Still Her SEAL (ASSIGNMENT: Caribbean Nights Book 10) (17 page)

Naturally, this is the moment when everything goes wrong. Right as I spot the exit sign for heaven and my dick’s gunning for the off-ramp, things take a right hand turn into hell. My first warning is the sound of paws hitting sand. I turn my head—and it practically takes an act of God to look away from Hindi working my dick—and spot Jack racing over the beach toward me, spraying sand everywhere as he runs. Fuck.

“Incoming,” I bark, already rolling, putting her behind me because God knows Hindi deserves a heads up before Jack’s slobbering all over her. Hindi shoves me toward the dog, shrieking. Right. She’s apparently a cat person—just my luck.

I yank my shorts up as I spring to my feet. Jack won’t come without company of the two-legged variety, and I don’t need my dick hanging out when I kill one of my Search and SEALers. Jack bounds up to me, barking like a madman. He’s thrilled to see me, even when I give him the command to stand down and sit. He plops his furry ass on the sand at my feet and grins at us adoringly. He thinks he’s the shit. He thinks he’s mission-accomplished. I shove my shirt at Hindi, who’s trying unsuccessfully to drag the wet romper up her legs. Her shit’s way too tangled up, so she’ll have to make do.

Naturally, Finn’s right behind the dog. “Got a problem,” he says, and he’s not wrong.

Fucking Finn, fucking cock-blocking me.

Before I can make my unhappiness clear, Finn trains his gaze on the fringe of palm trees at the top of the beach. He snaps off a command to find and hold and Jack bolts across the stand, making unerringly for the trees. “We’ve got photographers.”

“Who?”

There’s a reason why investigators and security teams are trained to watch faces. Your face is gonna betray you. Hindi’s not exactly the queen of hiding her shit anyhow, but she might as well confess on a billboard. Her eyes dart back and forth before landing unerringly on the access road that leads down to Search and SEALs’ headquarters. She’s not one bit surprised by our click-happy company.

Maybe that’s the reality TV star in her coming out.

Or maybe it’s the suspicious SEAL in me.

She yanks my T-shirt down and I pull her into my side. I should be shot for thinking that kind of shit about her. Why would she welcome the presence of paparazzi anywhere near the beach where we were about to get up close and personal?

Barking ensues somewhere out of sight behind the trees and then a car motor roars to life. Great. Jack is awesome, but no match for an engine and tires. He’s not super dog.

“Caught them coming in on the security cameras,” Finn says quietly. “They pulled in about ten minutes ago—must have followed the two of you back from the Tiki Hut. I got out here as fast I could. Figured one of us should find out what they wanted on private property. Funny that they’d just show up out of nowhere right when the two of you were getting it on on the beach.”

Yeah. Finn got an eyeful.

And since he’s not giving me shit about it, we’ve got bigger problems.

“I don’t think they came down here for moonlight shots,” he continues. “So what were they expecting to see?”

The hard look he gives Hindi says it all. He thinks she set this up, that she got me out here knowing there would be cameras.

Hindi stiffens. “You think this is my fault?”

Finn nods shortly. “Sure as fuck do, pretty girl.”

See, the thing is that she
doesn’t
deny it. Hindi’s plenty of things, but she’s never been a liar. She skirts and evades like a master tracker, covering her trail, but she doesn’t make shit up when you confront. Nope. She retreats.

Which is exactly what she does.

“Screw this,” she snaps and stalks away from us and up the beach. Part of me wonders if the paparazzi hiding behind the palms will meet her at the top of the road and give her a lift back to her place. I wish I had a clue what’s the right thing to do. Fooling around on the beach was stupid and I’m really hoping pictures of my bare ass aren’t making the rounds on the Internet tomorrow, but I’m also not ready to let her go.

I’m not done with her.

I catch up to her in two strides. “Let me give you a ride.”

Her mouth tightens. “Nope.”

Okay, then. I’m not sure why she gets to be the pissed off one here. I’m the one who got blindsided on the beach. Aren’t I?

“You want to tell me what’s going on here?”

She picks up the pace. Wish I knew where she was going. “You know everything, Ro. You figure it out.”

“Give me something to work with.” I make a grab for her as her foot slips on the sand and she lurches. She yanks her elbow away impatiently. Just minutes ago I had my fingers in her pussy and she was riding my hand for all she was worth. What the fuck has changed since then?

The heel of her hand slams into my chest in an invitation to back the hell of. “Sometimes I come with a camera crew, Rohan. It’s part of my job description. People take pictures of me and they don’t always ask first.”

Not unless she invited them to the photo shoot. That was the point Finn was trying to make back there on the beach, and I can see his point. Coincidences are far rarer than most people believe, and our piece of Angel Cay is both private and tremendously unexciting. We’re a bunch of guys running a K9-training business. I mean, we don’t even stock puppies—we’re truly all work and no play. There’s zero reason for snap-happy photographers to be on our turf in the wee hours of the night.

“If you don’t believe me, you can fuck off,” Hindi snaps when the silence spins out for too long and marches off down the road.

Alone.

After dark.

Yeah, I suck in the husband department.

Hindi

A
fter leaving Ro, I text Lilah to come and pick me up. No, she wasn’t the photographer lurking on the access road, camera in hand. She was, however, the anonymous tipster who sent a text to the camera crew from a national celebrity gossip site that just happened to be hanging around Angel Cay trying to snap pictures of Hindi Alvarez on her secret getaway. By the time I make it to the main road, I’m feeling sorry for myself and my feet hurt. If I could have, I would have sprouted wings and flown home. It sucked having to wait for somebody to haul my sorry butt from Point A to Point B.

Naturally, this is when Ro pulls up in his Jeep. He doesn’t offer apologies. I’d be happy to deal with even a simple request—because yeah, I’m feeling guilty—but he’s got his frowny face on and he doesn’t look happy at all. Seriously. I prefer his O-face. Those moments on the beach were out-of-this-world fantastic and I can still taste him on my lips. He’s like the world’s best flavor of cookie and I want to devour the entire box.

“Get in,” he says calmly, destroying my fantasy.

He doesn’t believe I had nothing to do with the photographer on the beach, but he hasn’t quite worked up to making accusations. That’s one of the things I love about Ro. He doesn’t rush to judgment. He thinks shit through, moving from point A to point B and you can’t speed the man up—or slow him down. He’s inexorable and inexorably fair. Therefore, there’s no way I come out on top and I’d prefer to leave before he gets that too-familiar disappointed look on his face.

I walk a few steps away. Lilah’s about five minutes out—surely I can last that long? “I don’t think so.”

Especially since certain parts of me are still tingling from a monster orgasm.

“I promised you a ride.” Oh, look. The muscle in his jaw tightens. It’s always nice to find out he’s not entirely indifferent to me.

He kills the Jeep’s engine. I do my best to ignore him… which is hard because the man is hot even when he’s all pissy. The road stays stubbornly empty and there’s no sign of Lilah or rescue. Ro makes a rough sound that might pass as conversation or a question in his universe, but I’m insisting on entire words and complete sentences tonight. At least he’s shed Jack and Finn, although I wouldn’t put it past Finn to pop out from behind a palm. That man doesn’t trust me.

“Ignoring me will make this take longer,” Ro growls. Goody. On a scale of one to ten, his pissiness has just achieved a perfect ten. I pull out my phone and send an emergency text.

Drive faster. Need immediate evac.

Lilah’s response comes almost immediately. Already breaking multiple traffic laws. B there soon.

Soon is not good enough. I need immediate. A transporter would be even better, because the Jeep door opens and then closes. Ro doesn’t slam it, but I can feel the irritation coming off him in waves. I sneak a look at him and he’s watching me.

“I told you I would take you home.” He holds out a hand to me. God, he makes this so hard. Everything he does, every time he opens his mouth, reminds me of us on the beach. Together and going at it, mostly naked, his fingers buried deep inside me.

I rode his fingers.

I came so hard I saw stars.

“I’ve got this,” I tell him. No way I’m getting in that Jeep with him. Then I’m a captive audience for the Hindi-you’ve-disappointed-me speech or, my personal favorite, the not-again-Hindi monologue.

He sighs. I stare down at my phone. The screen’s blurry all of a sudden and it must be raining because there’s a drop of water on the screen. And then a second.

“Are you
crying
?” Captain Obvious sounds horrified, so there’s a silver lining to my embarrassing breakdown.

“Fuck you.” He has eyes and I’m done here. “If you’re not putting me in the time-out corner, I’m leaving. See you around.”

I head down the road. I’ll text Lilah to keep driving until she spots me. No more waiting around.

There’s no warning rush of sound. The man moves like a snake. One second my feet are firmly planted on the ground and the next I’m dangling over his shoulder, kicking and hollering. If there are any paparazzi still hanging out in Ro’s palm trees, they’re getting their money’s worth tonight. He pins me in place with one arm.

“Hey.” I use his butt as leverage to push up. “I in no way agreed to playing kinky cave man games with you. Put me down right now.”

“Shut up,” he says, far too pleasantly. His long legs eat up the ground as he makes for the Jeep.

“You have no right,” I snarl and slap his ass. Not my finest moment, I’ll admit, but my options are severely limited by my current position and even I draw the line at biting his butt. I have a bad feeling I’d like it far too much, and biting would lead to kissing, and you can imagine how that would end up.

He smacks my ass. Hard.

“Tit for tat, darling,” he growls.

There’s a world of possibilities in
that
offer.

My imagination takes a lovely detour down Smut Lane, just long enough for him to drop me into the front seat of the Jeep. He reaches down, grabs the seat belt, and locks me in place. My bag goes flying into the back seat.

“You touch that belt,” he says conversationally, “and we’ll revisit the spanking game.”

Okay then. I think I’m supposed to be cowed. Not… curious. Jesus, the man is dangerous.

He retraces his steps around the Jeep and gets in. Seconds later, we’re headed down the road. “I’m taking you home. You don’t have to speak, don’t have to like it, don’t have to say thank you. But I promised to get you there safely and that’s what I’m going to do. After that, shit’s up in the air.”

Yeah. I know exactly what he means.

“Fuck,” he breathes quietly, driving just a little too fast.

I know exactly what he means.

Hindi

T
here’s a box of Twinkies on my back steps. There’s also an open can of tuna fish, and Yowly is going to town. I’ve been feeding that cat all week and he hasn’t let me touch him once, but he’s clearly happy to put out for the big, surly SEAL scratching behind his ears. Yes, I have an ex-SEAL on my steps, too. It’s like the gift that keeps on giving. His unhappiness last night certainly hadn’t translated into a promise to put in an appearance today.

“He has fleas,” Ro announces. “They sell shit for that, or you can stop by Search and SEALs and I’ll give you some of the stuff we use on the dogs. If you dial the dose down, it’ll work on furry here.”

While I appreciate the practical tip, I have one question. “Why are you here?”

He looks up at me. He’s got those goddamned sunglasses on that I hate, and since I’ve already achieved permanent residency on the naughty list, I reach out, pull them off, and tuck them in the vee of my T-shirt. This has the effect of drawing Ro’s eyes straight to my boobs. Since I wasn’t expecting company—let alone the Twinkie-and-tuna-fish-bearing kind—I’m not wearing a bra. What you see is what you get and that’s just a T-shirt and a pair of cotton shorts. It’s not my reality TV star look. This shit’s straight from Walmart and it’s the most comfortable thing I own. Two hundred dollar yoga pants may come with the job, but they’re for show. When I’m alone and being me, I want the stuff that I can spill shit on and that actually goes in both the washer and the dryer.