by Dawson, Zoe
He was so silky soft and sizzling hot against her. He crushed her to him, and her tight nipples made contact. His whisper of pleasure vibrated against her lips. She felt as if she were tumbling through space, dizzy, hanging on tight to her only anchor. Then she was against the wall, looking up into the blazing, passionate eyes of Hollywood. He dipped his head, focusing on her breasts, and she arched in reaction to his gaze.
His cell chimed loud in the bathroom, and the fire that she had ignited in his eyes banked.
“Dammit, slugger,” he ground out and snatched the phone out of his back pocket. Then softer, “Take a shower,” he ordered, his voice husky. He left the room and closed the door.
“Dammit, Jude,” she groused. Still using the wall for support, she whistled low. “Wow. Just freaking wow.”
Willow undressed and got in under the spray where she stayed until she warmed up. Stepping out, she wrapped a towel around herself and opened the door a sliver. He wasn’t in the bedroom, her purse was on the bed, and his bag was gone.
She stepped out and reached her drawers when crashing and sounds of a struggle came from downstairs, the distinct sounds of something like dishes smashing against tile, furniture being dislodged, chairs overturned.
Willow turned, her stomach flipping over. Rushing out of the room, she hurried down the stairs, and as she came around the hall and into the kitchen, she saw a man restraining Hollywood in some kind of ninja full body hold. Scared and angry that someone was in her house, she shouted at the top of her lungs, “What the hell is going on here?”
The man’s head jerked up.
She gasped, relief and anger pushing out the fear.
“Daddy?” she whispered.
8
Through the whole conversation—no, it was more like a harangue—Hollywood stood with his back against the sink in the ruined kitchen. Her dressing down reminded him of drill sergeants and the owl mail Ron got in Harry Potter where Mrs. Weasley bitched him out in that strident mom’s voice.
All he could do, at this point was stay out of volley range and worry she’d cut her feet while she waved her hands and chastised her dad. In. A. Fucking. Towel.
Of course, he was glad her dad was alive. But meeting him over fisticuffs in the kitchen when he was half-naked and Willow showed up in a towel wasn’t his ideal meet-the-dad scenario. He wouldn’t admit it, but he was grateful she started yelling at her dad. Shadow broke his own hold, a hold Hollywood wasn’t sure he could have escaped. The kind of choke hold a man who was twenty years older than Hollywood shouldn’t have been able to maintain, not to mention he’d ambushed him while he was making her tea. He’d burned his fingers, and from the stinging all over his back, he was sure there was crockery embedded in his skin.
What a freaking cluster, ever clustered to fuck him over. Every time he looked at her, he couldn’t help the memory of that damn kiss that had almost knocked him to his knees. His dick and balls were still tight. The view of her delectable body, still glistening with water and barely covering all her exquisite curves, wasn’t helping.
He never met dads, moms, sisters, brothers or any relatives or friends of the women he fucked. Because he fucked them and left before any of that entangling business could happen. How the hell had he gotten himself all tied up with this amazing woman and a man who had his deep and undying respect, except for what he’d put Willow through, was something smarter and less wicked men than him knew.
“I’m sorry,” Will said for the hundredth time, but Willow wasn’t about to let him off the hook so easily. If there had been a chalkboard, she would have sternly ordered him to write it out a million times. That might have been enough, but Hollywood wasn’t sure. “I thought you were mad at me and getting out of dodge was a good idea. I was helping a buddy move.”
“Mad? You haven’t seen mad. I’m livid and torn up. You scared the shit out of me. I found your coat floating in the ocean! I thought it was you! I thought you’d given up!”
He tried to hug her, but she wouldn’t have any of it. She pushed against his chest and slapped his hands away, looking outmanned, outgunned and shit out of luck. Willow and her flying monkey words were doing the job.
If his phone hadn’t distracted him, he would had fucked her three times already and would have deserved the scowling, dagger looks her dad shot him every chance he got. He wished for a T-shirt that would cover his semi-hard dick that was growing by the minute because he was a depraved fuck and couldn’t help looking at Willow as the sexy, desirable woman she was instead of Senior Chief Will “Shadow” Blackmoon’s daughter.
She pivoted on her heel and stormed out of the room, shouting in frustration as she stomped up the stairs. The door to her room slammed shut, reverberating through the house with an echo of the woman’s anguished rage.
Hollywood didn’t move or say a word.
Will just looked up at the ceiling. “You know how to stay out of the line of fire, boy. I’ll give you that. If they ever got to the W’s for hurricanes, Willow would be my suggestion.”
Hollywood huffed a laugh against his will. “Stop being a dick, Senior Chief. That usually makes daughters much more social.”
He gave Hollywood a narrowed-eyed look, his brows lifting at Hollywood’s flat tone and blunt words. He sighed and started to pick up broken crockery from a baker’s rack they’d bounced into when Hollywood was trying, unsuccessfully, to break the senior chief’s hold. Hollywood headed for the wastebasket.
“There’s a broom in that closet,” Will said.
Hollywood opened the narrow door, snagged the broom and dustpan, turned and walked across the floor, shards crunching under his boots. When he dropped the basket next to Will, he peered at him more closely.
“I know you. BUD/S.” He named the year.” There was nothing wrong with this man’s memory. “You were that smart-assed, know-it-all charmer,” Will said in recognition and a tinge of respect. “You made a fine SEAL,” he grunted.
“Thanks to you.”
He dismissed Hollywood’s comment with a roll of his shoulders. “You still serving?”
“Yes, sir. Active duty.”
Will looked at Hollywood’s dog tags, and his eyes clouded with pain, loss and a deep shame. Hollywood knew because he’d been where Will was years ago before he was lucky enough to land on Ruckus’s team.
“How do you know my daughter?” His voice was a raspy growl.
“She’s doing a project with the Navy and Heart and Hand downtown to raise money for homeless vets.”
Will’s head came up at those words, and he sighed heavily, closing his eyes. “I have put my little Alice through hell.”
Alice? That must be a pet name Willow’s dad called her. He wondered why. “She scoured the city looking for you. She lost it when she saw your coat. I’m pretty pissed off at you about that.”
“Is that right? Want to go a few more rounds out back, candy-ass?”
Hollywood shook his head.
Will scowled some more. “If you’re here to get photographed, what is my daughter doing in a towel?”
“That’s none of your business and stop threatening Hollywood.” Willow entered the kitchen, this time fully dressed. She matched his scowl. “I’m a grown woman, and what I do with grown men is my business.” Some of the anger had dissipated, but she was still plenty pissed at her dad. She only glanced at Will, her expression full of hurt and fury.
“Ha, apt call sign,” Will said. “It’s Jude Lock though, correct?”
“Yes, sir,” he replied while Willow was frozen in place, her eyes going over his body. He should get a T-shirt on right now as Will started up with the dagger looks again.
Before he could leave the room, Willow’s strained voice was on the verge of tears again. He could have punched the old man in the face, but he kept his balled-up fists at his side.
“Oh, God. You’re bleeding,” she said.
He looked down, and sure enough, trails of blood trickled down his chest and stomach.
/> “I’ve got something to handle that.”
“It’s nothing—” His words died as she gave him a battle maiden look, and he knew what was good for him. Complete surrender. He picked up one of the overturned chairs and sat down. She disappeared but was soon back with a first aid kit, opening it and pulling out antiseptic and cotton balls.
She soaked one of the puffs with the liquid and pressed it to his cuts, changing them out as they got too saturated with his blood. Her face was soft and tender as she ministered to him, the fresh, just-showered scent of her distracting him for a moment. Her long blond hair was loose, and as she bent, some of it flowed across his skin, the feel of the heavy silk of her hair making his body tighten with need for her again.
He sucked in his breath a couple of times as the sting from the multiple cuts turned into one big, burning tingle and her dad gave him a reprimanding look like he was being a baby.
When she was done with that, she pulled out a tube and started to rub ointment all over his chest, murmuring, “It’s wound cream and will help with the pain.”
When she swiped over his nipples, the pleasure raced down his body and settled in his groin. The feel of her soft, gentle movements was driving him crazy. He might be a big, tough SEAL, but his skin was sensitive, especially vulnerable to the palms of a woman he wanted to get it on with in the worse way. But there were so many barriers to having sex with her bumping up against his rules and, fuck him, but his morals.
He’d refused to take advantage of a vulnerable woman up in her bathroom. She was still feeling the effects of that whole finding-her-father’s-coat-in-the-ocean and his principles, fuck him again, held him back. So the cluster just seemed to cluster even more as he got another serious hard on as she doctored him right in front of her big, tough dad who knew every decadent thing that was roving through Hollywood’s head.
Yeah, a man knew a man’s thoughts. But a dad had the protective instincts to give him a warning that Hollywood didn’t miss.
“I think I’m good,” he said as he rose and backed up. “I should probably go.”
“Good idea,” her dad growled.
“No, you haven’t eaten, and it’s getting dark. We were searching all day. You’ll have dinner with us. Right, Dad?” she bit out.
Damn but he wanted her neck to be itchy right now. Deployment sounded so good.
Hollywood escaped upstairs into the hall bathroom, gathered up his wet clothes and boots and stuffed everything in the bag. He’d taken the liberty of using the hall shower while she was in the master. Even a cold one hadn’t helped, he thought as he donned a dry navy blue shirt and did up the buttons. He took a moment to text everyone to let them know Will had returned home.
He went back downstairs, shoving his keys in his pocket. When he entered the kitchen, the chairs had been righted and the floor swept clean. Willow was at the counter, opening a jar of spaghetti sauce while her dad filled a pot of water. He gave Hollywood another unfriendly look.
“Dad,” Willow said with an edge to her voice, and Will sighed. “You can chop vegetables for the salad.” She reached over and turned on the oven. “Hollywood, the garlic bread is in the freezer.”
They worked together to get the meal prepared and sat down at the table to eat.
“Who’s your commanding officer?” Will asked.
“Lieutenant Bowie Cooper.”
“Cooper? Hmmm,” he said. “Hard-ass but fair. I heard about your team. Tight knit and effective. You’ve been hunting those stolen warheads. What progress have you made?”
“Sir,” he looked at Willow. It wasn’t classified. It had been all over the news when the robbery occurred, and those Marines had died. “Are you sure this is dinner table discussion?”
Will looked over at Willow. “She’s used to it, right, kiddo?”
She shrugged. “Yes, battlefield talk is common dinner conversation.”
“It shouldn’t be, but to answer your question, we’ve recovered all but one of the warheads. We’re in the process of tracking down the people who are currently in possession of it.”
“That’s good news.”
It was, but that village of dead people with Eze in the mix had put the intelligence community on edge. They were stepping up the manhunt for Bill and Ted and Vyncent Eze. Hollywood didn’t want to contemplate they were working together, but his gut was telling him Eze was involved. After testing on the blood of the victims was complete, they would have a better answer. If it had been a nerve agent, there was a definite reason to be alarmed.
“Where did you go?” Willow asked
Hollywood looked at her and smiled. “Nowhere. I was just going over what I have planned tomorrow.”
“Still no itching, so we’re good for the late afternoon. I have a shift in the morning.”
“You sure about that? You really need to get some rest, babe.”
The endearment slipped out, and he really had no idea what he was doing here. He wanted her, but the consequences of leaving his rules behind left him on untested ground. At least, not since Ashley had cheated on him. She hadn’t been the woman he thought she was…or maybe she hadn’t been SEAL wife material. He couldn’t be sure.
He had no idea where Willow stood or how she felt about getting involved with him. It would take two to get together. He needed to talk to her. But not with her dad sitting within hearing distance.
In this instance, maybe rules were made to be broken.
Hollywood was also feeling the fatigue from the mission and the activity from today. He rose when he was done, taking his plate to the sink.
Willow shot her dad a look and said, “You’re not going to disappear on me again, are you?”
“No, kiddo. I’m staying put.”
She nodded, and he helped her clean off the table and get the dishes done. After that, he headed for the door, grabbing up his bag. She followed him, and for a moment, they stood there awkwardly. He had no idea how to say goodbye to her.
Finally, she got on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek, lingering there for a moment. He caught her around the waist, and they stared at each other. “Thank you so much for what you did for me this afternoon. I’m so grateful for you and your friends’ help.”
“It was my pleasure. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She nodded and held the door for him. He was almost home free, but he turned back, and she looked startled. He cupped her face and lowered his head, intending to give her a soft, quick kiss. But she grabbed him by the back of the neck, and it turned into something wet, deep and scorching. By the time he pulled away, he was breathing hard.
“Goodnight, Jude,” she said.
“Night,” he murmured.
Too ramped up by that kiss to go home, he headed to the All In Bar and Grille. When he walked in, he took a table instead of sitting at the bar. When the server came by, he ordered a beer. One and he’d head home.
Damn, her mouth had been soft, and she’d tasted so sweet. His bed was looking very empty tonight, and he wasn’t used to sleeping alone. But he didn’t even scan the bar for a fuckbuddy. He didn’t know where he and Willow were going, maybe nowhere when she heard about his rules. Truth be told, he really didn’t seem as interested in his rules as he’d been in the past.
He nursed his beer, and just when he was finishing the last swallow, Willow’s dad walked in and made his way over to the bar. It looked like he’d showered and changed. He threw a tip on the table and rose.
Swearing softly, Hollywood headed over to the bar. “Will.”
He turned and shook his head. “You following me, boy?”
“No, sir, but does Willow know where you are?”
“She went out like a light, and I need a little something to help me sleep. Not that it’s any business of yours,” Will said. Hollywood slipped onto the stool next to him, and Will made a disgusted sound. “You my watchdog?”
“After what Willow went through today, I guess I am.”
“Well, I don’t like drinking alo
ne.”
Hollywood had one more beer, but that was his limit to drive. Will threw back whiskey like it was water.
“You know that isn’t going to help in the long run. It makes you dependent and weak, Senior Chief.”
“If you’d lost your team, you’d understand,” he said, that haunted look in his eyes again.
“I did lose my team.”
Will turned to look at him. “Not that I heard.”
“It was six years ago in Mobutu.”
“Fucking Africa.” He turned his grizzly head toward him, his face tight with memory, and downed another shot.
Hollywood shook his head at the bartender, and when he shot Will a questioning look, he sighed and nodded. He turned to Hollywood. “I didn’t know. Usually word travels around the SEAL community, but six years ago, I was training at BUD/S.”
“I’m never going to forget those guys, but I had to let their deaths go, Will. You told me that the days that break you are the days that make you.”
He snorted and looked away. “Adversity builds your character. I told you failing was still a learning experience.”
Hollywood nodded. “What you taught me saved me, saved lives, got me through the most horrible experience of my life. Without it, I might have gone homeless and drank myself to death. Don’t do that, Will. Willow loves you, and she’s here for you. She’s so strong and amazing. Now that you’re retired, there are things that you can do with your life. Don’t throw it away. Those guys who died on the battlefield, they will always be there in your heart and in your head. You’ll remember them, like we all remember every fallen brother. But they wouldn’t want this for you either. They had your back when it mattered. Now you need to step up to the plate and make their sacrifice mean something.”
“Damn, boy. It seems I taught you well.”