SEAL's Embrace (2 page)

The lieutenant gazed up into his face, her eyes glazed, her lips parted. Then she blinked and the spell was broken. She glanced down at his hand on her wrist, and her gaze narrowed. “Do you know how wrong this is? Let go.”

Immediately, he released her. “For now. I still want to have coffee with you.”

“No. It’s a bad idea.” She eased back a step.

“Are you afraid of me?”

“No. I’m not afraid of you.” She turned back to the cabinet, fished something out of a drawer and a bottle out of the cabinet above. “Drop your drawers.”

“What?” He frowned. Had he read her wrong? Surely she wasn’t going to…not here…anyone could walk in. His heartbeat quickened.

“You heard me.” She turned toward him, syringe in hand and fire in her eyes. “Drop ’em.”

He held up his hand. “Seriously? You’re giving me a shot for a little cut on my finger?”

“No, for
three
little cuts on your finger.” She tilted her head, her brows rising in challenge. “Are you afraid of me?”

He stared at the syringe she wielded like a weapon. “Frankly, yes.”

“A little penicillin is good for warding off infection. And you, Special Warfare Operator Sanchez are an infection I can’t afford to catch. Turn around and bend over.”

God, he loved it when she bossed him around. He could imagine her ordering him to strip in the bedroom. And he would, one slow item of clothing at a time.

With a deep, calming breath, he performed an about face and dropped his shorts enough for her to jab the needle into his buttocks muscle. The pinprick sting was nothing compared to the swat on the ass she gave him next.

“Now, don’t waste my time again unless you’re really hurt.” She held the door open for him and jerked her head to the side. “Go.”

“All that for
un besito
?” He rubbed his butt as he exited the exam room and returned to the waiting room where Irish stood talking to one of the medical technicians.

“All done?” Irish asked.

“Yeah.” He rubbed his ass, tenderly.

His friend smiled at the technician and fell in step with Caesar. “Well? How’d it go?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” His ass still stung, but no more so than his ego. Lt. Erin McGee had put him firmly in his place, and more or less told him to bug off.

“What’s the matter, Nacho? Did the big bad nurse turn you down?” Irish chuckled. “Don’t tell me you’re giving up?”

“No way.”

Irish clapped a hand to his back. “That’s the spirit! Come on, let’s get some run time in. My mission meter is pinging. I predict we’ll be moving out before the night is over.”

As soon as they exited the hospital, Caesar and Irish broke into a jog, heading for the perimeter to stretch their legs. They didn’t say a word, just ran.

By the time he returned to their quarters, Caesar had come up with a plan to tempt the pretty LT into coffee and more. She’d responded to his kiss, of that he was certain. And where there was smoke, the passion was
muy caliente
.

After the SEAL
left, Erin retreated to the break room for a cup of cool water. Anything to reduce the heat burning inside.

“Crap, crap, crap!” she muttered beneath her breath, tempted to throw the water over her head to reduce the flames Sanchez’s kiss had fanned.

“What’s wrong?” Lt. Tracy Baumer reached around her for a cup of her own and filled it with water before she faced Erin.

“Nothing.” Her cheeks flooded anew with heat and she cursed her inability to tell a lie.

“Yeah. I can see that.” Tracy leaned her back against the counter and sipped from the cup, gaze narrowed over its rim. “Does your nothing have anything to do with the hunky SEAL that just left your examination room?”

Erin tensed. Fraternizing with an enlisted man was strictly forbidden. Especially in theater. But damn it, she needed to vent, and Tracy was her closest friend and knew her secrets. “I don’t need this.”

“Irritation? Flirtation? Frustration?” Tracy said. “Which one?”

“All of the above.” With a sigh, she looked up into Tracy’s eyes. “I can’t lie. I’m attracted to the man.”

“Because he’s a SEAL?”

“No.” She flung her hands in the air. “Yes. Oh, I don’t know.” She paced to the end of the break room and back. “I know better than to fall for a guy I outrank and especially for an egotistical girl-in-every-port kind of man. Been there, done that, have the scars to prove it.”

“You’re not in the same branch of service. He’s not in your chain of command.” Tracy tilted her head. “I don’t see your problem.”

Was she kidding?
“We’re deployed here in Afghanistan. You know the rules. No fraternization. Period. Even if I didn’t outrank him.”

“It happens.” Tracy drank from her cup, her gaze following Erin over the rim.

“Yeah, and people get reprimanded.” Erin rubbed the bridge of her nose, feeling a tension headache coming on. “Last month a woman was sent home for getting caught sleeping with her supervisor. Now she’s out of the Army. Poof!” She snapped her fingers. “Just like that.”

Tracy’s lips twisted. “She was stupid to get caught.”

Erin’s eyes widened. “I can’t believe you, of all people would condone such behavior.”

Tracy grinned. “Women have needs, just like men.”

Her chest tightening, Erin’s lips thinned. “That’s what Matt said.”

“Not all men are like Matt.”

The sad thing was that Erin wanted to believe her friend, but…“Sanchez is a player.”

Tracy planted a fist on her hip. “How do you know?”

“He’s too smooth. Too charming,” Erin responded, ticking the items off on her fingers. “And all that Spanish is…is…smarmy.” Her normal grasp of the English language escaped her when it came to the SEAL. The harder he tried, the weaker she grew.

“I saw Corporal Bradley flirting with him at the front desk.” Trace gave her a narrowed glance. “If you don’t want him, I’m sure she would take him in a heartbeat.”

“See?” Erin flung her hands in the air. “He’s a player.”

“Ha!” Tracy grinned as if she’d caught Erin at a lie. “That’s where you’re wrong. He never once looked at her. The entire time he was at the desk, he was searching for you. He’s been in here three times and every time, he’s only had eyes for you. I know because I watched him.”

Erin didn’t want to hear it. Everything Tracy was saying only made it that much harder for her to resist the man, and she was teetering on the brink as it was. “Why were you watching? Are
you
interested in the SEAL?”

She shrugged. “He’s got a great body and it doesn’t hurt to look. But no, I’m not interested.” Tracy’s shoulders relaxed and she gave Erin a soft smile. “You should give him a chance. Not all men are dicks.”

Erin snorted. “Right, from the woman who has ‘Back Off!’ tattooed across her forehead whenever a man comes near. What about the SEAL they call Irish? He seems to have taken a fancy to you.”

Tracy crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not ready to start something new. My divorce was only final two months ago. And this conversation isn’t about me.”

“No, and I’m sorry. At least I wasn’t married to Matt when he cheated on me.”

Tracy’s lips tightened and she twisted an imaginary ring around her finger as if the weight of her wedding ring was still there. “Yeah, you were lucky to dodge that bullet. Divorce is expensive and emotionally draining.” The nurse pushed back her shoulders. “So, what are you doing about this attraction you’re feeling?”

Fighting it with every fiber of my being and losing terribly.
With a weak smile, Erin raised her hands, palms up. “Nothing. I rotate out of here in two months. I’m thinking of resigning my commission and finding a job at a clinic somewhere in Virginia.”

“And give up flying as part of the team?” Tracy wrapped her arms around Erin and gave her a big hug. “You should give yourself a chance at love, sweetie.”

“But I can’t see that happening if I’m always flying somewhere. I want to find a man whose feet are firmly on the ground and who isn’t gallivanting around the world.”

“Picking up a girl at each stop?”

Erin nodded. “Exactly.”

“I hear ya, girl.” Tracy hugged her again. “In the meantime, a woman has needs. What are you doing about those?”

“I packed my vibrator. And extra batteries. That will be more than enough.”

“Uh huh. Right.” Tracy’s lips quirked. “My vibrator is the single most-used appliance I have and it still isn’t enough. If only men were as reliable as a vibrator. All I have to do is keep new batteries around. The silver bullet goes with me everywhere. But it’s not warm and doesn’t have arms that can wrap around me.”

“That’s perhaps the one thing I miss most about Matt. He was okay in bed. Nothing to get excited about. And a warm body beats a cold vibrator any day.”

Tracy sighed. “Maintaining a relationship when we’re deployed as often as we are is too hard.”

“I know. And only a special man will accept that you’ll be gone.”

“Tell me about it. A man who isn’t afraid of a woman in uniform. One who is loyal to a fault and always glad to see you when you get home.”

Shaking her head, Erin laughed. “We’d probably be better off getting a dog.”

“See? It’s not just me.”

“I know. I’m the pot calling the kettle black.”

Tracy’s brows furrowed. “Aren’t you on call tonight?”

“I am.”

A frown wrinkled her forehead and her friend crossed her arms over her chest. “Then why aren’t you sleeping?”

“My building is too hot. I can’t sleep.”

“Well, things are slowing down now and we don’t need you on the floor, so get out of here and sleep.”

“Why? It’s not like we’ll be going up. Things have been pretty quiet lately.”

Tracy squeezed her eyes shut. “Oh, baby, I hope you didn’t just jinx us.” She glanced around for a wood surface and knocked on it. “Last time you bet we wouldn’t get hit by casualties, we had a mass casualty event when that suicide bomber struck in town.”

“Sorry.” Erin grimaced. “I don’t wish disaster on anyone. The best nights on call are those where we sleep all the way through the shift.” Wishing she’d kept her big mouth shut, Erin knocked on the wooden surface of a desk. “Okay, I’m leaving. Maybe I’ll read awhile in my bunk. It’ll help me calm down and I’ll forget that I need to get laid.”

Tracy smiled. “If you need to get laid, I know a SEAL who’d be more than happy to accommodate you.”

On the way to her quarters, Erin’s thoughts pivoted to that SEAL who’d stolen a single kiss.
Damn him to hell
. If he hadn’t managed to catch her off guard, that would never have happened.

Yeah, right.

The devil on her shoulder snorted, telling her that she’d wanted it from the first visit she’d tended him at the sick call clinic. At that time, she hadn’t realized he’d cut his finger on purpose. And then he’d done it two more times, which was stupid, and kinda cute at the same time. What moron cut himself just to see a girl?

One Hispanic SEAL named Caesar Sanchez with brown-black hair and eyes so dark they were almost black. Top that with his broad muscular chest and a rash of tattoos across his biceps and shoulder blades, and he had too-hot-to-handle written all over him. He was the kind of man her mother warned her about when she’d first entered the military.

Hadn’t she learned not to fall for a man in the military? Captain Matthew Callahan had taught her that much. A larger-than-life F-16 pilot, he’d swooped in, wooed her, taken her to bed while he’d been screwing another woman at a different base. Hell, from what she’d learned later, he had a conquest in every base around the world. She’d just been stupid to fall for his blond good looks and cocky swagger. He hadn’t even been all that good in bed, more worried about getting off than making sure she was satisfied.

Navy SEAL Caesar Sanchez would probably be just like that. She hadn’t fallen at his feet and drooled all over his tattoos. Therefore, he saw her as a challenge. And her first opportunity to show him she wouldn’t fall in with his plan had been when he’d kissed her.

Erin smacked a palm to her forehead. She’d failed that test; she’d given in and responded. But she sure as hell wouldn’t fail the next one. Nothing could happen between her and Sanchez. They were in different rank structures, deployed and…well…she’d already been burned once by a cocky lothario. Once burned and all that.

With her resolve strengthened, she left the hospital headed for her quarters on the first floor in the stack of relocatable buildings. Hot and sexually bothered, she slipped out of her flight suit and into shorts and a T-shirt.

Caesar Sanchez had complicated written all over him. After breaking up with Matt, Erin wanted nothing to do with complicated. Still, the SEAL’s kiss had been…wow. And the feel of his hard muscles beneath her fingertips had been…well…wow. Her body heated more and she groaned. How was she supposed to relax when sexual tension built inside with no immediate release in sight?

She riffled through a box of personal items and grabbed a novel from the stack she’d brought along. Maybe immersing herself in a book for the afternoon would erase the residual effects of one unsolicited kiss. When she glanced at the cover, she cocked her arm, ready to throw it across the room. The last thing she needed was an erotic romance novel to stir her blood even further.

Yet, she didn’t throw it. Instead, she opened the book and read. Talk about stoking the fire.

‡