbed the clothes off the table. She was headed for the bathroom to change when he started talking again.
“Are these the only kinds of jobs you’ve been offered? The X-treme videos?” he asked.
“No. Of course not. I’ve had to turn down some,” she replied, without bothering to turn around. Her stomach had tightened at the question and she fought to keep the defensive tone out of her voice.
“How come?”
“Time constraints. Conflicts with jobs I was already on.”
“Jobs in your safe zone,” he said.
That made her turn around. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
She marched over to him, stood toe to toe with him and wondered if she could punch him hard enough to hurt him without breaking her own hand. “Is that some kind of a challenge?”
“To make something beyond the run-of-the-mill, X-treme video that’s all beefcake and brawn? Yeah, that’s a challenge to you. But I already told you that.”
“Why is it so important to you that I push my limits?” she asked.
“Because sometimes you’ve got to leap before you look,” he said. Had Stella loaned him her astrology book?
“I’m going to change now.” She walked toward the small bathroom and this time, he didn’t stop her. She was shaking as she pulled on the pants and the T-shirt, and she hoped she could stop that in time to hang on to the ropes. She tied the heavy boots that were her exact size and considered how long Cash may have been planning this little trick.
Yeah, she was up for the challenge. She opened the bathroom door, saw his look of approval and the idea suddenly came to her. So simple, she wondered why she hadn’t thought of it before.
Except she knew why. Cash always managed to get her so turned around and inside-out that she could barely think in a zigzag line. “If I do this, what do I get in return?”
“Beyond the satisfaction? Beyond the fact that, if you do it, you get to tape us for the day?”
“I’d get to do that anyway, and you guys know it. This is all just part of your show of dominance,” she replied, and thought she saw a hint of smile around his eyes. “I want that interview tape back.”
“You mean the one you obtained illegally yesterday?”
“Yes. That one.”
“Why didn’t you ask for it last night?”
She smiled slowly, ran a hand along the back of her neck and remembered Cash’s touch. “I was too busy to talk.”
“Yeah, you were. All right, it’s a deal. A heavily edited deal, if you know what I mean,” he said, and yes, she knew what he meant.
Together they walked back out to the field, and she felt the team’s eyes on her, knew they were betting on whether she would put her money where her mouth was. Rev handed her a pair of heavy gloves and Cash brought her over to the ropes. She climbed up a few steps, and then Cash told her to wait. He strapped her into a heavy harness.
“In case you fall,” he said, and somehow, she didn’t find that comforting. Then he strapped himself in the same way, behind her, and she realized he was going to play shadow to her the entire way up. If she made it that far.
She was going to make it. She needed that tape.
“You can go whenever you’re ready,” Cash said. She kept her eyes forward and began to climb. It was a lot harder than it looked because the ropes buckled and swayed under her hands and feet. She was concentrating so hard and kept moving, that when she looked down and saw she hadn’t gotten very far at all she stopped.
He’d set her up on an impossible task. She was already breathing heavily and realized she wasn’t in the kind of shape she thought she was.
“I can’t do this, Cash,” she said.
“Yes, you can.”
“I hate when you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Act like you know me so well. You’ve been doing it since the day we met.”
“Right back at you, Rina.”
“You are the most frustrating man.” She grunted her way up a few more paces because she would not let him get the better of her. And when she paused for a second to catch her breath, she heard him murmur, “I’ve got your back,” and suddenly, her nerves eased and the ground didn’t seem as far away, not with Cash right there to help her.
She never thought of herself as the type who needed rescuing, but hey, this wasn’t a bad way for it to happen. She brought her gloved hands up and then moved her feet. The ropes swayed against her efforts and she felt the pressure of his body behind her. She took another step and another. And when she was about halfway up, she made the mistake of looking down.
Rev, Hunt and Justin were down there, with Justin manning her camera and recording this for posterity. Just her luck he was about to catch her panic attack.
“Breathe, Rina,” Cash instructed. “And stop looking down.”
“I wanted to see how far I’d come,” she managed, although her throat was tight, dry.
“Why don’t you stay focused on what you still need to do?”
“Why don’t you stop being all sensible and reassuring,” she muttered. Taking a deep breath, she continued to climb. About three quarters of the way up, she stopped again.
“What are you worried about now?”
“Getting down.”
“That’s the easy part,” he assured her. “You can just let go and I’ll rope us both down. It’s a lot like flying.”
She clutched at the ropes and took a ragged breath.
“Or, you could climb down the old-fashioned way.”
“I’d rather do that,” she said. “Right now.”
“All right. We’ll back down slowly. You did a good job,” he said.
“Good enough to get the tape?”
“Good enough to get the tape,” he agreed, and that thought was enough to keep her movi
ng steadily downward. Which was much harder because she had to look down just enough to make sure she was catching the rope with her feet, but not too far down until the ground was a close, comfortable distance away.
When she hit the grass, she discovered just how tense her muscles were, how tightly she’d been holding on. But she’d made it, all the same. Her arms were shaking from the exertion and she knew she’d be sore as anything tonight.
“Great job,” Rev said as he began walking toward the ropes.
“Thought you might want this.” Justin handed her the camera. “You should start filming. We’re going to want to know who reaches the top first, and it’s always a pretty close call.”
He walked to join the others in front of the rope wall, and she pushed the camera into the tripod so she didn’t have to deal with her shaking, aching arms and began to film.
The men were talking as they started their own climb, and she wished she had miked them to catch their dialogue.
“HER TIME SUCKED,” Hunt said as the four men took the first steps up in tandem.
“She still made it pretty far,” Rev pointed out.Hunt grumbled and Cash smiled inwardly. He knew that Rina’s making it up even part way would mean something to the team. Prove something to herself, too, and he always liked killing as many birds with one stone as he could.
“What, am I supposed to give her free reign around here now because she climbed a little bit of rope?” Hunt asked.
“You’re supposed to stop acting like an asshole. You are getting laid regularly, right?” Justin asked.
“Same as Cash,” Hunt said.
Face forward and concentrate on the ropes. Don’t say a word. Cash kept climbing and within seconds he was ahead of his team. Talking, and Rina, were momentarily forgotten as they raced toward the sky.
13
A LONG HOT SHOWER and some light stretching helped to ease the soreness in Rina’s muscles. The day’s shoot had lasted for hours, and had been productive, as well. She was ahead of schedule on both the film and the grant tape after only two days worth of work, and as she played with the settings and rewound the film a few frames, she realized she was existing on very little sleep.
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