SEAL Brotherhood 06 - SEAL My Destiny
Read SEAL Brotherhood 06 - SEAL My Destiny Online
Authors: Sharon Hamilton
Tags: #Romance, #military, #Suspense, #SEALs
Sharon Hamilton
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I always dedicate my SEAL Brotherhood books to the brave men and women who defend our shores and keep us safe. Without their sacrifice, and that of their families—because a warrior’s fight always includes his or her family—I wouldn’t have the freedom and opportunity to make a living writing these stories. They sometimes pay the ultimate price so we can debate, argue, go have coffee with friends, raise our children and see them have children of their own.
One of my favorite homages to warriors resides on many memorials, including one I saw honoring the fallen of WWII on an island in the Pacific:
“When you go home
Tell them of us, and say
For your tomorrow,
We gave our today.”
These are my stories created out of my own imagination. Anything that is inaccurately portrayed is either my mistake, or done intentionally to disguise something I might have overheard over a beer or in the corner of one of the hangouts along the Coronado Strand.
Wounded Warriors is the one charity I give to on a regular basis. I encourage you to get involved and tell them thank you:
https://support.woundedwarriorproject.org
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Copyright © 2014 by Sharon Hamilton
Kindle Edition
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. In many cases, liberties and intentional inaccuracies have been taken with rank, description of duties, locations and aspects of the SEAL community.
Other Books by Sharon Hamilton
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N
avy SEAL Luke
Paulsen had that dream again.
Her red lips felt like succulent pillows against his cool mouth. Though he was huddled in his Afghan dugout bunk, he could feel the delicate vibration of her moan as her lust for him whispered things. Unmentionable things. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t recall her words. He could only remember the heat washing over him while she breathed life into him. Again. Like she did every night.
A sharp crack of gunfire forced him to open his eyes. He caught a glimpse of Carson’s frightened face in profile just before the young Marine caught a round in the chest, ripping through him between his shoulder blades. In a graceful dance Luke had seen all too often, Carson fell into his arms, and he watched the youngster’s life bleed out onto the sandy pit and all over his boots. He held Carson’s clear blue gaze, and, without saying a word, told him he’d see him again one day, while he witnessed the young Marine’s passage from his arms into the arms of death. The boy’s eyes remained open and fixed after his soul had departed.
A split second later, Luke remembered who he was and why he was here. A day’s ride by donkey from anywhere. He lifted the tiny mirror on a wire, the sun to his back.
Still clutching the body of the lifeless Marine, he traced the trajectory of the round that had killed his young apprentice, and caught the glint of dark blue steel disappearing into a blackened doorway. Laying the Marine down gently, he picked up his H&K MP5, counted to five while he clicked the safety once. Before he saw the barrel of the ragman’s rifle again, he fired off several rounds which landed exactly ten inches above the protuberance, and then saw the red spray of a kill.
Was it wrong that the color of the spray reminded him of her crimson lips? That he died a thousand little deaths with each of her kisses?
His dreams were stealing his present.
A week later,
SO Luke Paulsen watched the sun pour itself into the horizon from one of San Diego’s white sand beaches. The afterglow felt good. So did the flush on his face from the three beers. He usually drank with the rest of his SEAL Team 3. But this last DT, Disassociative Tour, in Afghanistan had teamed him with cadres of young Marines eager to prove themselves, including Carson, the medic-in-training.
But Carson had drawn a different card and had taken the short flight to heaven while his body took the long flight home. Luke raised his long-necked IPA to the sunset and toasted the kid.
“To all the young hearts you won’t break,” he whispered to the soothing waves and the sunset.
It was a damned shame. Carson would have made an excellent doctor.
Luke heard laughter as two lovelies in shorts ran past him to splash in the surf. Slender, tanned legs kicked droplets of white foam into the air. He loved watching the girls’ carefree spirit, just being goofy and lacking an ounce of self-consciousness. He couldn’t help but smile.
The dark-haired girl, the one with the cut off, inside-out sweatshirt that showed her muscled midriff, stopped and turned to face Luke. Her brown eyes were set wide apart over a thin nose that led to full, bright red lips. She licked those lips and pushed her mahogany brown hair from her forehead, exposing a delicious ridge of little worry lines on an otherwise smooth and flawless forehead. She cocked her head at a tiny angle and waved in that embarrassed way her mother must have told her never to do. Especially to a strange sailor sitting alone on the beach with empty beer bottles at his feet.
Luke waved back, using the same twiddled fingers she used, sending his communication off with a shy smile. He imitated the angle of her head and felt the dangerous curiosity and wonder of their chance meeting.
He wanted her in the worst way.
The blonde was pulling her friend, gesturing to a spot down the beach, but the dark-haired girl wasn’t having any of it. Luke’s unspoken message clearly had reached her, and the golden tethers of his thoughts drew her to him, just as if he had special powers. It was lovely when that happened. He could almost believe in the supernatural, like those paranormal guys his sister read about in her romance novels.
The exquisite young thing with the well-defined legs came to within striking distance. If he wanted to—and hell, yes, he wanted to—he could reach out and bring her into his arms. And he could tell she wouldn’t resist. But it would be so much better if he showed a little restraint.
Those who wait?
What was that saying?
No matter. Luke felt the confusing enchantment, like vamps did in those books. It was a pleasant fantasy. Let her have her way with him.
Yes
. He could tell she believed she had a date with destiny.
I can be your destiny for one night, darlin’.
She disposed of her friend with a sharp command and, alone now, stepped closer to Luke. “You look like you could use some company,” she said as she swung her upper torso from side to side. Her feet were planted in the sand and he watched her pink nail polish peek out from beneath the grains.
Lady, you have lovely toes.
But she’d asked a question that needed an answer.
“That depends,” he was stunned at the joy it gave him let his eyes walk slowly up her body, every lovely inch, heightened by the knowledge that she let him. He watched the tops of her breasts quiver under the cotton sweatshirt.
He’d learned to assess subtle changes in body language and heart rate. He noticed the blush in her cheeks and the red blotches on her chest just below the delicate V at the top of her breastbone. His eyes roamed over her quivering chest again and he smiled. He couldn’t wait to hear her response.
“Depends on what?” she asked. Her brown eyes mirrored truths he wasn’t sure he’d divulged to himself.
“If it’s complicated,” he said. “I like
un
complicated.” He was telling her something he was trying to convince himself he believed.
She took a sudden brief inhale, her gaze quickly diverted to the ocean, giving him a full-pour look at her upper torso, every curve and dip, until he thought perhaps he could even taste her skin. What Luke saw in profile was a strong, handsome woman with a body made for hard loving, and who was unafraid.
Then she turned back and faced him fully. She sunk to her knees in front of him so quickly he thought perhaps she’d suddenly gotten ill. “I don’t do uncomplicated,” she whispered. “I like it
complicated
, and rich. I like entangled. I like feeling everything and being sorely missed when I’m gone.”
She didn’t physically touch him, but she had mated with a part of his body that was rarely visited.
His soul.
The next few minutes flew in a blur of erotic fantasy, his body working on autopilot. He asked her the question without speaking a word. Keeping her eyes on his, but raising an eyebrow, she smiled softly, waiting for his response and then focused on his mouth. He stood, held out his hand, and they raced for the parking area.
He walked around the front of his red Mustang, watching her squirm to get comfortable, crossing those impossible legs on his leather front seat. His pants were tight from things springing to life. Yup. He had the brass band, the pom-poms, and the whole fucking cheering section working on him now. It was going to be an effort to take it slow.
He realized he wasn’t going to be in charge when he opened the driver’s door and tucked his stiff torso carefully around the steering wheel. When he looked at her face, she was staring at his lap.
So much for secrets.
Now that she knew he knew that she knew, it was going to be fucking impossible to move any slower than the speed of a bullet train.
“I’m between places…” he began by way of an apology.
“I have a roommate, and she’s home tonight,” she said as she frowned. “But I’m okay with a motel.”
They were magic words. He leaned across the center console and planted a long, languid kiss against her hungry lips, lips just like the girl in his dream. She wore her perfume subtly, somewhere behind her ears or between her breasts, because the mild fragrance hooked his chest until he found himself with his arms wrapped around her, pressing her into him, feeling those firm, perfect breasts.