SEALed with a Ring

by Mary Margret Daughtridge

  Her green eyes narrowed, and the corners of her lips tightened. "Trust me, I'm not."

  JJ toddled toward her bedroom with as much barefoot dignity as she could achieve while holding fistfuls of terry robe together at the waist and top of her thighs. She hadn't been able to find the sash. Comfortable naked, she'd rarely used the robe since she'd moved to the cot tage. Drat the man for destroying her carefully orches trated scenario.

  She'd had a dress all picked out. One that said she was fully aware of her power and able to be in charge. She had intended to take him to one of the gourmet res taurants on the sound side of the island for a nice dinner over which they could come to terms.

  Now she had to regroup. She took a deep breath and focused on what she wanted, not what wasn't working. She had achieved part of her goal. He was here. He hadn't said no.

  As if delighted with the change in plan, she put a smile in her voice and called over her shoulder as she gained the dressing alcove, "I put some soft drinks in the refrigerator, or you can pour yourself something at the bar. I'll be out in a minute."

  In the bathroom, she abandoned her plan to blow-dry her hair straight and then iron it into silky smoothness. Her thick hair would take too long to dry completely. Instead, she dried the ends enough to prevent them from clinging wet and cold to the back of her neck and shoulders, then combed her hair back and clipped it at the nape.

  She did take the time to slick on some lip gloss and a little mascara. In the vanity mirror, she checked the black wide-leg jeans and baby-doll top she'd grabbed on the way into the bathroom. It wasn't what she had intended to wear for this meeting, but he didn't need to know that. The jeans showed off her most excellent butt, one payoff of her ballroom-dancing hobby.

  When she came out of the bathroom, she grabbed the initiative. "Can I take your early arrival to mean you're eager to accept my offer?" she asked over her shoulder as she slipped on lollipop-red Manolos.

  "Not exactly."

  JJ whirled at the sound of his voice right behind her.

  He leaned against the opening of the dressing alcove, a can of Coke in one hand. He gave her a slow, frankly approving appraisal.

  He was trying to rattle her to gain an advantage. She told her heart to slow down and her body to ignore his proximity. As if she'd expected him to turn down her first offer, she gave him a knowing smile. "And yet, you are here," she told him. "Sounds like we need to talk. I think I'll have some wine."

  She led the way into the great room. A glass of white wine already stood on the placemat at one end of the dining table. Piled with papers, the other end of the table had slowly turned into JJ's home office.

  He grinned. "I already poured your wine."

  "How did you know I'd want it?"

  "Open bottle in the fridge. Wine glasses in the dishwasher. You told me you had bought soft drinks, which made me think you didn't always keep them on hand."

  "Oh. Thanks. Can I get you something else?"

  He lifted the Coke can. "This is fine." He pulled the prenuptial agreement from a back pocket and tossed it on the table before seating himself. "You can tear this up. I'm not signing it."

  The trick to staying in control of a negotiation was to remain flexible. JJ ignored the icy weight in her stomach and smiled ruefully. "Too bad. Out of curiosity—how large would the offer need to be to be attractive?"

  He laced his fingers around the Coke can as if he needed to anchor them. "Here's the deal. I don't want your money, and I don't need it," he stated in a flat, throaty growl. "I won't take a cent from you. Not now, not ever. No perks, no expensive presents."

  He was turning her down. The tsunami loomed closer. JJ fought dry-mouthed panic to say smoothly, "But you want something or you wouldn't be here."

  Her phone, where she had left it on the granite coun tertop, made a loud buzzing noise. She had set her phone to vibrate since she didn't want any distractions. It was probably Blount again. She swallowed her frustration.

  "You want to get that?"

  "Let me see what it is, then I'll turn it off."

  But the text message read GF 911.

  She had bought Ham a cell and taught him to text, but he had neither the patience nor the comfort with technol ogy to learn anything fancy. They had settled on a few simple codes. GF 911 meant an emergency concerning her grandfather.

  "I'm sorry. I have to take this," she told Davy as she punched in Ham's number. "What is it?" she asked when he answered on the first ring.

  "Lucas and me, we're at the hospital. He had some shortness of breath."

  "Is he okay?"

  "I think he is. The doctor's in with him now."

  Davy was listening to her half of the conversation with frank interest. If only she could have finished ne gotiations with him before this call. If they broke off now, the deal was going to go cold. But neither her grandfather nor Ham dealt well with modern medicine. Ham shut down and became robotic. Lucas combated helplessness by giving orders. "Is Esperanza with you?" she asked Ham.

  "She's got the flu. Lucas sent her home."

  "So he was home alone and called you? He should have called 911. No, forget I said that. At least he had the sense to call you. He didn't attempt to drive himself." She would deal with the guilt that he hadn't called her, later.

  She came to what had always been a foregone conclu sion. "I'll be there as soon as I can, but I'm on Topsail. It will be thirty minutes—at the very least."

  "Trouble?" Davy asked when she ended the call.

  "My grandfather. He's in the ER with shortness of breath. I guess you and I will to have to talk later. Maybe I can—"

  "How 'bout if I ride with you? Thirty minutes, you said. That should be plenty of time."

  "You know what emergency rooms are like. I have no idea how long I will be."

  "No problem."

  "But what if you miss your ride? Don't you have to be back at the base by a certain time? I guess Ham could drive you back here, or I could ask—"

  "Don't worry about it. It's not a problem. I can get myself where I need to be."

  Fear for her grandfather, relief that this window of opportunity with David wasn't lost, hope that her life could get back on track again produced a roller coaster of emotions. "Okay. Okay! If worse comes to worst, there's always a plane. I'll call my assistant and have her check flights to—Norfolk? Is that the best airport?"

  He closed his fingers over hers and gently forced her to close her phone. "I said I'll take care of it. I can look after myself. Do you always make yourself responsible for everyone?"

  The warmth of his fingers spread up her arms. The man exuded reassurance. "I guess I do." She thought about it a second and chuckled tiredly. "Actually, most of the time, I am responsible."

  "No. It's my duty to get myself back to base. Mine alone. Now, do you have a raincoat or something? There's weather coming in."

  The cloud ceiling had lowered, and an early dusk turned the pines beside the road black. At Hampstead, where 210 left U.S.17, the stoplights bounced and swayed in the gusts. The closer they got to Wilmington, the heavier the five o'clock traffic became.

  Even though the cockpit of JJ's red Lexus was roomier than many sports cars, with David in the pas senger seat, it suddenly felt small. He wasn't taller than average, but somehow there seemed to be an awful lot of him. Even separated by the gearshift, their shoulders almost touched. She was aware of his masculine scent and the warmth his body heat added to the small confines.

  She hadn't brought up the subject of marriage again. She usually faced things head on. She was the kind of person who liked to hear the bad news first. Though it might be cowardly, if there wasn't a chance they could come to terms, she didn't want to know—not right now.

  Instead, David had asked her questions about her grandfather's heart condition, and she'd wound up tell ing him her grandfather's entire medical history. He was a good listener. JJ tapped the breaks when an SUV pulled out in front of them. The speed limit through here was 45
, but she wasn't doing even that. A fine mist covered the windshield. She switched on the wipers and headlights. She sighed.

  "Are you okay?" he asked in his dark, smooth, com forting voice. He sounded like he really cared.

  "To tell you the truth, I don't know what I am. For the past year, I've lived with my eyes on the future and one goal: find a man I could marry so I could save Caruthers. I didn't hope… I didn't despair… I didn't anything. I just kept moving. In the last forty-eight hours, it's all falling apart, and I can't seem to put it together again. I can't even find all the pieces."

  JJ waited for David to say something. The car filled with the hiss of tires on wet pavement. The swish-slap of the wipers.

  "I'm so angry at him." There. She'd finally said it.

  "Your grandfather?"

  "I don't want to care that Lucas is sick, but I do. We had an argument earlier today. I'm afraid it caused a heart attack or something, and now he's in the hospital and it's my fault. And here I am, rushing to the hospi tal—rushing as much as I can in five o'clock traffic— which I wouldn't be in, not like this, if I hadn't moved to the beach to get away from him."

  "Why did you dump the idiot?"

  "The idi—? Oh, Blount." She sniggered. "Lost my mind?"

  "Seriously. Why?"

  Why. JJ had asked herself that over and over. David's "why" wasn't an accusation the way hers had been. It was a simple request for information. She searched for how to explain it. "Watching Emmie and What's-his name get married—"

  "Do-Lord."

  "Anyone could see how in love they are, how right for each other. I've never been in love like that—have you?"

  "Like that? No. Not yet."

  "And Jax and Pickett. The air between them sizzles."

  "So, you were envious of them."

  "Maybe. Partly. I could have dealt with that. But then I almost kissed you. And I thought, 'Where did my integrity go?'"

  "Huh."

  JJ wouldn't have thought one grunt could contain that much satisfaction. She stole a sideways glance. She'd already noted that the scarred side of his face was less moveable, but even so, she could see the way he held back a smile.

  JJ laughed against her will. "Oh, wipe that smirk off your face!"

  "One almost-kiss, and you ditch him? Come on, girl, a kiss that powerful is smirk-worthy."

  "It's not, and that's not the way it was." She smacked him on the arm with the back of her hand. "It's just that when I couldn't make myself spend the night with him be cause I felt so guilty, he got pissy and acted like a jackass.

  "I had to threaten to call 911 and say I was being kid napped before he would stop the car to help a dog. A dog." Her ire rose again at the memory of Blount's cowardice. "Nobody was asking him to run into a burning building. A phone call was all it took. And I lost my temper."

  "I'll bet that doesn't happen much. How did it feel?"

  "Better than most sex I ever had."

  "Huh."

  "Are you smirking again?" she asked dangerously.

  "No, ma'am! Not me!"

  "You are. I can feel you over there, laughing."

  "No, I'm not. Sex that bad is serious!"

  "I didn't say I had bad sex."

  "You didn't have to."

  "Be that as it may, good or bad, the high afterwards was just as short-lived. I had blown my future and the future of everything I cared about. I walked around in a daze for about twenty-four hours. Then I had the idea of asking you to marry me. I had hope again."

  "Tell me again, why me?"

  "Because you're the only SEAL I know."

  "Oh, right. And SEALs are never around. You wouldn't have to face me at breakfast."

  "I didn't mean it that way. I meant your time is al ready occupied. It's also that you don't care anything about me. I didn't have to worry about hurting your feel ings every time I put Caruthers first. Not even to save Caruthers am I willing to break someone's heart or ruin their life. But you're not in love with me, and I'm not in love with you. Best of all, SEALs have a ninety-five percent divorce rate. It would come as no surprise to anyone when we split up."

  JJ put on her signal to make the turn onto the U.S. 17 Bypass. They would make better time now. "It doesn't matter now. You're not interested in what I have to offer. So you ask me if I'm okay. Well, I'm worried and guilty and angry and sad and hopeless. And I'm off to the bedside of a man I'm not ever going to forgive—" Her stomach shook with pained laughter at what a mess she was. "But I'll probably be at his bedside the next time he needs me, even so."

  Chapter 24

  HER PAINED LITTLE LAUGH WAS FULL OF AFFECTIONATE irony. Like the precordial thump—a blow to the sternum administered before initiating the chest compression part of CPR—it surprised his heart into a different rhythm. She was a woman of deep feelings who didn't give in to them—not when they conflicted with her principles. She would never abandon those for whom she was responsi ble. She wouldn't cut and run when the going got tough.

  Morally, he was turned off by her cold-blooded offer. Marriage was only a means to an end with her, but even if he'd never thought it was in his future, it meant some thing to him. At the same time, she had qualities he ad mired in a man but that he'd never sought in a woman. Her fundamental kindness, her strength, her unflinching shouldering of responsibility, and her willingness to do what had to be done were qualities he respected and were a surprising turn-on. He had come to her beach house prepared to make her an equally cold-blooded counteroffer, but now he knew there was no way. This wasn't a woman he could marry and walk away from.

  She reached for his hand. "Even though you're turn ing me down, I appreciate your coming with me. I'm glad I'm not making this drive alone."

  Her fingers were chilly, revealing the stress she didn't allow to show on her face. She withdrew them quicker than he wanted her to.

  "I didn't say I'm not interested in marrying you," he told her.

  She flicked her eyes from the rain-washed street to give him a disbelieving look. "Sounded like it to me. You don't want money or presents or I forget what else. You have your own money—I remember that part. You don't have to try to soften the blow. It's fine."

  "I'm not softening anything. I've got another deal I want to talk to you about."

  "Fine." She flicked on the turn signal and moved into a right turn lane. "You want to make me a deal. Talk fast. We're only a couple of blocks from New Hanover County Hospital."

  "I'm serious."

  "Okay. But pardon me if I don't get my hopes up again." Her phone rang and she brought it to her ear. "Hey, Ham, I'm almost there… Yes, I know Lucas made you call me… It's okay. I'm turning into the parking lot now… Okay." She closed the phone with a sigh and a bewildered shake of her head. "I guess you heard. I don't know what Lucas thought Ham could do to make me go any faster!" He could see her mentally shifting gears as she spied a parking place and expertly whipped the Lexus into it. She switched off the ignition. "Now, you were saying something?"

  "This isn't the right time." She wasn't listening. Not really. Her mind was already on what she would find when she saw her grandfather. She was always two or three steps into the future.

  "Maybe this will grab your attention." He slid his hand under her hair. He grasped her nape firmly enough to immobilize her head and captured her mouth with his. He suspected she opened her mouth more in sur prise than anything else, but he was too much a SEAL to let an opportunity like that pass. He ran his tongue over the silky inner face of her lips before sealing his mouth to hers.

  He had intended to make it quick. As soon as he felt her tongue move in response, he decided to go for thorough. She tasted incredible. Her breathing quick ened. He damned the console that separated them. He wanted to feel her breasts flatten against his chest. He angled his head for a deeper taste. He wanted to taste her everywhere.

  When he slowly let her go, there was something thoroughly satisfying about the startled look in her green eyes and her soft, slightly parte
d lips. "Just don't go offering your hand in marriage to the first doctor or orderly or hospital security guard you see. Keep in mind that we are still in negotiation. You're not free to make any other deals until you've heard me out."

  She blinked the startled look from her eyes. "Ooo-kaay."

  He reached for the door handle. "We'll talk about it later. Let's go see how your grandfather is."

  The tired-looking doctor, short and dumpy in her white lab coat, was with Lucas when they arrived at the ER. She told JJ they had run an EKG and drawn blood to check for cardiac enzymes but had found nothing alarming.