Hot SEAL, Runaway Bride

by Cat Johnson

  "Hey, Pretty Boy. I was thinking about heading to McP's for a cold one. You in?"

  Nick had tried alcohol many times in the past to cure himself of his Dani hangovers. It didn't work. "Nah. Thanks. I’m gonna head down to the O-Course."

  Eric's eyes popped wide as his head snapped back. "The O-Course. Uh, why? It’s hot as balls outside."

  Nick laughed at his teammate's shock. "Because staying in shape and keeping my skills sharp is better than getting dead."

  Eric scowled. "That's bull shit and you know it. Any other day we'd all be working our asses off. But our downtime is for kicking back and relaxing and pretending we have normal lives, not running the O-Course."

  Nick shrugged. "I find the O-Course very relaxing."

  Besides, he'd pretended he had a normal life at Michael's barbecue. Look where that had gotten him.

  "You're a freak, you know that?" Eric shook his head.

  Nick blew out a short laugh. "I've been called worse."

  "I'm sure." Eric folded his arms, his head cocked to one side. "You know what? I think it might be fun to head down to the beach and watch you 'relax'."

  Nick dipped his head. "Sure. Go get changed. I'll wait."

  "Oh, no. I won't be running the course. Just enjoying watching you run. I'll even time you."

  Nick rolled his eyes. "You really are bored."

  "Yup. Come on. Let's go. I figure you’ll run the course and shower and we can be at McP's within the hour."

  He laughed. "Ah, so that's your plan."

  "Yup."

  "All right. Come on." It looked like he was going out after all.

  Hopefully the O-Course would knock Dani out of his system so he'd actually be able to enjoy himself at the pub.

  The handful of brown-shirted trainees practicing on the course stepped aside without being asked to let Nick jump in for a run.

  First Eric, and now a bunch from the SEAL class—Nick’s audience was growing by the minute.

  That didn't matter. The moment Eric hit the button for the timer on his cell, all thought fled. There was nothing on Nick's mind except the challenge in front of him.

  He cleared the first couple of obstacles easily, half through muscle memory, half from the loop of internal dialogue running through his head.

  After all these years of running this course countless times, he knew exactly what he needed to do. Remembered what tricks he had mastered.

  It all worked to help him get through the course in what felt like record time today.

  Was it possible? Did Dani drive him crazy enough he could beat his personal best?

  "Time?" Nick shouted to Eric, who’d been following alongside, keeping pace with him from the sand.

  "Five minutes thirty."

  Holy shit!

  Nick had lived by the stopwatch during BUD/S when his time on the O-Course was one of the many things that could sink him from becoming a SEAL. That’s how he knew, that time was better than he'd ever had for this far into the course.

  He could break his personal best time.

  Knowing that, he dug deep and pulled out everything he had, pouring on the speed for the final obstacle—the vaults.

  His foot had just landed on the sand after the final hurdle when he felt it—the searing pain in his knee, right before he fell face first onto the ground.

  By the time Eric was standing over him, Nick was in the fetal position, cradling his knee and trying to blink away the tears of pain and the grains of sand in his eyes.

  "You all right?" Eric asked.

  "Fine," he said through clenched teeth.

  "You don't look fine."

  "Fuck." Nick drew in a shaky breath. This didn't feel like the kind of pain he'd be able to walk off.

  "Can I get a hand here?" Eric called to the trainees, who had already moved closer to Nick.

  "Sure thing." One trotted over and reached down to Nick as another came to the other side of him.

  Ready or not he was being half carried toward Eric's car.

  Thank God they'd driven down to the course rather than walk. Only because Eric hadn't wanted to get sweaty before going out, but it worked to Nick’s advantage now as he was carried off the course.

  Carried off the course. How fucking embarrassing.

  It looked like that whole McP’s plan was out. The only place he'd be going was Medical for an MRI.

  Christ. This sucked. All for the glory of a better time.

  Speaking of—Nick glanced back at Eric as the two brown shirts got him across the sand to where they'd parked. "Any chance you stopped that timer when I fell?"

  Eric shook his head. "You're a crazy son of a bitch. You know that?"

  "Yup." Nick dipped his head. “So did you?”

  "Yeah, I stopped it when you fell, because I know you, you sick mother-fucker. And even though you didn't technically cross the finish line, you cleared the last hurdle at five-minutes fifty-five seconds. You ever break six minutes before?"

  "Nope."

  "Yeah, didn't think so." Eric smiled.

  "Six minutes? Holy fuck." The first trainee whipped his head around to look wide-eyed at Nick before shooting a concerned glance at the other trainee.

  He knew the cause for their concern. In their stage of training there was no way they were running the course even close to that fast.

  Nick was glad they were impressed because it might be his best and last time on the course.

  Shit. If this injury turned out to be career ending, what the fuck was he going to do?

  EIGHT

  New Millennia Media had lots of shows.

  Shows that Dani actually might have enjoyed working on.

  The home renovation show Hot House with that tall, dark and broody Clay and his co-host girlfriend Tasha would have been a good one. Dani liked pretty houses as much as the next girl.

  Then there was that cool upcycle design show—Trash to Treasure—where Gabrielle Lee, a local up and coming interior decorator, took literal trash and turned it into décor. Dani would have enjoyed that one too.

  But Cold Feet, the show New Millennia Media had been hiring for at the time, was the job she got.

  Ugh.

  Besides her personal aversion to weddings, there was the whole concept of the show that turned her off.

  It was ridiculous. Barbaric even. Who in the world could have thought this was a good idea? The answer was beyond her.

  The producers must have all been drunk at Gabrielle Lee's Trash to Treasure wedding to her hot Navy SEAL hubby Zach when they decided a wedding show was going to be their next big hit.

  Hmm. Did Nick know Zach? They were both SEALs out of Coronado. The thought careened through her brain before she banished it.

  No more thinking about Nick. It was partially—make that mostly—his fault she despised weddings. Even normal ones not attached to crazy ratings-grabbing schemes.

  Cold Feet was train wreck TV. Pure and simple.

  One bride. One groom. Chosen from the masses of applicants who'd applied for the show. And a bevy of eight bridesmaids, plucked from a cattle call by the show’s producers for their potential to be exploited on air.

  Besides being eye candy—bikinis were a show requirement—they were there to act as a temptation for the groom. To test if the newly engaged couple's relationship could withstand the strain. For the entire month before the wedding they were all living together in a beach house.

  Insane!

  And to be fair, and to avoid the angry letters and accusations of sexism by viewers, there were also eight hot—almost always shirtless—groomsmen, carefully chosen to tempt the bride.

  To make things even more dramatic, the wedding party—if you could call them that—were rooming together, four to a bedroom. Except for the bride and groom, who each had their own private rooms. The better to hook up in . . .

  At the end of four weeks, the bride or the groom could choose not to go through with the wedding and ride off into the sunset with one of the other cast
members. But if they did go through with it, they got an all-expenses paid wedding reception, plus a load of cash to begin their new life together.

  For their trouble, each cast member got one thousand dollars per episode.

  They’d gotten the green light to produce ten episodes. That meant each got ten thousand dollars to prance around scantily clad in front of cameras, twenty-four/seven, knowing that through creative editing the show could make them look however the producers wanted. Good or bad.

  Given that, it didn’t seem like very much money at all.

  The worst part was, if Dani hadn’t been working on the production, if she was just home on the sofa, lounging in yoga pants with a bowl of popcorn, she totally would have watched this show and enjoyed all the drama playing out.

  But being attached to this show professionally, when she’d been hoping to get on a documentary or something else meaningful she could be proud of, was like something from out of her nightmares.

  She should have kept looking.

  Dani sighed and headed for the craft service table to grab a flavored sparkling water. They stocked the stuff by the case for the cast—along with plenty of "adult beverages" of course.

  Free flowing alcohol made sure the decisions the cast made on camera were extra dumb. That the dramatic moments became extra dramatic. Even if it was just the start of the first week on set, she could already see every little detail had been carefully planned to keep the cast off-kilter.

  They were completely cut off from the outside world.

  All of the clocks were set to the wrong time, so the cast never knew what time it actually was. There was no TV. No internet. The cast’s cell phones only connected to each other, restricting all communications with anyone outside the show. Even friends or family.

  The late nights. The early mornings. The blaring lights and music as their wake up call each day. The competitions disguised as games planned to pit the cast against each other. It was all designed for maximum drama.

  Drama equaled ratings. And ratings equaled advertising dollars.

  When the only goal was securing season two, the producers went all out on season one—reality be damned.

  Ugh, how had this become her career?

  Shouting interrupted Dani's depressing reverie about the state of her life and the entertainment industry.

  Abandoning the unopened sparkling water, she trotted to the source of the raised voices that had drawn her attention.

  "It had to be you! I had it last night. I took it off and put it on my bedside table right next to my cell phone and now it's gone." Korina stood, hands on her hips, shouting at Albany.

  Eyes narrowed, Albany shot back, "Why would I want your fake ass ring anyway?"

  The two took a step closer, sending Dani leaping to get between them.

  She recognized a fighting stance when she saw one. She'd tended bar for a semester during college to earn cash.

  Surprisingly, there were as many fights between females as there had been among the male patrons. Maybe that was to be expected in a college town where booze was cheap and crowds were thick.

  In any event, the two contestants were toe-to-toe, breathing fast, rocking in place where they stood with barely controlled aggression, which signaled the earrings were about to come off any second.

  Dani snapped into action, barely hesitating. She stepped from the safe area where she knew she wouldn't be seen by the stationary camera set up in the kitchen, and into the zone where she knew she would be recorded.

  It couldn't be helped. The two were seconds from one or both having their hair extensions torn out.

  "Whoa, whoa, whoa. What's wrong? How can I help?" Putting herself right in their faces, if not between them since there was no room, Dani hovered between being a PA and a bouncer.

  God, she'd give anything for a real bouncer on set. Occasional roid rage and all, one of those big guys would be handy right about now.

  A fist fight among the girls was one thing she hadn't anticipated having to deal with on set. Though it should have been. She'd watched enough reality TV to know better. Her bad.

  "She stole my ring," Korina accused.

  Albany blew out a snort. "I told you I don't want your ugly cheap piece of shit—"

  "I'm sure we can figure this thing out. With four of you sharing one room, things are bound to get misplaced, or accidentally knocked on the floor."

  "I'll knock her on the floor." Korina leaned in, her clean-scrubbed face red without the layer of the usual make-up.

  Meanwhile, Albany's hair was all over the place.

  This fight had started bright and early, before either cast member had time to get ready for the day. The fact both were standing in the bright light of the morning sun streaming through the kitchen windows, with no regard for how they looked in front of the camera that was catching it all, told Dani they were no longer thinking clearly.

  These girls usually snuck to the bathroom, the one camera-free zone, clutching a sheet to their faces so no one caught them looking less than perfect.

  Her first thought was that the producers were going to love this. Hot tempers flaring. Cast members who actually forgot the cameras were everywhere. A possible fight to put the ever-present ambulance to work.

  Train wreck television indeed.

  Her second thought was that she needed to get out of the damn shot before she got fired for ruining it. But she couldn't leave before she diffused the situation.

  Damn her father for raising her to always be early.

  The big guns on this show hadn't even shown up yet. Except for some low-level crew—lighting guys and catering—who had started to trickle in, she was on her own to fix this.

  The director would probably want her to let these two tear the gel nails off each other. Instead here she was, on camera, trying to break up the fight.

  Yup, she was so fired.

  Eyeing the group of four less than helpful male cast members who'd come for the coffee but stayed for the show, Dani decided getting fired might not be the worst thing.

  "Why don't you two go look for the ring in the bedroom together?" Dani suggested.

  Thalia, the duo's third roommate, came running in. "This ring?"

  Korina stepped forward, eyes wide. "Yes. Where did you find it?"

  "I was making my bed and it fell out of the sheets."

  "You? Were making your bed? Since when?" Albany scoffed.

  "Mm, hm. Sounds like a lie to me. Sounds like you heard I noticed my ring missing when you suddenly got the urge to make your bed for the first time ever and ‘found’ it." Korina moved to stand shoulder to shoulder in alliance with Albany.

  The two had been fighting mad a second ago. Now they were a united front. What the hell was going on?

  Thalia folded her arms and looked from one to the other. "I had to straighten my bed because my eReader is missing. Maybe one of you two can tell me where that is. Hm?"

  "I don't want your old ass first generation piece of crap," Albany shot back.

  "Excuse me that we all don't have a sugar daddy to buy us the newest electronics every year."

  "You got that right." Korina turned to shoot Albany a judgmental glance as the alliance shifted one more time.

  The audience watching the confrontation grew as more male and female cast filtered into the kitchen.

  Brittany L stepped forward. “Don’t fight, guys.”

  And there was Dani, still in the middle of the shot. She took a step back.

  She couldn't help she was in the room, but at least she could make sure the ceiling mounted camera had a clear view of the cast.

  "How about all three of you go look for the eReader together. I'm sure it will turn up just like the ring did," she said, desperate to get them to move to another room so she could get the hell off camera.

  "Hey, where's Diamond?" Korina glanced around looking for the fourth roommate and the only one not in the kitchen throwing around accusations.

  "I don’t know. She mu
st have come to bed after I fell to sleep last night and was already gone this morning when I woke up," Thalia said.

  A few men in the group of onlookers snickered. Some let out a juvenile and suggestive oooo.

  Korina let out a snort. "Wow. I figured she'd be the last one of us to hook up."

  "And why is that?" Thalia folded her arms and glared.

  "I mean, look at her," Korina answered.

  Thalia stepped forward, looking as if she was about to take down Korina to defend Diamond's honor, when the missing roommate herself skidded into the room.

  Breathless, Diamond said, "Katia is missing."

  All three roommates turned to the new arrival, but it was Dani who asked, "What do you mean missing?"

  "I just went to her room. It's empty. She's not in the shower. She's not out for a run. Her running shoes are still in the closet."

  "Then she's with Carl," Korina suggested. It made sense the bride might be with the groom.

  "Nope. I knocked on his door. She's not there. He hasn't seen her since last night. And then there's this . . ." The girl held up her hand. In it was a bejeweled cell phone. "This was on the floor next to her bed."

  There was a collective audible gasp from the room.

  The show had only been running for less than a week, but even Dani knew well that Katia would never willingly let her cell phone out of her sight.

  Even if it was only connected to the other cast members, when she wasn’t texting the other girls, she spent ninety percent of her time snapping selfies on the phone’s camera to post on her Instagram after this was all over.

  Something was very wrong.

  "What's going on here?"

  The sound of the director’s voice had Dani turning to see Maria, glaring at her in particular as she stood in the middle of what might possibly be the most dramatic episode of the season.

  At least she had a moderately understandable excuse. "The bride is missing."

  NINE

  "You're such a liar."

  A short shocked laugh escaped Nick. He peered at his brother through his sunglasses. "What do you mean?"

  Michael shook his head even as a small smile appeared. "It's okay. I understand. Super-secret SEAL stuff. I should be used to it by now."