Hot SEALs: SEALed Fate (Kindle Worlds) (Deep Six Security #0) (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

Sitting in Rick Mann’s living room in a chair across the coffee table from Zane Alexander, who was dressed like he was ready for the country club, seemed surreal to Jaxson.    He had no idea why he’d never noticed that the man smelled like money.  In his experience with his former teammate, Zane had smelled like sweat from hard work, or some sewage ditch they’d had to crawl through to get to their target point.  Just like the rest of the SEALs in their squad.

Maybe this was something new.  Perhaps their new company was doing very well and he was glad for Jon and Zane, but if that were so why then would his ‘interview’ be conducted in Rick Mann’s living room?  Why in the hell didn’t they have an office?  Had he made a mistake coming here?  Could these guys really afford to hire him? 

So many damned questions, but he knew it would be rude of him to ask them.   Jax kept quiet, and listened while Zane explained the shipping contract they were negotiating, and what it would entail if they got it.  Was this a wing and a prayer hope of getting the contract—is that where they got the idea to name the company Guardian Angels?

Jax sure as hell hoped not.   “So, we’re talking the Gulf of Aden? Horn of Africa, Yemen and Somalia?”  Pirate central, so he’d definitely need good weaponry and hoped GAPS had the funding to provide it.

Zane blew out a breath.  “We’re talking everywhere.  Our research shows the company has ships in ports and trade routes all over the world.  If we get the contract in the hot spots and do well, we’re hoping they’ll expand our contract to include all of their ships, even the small cruise line they have.  As you know, terrorism and piracy isn’t just confined to the hotspots these days, so we included statistics and probabilities of that to happen on all of their ships in our presentation.”

Zane was singing to the choir, because, yeah, Jaxson knew that well.  He also knew that Zane Alexander was in sales pitch mode.

“You want some iced tea?” Rick yelled from the kitchen and Jax’s eyes met his across the room.  Rick Mann was in the
kitchen
, doing
dishes
, and offering to serve drinks. 

It was really weird. This whole situation felt weird. 

Since Rick let Jax in his front door, he’d been pacing around the house like a caged tiger.  It was obvious the man was bored out of his mind and struggling to stay occupied since his forced medical retirement from the teams.  It was also obvious to Jax that retirement wasn’t sitting well with his rugged teammate whose bum knee had taken him out of the SEAL game.

That knee shouldn’t be enough to keep him out of the civilian game though, and that led Jax to wonder why he wasn’t off on some mission for GAPS if the company was doing so well.  It was time for him to get answers.  Jax’s eyes swung back to Zane, who was still rambling.

“I need a job, buddy.  Do you have jobs that you are already contracted to do?”  There, he couldn’t be any more blunt than that.  No dancing Alexander, let’s just get to the point.

“We’re working on it,” he said, tossing his pen on top of his note pad to sit back against the sofa.  “We’ve had a few jobs, but nothing big yet.”

“What about immediate prospects?  How soon will you know about the shipping company contract?” Jax pressed.

Zane’s jaw worked, before he finally admitted, “Probably not for another few months.”

Jax huffed out a breath and leaned his forearms on his knees.  “I can’t wait that long.”

“I know.”  Zane leaned forward too, to put his arms on his knees.  “I wouldn’t expect you to wait, but you’re too good for us to let the opportunity to hire you pass.  We could definitely use you when we get that contract.”  Zane dropped his eyes to the pad, and huffed a breath.  “There is one small job I just signed a contract for when I had lunch with Missy and her friend at the club, but I doubt you’d want it.  I called Chris, but he didn’t ans—”

“I’ll take it,” Jax interrupted.  Like he’d told Grant, he would take anything at this point.

“It’s a protection detail for a federal judge, a friend of Missy’s father, who’s getting death threats over a decision against a mobster.  I’d love to give it to you, so we can keep you occupied until the shipping contract comes through.  We really need you for that.”  Zane’s eyes shifted to the yellow legal pad on the table again.  “But I, ah, I’m not sure you’d want this job.” 

Protection detail?  Federal judge?
A shiver snaked down Jaxson’s spine.  God, there had to be something else he could do. But if this was all GAPS had, he’d definitely take it.  He wasn’t sure Zane was thinking about the possible ramifications though. 

“Considering my exit from the teams involved a federal judge, and what happened with the protection detail I just screwed up for Deep Six, I don’t think it would be smart of you to put me, the FNG with your
new
company, on one of your protection details right out of the gate.  Especially one protecting a federal judge.”

God, why in the hell was he talking Zane out of hiring him?
 

Because you care about and respect them, he answered.  Jax had been to hell and back with these men, counted on them to watch his six in every hellhole in the world, just like he’d watched theirs.  He did not want to see them make a mistake that could hurt their new company, so he felt obligated to make that point, just as he’d felt obligated to give full disclosure to Zane about the situation with Deep Six as soon as they sat down.

Zane finally looked at him again.  “Yeah, I know what you said happened, but from the sounds of it that screw up in Dallas wasn’t a screw up—it was a set-up of some kind.  Did you mention that to your boss?”

Changing the subject, redirecting to another, avoiding making eye contact with Jax—definitely not the signs of a man who was being totally forthcoming or honest.  They both knew that from their prisoner interrogation training in the SEAL teams.  That made Jax wonder why Zane was doing it.  Something was worrying him about this protection detail, but he didn’t want to tell him what that was for some reason.

“No, Deep Six is damned good and Slade will figure it out.  I didn’t have proof and thought the best thing I could do for them was get the hell out of Dodge to save their contract.”  Leaning in closer, Jax jerked the pen out of Zane’s fingers and he finally made direct eye contact. “Just cut through the shit, Zane.  Tell me what’s worrying you about this job?  Why can’t one of the other guys do it?”  If they didn’t want it, the odds were Jax shouldn’t either.

“I want to give you the job to keep you around until we get the shipping contract, but I’m not sure if you’ll want it once you find out who the federal judge is.  I can ask Chris if he wants to do it—or maybe Rick, but they probably don’t want it either.  I know one damned thing, I sure can’t take it.”

“Nah, starting tomorrow I’ll be on overtime at the nuke plant.  They’re having a turnaround,” Rick shouted from the kitchen, his voice terse. “Jon and Chris are going to Abu Dhabi in a few days to scout out another potential client.  I hope like hell they shake something loose, because I’m damned tired of being trapped in this house with nothing to do but listen to Cassidy and my sister having sex.” Rick grabbed a wad of steel wool and squirted some soap on it to scrub whatever he had in the sink. “He didn’t tell you?” 

Jax tensed and even though he sort of didn’t want to know now, he had to know.  “Why would you think I wouldn’t want the job?  Who’s the judge?”

“Does the name Fallon Sharpe ring a bell?” Zane asked, with a long-winded sigh.

Judge John Sharpe’s daughter?
  Hell, it was a name he wasn’t likely to forget in this lifetime. 

“Is John Sharpe the federal judge?” Jax asked, his blood freezing in his veins. “Are they threatening his family too?”  Jax did the math in his head, taking the fact he knew she’d been a twenty-six year old college co-ed in Cancun, and added the five years he’d been gone from the teams.  “Fallon is like thirty now, right?  Is she still living at home?”

That would not surprise Jax one bit.  That woman looked like ten clicks of fucking weedy jungle that no machete was going to help.  If she ever got a man to look at her, he’d still head for the hills as soon as she opened her mouth.  That mouth had more razorblades in it than the wire that had lined their forward base in Fallujah.

“Isn’t that the frizzy-haired redhead we rescued from that cartel in Cancun with her hot sister and friends?  The one who accused you of making time with her sister on the mission?  The woman directly responsible for you being discharged?” Rick asked his voice angry.

“That’s the one,” Zane admitted, but dropped his eyes back to the pad again.  “But she isn’t living at home, and this has nothing to do with her father. 
She’s
the federal judge who’s pissed off the East Coast mafia.”  Zane finally met and held his gaze.  “I would’ve turned it down, but my girlfriend Missy’s dad asked, and since he funds GAPS, I couldn’t very well say no.  Fallon also specifically wants a SEAL for the job, since she’s so…familiar with our capabilities.” Zane forced a smile.  “So, do you want to have another go with Frumpy Fallon, or not?”

Forget the thousands—that was the sixty-four
million
dollar question.  His stomach did a somersault as he considered his options.

“I wouldn’t fucking take it if you paid me a million dollars.” Rick growled mimicking Jax’s thought, as his whole body shook with the muscle he was putting into scrubbing.  “I can’t see how Jax would want it either considering what she did to him.  I’d want to kill her, not protect her.”

Tick, tick, tick
.  The clock behind Jax somewhere in the house timed his thoughts.  Where in the hell would he go if he didn’t take the job?  His mother’s house in Colorado where she was shacking up with the flavor of the month?  Maybe his sister’s place in St. Louis where she was going to school?  Even if he did that, there would still be the problem of not having a job.  He was not going to live off his sister like it looked Rick had chosen to do until he figured out what he wanted to do with his life after the teams.

“I’ll take it, but you need to forewarn her who is coming to protect her.  Make sure she knows ahead of time and is in agreement.” 
And let her know that she might well be in more danger of dying at her bodyguard’s hand than she is from the mob if she opens that mouth of hers. 

He and Rick were definitely on the same page there too.

The only hope Jax had of getting out of this job was Fallon Sharpe’s refusal to let him be her bodyguard.  If she still hated him as much as her father did, she definitely would, and Jax almost hoped she did.  That meant both he and Zane would be off the hook. 

One thing was for sure—none of the Sharpes could hate him more than he despised them.  Actually doing this job, if Fallon Sharpe accepted, would be one of the toughest things he’d ever done in his life.  That was saying a lot for a former Team Six SEAL. 

But because Jax
was
a SEAL, he had purposely signed up for the dirty jobs nobody else wanted to—or could—do.  It looked like his assignments in the civilian career he’d chosen wouldn’t be any cleaner.  The only thing he could do is just what he’d done with the teams. 

Deal with it and get the job done.

If Fallon Sharpe accepted his protection, he would safeguard the one woman on earth he wouldn’t mind seeing dead to make sure she stayed alive to harass someone else. 

Who knew, maybe in the process of protecting her, Fallon would have an opportunity to see firsthand the skills that she’d denied the SEAL teams, the country who’d spent so much money training him, by tattling to her daddy and jumping to conclusions about him that were dead wrong. 

CHAPTER THREE

The doorbell rang, and Fallon Sharpe almost jumped out of her skin.  Her gaze flew to the door and her hand shook, her heart raced as she fumbled under the couch cushion for her gun.  When she finally found it, her hands were shaking so badly she juggled the gun before getting a good hold on the grip.  Lessons learned in her concealed carry class the week before ran through her mind like a movie on fast forward as she crept toward the door. 

If I shoot him, I have to render aid.  That could be as simple as dropping a Kleenex over the bullet wound, before calling 9-1-1.  But that was putting the cart before the horse.  Fallon had to shoot him first and not miss. 

Oh,
God
—was it the center of the chest or the head she was supposed to aim at? 

By the time she reached the long window beside the front door, Fallon’s heart was a mere quiver in her chest.  She streaked by the window to press her back against the wall, and a bead of sweat streaked down between her breasts.  Swallowing hard as the bell rang again, she reached across her body with her left hand to lift the sheers to see who was there.  The man’s body froze, and Fallon whimpered as she dropped the curtain back in place. 

He’d seen her—and this guy was definitely not a Navy SEAL.  No camo or war paint, no big guns strapped across his chest.  He wore pressed khaki pants, and a red polo shirt.  His hair was too long, and the sunglasses too dark.  And her protector from that security firm in Virginia wasn’t supposed to arrive in Washington until tomorrow.  That’s what Senator Greenwood told her yesterday when she spoke to him.

It had to be one of East Coast Willie's goombahs. 

Fear sliced through her as Fallon ran like a bat out of hell for her bedroom.  Her leg caught the sharp corner of the coffee table, but the pain didn’t register in her frozen brain and neither did the fact that her cell phone was on the tabletop. 

Fallon didn’t stop until she was inside her bedroom and the door was locked.  She leaned against the door for a second to gather herself, but when her brain finally kicked into gear, she realized she had no phone.  Next, she realized that leaning on this door meant she was right in the line of fire if the thug shot through the thin wood door. 

Running to the far side of the bed, Fallon crouched down, her body shaking like she was freezing to death, and she probably was, with fear.  That assassin on her doorstep wore death like a dark cloud over his head.  He might as well have been wearing a black cloak and have a sickle in his hand like in the movies.  It was obvious to Fallon from the deep grooves in his unsmiling face, the tenseness in his hard body he was a trained killer.  He’d been sent here by Willie to kill her for having the gall to bring him to justice and give him the jail time he deserved. 

If she didn’t, who else would?  Not her estranged father, who was only estranged because she refused to heed his cowardly advice to take a dive and let the bastard off.

Not without a fight, bucko
. 

Kneeling, Fallon balanced the shaking pistol on the bed to steady it so she could take better aim at the door.  If that man walked through her bedroom door, she was going to shoot him.  Even if he turned and ran when he saw her gun.  Screw the instructor in that handgun class.  This bastard was in her house and the instructor was not. 

Fallon
knew
he was in the house too because she’d heard the front doorknob rattle, the scraping on the deadbolt and the squeaky tumble as it released as she ran for the bedroom.  Further proof this man was a professional assassin. 

Gripping the pistol tighter with every second she waited, Fallon’s finger got closer to the well of the trigger.  She knew she was supposed to keep it flush with the body of the semi-automatic pistol, above the trigger well, but she wanted to be ready. 

More than ready. 

Shoving her finger into the circle, she rested it on the curve of the trigger and tensed.  The doorknob barely turned before the bedroom door swung inward, and even though no one filled the doorway, Fallon closed her eyes and pulled the trigger.  When it didn’t squeeze and no explosion came, her heart stopped.

The safety
! 

Fallon’s eyes flew open in time to see a blur as someone dove inside the bedroom door, as she fought frantically to release the safety latch.  It finally clicked off, and Fallon tried to raise the pistol again, but a large hand snatched it from her before her back slammed hard into the carpet and a hard body covered her.  Wide shoulders pinned her to the floor and hands like vises held her hands above her head. 

“Who else is in this house?” her assassin growled, breathing hard near her ear.

Buddy, if you think I’m going to tell you that I’m alone you have another think coming
.

“My Navy SEAL boyfriend is in the bathroom and is going to kick your ass in about thirty seconds,” Fallon forced past her fear-frozen vocal cords.  She was pleased when his big body tensed, so she decided to press her point.  “His whole damned platoon is coming over for a barbecue in ten minutes.”  Three quick, hot breaths in her ear raised every hair on her body. 

“Platoon?” he replied with what sounded like a chuckle, as he released her wrists to push up to his feet.  He reached a hand down to help her up.  “Well, I guess I better be on my way then before the
Army
gets here.” 

Was he leaving?
  Relief flowed through Fallon and her confidence built as she ignored his hand to get to her feet by herself.  But she wasn’t out of the woods yet.  She tried to squeeze past him to run for her cell phone, but he blocked her as he bent to pick up her pistol.  When he stood with it in his hand, a whimper slipped past her lips, but he didn’t point it at her, he reached behind him to stuff it into the waistband of his slacks.

One corner of his firm lips kicked up.  “I’ll just take this with me to make sure you don’t shoot yourself, or your
boyfriend
.  If
I
were your Navy SEAL
boyfriend
, Judge Sharpe, I’d teach you how to handle a pistol before I put one in your hand.  Do you know how many people get killed by criminals using their incompetent victim’s own gun against them?”

This man—this
criminal—was
giving
her
a lecture on gun safety?  “East Coast Willie must be short on Goodfellas if you’re the best he had to send to kill me.”

“East Coast Willie?” the man asked with a laugh.

“The gangster who put a hit out on me.  Your
boss
?”

The man’s clean-shaven jaw tightened, deepening the dimple in his cheek.  “Zane Alexander is my boss, but I may just kill
him
.”  He huffed a breath.  “He didn’t tell you who was coming to protect you did he?”

“No, Senator Greenwood just said it was a former Navy SEAL, and if that’s you…” 

Fallon really looked at the man glaring down at her.  The grooves in his face were deeper now, especially around his deep blue eyes like he’d had a hard time recently.  His mouth was tighter showing his strain too, but his hard body was sure the same.  The muscles of his biceps stretched the red polo to its ripping point at the hems of the sleeves, and there was no mistaking his clearly defined chest muscles under the tightly fitted shirt. 

Without the black face paint he’d worn when he and his team rescued Fallon, her sister and Hannah’s friends, the only time she’d seen Jaxson Thomas, his piercing blue eyes were a little less piercing.  But the air of arrogant confidence surrounding this man was the same.  It was no less daunting than it had been when he and his friends led them from that dark, smelly room in that cartel stronghold, right past the drug lords guarding them, without firing a single bullet from the heavy guns strapped to their broad chests. 

They were like freaking ninjas they were so quiet that night.  The cartel hadn’t even realized that
eight
U.S. Navy SEALs had infiltrated their compound to steal their hostages.  Those men were that good, and that’s why Fallon had specifically asked Senator Greenwood, the man who’d helped her father arrange their rescue from Cancun, to find her a Navy SEAL to protect her, instead of accepting the newbie federal agent the FBI had offered her until they figured out who was threatening her. 

Never in a million years though would she have expected
this
man would be the Navy SEAL sent to protect her, but fate evidently had a sense of humor.  She hoped her new bodyguard did too, because what she had to tell him could get her killed faster than the mob hit, if not.  But Fallon was all about efficiency, so this could work out.  It would give her a few weeks to smooth over what happened after Cancun with him, and have protection until the FBI figured out who was trying to kill her. 

There was no figuring it out.  Fallon
knew
it was East Coast Willie. 

The arrogant wink and air kiss the gangster threw her while being handcuffed in her courtroom after sentencing, told her it was Willie.  He wanted his revenge for her sentence of ten years without probation.  Now he had even more reason to want her dead.  Through the luck of the assignment draw, Fallon was to now to preside over his nephew Peter’s trial on the same charges.  Same charges, same prosecutor, same judge and probably same defense counsel—how could the outcome be any different than Willie’s conviction and jail time? 

The mobsters knew that too. 

Since Peter Crifaso was the second in command in the family, if he went to jail, that would be the beginning of the end for the crime family.  It wasn’t difficult to see that their solution was to put an end to her before the trial, because she refused to recuse herself, so another more liberal judge like her father could let them off. 

Being notified by the FBI mob unit last week that there was a contract hit out on her wasn’t a big surprise, but it was terrifying.  Fallon had been locked up in her house since then, because she knew running until the trial date came wasn’t going to do her any good.  Their reach was probably long and they would find her.

“Why in the world would you agree to protect me?” she asked, twisting her hands trying to decide if she should request someone else. 

Considering their history, what she’d been instrumental in doing to him, it was confusing to her why Jaxson Thomas would accept the assignment to protect her.  Was he still angry enough to want to sit back and watch while Willie’s hitman did him a favor?

“You ordered up a Navy SEAL, lady, and you got one,” Jaxson Thomas replied arrogantly, then narrowed his disconcerting eyes. “Oh, yeah—make that
former
SEAL because of
you
.” 

Oh yeah, he was definitely still angry enough.  Fallon stepped back, but he took a step to close the space, effectively trapping her in front of her nightstand. 

“I’m not any happier about me being here than you are about having me here.  Tell me to leave and I will because that gets me off the hook with Zane, and it wouldn’t bother me a damned bit if East Coast Willie did to you what I’ve been dreaming of doing for five years.” 

He turned toward the door, but looked back over his shoulder.  “I have to warn you though, GAPS doesn’t have another
SEAL
to send to babysit you.  I drew the short straw as the fucking new guy, so it’s me or take your chances with the mob.” 

His eyes bored into hers, while Fallon stood there slack-jawed, trying to decide whether she should trust this man to protect her.  After a few seconds, Jaxson’s muscles tensed, his jaw tightened, then with a lifted-chin salute he walked toward the bedroom door. 

GAPS doesn’t have another SEAL to send to babysit you.
 

Fallon woke up, her brain engaged and she walked behind him.  This man was her only chance of avoiding being fitted for those concrete shoes Willie wanted made for her. 

There was no way she was letting him walk out of that door.

“
Wait
!” Fallon yelled, sprinting behind him to keep up with his longer strides, panicking when his hand closed over the doorknob.  She grabbed his thick forearm and his muscles bunched under her fingers.  “Don’t leave, Jaxson,
please
.  I need you to help me.”

Jaxson slowly turned around and Fallon stepped back.  His heat, the cat-like tenseness in his big body seemed to short-circuit her senses.  Or it could be the cologne he was wearing.  That rich, leather and wood scent reminded her of her father’s library where she’d spent half of her childhood curled up with a blanket, reading.  It set off every nerve in her body when he’d held her down, but it comforted her too for some reason, if that was possible.

“Okay, I’ll stay—but there are a few things we need to get straight.”  His eyes dropped to her chest where she was sure he saw her heart pounding.  “Either you agree to my terms, or you’re on your own.”

Suddenly, Fallon felt a little more compassion for her wild younger sister’s plight the night she stripped naked and found this man’s tent in the woods in Cancun.  Because the way Jaxson Thomas was staring at her breasts right then, almost licking his lips, Fallon thought she might well agree to anything he asked of her too.