A SEAL’s Desire

by Seton, Cora

  In one corner of the large room, Byron the cameraman was talking quietly on his phone. He’d been sleeping at Base Camp recently on Clem’s orders. When he was in town last, the director had become convinced they got up to all kinds of shenanigans at night. Byron was his spy. He wasn’t supposed to film after lights out, but Greg had no doubt if anything unusual happened, he’d been told to get his camera rolling.

  “Yeah, they’re already on their way to the hospital. No, I wasn’t filming, I was asleep. I know. I know, all right. I’ll get there as soon as I can.” Byron hung up. Caught Greg watching him. “Clem,” he confirmed. “I’m supposed to call him right away when anything exciting happens.”

  “What about Renata? Did you call her, too?”

  Byron shook his head warily. “She’d skin me alive if I woke her up.”

  Greg assessed the situation. Clem was probably on his way to the hospital right now, crew in tow. He’d get the footage of Savannah checking in. Renata would be skunked. After the way she’d showed Clem up in the weeks since he’d come on board, Greg had a feeling Clem was eager for revenge.

  Greg made up his mind what to do.

  Fifteen minutes later, he was driving into town in one of Base Camp’s communal trucks, with Avery, Walker, Angus and Addison Green joining in the convoy. Addison was married to Kai, Base Camp’s cook, who was one of the men on patrol tonight. He and Anders would stay at Base Camp to keep watch. Everyone else was packed into the trucks winging their way to the hospital.

  Renata met them in the hospital intake room and took Greg aside. “Thanks for calling,” she said brusquely. “I’m going to kill Byron.”

  “Clem is the one you should be pissed at.”

  “I’m always pissed at him.”

  As the hours passed, Greg wondered why they’d all been in such a hurry to get to the hospital. It was clear this wasn’t going to be a fast delivery. They practically filled the whole waiting room. Boone and Riley held hands and whispered in one corner; Nora and Clay Picket slumped in a pair of chairs, her head resting on his shoulder; Avery, Walker, Angus and Addison stood with Curtis and Hope Lloyd, talking quietly. Everyone else was asleep in awkward positions in the plastic chairs.

  Except Renata.

  She looked far more approachable than she had at the wedding in that gunmetal-gray gown. He’d rarely seen her dressed so informally. In fact—Greg flipped through his memories. No, he’d never seen Renata in jeans before. Paired with a deep-blue sweater, her feet stuffed into winter boots, she looked human. Vulnerable. Far from the polished, ultra-serious persona she wore to deal with Base Camp’s cast and crew. She was watching the corridor down which Savannah was presumably now laboring with her husband, Jericho, to help—

  And Clem to film.

  The ultimate coup, Greg realized. Whoever got footage of Base Camp’s first birth would be the star, at least for a little while.

  “Byron doesn’t look too happy,” Greg said when he took a seat next to Renata, hoping to distract her.

  “He filmed the whole ride to the hospital and Jericho carrying Savannah inside—then Clem got here and took over. He chose Adrienne to do the filming.” She was referring to one of the crew’s female members, a mousy woman who’d barely said a word in the months Greg had been here. “Byron’s pissed, as well he should be.”

  Clem had shown a little tact for once, though, Greg thought. Choosing a woman to film the birth—

  All of them jumped when a door down the hall swung open and banged into the wall, and two figures lurched out, one of them holding a video camera. A loud string of curses preceded Clem and Adrienne down the hall.

  “—doing my goddamn job, that’s all. How the hell am I expected to put together a winning show if—”

  “Sir, you’ll have to lower your voice if you want to stay here. No filming,” a stern nurse snapped from behind a desk. Clem glared at her and stalked into the waiting room. Adrienne followed quietly, her shoulders high, her face pink. She didn’t enter the waiting room, though. Instead, she positioned herself against a wall near the front entrance, as if hoping it might offer some camouflage.

  Clem ignored her, making a beeline to Renata.

  “You can take yourself right back to the motel,” he snarled at her. “If I can’t get footage, you don’t stand a chance in hell.”

  Greg surged to his feet, fists balled, ready to do battle with the man, but Boone intervened and corralled Clem into a seat across the room, peppering him with questions about Savannah and Jericho.

  “She’s fine.” Clem was annoyed. “Doctor says it’ll be hours.”

  Greg sat down again.

  The time crawled by, broken only by coffee runs, desultory conversation and the silent flickering of the waiting room TV with its sound on mute. When Clem and Renata nearly got into blows over one of the three outdated magazines available in a room that held seating for more than twenty, Greg took her hand and tugged her outside into the crisp dawn.

  “At least we’ll see the sun today,” he said when they were safely outside.

  “For a few hours,” Renata added dryly.

  “Don’t knock Montana. Britain isn’t known for its blue skies,” he pointed out. “If you grew up there, you must be used to this.”

  “Why do you think I left?”

  “Did you spend a long time in California with Fulsom before you came here?”

  “I spent time everywhere with Fulsom. He’s hardly in one place for three days strung together. The man can’t stop moving.”

  “Which do you prefer—moving all the time or being here?”

  Renata frowned as if she’d never pondered the question before. Maybe she hadn’t. “I’d prefer to get to choose for myself,” she said quietly.

  Greg supposed he could understand that. “You could quit.”

  An expression he couldn’t pinpoint flashed over her features and was gone. “That wouldn’t be my best move,” she finally said. She pulled her jacket’s zipper up the last few inches and shoved her fists in her pockets. “Cold.”

  He nodded. The comment didn’t require an answer. It had been cold for months. He was ready for spring, too—they all were. He didn’t want to go back inside, though.

  “At least Clem isn’t getting any footage, either,” he remarked. The man was visible through the glass doors into the hospital, pacing and holding a phone to his ear.

  He turned when a snowball thwacked into his arm. “Hey!”

  “Don’t even mention his name. That jerk is after my job.” Renata stood with her hands on her hips.

  Greg scooped up a handful of snow, considered tossing it back at her but decided that was a bad idea. He threw it at the side of a nearby bus kiosk instead and hit the shoulder of the businessman pictured in the advertisement that ran the length of the kiosk’s side. Renata’s eyebrows raised.

  “Beat that,” Greg said.

  “Ten points for a body shot, twenty points if you hit his face. First one to a hundred wins,” Renata rattled off. She scooped up some snow and took her shot. Tied with Greg when she hit the man square in the chest.

  The game went fast after that, each of them taking their shots and calling out their score. Greg got two more body shots and finally hit the man’s face. “Fifty!”

  Renata hit the face on her second shot but then missed the kiosk altogether before getting another body shot. “Forty.” Her frustration was clear.

  “Seventy,” Greg gloated when his next shot hit the man’s face.

  “Sixty.” Renata’s confidence returned.

  “Eighty.” Damn it. That shot had nearly missed altogether. He was letting Renata get to him.

  “Eighty!” Renata crowed after her shot hit the man square on the jaw. “I’m going to take you down, Devon!”

  “Not likely.” This time Greg knew his shot would land the moment it left his hand. It hit the kiosk with a satisfying smack, dead center in the businessman’s face.

  Greg didn’t think. He simply reached out, caught
hold of Renata’s jacket and tugged her closer at the same time he stepped toward her. He saw surprise widen her eyes just before his mouth met hers. Their kiss was brief—over almost before it began.

  But he knew it would change everything.

  “Renata! Greg! The baby’s here!”

  Avery’s voice cut through the silence, jolting Renata out of her shock. Still facing Greg—staring at him—Renata shook herself back into the present. Took a step back. She didn’t think Avery had seen what they were doing—thank goodness.

  “Renata.” Greg’s low, rich baritone stopped her. “We should talk about this.”

  “Come on!” Avery cried. “They’re letting us in a few at a time. You have to cover this, Renata. Don’t let Clem win.”

  That snapped her out of her shock. She was never going to let Clem win.

  “Renata,” Greg called after her as she strode toward the hospital.

  “Later. I’ve got work to do.” She was tingling all over, though, and Renata wasn’t sure she’d ever get over the shock of that kiss. She supposed it made sense he’d make a pass at her—the way he’d been watching her—but it had still taken her by surprise. Somehow she’d supposed that her absolute unavailability would be as clear to the men of Base Camp as it was to her. She’d never given a single one of them so much as a flirtatious glance, least of all Greg, because he was the one to whom she was the most attracted.

  Inside, she made her way down the corridor to where the members of Base Camp had clustered around Savannah’s room. She’d have to sort out Greg later. Right now she had a job to do—one that would keep paying for the girls of Colina Blanca.

  “Out of my way,” she ordered, marching through the gathered people, grabbing Byron’s arm as she went. She’d need a cameraman.

  “Three at a time,” Riley said apologetically.

  “That doesn’t apply to me.”

  “Or me,” Greg said, hurrying after her.

  “Like hell it doesn’t,” Clem said. “If I have to wait, so do you!”

  Renata barged past him into the hospital room, still dragging Byron along, followed by Greg, who shut the door behind him. Hope and Curtis Lloyd, spotting them, straightened from where they’d been bent over mother and child.

  “We’ll see you again tomorrow when you’ve gotten some rest,” Hope told Savannah. “You have a beautiful baby.”

  “I’ll go, too,” Nora Pickett said. “I’m so happy for you, Savannah.”

  “You next,” Savannah told her.

  Nora patted her slightly rounded belly. “Can’t wait.”

  As they left, Renata edged closer to the bed upon which Savannah lay, supported by pillows, her baby in her arms. Jericho sat close by, beaming at wife and child as if he couldn’t be prouder.

  “It’s a boy?” Renata asked, hardly daring to breathe. The baby was asleep, a tiny bundle with a sweet, puckered face. What she would give to have a baby like that. The thought should have surprised her, career woman as she was, but she felt the same longing every time she saw a little one. It was just part of being a woman, she supposed. Or maybe her history was to blame. She’d grown up around other lost, lonely children in the foster care system, all of them craving care and love. She’d done her best to give it to them—while she was there. It seemed to her the foster care system was simply a series of goodbyes.

  “Yes. Jacob Boone Cook.”

  “That must have made Boone happy.” Renata drew nearer, taken by the baby’s tiny hands among the nest of blankets Savannah held him in. This baby would never know the kind of sorrow and loneliness she’d felt and seen during her childhood years. He would grow up surrounded by love—as a baby should.

  “I think he cried a little when we told him,” Savannah admitted.

  “Boone was bawling like a newborn himself,” Jericho put in. “But he’s been a good friend for a long time.”

  “Jacob is so sweet.” Renata bent even closer. “What a perfect baby.”

  “Do you want to hold him?”

  Renata nodded. Her arms were aching to hold him. How had Savannah known?

  She sat down on the edge of the bed, and Savannah transferred the little mite, swathed in his blankets, into her arms. “There.”

  The small weight felt wonderful, and Renata drew in a shaking breath. She couldn’t even place the feeling filling her heart. It went so far beyond longing—eclipsed even her commitment to the girls she was supporting in Peru, something she’d dedicated her whole life to these past ten years. When she allowed herself to think of the future, she focused on work—on the films she’d promised herself she’d one day produce. She wanted to provide an escape from reality to all the people who had suffered like she had.

  But—

  Jacob shifted, his tiny fingers straightening, then curling into fists again.

  A baby. She wanted a baby, too. A house. A real home. Somewhere she never had to leave again. Roots. A family. One that would last forever. Maybe a husband—

  A noise escaped her, and shame washed through Renata at having exposed herself like that. It was a noise someone like Savannah would recognize. And maybe Greg might, too. Not to mention Clem if he were in the room.

  Renata’s back stiffened even as Savannah reached out to pat her arm.

  “It’s all right,” Savannah said. “Everyone loves new babies.”

  Renata blinked back the tears that were threatening to slip down her cheeks.

  “It’s that they’re so new,” Savannah said. “It reminds us we were new once, too. Innocent. Before the world got to us.”

  In a flash, Renata was back in England—the small town outside London where she was born. She had a sense of a living room. A soft couch. A fireplace. Snow falling.

  Hot chocolate.

  Her mother singing. Her father in the easy chair with a book.

  Another sound escaped her, and she swayed forward to deposit Jacob back into his mother’s arms. She stood up and scraped a hand across her cheek. What was wrong with her?

  Greg caught her when she stumbled over her own feet and put his arm around her waist to steady her, but when she moved toward the door, it swung open, and Clem stepped in her way. He looked her up and down scornfully. “What’s wrong with you, Ludlow? Are you crying?” He glanced at Savannah in the bed, baby Jacob in her arms, and sneered. “No wonder Fulsom gave me your job. You’re on the mommy track. Not a serious director at all. Just killing time until a husband comes along, huh?”

  Renata didn’t know what she’d have done if the door hadn’t swung open a second time—and ushered in Fulsom.

  She sucked in a breath, completely taken aback. Dashed her hand quickly over her cheeks again, grateful she hadn’t had time to put on makeup before rushing to the hospital. She didn’t think she could face her boss with mascara running everywhere.

  “How’d you get here?” Greg asked him.

  “The same way I always get here,” Fulsom said calmly. He brushed past them to pay homage at Savannah’s bedside. “Beautiful as ever, my dear,” he told Savannah. “I don’t know how you always manage to look like a painting by Raphael, but you do. And look at this little man. Jacob Boone, right? He’ll be the spitting image of his father. Good job, you two.” He turned to Clem. “You getting the footage you need?”

  Fury filled Renata. What about her? She wasn’t getting any of the footage she needed. And she’d exposed Clem days ago for the criminal he was. This situation was intolerable. Two directors were one too many—

  “I’m getting everything,” Clem assured him. “Unlike some people, I don’t have anything to distract me.”

  “Good. As for you, Renata…”

  Here it came. Renata swallowed in a dry throat, her pulse tripping along like a toddler on hot sand. Fulsom was going to fire her. She was going to let everyone down. Her students—

  “I’m not sure you’re needed at Base Camp anymore,” he began, confirming her worst suspicions.

  “Yes, she is!” Greg blurted behind her. “She
damn well is!”

  “Clem here is perfectly capable of directing—”

  “She’s the one.” Greg cut off Fulsom again. “She’s the woman I’m going to marry. She has to stay because she’s going to be my wife!”

  Clem’s laughter filled the room.

  Chapter Three

  ‡

  “…audience will love it. They’ll eat it up. It’ll be great for ratings,” Fulsom was telling a furious Renata when Jericho pulled Greg aside.

  Greg hadn’t even noticed him skirt around the bed and cross the room. He’d been too busy watching the blood drain from Renata’s face as she realized Fulsom was going to force her to remain on the show—as a participant, not a director.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Jericho hissed at him. “You have to marry in forty days. You can’t mess around trying to save Renata’s job.”

  “I’m not. I’m telling the truth—she’s the one. She’s always been the one.”

  “Renata? How?”

  Greg knew what he meant. As director, she’d been a sharp-tongued battle-ax of a woman, but that was what the job required. She was bossing around ten men who’d spent years with the Navy SEALs. Did Jericho expect her to be a soft-spoken schoolgirl?

  He knew another side to Renata. He’d been there in Peru—

  Even if she didn’t remember him.

  “Sleep on it,” Fulsom told Renata. “You’ll still get paid, so don’t worry about that,” he added. Behind him, Clem smirked.

  “Pay me double.” Renata’s voice was tight with rage.

  Fulsom shrugged. “Sure, I’ll pay you double. It’s worth it.”

  She whirled and strode to the door, her cold gaze slicing through Greg like a knife as she passed.

  “Renata—”

  She lifted a hand to stop him and kept going. The door closed behind her a moment later.

  “Let her simmer down.” Fulsom came to stop Greg from following her. “She needs sleep. Time to think it over. She’ll see the value of playing along.”