by Tawny Weber
Either.
Both.
He remembered the look of desperation he’d seen in Jared’s eyes. The willingness to do almost anything to keep the girl.
Almost.
“I’m tempted to let you think I’m a hero if it gets me what I want. But I figure there’ve been enough lies, too much deception already.”
Her eyes searched his face, but her expression didn’t change. “What is it, exactly, that you want, then?”
“You.”
* * *
HE WANTED HER. Enough to fight to keep her? A fierce sort of joy took hold in Harper’s heart.
“You liked the sex,” she murmured, skimming her hand up the length of his arm from wrist to shoulder. Then, because it felt so good, she slid it right back down again.
“Like is a mild word,” he corrected her. “It doesn’t come close to what I felt with you.”
Harper’s heart raced. Her body screamed at her to go for it. To jump at the chance. She wanted this. More time. And, yes, more sex.
But mostly the time to get to know Diego better. To let him get to know her better. To see if he’d stick around after the initial flash of hot sex was over.
“As good as it is between us, though, it’s not enough,” he said.
Disappointment cast a shadow over the hope that’d been building in her heart. “What do you mean?”
“We’re compatible in bed. We’re hell on wheels in bed,” he clarified. “In bed, in the shower, in the air and against the wall. We’re damned good together.”
“But?”
“Well, I know you said it wouldn’t matter. But.” He drew in a deep breath that seemed to take the very air from Harper’s lungs, too. “I’ve fallen head over heels in love with you. So even though you aren’t angling to build this into more, I am.”
Her heart shook as her mind flashed back to their first night together.
He was in love with her. And he wanted more.
Oh, God. He loved her and wanted more. The words played over and over through Harper’s head. A part of her wanted to climb into his arms, curl up and purr. But she couldn’t get past the snarling fear in her belly.
“We had fun, Diego. Great sex. Good times. But it’s different now. It’s not just me. I’m not a single woman. I have priorities...” she said. His scowl stopped the rest of her words before they left her lips.
“Get real. You think I don’t care about that kid? I’d step away if my being around hurt him, if I was a reminder. A source of PTSD. But you closed that door when you said my involvement wouldn’t hurt him.” His scowl softened for a moment as he looked at Nathan, cruising through his happy dreams with his kitten. “I care about that kid too much to let you shut me out of his life. Not even if you and I are done.”
That self-assured arrogance was exactly what she wanted to hear. It was the perfect fit for the last piece of the puzzle that made up the image in her mind of the life she wanted. The life she hadn’t let herself dream about until Diego.
He stepped closer, his fingers cupping her chin, tilting her face higher so he could stare into her eyes.
“So, here’s the thing. I am head over heels in love with you.”
Her heart jumped again, pleasure pouring through her.
“But I’m a SEAL.”
Harper blinked, frowning as that pleasure changed to confusion. “What does that have to do with anything? I already know you’re a SEAL.”
“I told you once that I wasn’t open to a relationship and never would be. I changed my mind.” And he didn’t exactly look thrilled about it. “But I won’t, I refuse to, change being a SEAL. You’ve seen for yourself the risks that go with that, and I won’t lie. Kidnapping an innocent kid, it sucks, but it’s nothing compared to what we usually face.”
Harper nodded, her heart pounding faster, this time with fear. He’d never be a safe man to love. “You live a dangerous life,” she acknowledged.
“I’m one of the best. I’m trained by the best. I’m good now—I’ll be better tomorrow. It’s what I do.”
Desire, always present when Diego was around, curled hotter in her belly. God, that arrogance was sexy. “So why is that a problem?” she asked, trying to focus on the matter at hand and not on jumping him. “Do you think I’m afraid? That I can’t handle the reality of what you do? That I can’t accept the secrets that you keep?”
She should be insulted by either option. But she wasn’t. She’d almost seen her worst nightmare come true. She knew what it was like to live with the terror of losing her heart.
“Hell, no. I think you’re the bravest woman I know. You have a strength that humbles me. Enough strength to face what I do, and to accept not knowing the details.” He shook his head and gave a low laugh. “It really isn’t an issue with you? My being a SEAL?”
“No more than my being a mom who is an interior decorator is an issue for you.”
She saw the kiss coming a heartbeat before he took her mouth. It was a heady, wild dance that sent passion spiking through her system with its needy edges and tugging demands. Harper pressed tight against his body, wanting his strength, reveling in his power.
“So?” he asked, his words low and husky when he lifted his head.
Harper could only stare as her mind swirled on the delighted waves of pleasure. It took a few moments for his word to sink in, but she still didn’t get the question.
“So, what?”
“So what are you going to do about me being head over heels in love with you?”
Suddenly she felt as if her whole world was shining a little brighter. “Well, you are a god in bed,” she admitted, sliding her palms up the hard breadth of his chest and reveling in the fact that this didn’t have to be the last time. “And you’re a true hero, even if you don’t want to believe you are. Added to that, you make me feel pretty amazing.”
“And?”
“And, as good as you make me feel, that’s probably not enough.” Harper pressed her palm against his stubbled cheek, delighting in the rough contrast of his strength and her softness. “But when you add the fact that Nathan adores you, and I love you, then things get a little more complicated.”
His eyes lit up, but he didn’t smile. Not yet.
“And?”
“And...” Harper rubbed her lips against Diego’s and tried not to cry at the intensity of her feelings. “I guess I’d better keep you.”
Diego’s arms wrapped tight around her, pulling her close to the hard warmth of his body. “I guess that makes me a winner.”
* * * * *
Look for the next exciting SEAL Brotherhood Novel featuring Lieutenant Elijah Prescott, when CALL TO ENGAGE goes on sale in July 2017.
And for more from New York Times bestselling author Tawny Weber look for a sexy SEAL story on sale in June 2017 from Harlequin Blaze.
Read on for a special
SEAL Brotherhood Novella
bonus prequel
from Tawny Weber
NIGHT MANEUVERS
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER ONE
“AND THAT, MY FRIENDS, is how it’s done.”
With a cocky grin and a cockier salute, Chief Petty Officer Aaron Ward flipped his empty shot glass into the air, caught it upside down and placed it with the others on the tower already stacked on the table.
Across from him, blurry eyed with a slack expression, his opponent reached for his shot of tequila. He overshot the distance by a few inches and lost his balance. With the speed and dexterity they were know
n for, one of the SEALs on the team opposite Aaron slid a chair under his wavering teammate.
“Concede?” Elijah Prescott asked from his position at the head of the table. Deemed the fairest of them all by most of the personnel at Coronado Naval Base, the majority of SEAL Team 7 and the entirety of Poseidon, the lieutenant was their usual go-to referee.
Half the bodies in the Officers Club surrounded the table, forming a wall of testosterone with a random nod to estrogen sprinkled here and there. There wasn’t much that offered more off-duty entertainment than the friendly rivalry between SEAL Team 7 and Poseidon. Although, as plenty had pointed out, every member of Poseidon was on SEAL Team 7 themselves.
The brass deemed the healthy competition to be beneficial, and a lot of the sailors on base who weren’t in Special Forces saw it as inspiration. The SEALs, those who were and those who weren’t Poseidon, saw it as just one more way to train.
That was what they did.
They trained to be the best.
There was a lot to be said for being the best.
With that in mind, Prescott reached over to tap the still-untouched tequila shot and asked again, “Concede or not? Time, it is a-wasting.”
Petty Officer Brett “Chug-a-Lug” Samson tried to reach for the glass again, but only managed to lift his hand about three inches before his eyes rolled back. Laughter rang through the low-roofed building as the man slid off his chair, into a puddle under the table.
Prescott bent at the waist to peer at Samson, then rose to his full six feet two inches. He made a show of pointing both hands toward Aaron.
“The winner and still reigning champion, Team Poseidon,” Prescott declared with a wicked grin. “That’s twelve face-offs out of twelve.”
“And that, my friends, proves that there is nothing that we’re not the best at.” The room exploded in groans and applause as Aaron took his bow.
“Bullshit,” someone muttered. Aaron glanced at Mike Borden, noting the guy’s face was a study of frustration. “There’s got to be something.”
“Well, Lieutenant, let’s see,” Jared Lansky mused from his spot at the bottle-laden table next to the jukebox. With an arrogant tip of his beer, he leaned back so the chair rested at that perfect tipping point on its rear legs. “That’s pool, track and poker. We’ve nailed rock climbing, para-targeting and a dance off. Beer guzzling, weight lifting, sharpshooting, the trivia trifecta and now tequila shots. What else did we beat everyone at? Oh, yeah, who could eat the most pizzas. What’s next on the list?”
“How about a bake off?” someone called from the other side of the room.
“Got that covered. Powers grew up in the restaurant biz, did his first tour as a culinary specialist on a sub. He can cook the hell out of anything from five-alarm chili to turducken to oh-la-la éclairs.”
Mixed in with joking recommendations of just exactly what should be done with turducken were suggestions of which arena they should compete in next. While that raged around him, Aaron took a seat. He figured he did it with a lot more grace than Samson had, but with far too many shots of tequila swimming in his head, he couldn’t be sure.
While the debate raged on, Diego Torres snagged the deck of cards, shuffled and dealt four hands of poker. He tossed a twenty into the center of the table, snapped up one of the hands of cards and waited for three others to pony up. Aaron debated for a few seconds, considered his chances of winning in his condition, then dug some cash out of his pocket. A pair of tens and two more twenties joined the one on the table, with Aaron, Prescott and Lansky snagging hands at random.
“Bet’s to you, Bulldog,” Torres said after a glance at his cards.
Aaron eyed the hand of crap he’d pulled, shot a quick glance at the other three faces and, reading exactly what he’d expect on them—nothing—tossed another twenty in the pile. He might have a lousy hand, but he’d won with worse.
“And that, my friends, is how you win,” he murmured four minutes later as he laid down three ladies and a pair of aces.
Lansky tossed his cards onto the table and shook his head.
“You’re on a roll, Bulldog. Me? My luck is sucking big-time tonight,” he muttered. “I should ditch this and head for Olive Oyl’s. Good-looking women, loud music. Just the ticket.”
“Not like you’d have any better luck with women, Lansky. At least, not the way I hear it,” Brandon Ramsey said from his spot at the next table. The image of relaxation, the tall blond lieutenant had propped his four-legged wooden chair to recline against the wall and leaned back with his head resting in his hands and one booted foot propped on the other knee. “Can’t say as I’ve seen you step up for any of these competitions, either. Twelve men on Poseidon and, what? Seven of you have done all the heavy lifting. Gotta wonder what that says about your qualification process.”
“Haven’t you been beaten enough yet, Ramsey?” Torres asked, not taking his eyes off his cards. “You really want to battle wits with MacGyver here? He’ll fry your ass.”
Not even a gallon of tequila could dull the senses to the waves of hostility bouncing between the tables. Before it could explode into anything more than a few hard glares and cursing, a man moved between the tables.
“Now that you mention it, Ramsey, I haven’t stepped up to compete myself. Do you think my qualifications might be lacking?” Lieutenant Commander Nic Savino stood like an avenging angel for his team. Spiked black hair, obsidian eyes and sharp features echoed the blade-sharp edge in his voice.
“No, sir. Of course not,” Ramsey said, his words as conciliatory as his smile.
“I didn’t think so.”
Aaron grinned at Savino’s tone. The man had one hell of a way with the verbal eye roll.
“Gentlemen, if you’ve finished playing, we have a matter to discuss.”
As one, the seven members of Poseidon who were in the room came to attention. They didn’t stand, they didn’t salute, but all of them gave Savino one hundred percent of their focus. Everyone in listening distance quieted, all wanting to hear as much of the discussion as possible.
Savino had that effect.
As ranking member of Poseidon under Savino, Torres took the lead.
“Sir?” he asked, his voice lightly accented with the same hint of Mexico apparent in his dark features. The sharp spikes of barbed wire and the base of a trident were visible beneath the rolled edge of his shirtsleeve. A gang tattoo, Aaron knew. One Diego had changed to represent his service after he’d joined the SEALs. What the man hadn’t changed, though, was his devotion to brotherhood. His belief in the sanctity of the team. And the strongest handle on temper Aaron had ever seen.
“Word just came down. There’s a new civilian public affairs specialist. She has a hankering to create a special campaign to celebrate the SEALs’ fifty-fifth birthday. A big splash outlining the SEALs’ achievements over the years, their skills and renown. In our interest, she wants to do a PR piece highlighting Poseidon.”
Mutters and derisive laughter skittered around the room. While the SEALs had gotten a lot of press over the past few years—movies, books, write-ups—as a whole, the men preferred their oath of anonymity. They didn’t fight for fame, they fought for their country.
“We don’t want PR and we do all of our liaising on the field of battle,” Torres pointed out, tapping his cards on the table.
“That’s what I said.” Savino nodded. “That preference was noted and dismissed. Orders are to comply with the interview.”
The mutters took on an angry edge. Public relations, publicity, public forms of attention, they were all against the motto most of these men lived by.
“‘I do not advertise the nature of my work, nor seek recognition for my actions,’” Aaron muttered, quoting the SEAL ethos.
“I agree.” The moment Savino lifted his hand, the room quieted. Settled. “But we’ve
all been given unappetizing orders before. We all know how to swallow our objections, to move past any issues and do the job we’re assigned to do.”
“Some versions of unappetizing are uglier than others,” Lansky said, rat-a-tat-tatting his hands on the table in a nervous staccato.
“Only the ones we’re not trained for,” Prescott reminded him. “Which, let’s face it, this would qualify for. Nobody on the team worked in PA. We’re warriors. Not puppets.”
“I’ll do it,” Ramsey offered, his pretty-boy smile flashing with movie-star glam.
“There ya go. Let Hollywood do it.” Aaron figured he’d be good at it. The guy had the looks, charm and a mile-deep line of bullshit that’d easily bury a reporter.
“Yeah, be sure they take photos, too. Ramsey needs something else to add to his personal scrapbook,” Prescott joked without lifting his eyes from the sketch pad he’d been doodling on since the contest had ended. Within seconds, he tore off the sheet he’d drawn on and tossed it onto the middle of the table. The paper fluttered down to cover the pile of bills that made up the current poker pot, with Ramsey’s face grinning off the page in charcoal.
The quick sketch showed the SEAL posing in shorts and combat boots, his T-shirt covered with medals and arms lifted to show bulging biceps. His pretty-boy features were exaggerated, the smile gleaming with tiny stars. At his feet were a series of bowing figures, a couple with notepads and pen and the others with cameras.
“Rock on, Rembrandt,” Ramsey said, snagging the sketch and laughing. “You captured my best side.”
“Best side is the one you sit on,” Lansky muttered, tossing his cards on the table. “Weren’t you listening? This PR expert is looking for someone in Poseidon. That ain’t you, Ramsey.”
Ramsey’s smile didn’t change, but his eyes went ice-cold. It wasn’t news that the guy was having trouble adjusting. Used to being the shining star of every force he’d served on, Ramsey didn’t much like that Poseidon’s rep was almost on par with DEVGRU. Poseidon was made up exclusively of twelve men who’d come out of BUD/S class together a decade ago. All twelve served among SEAL Team 7’s various platoons, putting in extra training, extra studying, extra time together in their off hours with a single goal. To be the very best. Their mission was known only to them, their focus broad and well defined. Ramsay had no part in all this.
