Contract with a SEAL (Special Ops: Homefront Book 3) (5 page)

Vi stopped alongside the road at an
overlook, not to take pictures like the other handful of cars that she had
joined, but to catch her breath.

At Joe’s suggestion, Vi took the scenic
route to Little Creek, down Maryland’s Eastern Shore and over and through the famed
Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, the wonder of modern engineering that lay just
north of the Navy base at Little Creek. The drive was relaxing compared to the
alternative that would have her ensnared in the traffic of DC and the Northern Virginia
suburbs. But the bridge-tunnel itself caused her heart palpitations, stretching
seventeen jaw-dropping miles.

Having white-knuckled it the entire way,
she needed to stop at the scenic overlook after emerging from the tunnel
portion of the ride. She hated tunnels. Even shooting through the Queens tunnel
in New York on her way out of Manhattan made her claustrophobic and that one was
petite by comparison to this one.

Never one to venture outside of her
career-focused social circles without a fight, she had been nervous enough
coming down to Little Creek for this party. Tack on the idea of spending the
night in Joe’s house had her only a touch this side of sheer panic.

Separate room or not, she had never spent
the night with a man who looked like he should be chiseled in marble and placed
on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Joe met her at the base’s security gate
to affix her car with visitor’s pass for the weekend. She noted his double-take
at her saucer-sized eyes. “Are you all right?” he asked, cordial and completely
unreadable as ever.

“I don’t like tunnels,” she responded
quietly, then shutting her window. She hadn’t recovered enough to give a
further explanation.

From the gate, she followed him to his
house, a sprawling ranch house, far too large for one man to live alone,
overlooking a mirror-still brackish lake. Just on the other side, Joe told her
as she climbed out of her car, thick rows of trees screened a beach on the
Chesapeake Bay where the SEALs do some training.

Ha, she couldn’t help thinking. Single
women would pay good money to hang out there if they could just get past
security.

Thick garlands were wrapped around the pillars
outside his front door, and cheery wreaths hung from every window. Another hung
from his door, this one heavily adorned with tiny red ornaments and pinecones.

Somehow, the decorations surprised her,
as did the eight-foot Christmas tree that stood beneath the great room’s high
ceilings.

“Wow,” Vi said under her breath.

“What?”

“You really go all out for the holidays,
Joe.”

He grinned. “Glad it looks that way. It’s
all for the party, actually. A lot of the teams were deployed last holiday
season, so I want to make it a special night for them and their families. God
knows they deserve it.”

Behind the festive trappings, the house
was beautifully decorated in a tasteful, nautical theme. Walls were filled with
Navy memorabilia, along with a smattering of antiques. A captain’s wheel hung
over the fireplace. Two elegantly framed prints of the USS Constitution and the
HMS Surprise adorned the wall, along with a nautical barometer. Throw pillows
were tossed carelessly on the leather sofa along with a bright chenille throw,
adding a splash of color to the otherwise masculine room.

Vi explored her surroundings with a
quizzical eye. “This isn’t what I was expecting. Did you decorate your place
yourself?”

 “God, no. Before I met Maeve, this
place looked like a dorm room. I don’t have a domestic bone in my body.”

“So she did all this?” Vi gently stroked
the supple leather on the couch, wondering why she felt a pang of jealousy,
thinking of Maeve in this house, with this man.

“She did. All by remote, too. She’d send
me photos online, tell me what to buy and where to put it. The woman’s a genius
with design.” He set her bag down at the entry to the hall. “Was it a hard
drive down?”

“No. No traffic at all, just like you
said. But I still can’t believe your job makes you drive up there all the time.”
Long drives weren’t something Vi readily embraced, being a staunch city
dweller. She had lived in New York City five years before she even considered
buying a car. After all, parking in Manhattan was more than Vi paid in rent in
Annapolis.

Joe shrugged. “They fly me up when they
just need me there for one day. But I actually like the drive.” Joe reached for
her small suitcase. “Let me put your bag in your room.”

“I can get it,” she said, reaching for
the handle and brushing her hand against his skin. His touch, so warm on her chilled
hands, somehow sent a tingle down her spine.

“Of course not,” he said, pulling it gently
from her grasp. “Grab yourself a glass of wine if you like. I’ll be right
back.”

Wine. Thank you, Joe.
Her heart still palpitating from the
tunnel—or was it Joe’s effect on her?—a glass of wine was exactly
what she needed right now.

There was nothing to be nervous about,
she reminded herself. This wasn’t a date. This was nothing more than two people
doing mutual favors for each other.

Oh, the favors she’d like to enjoy with
this man.

Somehow being in his space—the air
thick with testosterone—made her painfully aware that it had been nearly
a year since she had slept with a man.
No, wait.
That had been with her
ex, and seeing as he was more snake than man, that didn’t count either.

Glancing down the hall as he walked away,
her eyes couldn’t resist soaking in the vast expanse of muscles that could be
seen through the fabric of his Henley, and his marvelously shaped ass beneath
his jeans.

Suppressing an appreciative purr, she reminded
herself to keep her hormones under lock and key tonight.

Finding a bottle of wine chilling in an
ice bucket on the kitchen counter, she poured some into a glass he had set out
for her. The guy elevated thoughtfulness to a whole new level. Just what she
needed, she confirmed as the buzz of the alcohol warmed her to her fingertips.

Wandering back into the great room, she
glanced at a photo of him as a young Lieutenant with his SEAL team. They were
dressed in the old desert cammies, not the kind the Navy later replaced them
with. He was holding some kind of assault rifle and posing with his teammates.
Not a smile among them, she noted, not that there was much to smile about in
the thick of war.

Joe emerged from the hallway. “Find
everything you need?”

She gazed at him wantonly, noticing the
way his shirt clung to his torso. It was probably an extra-large by the look of
it, but still seemed a shade small for the body that was hidden beneath the
cotton.
Yep. You’re everything I need right now. Too bad you’re off-limits.

Tossing back another gulp of wine, she
hoped it would extinguish the libidinous effect his presence had on her. Perfectly
shaven, his face was impossible to read—not as though he was trying to
deceive her, but simply as though he were a man who liked to hold all his cards
to his chest.

And what a chest it was.

“Vi?”

“Huh?” She snapped back to reality.

“Did you find everything you need?”

“Oh—yeah, I did. Thanks.”

“Good. I picked up some antipasti at the
commissary. Let me get it for you.” As he passed her, the scent of him wafted
her way, a luscious mix of soap and man. There were no aftershaves for a guy
like Joe. No cologne. He wasn’t a man to try to lure women in with false
scents. He simply didn’t need them.

Vi Owens was living proof of that, she
pondered, as her toes seemed to be melting inside her shoes.

“Thanks,” she finally said, as he
drizzled mozzarella balls with extra virgin olive oil. It looked almost seductive
to her, the way he moved the bottle slowly over the cheese. But a man like Joe
Shey would look seductive cleaning a toilet.

Picking up a red pepper, he extended it
to her. “Try a pepper?”

Emboldened by the wine, she bent over
slightly and took the pepper in her mouth, making sure her lips touched his
fingers. It might break the rules a bit for the evening, but she couldn’t
resist.

His composure faltered.
Good
. Finally,
a chink in his armor, she thought. At least she wasn’t the only one feeling a
hint of sexual tension in the air.

“Like it?” he asked, his voice strained.

“Very.” Her eyes transfixed on his, she took
another sip of wine.

Joe raised his eyebrows. “Umm, might want
to slow down a little. We’ve got a long night ahead of us.”

His words were like a slap of cool water
on her face.

This wasn’t a date. This was an important
event for his teams and their families. What the hell was the matter with her?
“Of course. It just feels good. My body was still vibrating from sitting in
that car for so long.”

“Mmm…” He stared at her a moment as
though he might say something, then stepped backwards suddenly, reaching for a
glass in the cabinet as he cleared his throat. “So, the caterer should be arriving
to set up any minute,” he began, filling his glass from the tap. “People will
start showing up at sixteen hundred hours. Usually it’s families with small
children first. Then the ones with older kids. Last are the couples and singles
who usually close the party down at around twenty-three hundred hours.”

Vi looked at him quizzically. “Translation,
please?””

The glass met his lips for a moment as he
drank, and he seemed to savor the water as though he was a parched man just
emerging from the desert. “Oh. Sorry. Party starts at four o’clock. Closes down
around eleven.”

Vi nodded.
Perfect.
The longer the
guests stayed, the less time she had with Joe alone. And that was definitely
safest.

Grabbing a mozzarella ball, she popped it
into her mouth. She better get something in her stomach to ward off the effects
of the alcohol. Clearly she was not a woman who could drink on an empty
stomach. At least, not in the presence of Joe.

She leaned against the counter. “So,
they’ll be thinking we’re an item, right?

“I won’t overtly lie to them about it. But
yeah, just because you’re here, they’ll assume that.”

Vi cocked her head to the side, frowning
slightly as she silently measured the distance between them. For two people who
were supposedly dating, their body language more closely resembled a brother
and sister. “Well, if we are going to pull this off, there’s really something
we should do first.”

“What’s that?”

“Kiss me.” She used her most direct tone,
the one she used in business. Yet still a blush crept to her cheeks from the
mere utterance of the word.

His eyebrows arched. “Kiss you?”

Resting her hand on her hip, she leaned
against the counter. “Seriously, we look like we’re just two friends right now.
We’ve got to amp up the chemistry between us.”

Joe’s face was deadpanned. “Vi, you know
damn well there’s enough chemistry between us to blow up a building.”

Vi grinned at his words. Actually, she
hadn’t known till just this moment. After getting rejected at the wedding and relegated
to the ranks of friendship at their first dinner together, how could she
possibly know whether Joe had any interest in her other than as a pretend date?
“Could have fooled me. We could pass for brother and sister, the way you’re
standing over there and I’m over here.” Brother and sister, she thought. Well,
if that idea didn’t stifle Vi’s attraction for him, nothing would.

“Brother and sister,” Joe repeated,
lowering his chin as he stepped toward her.

The space closing in between them, Vi’s
heart rate quickened.

“Yeah,” she answered. Her eyes flashed in
challenge. “Or are you just not any good at it?”

Joe’s grin was dangerous. “At kissing?”

“Mmhm.” Her pitch elevated an octave with
him now only inches away from him. Suddenly, she was wishing she had kept her
mouth shut, grabbing her glass of wine and holding it in front of her, feeling
the need to put something between them.

This was not a man who would step down
from a dare. Nimbly, he took her glass of wine from her hand and set it on the
counter behind her. Backing her against the counter, he took both her hands in
his and planted them behind her, covering them with his own. Trapped between
his steaming hot body and the cool granite behind her, her elongated sigh
caught in her throat making her suddenly lightheaded.

“You be the judge,” he said as he lowered
his face down several inches to hers, pausing slightly, then brushing his lips
against hers. His touch was light at first, then pulling away slightly as
though he might stop, forcing her to utter a soft murmur in plea just as he
pressed his lips harder to hers. His hands moved to her face, angling her chin
upward to reach up to his tall form. The sweep of his skin against hers set
fire to her nerve endings, heating her from her core out to her fingertips.