Insta-crush was probably an understatement. Puppy love? Worship? Maybe a little of all three. He was like catnip—utterly irresistible even when you knew he might not be good for you. He was so far out of her league, but she convinced herself that he’d seen something in her.
When he wasn’t at the base, he was with her. For three incredible weeks.
Her brother tried to warn her, but she was twenty-two and thought she knew everything. She really believed that she and John had a special connection.
She was so certain of their connection right up to the point that she saw him on the beach—at that same BBQ where the picture had been taken—with not one but two women.
As she’d said, player with a capital “P.”
Hurt, humiliated, and knowing she couldn’t stay there any longer, Brittany had gone to her brother’s room to write him a good-bye note. She hadn’t meant to spy, but the paper was right there on his desk. It had “confidential” stamped all over it, which basically made it like catnip, too. Brandon was being transferred to Hawaii and recruited for some kind of secret SEAL team.
Her brother had come in before she could finish reading it and accused her of spying on him to get her job back. Furious that he would think that of her, she’d lashed out at him, telling him that at least she hadn’t lied and betrayed her entire family, including their dead parents. He started to say something. Thought better of it. And then told her maybe it was better if she left.
They hadn’t seen each other or done more than exchange a yearly phone call since that day. She should have done something. Shouldn’t have let it go on that long. But she was stubborn, and now . . . was it possible that it wasn’t too late?
Thanks to the picture, she had a way to find out.
Four
John resisted the urge to fish his phone out of the trash bin he’d tossed it in for a good three hours. Now, twenty-four hours later, with the account restored and still with no response, he could finally throw it back in again and congratulate himself on a job well done. His answers to her photo question must have convinced her of his—Brand’s—identity, and she’d taken his warning to heart.
He would be celebrating more if he didn’t feel so bad about lying to her about Brand being alive. He was only trying to protect her, but he doubted Brittany would see it that way when she learned the truth. He hoped to be a long way away when that happened. Preferably on an op on the other side of the world.
Who was he fooling? Antarctica wouldn’t be far enough. She’d track him down and kill him—which he probably deserved.
Well, he might have to pay the piper one day, but fortunately, that day would not be today. Today he’d gotten rid of her, which was plenty of reason to celebrate. John was doing his best to do exactly that while sitting at the bar of his favorite hangout with a few of his housemates, waiting for Marta. He’d promised her a makeup date after having to cut their sauna party short the other night.
But he might have been going at the celebrating a little hard and had a few too many of Alexi’s vodka shots. Most of the bar had had too many of Alexi’s vodka shots. Their group had grown with every chorus of cheers. But the next time his housemate yelled out a toast in Russian (they never seemed to be the same—they could be toasting goats for all he knew), John lifted a pint glass of beer instead.
He was pretty buzzed, but not too buzzed to notice that itchy feeling at the back of his neck.
Someone was watching him.
He did a quick scan of the bar, his eyes snagging on that someone immediately. A woman was standing by the door staring at him in wonder and disbelief. He was used to expressions like that on women, but this wasn’t that kind of wonder.
He blinked, trying to clear his vodka-hazed vision. He must be more drunk than he realized, because she sure as hell looked like . . .
Their eyes met, and shock punched him in the gut. He caught the flash of emotion behind the trying-to-be-unflattering-but-doing-a-piss-poor-job glasses and knew he wasn’t imagining anything. Thick, wavy chestnut-brown hair, big baby-blue eyes, skin like fucking powder sprinkled with a few freckles across her nose, pretty, girl-next-door features, tight, curvy little body . . .
His spine went rigid. No mistake.
He cursed again with disbelief, trying to think of a way to ward off what he knew was an impending disaster. But there wasn’t time. The impending disaster was heading his way with a very determined, don’t-even-think-about-trying-to-put-me-off expression on her face.
Brittany had changed. It wasn’t just the five years that had taken her from twenty-two and still part girl to twenty-seven and definitely all woman; it was also the hardness of her expression. She’d always been determined, but the last time he’d seen her there had been some vulnerability and lingering innocence—even with everything that had happened to her. That wasn’t there anymore. The same thing happened to guys on the Teams. It was part life, part experience, and part disappointment that came with a little too much reality.
He missed that softness. But maybe it was a good thing it was gone. He figured that was what had attracted him so intensely to her. It wasn’t that she wasn’t pretty—she was—but she wasn’t his usual type. The Barbie Brigade had been aptly named. Brittany had stunning blue eyes and plenty of curves, but she had chestnut-colored hair—not blond—and stood about a foot shorter than him. She was also too girl-next-door wholesome. Messing around with someone like that . . . it wasn’t right.
Unfortunately, one big mind-of-its-own part of him hadn’t agreed.
The bar was small, so it didn’t take her long to cross the distance to his stool. He could see the questions and anger in her eyes.
She opened her mouth.
God only knew what kind of insults and accusations she was about to hurl at him, but he couldn’t let anyone hear them. He had to shut her up before she blew his cover.
He did the only thing he could think of to do. Leaning forward, he caught her around the waist and pulled her in tight against him. He was mostly leaning on the stool, and she slid right between his legs.
“What are you—” was as far as she got before his mouth closed over hers. He kissed her hard. He knew how good she was at talking—and giving him hell—and he wasn’t going to give any of those words a chance to escape.
He filled her mouth with his tongue just to make sure.
Oh, shit. Not good. Too good. He remembered this. He remembered the flood of heat. The tight feeling that came over his entire body. The drowning buzz in his ears that made everything else around him disappear. The way she tasted. Warm and sweet with the faint tinge of the butterscotch Life Savers that he used to tease her about chewing. They were supposed to be sucked.
Damn it, not a great word to think about right now. It made him think of sucking her tongue deeper into his mouth and swirling it around slowly with his own. Tasting every corner and every sweet crevice. God, he really loved butterscotch.
It made him think of another kind of sucking, too.
Really wrong. But too right to stop.
He groaned as his hand slid through her hair to cup the back of her head. It was clipped up in some kind of knot, but enough strands had slipped out to tell him that it was every bit as silky as he remembered. He’d thought he’d been exaggerating it in his mind, but no—he groaned again as he dug a little deeper to pull her head in closer—it was feathery soft and flowed between his fingers like a satin waterfall.
She’d frozen in shock initially, but it didn’t take long for that first crack in the ice to appear. Her response was tentative at first. A tiny moan. The softening of her mouth and opening of her lips a little wider. The melting of her body into his as the stiffness left her shoulders, spine, and limbs. The slight movement of her tongue against his.
Oh fuck, yes! You’d think she’d jumped on top of him with the roar of satisfaction that surged through him. He’d never
been so happy to have a woman kiss him back. Which maybe wasn’t that surprising, since this was the first time he could remember that it had even been a question.
The crack in the ice turned into a chasm as her response grew bolder and more passionate. She was full-on kissing him back now, circling her tongue against his with every bit of the frenzy and hunger that he was experiencing.
It was a heady combination. One that was quickly making him lose all sense of reality. Just like last time. He hadn’t wanted to stop then either. All he could think about was sinking in deeper, tasting her deeper, making every second last.
She’d wrapped her hands around his neck, and her soft breasts were pressing into his chest. He slid a hand down to her waist, needing to feel her against him. He was hard and throbbing, and the subtle friction wasn’t enough.
He wanted to pull her onto his lap, wrap her legs around his waist, and sink in deep, right here in the middle of the . . .
Bar.
Fuck. When he pulled back suddenly—maybe a little harshly—he wasn’t the only one reeling.
She blinked up at him with a hazy look in her eyes that sent the surge of need racing harder through his body. He had to grit his teeth against the urge to pull her back into his arms and keep that haze in her eyes.
The glance that passed between them was of shared shock. A consensus of What the hell just happened?
It wasn’t a question he wanted to answer. Not here. Not now. Not ever.
Before she could say anything, he stood, threw a few bills down on the bar, told the bartender to call them a ride, grabbed her by the hand, and led her out of there. He could feel the stares of his friends and housemates, but he would answer the questions later.
They stood outside in silence, not even looking at each other as they waited for the cab. It didn’t take long, but it was long enough for the shock to wear off and be replaced by something easier to think about: anger.
By the time he was opening the door to his house, John was furious. What was she doing here? How had she found him? And what part of “danger” hadn’t been clear?
It took a lot to rile him up, but she’d done it without a fucking word.
* * *
• • •
He’d been trying to shut her up. That was why John had kissed her. For a moment she’d thought . . .
Idiot.
Brittany didn’t trust herself to look at him, fearing that he might catch a glimpse of her stupidity. That he might somehow read her mind and guess exactly what she’d thought. That for one deluded moment, when he’d pulled her into his arms and kissed her, she’d thought she’d walked into her own Hallmark movie. The kind where everything is a misunderstanding and at the very end they realize they were made for each other. The kind where for five years he’d been thinking about her and regretted pushing her away, and now that she’d found him again, they were going to live happily ever after. That kind of movie.
You know, fiction.
She didn’t understand it. Brittany had never been a fairy-tale kind of girl. She didn’t like chick flicks, didn’t read romances, and thought words like “destiny,” “fate,” and “soul mate” set women (and maybe a few unusually sensitive men) up for a lot of disappointment. It wasn’t a feminist statement as much as learned cynicism.
But for that one fraction of a heartbeat, when he’d looked into her eyes and pulled her into his arms, she’d been Cinderella, Snow White, and every naive princess in between who believed in “one true love” carrying them away to happiness.
It was disconcerting how an independent woman who’d been on her own for a long time, who liked being on her own, could turn into a starry-eyed romantic in the blink of an eye.
The blink of a very sexy blue eye attached to a man who’d gotten even better looking—as if he needed to—in the five years since she’d seen him last.
Yep, Mr. Good Times, aka “Dynomite” as her brother called him, was still in prime form. The center of the party, surrounded by women, and jaw-droppingly gorgeous even with the lumberjack scruff and long hair. The Viking look wasn’t easy to pull off—even in Finland—but he somehow managed to make it sexy as hell. Hello, Thor.
He’d beefed up in the handful of years since she’d seen him, but from the feel of that rock-hard chest against hers, it was 100 percent grade A muscle.
Of course it was. His body had always been a temple— with plenty of worshipping going on.
It had been a long day, and Brittany wasn’t in the mood for John Donovan and his masculine perfection. Everything was always so easy for him. Even in Finland everyone liked him, apparently. Let him dazzle one of the women who’d been hanging on him in the bar when she’d arrived with his good-time-surfer-boy—or, in his case, water-polo-player—charm.
She didn’t have the patience for it. Not only was she exhausted from hours of travel—could he have picked a more hard-to-get-to, out-of-the-way place?—but she’d better hope there weren’t a lot of storms in her future, as she’d had to use up most of her “rainy day” savings for the last-minute ticket after her boss had refused to pay for it. She was on her own here, with everything—literally—on the line. Job. Reputation. Ability to pay bills.
Was it any surprise that he’d caught her off guard with that kiss?
If only she could convince herself that travel weariness and fears of looming poverty were to blame. But John Donovan had an uncanny ability to make her feel vulnerable in a way she didn’t like.
She’d marched across the bar, intending to get answers, and he’d pulled the rug out from under her with that kiss. A kiss that wasn’t some kind of romantic moment at the end of a movie, but a kiss to shut her up.
That it had worked so thoroughly—so easily—only made her angrier. She stewed in that anger as the car took them wherever he was taking her—she assumed his apartment. Which was ironic, given the last time they were alone together he couldn’t wait to get her out of his room . . .
Brittany paced back and forth across the attic-turned- bedroom, pausing every now and then to peer out one of the windows to see if the sound of a car was the one she was waiting for.
But maybe John wouldn’t be driving? He’d been drinking heavily before she left. Too heavily. More heavily than she’d ever seen him drink before. Tequila—not beer.
Did that mean something? Was that why he’d done—her heart caught—that?
Tears clogged her throat and raw eyes, threatening to spill again.
She wasn’t mistaken in what she’d seen, but maybe there was an explanation. Such as whether the brother she hardly knew anymore had interfered.
Earlier tonight, she had gone down to the beach. It had been a little later than she’d planned, and the bonfire was already jam-packed with people. The guys had a Saturday night off from training, and they were taking full advantage.
She had to admit seeing a dozen good-looking, built guys in one place took some getting used to. She wasn’t used to so much testosterone flowing around and didn’t think she would ever get over the little primitive flutter of awareness that went through her.
But there was only one guy she wanted to see. She couldn’t wait to find John and tell him her news. She’d followed his suggestion and gone downtown to speak with one of the free local papers—one with a liberal bent that didn’t dismiss her claim of a cover-up out of hand—and they were willing to give her a shot. It wouldn’t be much at first, but it was a start.
She was back in the game. Not even four weeks after, she’d been fired and it had seemed as if her career was over. And she had John to thank for it.
She rose onto her tiptoes, trying to look over the crowd—there must have been forty people here tonight—but didn’t see him right away. She saw her brother standing in a circle with a few of his other SEAL friends off to the side near the barbecue, but no John.
She frowned, thinking it str
ange. John usually took control of the barbecue. He hailed from one of the “culinary meccas” (his words) of the world, the San Francisco Bay Area, and took his food preparation and selection seriously.
Only Brittany knew the reason why. Before she’d died from breast cancer, John’s mom had been a sous chef for one of the most important chefs in modern culinary history—Alice Waters of Chez Panisse and “California cuisine” fame.
Brittany tucked that little nugget of knowledge back in her heart, where it had taken up residence when he’d shared it with her. That and the knowledge of how horrible his mom’s death had been. John had told her how he’d spent his senior year of high school in a vigil by her hospital bedside. Brittany would bet what money she had that she was the only person he’d ever confided in about that—including her brother.
Brandon was wrong.
Her mind turned to the conversation she’d had with her brother the day before. John did care about her. What they had was different. They’d connected right from the start.
She grinned. No one was more surprised than her. The gorgeous golden boy Navy SEAL with “Hermione,” as Brandon liked to call her for her supposed resemblance to the actress in the Harry Potter movies, didn’t exactly fit.
Brittany wrinkled her nose. She supposed she could see it, but she wasn’t sure it was flattering for someone who wanted to be thought of as sexy.
She headed down to the beach, thinking that maybe John was watching the waves as he liked to do—as they both liked to do—when she stopped in her tracks.
He wasn’t down by the beach. He was sitting in a low beach chair in front of the fire. The shirt was unmistakable. No one else would wear a Hawaiian shirt that loud and ugly—especially with plaid board shorts.
She just hadn’t seen him right away because someone was sitting on his lap. Not just someone—it was Candice O’Reilly. Her twin sister, Barbara, who was never far behind, was sitting on the arm of the chair. Candy and Barbie were just as sweet, beautiful, and vacuous as their nicknames suggested. They had a thing for SEALs and hung out at Danny’s Palm Bar in Coronado—a favorite SEAL hangout—but this was the first time Brittany had seen them at one of the beach parties. They’d made no secret that they thought John was “hot,” but John had never taken them up on their subtle—or not-so-subtle—invitation(s). He usually stayed away from “frog hogs,” as the women who targeted SEALs to sleep with them were known.