The Lone Warriors
Daniel Banner
Copyright © 2018 by Daniel Banner
Edited by Nancy Felt
Proofreading by Sadie Coleman
Cover by Steven Novak
Formatted by EmmaKaite Coleman
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Any resemblance to persons dead or living is entirely coincidental.
Created with Vellum
To anyone who has ever fought for freedom. You have always been this fireman’s heroes.
Contents
Creed — The Stealth Warrior
Blaine — The Found Warrior
Jace — The Fearless Warrior
Maddox — The Diehard Warrior
Baron — The Honest Warrior
Logan — The Rogue Warrior
Navy SEAL Romance Series
Acknowledgments
Also by Daniel Banner
About the Author
Creed — The Stealth Warrior
Creed Hawk stared at the computer screen in disbelief. His girlfriend, Kiera, had done it. She was living her dream and in six days would be on the biggest stage in all of dance, competing on the finale of America’s Got Talent: Just Dance. And while she was on stage, performing for the world, Creed would be …
Not by her side and not cheering louder than anyone in there. Not even watching on TV. Creed would be elbows deep in the biggest mission of his SEAL career. What kind of boyfriend left his girl hanging like that? He simultaneously felt like celebrating and punching something.
From day one as a SEAL he’d known there would be sacrifices. He had sacrificed sleep, food, and comfort every day of BUD/S training. And for years to come, he’d miss holidays and special events when deployed, but the chances of the woman he loved being on a world stage this big were next to none. If she won, she’d have her choice of career paths, movies, late-night show spotlights, whatever she wanted, but this one moment would be the biggest of her career, and instead of losing his voice as he cheered for her, he was 7,000 miles away on a U.S. military base in Kuwait.
Logan and Maddox came into the day room. Logan’s head was down, looking at some papers he held in his hand. He had a somber look on his face, drawing Creed’s attention away from his own crisis for a moment. Soon the other guys would be here and they would all want their turns with one of the two computers. Creed could find out then what was bugging Logan so bad.
Creed brought his attention back to the monitor and started drafting his reply to Kiera.
That’s so great!
Blah. It didn’t even begin to describe how he felt. He deleted it.
I’m the proudest boyfriend in the world right now!!!!!
That seemed like too many exclamation points. He left them for now, but reserved the right to kill some later.
Wish, I could be there.
“Well, duh,” he muttered. “Pathetically obvious.”
It’s destroying me to not be there.
Better.
Maddox appeared on the other side of the monitor. “Whatcha working on? Looks pretty serious.”
“She rocked it. Finals are in six days.”
“Cool,” said Logan. “So why do you look like she just told you her dog died?”
Creed let out a breath and leaned back in his chair. “It’s … I … What kind of boyfriend am I? I should be voting ten thousand times for her.” He flicked his thumb against his leg. “I can’t even watch her performance.”
“Okay,” said Maddox, “First of all, you’re only allowed to vote ten times per voting method, and I doubt 30 votes is going to push her over the edge.”
It didn’t surprise Creed that Maddox had pulled out that little piece of trivia; Maddox’s head was full of the most random bits of information. Logan was studying Creed a little too closely for his comfort. “Voting isn’t the point,” said Creed to Maddox. “It’s about the handsomest man in America supporting her.”
Maddox elevated an eyebrow. “Sad for her I’m not in America.”
“Just come around here and put that Communications degree to good use for once. I need a diplomatic—no, a heartfelt—way to tell her that I support her, but I won’t be watching because we’re going up against the worst that ISIS can throw at us within the next couple of days.”
Maddox grinned and made his way around the computer desk to Creed’s side. “You sure you want my help? I’m the only one of this sorry bunch who doesn’t have some poor woman waiting for me at home.” He started reading over Creed’s shoulder.
“Wait,” said Logan, staring blankly ahead.
Looking at Logan, Creed said, “The wheels in your head are spinning so fast I see smoke coming out of your ears.”
“Don’t send that email. You gotta hear this first. No wait, I gotta get the other guys.” Logan fled the room with the idea light bulb still hovering over his head, leaving Creed and Maddox confused and staring awkwardly at each other.
In less than a minute, Logan came back in, with Blaine, Baron, and Jace. The six SEALs shared this day room and the attached dormitory. Few people outside the SEALs realm would understand the close bond Creed and his fellow team members shared. They were his brothers. Almost as close to him as his three blood brothers. Thankfully the other mighty Hawk brothers were safe in the good old US of A.
Typical of any brother, he knew his SEAL brothers fed on giving each other crap. And he could smell the conspiracy, they were ganging up on him and it was going to get ugly.
Maddox asked, “What’s up, Logan?”
“Oh, you can leave,” Logan told him. “You’re the only one who doesn’t have to be here.”
Maddox made a face, and plopped down on a folding chair. “You don’t have to rub salt in the wound,” he grumbled.
“Okay, guys.” Logan looked like he was about to make a presentation to a board of directors the day after the stock had dropped a hundred points. He slapped the papers he’d been reading down on the table. “Did you guys see what happened to Team 4?”
The room grew serious. Apparently they’d heard. Creed didn’t know the details, but said, “They lost two men.” He didn’t know their families, but Creed felt a twist in his gut for what they must be going through.
“Evans and Silva,” added Maddox.
“The After Action Report just dropped,” said Logan. “Anyone read it?”
Baron grunted in the affirmative, but the rest of them shook their heads.
Logan continued. “Silva had a girl back home. Proposed to her a couple of weeks before the mission.”
Logan paused and Creed could tell it was hard for him to talk about. None of them liked dwelling on missions gone wrong, and especially not when SEALs lost their lives.
Creed put his head down and shook it slowly. During the seconds of silence, Creed considered how similar his situation was. The upcoming mission was riskier than anything he’d ever done, and he needed to figure out the situation with Kiera before deploying.
“How did the girlfriend take it?” asked Jace.
Logan shrugged.
Creed corrected him. “Fiancée. Not girlfriend.”
“She’s on suicide watch,” said Baron. “It’s not in the report.”
Creed didn’t bother to ask Baron how he knew. As the intelligence expert, Baron liked to know as much as he could about everything.
“That poor girl,” said Logan. There was silence as all th
e guys absorbed that information and what that meant for them and their loved ones personally.
Logan continued. “Brings me to my next point. That report shook me, guys. I know he had good intentions, but it just feels wrong what Silva did to that poor girl. I think we should cut all ties with home.” He cleared his throat. “Specifically with our girls.”
“No way!” said Creed, realizing Blaine had said the same words in unison and risen to his feet.
“Forget about it,” added Blaine.
Maddox chuckled, a welcome break in the solemn room. His girlfriend had broken up with him a couple weeks earlier because she was tired of “always being left behind.” He said, “That is so like you, Logan. All predictable and by the rules most of the time, then off on a wild tangent like this. Well, on the bright side, I’ll no longer be the only one without a girl.”
Creed’s stomach pitched as he shot Maddox an annoyed look. He didn’t know what had crawled up Logan’s jockey shorts, but no way was he gonna cut Kiera out of his life. He’d loved her since they were teenagers.
“You go ahead, Logan, but you’re not taking me down with you,” said Blaine. He had a façade of coolness, but Creed knew him well enough to know that the idea would light a fire under the surface. “I found the perfect woman and I’m not letting her go.”
Maddox rolled his eyes. “Blaine, you’ve known her for two weeks!”
“This isn’t a wild tangent,” Logan interjected. “This is real life, not some Disney movie.”
“What was the last Disney movie you saw?” asked Maddox. “They aren’t all happily ever after now.”
“Oh, so you’re now the expert on Disney movies?” Blaine shot back, apparently smarting from Maddox’s jab about him only knowing his woman for two weeks.
Creed noticed that Jace and Baron were silent. That was normal for Baron, who always liked to gather more intel than he gave. Jace on the other hand, always had a dryly humorous comment, and he’d passed on plenty of chances to take a jab. It was just a matter of time.
Creed asked Baron, “What do you say, your highness?”
Baron rolled his eyes at the nickname. He lifted one shoulder and simply said, “I’m listening.”
“Hear me out,” said Logan, all eyes returning to him. “You guys know my dad was killed overseas. I was ten. It was hard on me, but I’ll never forget what it did to my mom. Yeah, she knew he was a SEAL when she married him. Knew the risks he took on each mission, but it still messed her up.” He looked at each man in silence. “I don’t have to remind you how dangerous this next mission is going to be. You are the baddest sons of guns I’ve ever met and I have no plan of letting ISIS get a piece of any of us, but out of all the missions any of us has ever done, this one is the most likely to go wrong.”
It was true; Creed had felt the weight of the mission since their first briefing. Kiera’s face came into Creed’s mind. Her long dark hair, sparkling deep brown eyes, and smile that made everything in the world better. What would happen to that smile if something did go wrong during the infiltration? What would losing him do to Kiera?
Logan went on. “I’ve been thinking about Jill since we were briefed on the infiltration, wondering how I could go in with a clear conscience. It hit me hard when I heard about Evans and Silva then saw Creed looking like someone just plugged his dog. We can’t do that to them, guys.” He made eye contact with each of them again. “It’s not fair and if we care about them, we need to end it. It will hurt much less that way.”
That hit Creed right in the heart. He did care about Kiera, as much as he cared about anything, right up there with his parents and brothers. None of the guys expected to not make it back, but with every mission it was a possibility, and this one was risky enough to give the SEALs the reputation as the toughest warriors on the planet. Creed couldn’t stand to think for a second about Kiera getting that kind of news. Equally unthinkable was breaking up with her. If he did break up with her and then survived the mission, he could always try to get back together with her. The mission would only be a couple weeks or so. Would she still be there? Would she forgive him?
He tried to divert the issue entirely. “Hey, I just asked Maddox for help telling Kiera I wished I was there to cheer for her, not start an intervention or whatever this is.”
Blaine had his back. Turning away from the conversation, and walking toward the door, he said, “Yeah, you guys have fun with that. I’m out.”
“Wait!” Finally Jace had joined the conversation. “Logan’s right. We should do it. I’m officially aboard the Dear Jane train.”
Something was up with Jace tonight. Jumping onboard so quickly didn’t seem like him. He and Mindy were a happily ever after waiting to happen. Creed had too much on his mind to worry about it right now. Jace’s words were enough to bring Blaine back to the conversation.
Blaine was standing by the door, half facing the guys and half ready to bolt. “Our orders are coming down any day now. Don’t we have more important things to worry about?”
“What could possibly be more important?” said Logan, coming to stand next to Jace. “I know none of us want to talk about it, but what could be more important as far as getting our affairs in order?”
Leave it to Logan to hit hard. Everything else in Creed’s life was ready to go, no matter how the mission turned out. Everything except Kiera.
Maddox was next to move. He stood by Logan and Jace. “I already punched my ticket on the Dear Jane train.”
“She punched her Dear John ticket, you mean,” Blaine countered.
Maddox grunted as a few of the guys hooted.
“No offense, dude, but single guys don’t get a vote,” Blaine added.
Maddox took a small bow. “Hey, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I know you all want to be just like me.”
Blaine made a scoffing sound. “I liked you better when I first met you and you knew how to keep your mouth shut.”
“Logan’s right, though,” Jace said. “I should have thought of it earlier. It’s the only way to move forward with a clear conscience.”
Creed couldn’t believe it, but he found himself sitting on the fence. He was actually considering changing the email right now. “Wait. This is crazy. I can’t break up with her days before the Just Dance finale. That would be … savage.” It would break him if he was in her shoes. Kiera was the only person, besides his mama and his brothers, who truly loved him for him.
“Phew,” said Baron. “It’s about time you found out she made the finals. I’ve been sitting on that intel for twelve hours.”
“All right,” said Blaine, throwing up his hands. “We’ve officially gone off the rails. Baron just referred to a dance show result as intel.”
A few guys chuckled. Creed was confused. “How did you know? I was the first person she emailed after the show.”
Baron smirked. “I knew while she was still on stage crying tears of joy. It’s my job to know things.”
“Back to the point,” said Logan. “This is the genius of breaking up with her. Snail mail turnaround time is seven to thirteen days. You drop it tomorrow, by the time she reads it, the show’s over.”
“That’s brilliant,” agreed Maddox. “We’ll email her tonight with good luck, love you, and blah, blah, blah.”
Creed wanted to smack him. There was no blah, blah, blah to how much he loved Kiera.
“It really is the best way to let her down,” said Logan. “Because it makes it so independent of how the show turns out. She’ll know the breakup was to spare her from suffering and not because of how the finale goes.”
That made some sense to Creed. He loved Kiera, and because of that he knew she deserved better than a guy who couldn’t be there for her. The thought of her having to lose him was too much to bear. He’d end things preemptively and she’d be so ticked at him that if he died, she wouldn’t feel as much pain. Right? And if he survived he’d somehow beg her to forgive him. He smiled. It would take a lot of begging.
> It made perfect sense. The guys were right. It was the only logical solution.
And when it came to matters of the heart, logic didn’t matter a bit.
“I can’t do it,” said Creed. “As much sense as it makes up here,” he tapped his temple, “it just doesn’t feel right.”
The three guys in the center of the room groaned. “I thought we had him,” said Maddox.
Logan was staring deep into Creed’s eyes and Creed could see the fires of his imagination sparking up again. “I’ve got it!” said Logan, snapping his finger. “I know how to make everyone happy.”
“Even the girls?” asked Creed, dubious.
Logan began pacing slowly. He’d gone from boardroom to courtroom, now ready to address a jury. “Okay, so we have no idea what’s going to happen next week, other than us going in and kicking some ISIS butt. There is a chance, no matter how slim, that one or more of us don’t make it back.”
It was much more than a slim chance, but Creed was fine with Logan’s confidence.
“In the unfortunate and unlikely event that something happens, do you want Kiera mourning for a boyfriend, or for an ex-boyfriend?”
Logan had turned and focused intently on Creed. The answer was obvious, but Creed did not want to say it.
“I know you don’t want to think about this,” said Logan, “but after what happened to Silva and his poor woman, we have to consider it. Forget logic and forget your brain, what does your heart say?”
“It would be better if she lost an ex,” Creed admitted.
Logan clapped and pointed a finger at Creed. “So here’s the solution. Write the letter. Don’t send it.” He paused and let the silence seep in to the room. “Yet,” he added sharply.
Creed shook his head. “If something happens, it’ll be too late to send it.”
“That’s the genius of my brilliant plan.” Logan spread his arms. “We write the letters, and give them to someone we trust. If something happens, he drops them in the mail. Voila, our bets are hedged.”
The Lone Warriors: Intro to Navy SEALS Romances 2.0 Page 1
