And doing it right meant that he wasn’t in the way. Damn, as much as Frisco hated that, he knew it was true.
“Hey, you said it yourself. Working as a team means recognizing team members’ strengths and weaknesses,” Joe said as if he could read Frisco’s mind. When Frisco would have nodded and turned away, Joe Cat stopped him again. “You can still be part of SEAL Team Ten, Lieutenant. God knows we need your strengths. I’ve got one hell of a shortage of dependable instructors and way too many raw recruits coming into the SEAL Teams to be able to teach ’em properly. You have a wealth of information to pass on to these kids. You could virtually have your pick of subjects to teach.”
Frisco was silent. Teach. Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Except, what was it that Mia had said? Those who are taught, do. Those who teach, shape the future.
“And as for your weaknesses…” Joe Cat continued. “Do you remember the very end of Hell Week? You weren’t in my boat team, but I know you probably heard the story. I was a half a day away from the end of the ordeal, and I got a stress fracture in my leg. Talk about pain. It was hell, but I wouldn’t quit. I wasn’t gonna quit after I’d come that far. But I was damn close to being taken out. One of the instructors—a real bastard nicknamed Captain Blood—was about to call for the medics and have me removed.”
Frisco nodded. “I remember hearing that.”
“But then Blue and the other guys who were left in my boat team told Captain Blood that I was okay, that I could make it. In fact, they said I’d run a mile down the beach to prove it. And the captain looked at me and told me if I could run that mile, he’d let me stay in ’til the end.
“There was no way in hell I could walk, let alone run, but Blue and the other guys picked me up, and they ran that mile carrying me.”
Frisco had heard that story. With their incredible show of unity and loyalty, Cat and Blue and the rest of their boat team were rewarded by having the hard-nosed instructor announce them secure nearly six hours before the official end of Hell Week. It was unprecedented.
Joe Cat reached out and squeezed Frisco’s shoulder. “Right now you’re letting us carry you. But don’t think there’s no way you can carry us in return, my friend. Because you can. By teaching those recruits who are going to back us up someday, you’d be shouldering more than your share.”
Frisco was silent. What could he say?
“Think about it,” Cat said quietly. “At least think about it.”
Frisco nodded. “I will—after you get Mia and Natasha safely out of that house.”
“I know you meant after we get them out of there. All of us—working as a team.”
Frisco smiled. “Right. Slip of the tongue.”
From where he sat, Frisco could see the light coming from an upstairs window. This window was smaller than the others—it had to be the bathroom.
Mia and Natasha were on the other side of those panes of glass. So close, yet so damn far.
As he watched the infrared scanner, the reddish-orange spots that were the Alpha Squad moved closer to the house. Two who had to be Lucky and Cat moved up onto the house.
The other four—Blue, Bobby, Wes and Cowboy—were motionless now, waiting for Frisco’s command.
Inside the house, according to his scanner, nothing had changed. Dwayne and his men were still in the living room. Mia and Tash were still upstairs.
Mia and Tash.
Both of them had given him unconditional love. Funny, he had no problem accepting it from the kid, but from Mia…
Frisco hadn’t believed it was possible. It still seemed much too good to be true. She was filled with such joy and life while he was the poster model for despair. She had such strength of purpose while he was floundering and uncertain.
He hadn’t told her he loved her. He could have. But instead he’d attacked her, attacked her avocation. He’d pushed her away. Yet still she loved him.
Was it possible that she’d somehow seen the desperate, frightened man that hid beneath the anger and pain of his verbal attack? Thomas had told him she’d done the same with him, making a critical difference in his life, altering his destiny, shaping his future.
Those who are taught, do. Those who teach, shape the future.
Frisco could picture Mia telling him that, her eyes blazing with passion and fire. She believed it so absolutely.
And right then, as Alpha Squad waited for his signal to move into Dwayne Bell’s house, Frisco knew just as absolutely that he wanted a second chance.
His entire life was full of second chances, he realized. Another man might have died from the wounds he’d received. Another man would never have made it out of that wheelchair.
Another man would let Mia Summerton get away.
He thought of that list that she’d posted on his refrigerator—all the things he could still do. There was so much he could still do, although some of it was going to be extremely hard.
Like not being an active-duty SEAL. That was going to be damned hard. But it was going to be damned hard whether he spent the rest of his life drinking in his living room, or if he signed on as an instructor. His disappointment and crushed hopes would be a tough weight to carry, a rough road to walk.
But he was a SEAL. Tough and rough were standard operating procedure. He’d come this far. He could—and he would—make it the rest of the way.
“Okay,” Frisco said into his lip microphone. “The three targets haven’t moved. Let’s get this done. Quietly and quickly, Alpha Squad. Go.”
There was no response over his headset, but he saw the shapes on the infrared scanner begin to move.
Blue clicked once into his lip mike when the downstairs team were all inside.
“Moving slow in the attic,” he heard Joe Cat breathe. “Beams are old—don’t want ’em to creak.”
“Take as long as you need,” Frisco told him.
It seemed to take an eternity, but Frisco finally heard Cat report, “In place.”
He and Lucky were outside the upstairs bathroom door. That was Blue’s signal to move.
Frisco heard the flurry of movement and the sound of four automatic weapons being locked and loaded. That was when the noise started.
“Hands up,” Blue shouted, his normally smooth voice hard and clipped. “Come on—let me see ’em. Hands on your heads!”
“Come on, get ’em up!” It was Cowboy. “Come on—move!”
“What the…” Frisco could faintly hear Dwayne’s voice as he was picked up over all four microphones.
“Move it! Down on the floor, faces against the rug. Let’s go.” That was Bobby, along with an accompanying crash as he helped someone down there.
“Who the hell are you?” Dwayne kept asking. “Who the hell are you guys?”
“We’re your worst nightmare,” Cowboy told him, and then laughed. “Hell, you don’t know how many years I’ve been waiting to say that line!”
“We’re Alan Francisco’s friends,” Frisco heard Blue tell Dwayne. “Okay, Frisco, Mr. Bell and his associates have all been relieved of their weapons.”
“Take ’em out into the front yard and tie ‘em up, Blue,” Frisco ordered. He had already moved across the yard and was nearly inside the house. “H., use that fancy equipment of yours to dial 911. Let’s get the police garbage removal squad to take away the trash. Cat, this is my official all clear. Let’s get Mia and Tasha out of there.”
The bathroom door swung open, and Mia stared up into the face of an enormous dark-haired stranger carrying an equally enormous gun.
He must’ve seen the surge of panic in her eyes because he quickly aimed the gun down toward the floor. “Lt. Commander Joe Catalanotto of the Alpha Squad.” He identified himself in a rather unmistakable New York accent. “It’s all right now, ma’am, you’re safe.”
“Dwayne’s been detained—permanently.” Another man poked his head in the door. It was Lucky O’Donlon. Both men were wearing army fatigues and some kind of black vest.
“Are you
okay?” the dark-haired man—Joe—asked.
Mia nodded, still holding Tasha close. In the distance, she could hear the sound of sirens. “Where’s Alan? Is he all right?”
Lucky smiled, coming forward to give them both a hand out of the bathtub. “He’s downstairs, waiting for the police to arrive. They’re not going to be real happy to see us here, doing their job for them, so to speak.”
“I pretended to throw up so the bad man would lock us in the bathroom,” Natasha told Lucky proudly.
“That’s very cool,” he told her, perfectly straight-faced. But when he looked up at Mia, there was a glint of amusement in his eyes. “Barfing kid as weapon,” he said to her under his breath. “The thought makes the strongest man tremble with fear. Good thinking.”
“I want to see Alan,” she said.
The man named Joe nodded. “I know he wants to see you, too. Come on, let’s go downstairs.”
“How many SEALs are here?” she asked Joe as Lucky, Tasha in his arms, led the way down the stairs.
“All of Alpha Squad,” he told her.
“How did you ever get him to agree to let you help?”
“He asked us.”
Mia stared at Joe. Alan asked them for help? They didn’t volunteer and he grudgingly accept? God, she’d been so afraid he’d come here on his own and get himself killed….
“It’s hard for him, but he’s learning,” Joe said quietly. “Give him time. He’s gonna be okay.”
“Frisco!” Tasha shouted.
Mia stopped halfway down the stairs, watching as the little girl wriggled free from Lucky’s arms and launched herself at Alan Francisco.
He was dressed similarly to the other SEALs, complete with black vest and some kind of headphone thing. His crutches clattered to the living room floor as he caught Tasha in his arms.
From across the room, over the top of Tasha’s head, Alan looked up at Mia. Their eyes met and he smiled one of his sad, crooked, perfect smiles.
Then, God help her, she was rushing toward him, too—as shamelessly as Natasha had.
And then she was in his arms. He held her as tightly as he could with Tasha still clinging to him, too.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into her ear. “Mia, I’m so sorry.”
Mia wasn’t sure if he was apologizing for his angry words or Dwayne’s abducting them. It didn’t matter. What mattered was they were safe and he was safe and he had actually asked for help….
Flashing lights marked the arrival of police squad cars, and Frisco loosened his hold on Mia and let Tasha slide down to the floor.
“Can we talk later?” Frisco asked.
Mia nodded. “I was coming back, you know,” she told him. “To the cabin. To talk to you—talk, not fight. That was when Dwayne nearly ran me off the road.”
Her beautiful hazel eyes were shining with unshed tears. She had been coming back to the cabin. She loved him enough to swallow her pride.
And suddenly later wasn’t good enough. Suddenly there were things he had to tell her, things that couldn’t wait.
Frisco knew in that moment that even if right then and there, in a miraculous act of God, he suddenly regained full use of his injured leg, he would still be less than whole.
He knew with a certainty that took his breath away that it was only when he was with this incredible woman that he was truly complete.
Oh, he knew he could live without her—the same way he knew he could live without ever running again. It would be hard, but he could do it. It wasn’t as if she’d saved him. She hadn’t—he’d done that himself. With a little help. It had taken Natasha to nudge him back to the world of the living. And once there, Mia’s warmth and joy had lit his path, helping him out of his darkness.
Frisco knew he’d probably never run again. But he also knew that he didn’t have to live without Mia.
That was something he had at least a small amount of control over.
And he could start by telling her how he felt.
But there wasn’t any time. The police had arrived, and the uniformed officers were less than pleased that the SEALs had taken matters into their own hands. Joe Cat had intercepted the officer in charge and was trying to calm him down, but back-up had to be called along with the police captain.
And instead of telling Mia that he loved her, Frisco turned to Lucky. “Do me a favor, man, and walk Mia and Tash out to Harvard’s van. I want to get them out of here, but I’ve got to set one thing straight with the police before we leave.”
“Absolutely.”
Frisco picked up his crutches, positioning them under his arms as he looked back at Mia. “I’ll try not to take too long.”
She gave him a tremulous smile that added so much weight and meaning to her words. “That’s okay. We’ll wait.”
Frisco smiled back at her, suddenly almost ridiculously happy. “Yeah,” he said. “I know. But I don’t want to keep you waiting any longer.”
“I told the police captain that Sharon was willing to testify against Bell,” Frisco told Harvard and Mia as they climbed out of the van and started toward the condo courtyard. “With her help, they can ID Bell as the perpetrator in a number of unsolved robberies and possibly even a murder.”
“Sharon saw Dwayne kill someone?” Mia asked Frisco in a low voice.
He nodded, glancing at Harvard who was carrying a drowsy Tasha. But her five-year-old ears were as sharp as ever and she lifted her head. “I saw Dwayne kill someone, too,” Tasha told them, her eyes filling with tears. “I saw him kill Thomas.”
“Thomas isn’t dead,” Frisco said.
“Yes, he is,” Tasha insisted. “Dwayne hit him and made him bloody, and he didn’t get back up.”
“Thomas is waiting for you, princess, up in the condo.”
“Oh, thank God,” Mia said. “Is he really all right?”
“A little shaky, maybe,” Frisco said, “but, yeah. He’s okay.”
All signs of her drowsiness gone, Tasha squirmed free from Harvard’s arms. Like a flash, she ran up the stairs. But the condo door was locked, and she pounded on it.
As Mia watched, it swung open, and sure enough, there was Thomas King, looking a little worse for wear. Tasha launched herself at him, and nearly knocked the teenager over.
“Hey, Martian girl,” Thomas said casually and matter-of-factly, as if they’d run into each other on the street. But he held the child tightly. That and the sudden sheen of tears in his eyes gave him away.
“I thought you were dead,” she told him, giving him a resounding kiss on the cheek. “And if you were dead, then you couldn’t marry me.”
“Marry you?” Thomas’s voice slipped up an octave. “Whoa, wait a minute, I—”
“A Russian princess has to marry a king,” Tasha told him seriously.
“You’re kind of short,” Thomas told her. “I’m not so sure I want a wife who’s that short.”
Tasha giggled. “I’ll be taller, silly,” she told him. “I’ll be sixteen.”
“Sixteen…” Thomas looked as if he were choking. “Look, Martian, if you’re still interested when you’re twenty-six, give me a call, but until then, we’re friends, all right?”
Natasha just smiled.
“All right,” Thomas said. “Now, come on inside and see what Navy bought for you.”
They disappeared inside the house, and Mia could hear Tasha’s excited squealing. She turned to Frisco, who was painstakingly pulling himself up the stairs. “Is it the couch?”
Frisco just shook his head. “Man, I forgot all about it.”
“I didn’t,” Harvard said, laughter in his voice.
Curiosity overcame Mia, and she hurried to Frisco’s door. And laughed out loud. “You got it,” she said. “The couch. Dear Lord, it’s so…”
“Pink?” Frisco volunteered, amusement and chagrin glinting in his eyes as he followed her inside.
Tasha was sitting in the middle of the couch, her ankles delicately crossed—the perfect Russian princess, de
spite the fact that her hair was tangled and her face dirty and tear streaked.
Harvard started packing up the array of equipment, and Thomas moved to help him.
“This stuff is so cool,” Mia heard Thomas tell Harvard. “What do I have to do to become one of you guys?”
“Well, you start by joining the Navy,” Harvard said. “And you work your butt off for about three years, and maybe, just maybe, then you’ll be accepted into the BUD/S training.”
“Hey,” Frisco said to Natasha. “Don’t I get a hug? Or any thanks?”
Tasha looked at him haughtily. “Russian princesses don’t say thank you or give hugs.”
“Wanna bet?” He sat down on the couch next to the little girl and pulled her into his arms.
She giggled and threw her arms around his neck. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you—”
Frisco laughed. Mia loved the sound of his laughter. “Enough already,” he said. “Go wash your face and get ready for bed.”
Tash stood up, casting a look of longing back at the sofa.
“Don’t worry,” Frisco told her. “It’ll be here in the morning.”
“You bet it will,” Harvard interjected. “And the morning after that, and the morning after that…”
“I don’t know,” Mia said. “It’s starting to grow on me.” She held out her hand to Tasha. “Come on. I’ll help you.”
Frisco watched them disappear into the bathroom. Tasha was dragging, clearly exhausted. It wouldn’t be long before she was sound asleep. He turned back to Harvard. “Need help getting that stuff together?”
Harvard grinned, reading his mind. “All done. We’re out of here. Gee, sorry we can’t stay.”
Frisco held out his hand, and Harvard clasped it. “Thanks, man.”
“It was good seeing you again, Francisco. Don’t be a stranger.”
“I won’t be,” Frisco told his friend. “In fact, I’ll probably be coming over to the base in a few days to talk to Cat.”
Harvard smiled, his powerful biceps flexing as he easily lifted pounds and pounds of heavy equipment. “Good. See you then.”
He followed Thomas outside and closed the door behind them.
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