Shayla glanced at him again as they finally rolled forward, but slowly, since the light ahead was already red again. She chose her words carefully. “I’m guessing your stints of solo custody are still new, Lieutenant.” Subtext: the divorce was recent.
He laughed again at that and said, “Oh, yeah.” And now the maroon sedan was in range of a side street to the left that it could use to escape, so again he stayed in the car. But his frustration was palpable. “Very new. And it’s Peter.”
She realized she hadn’t introduced herself yet. “I’m Shayla Whitman. We’re neighbors.” She kept both hands tightly on the steering wheel because a handshake at this point would’ve been awkward and weird. “My boys and I live right across the street from you and Maddie.”
The SEAL was embarrassed again. “You do? Ah, Jesus, I’m so sorry—”
“Please, it’s more than okay. You’ve obviously been a little preoccupied since you’ve moved in.” She cleared her throat. “At the risk of overstepping my neighborly role, have you…called her mother yet?”
Just like that, he shut down, hard and fast. “No.”
Oh, dear. “If it were me,” Shayla said carefully, “I’d want to know. I’d want to help, I’d want to—”
“Maddie’s mother can’t help,” he said tersely.
“I know it might feel that way,” Shayla started as the cars up ahead began moving. But again the light cycled back to red while the maroon sedan was still on their side of the intersection. It was now signaling to make a right—toward the mall, for the win! But it was blocked from doing so by one car in front of it.
The SEAL—Peter—was sitting forward slightly, watching.
“We’re okay,” Shayla told him.
“No, we’re not,” he said as that first car in line started signaling and then made a right on red. “God damn it.”
And just like that, the maroon sedan turned, too.
The two cars and the van directly in front of Shay’s car pulled forward but then sat there, essentially locking them in place just a few short yards from the driveway to that corner gas station.
“Shit!” She hit her horn, but of course no one moved.
Do it. Harry’s voice was back in her head, absolute in his conviction. Come on, Shay. Go! Trust me, you don’t want to have to watch while a Navy SEAL weeps. They’re known both for acting rashly and for crying like babies, you know, at the least little thing—
“Don’t be an idiot.” Oops, she’d said that aloud, and now said Navy SEAL was looking at her questioningly. “Don’t,” she repeated, saving her crazy, talking-to-invisible-friends ass by returning to their previous conversation. “You really need to let Maddie’s mother know what’s going on.”
Meanwhile, Harry was talking over her. Do it, he said again. There’re no pedestrians. Do it, Shay, or you’ll lose them!
“All right, all right, I’m doing this!” There were no pedestrians in sight, so Shay wrenched her steering wheel toward the sidewalk and hit the gas. Her little car was unhappy about the curb but it was rounded and worn so she finally humped up it and then carefully squeezed between a telephone pole and a row of hedges as the SEAL exhaled his appreciation and surprise.
But how well would it go, she wondered, when she informed the police officer who pulled her over that she only drove on the sidewalk because a fictional FBI agent had insisted that she should?
Not well, Harry agreed, even as the SEAL said, “You’ve got it! Go! Go!”
Her unorthodox move had brought them to the gas station’s entrance, and she now quickly zipped past the pumps to cut the corner and make the right turn to once again Follow that car.
It was in the left lane, and she quickly caught up with its ancient taillights. And then, sure enough, they both slowed as the maroon sedan signaled to turn left into the shopping mall’s main parking garage.
Don’t lose them now, Harry said, again in near unison with the SEAL’s “You got this!”
And Shayla did have it. She practically piggybacked the sedan as she also took that left with a squeal of tires. Again, the SEAL chuckled at the blaring horn from the oncoming car that she’d deftly cut off. His hands were up over his face, pressing his forehead as if he had a bad headache. But Shay knew he was hiding in case her noisy turn had caught the attention of the maroon car’s occupants.
Stay with them, Harry ordered—a far easier task now, since the speed bumps in the garage kept the ancient sedan well under the posted limit. She followed it past the first LEVEL FULL sign and down a ramp.
The parking places in this garage were tight, as was the case in most city malls in coastal California. Tight and hard to come by. If this were the Natick Mall back in her beloved Massachusetts, the maroon sedan would’ve already found a spot. But the next level was also full, so they just kept slowly going downward.
Which was exactly where she didn’t want to be in earthquake-prone California. In the sub-sub-subbasement of a six-story building. Yay! Still, a missing teenaged daughter trumped her earthquake fears, hands down.
Courage doesn’t mean you’re not afraid—it’s acting in spite of your fear.
Thanks, Hare. “So, how are we doing this, Lieutenant?” Shayla asked briskly. “They park, I block them in? You get out and knock on the window? Hello, is my daughter in there?”
“Peter,” the SEAL said as they went down yet another freaking level. Finally there was no FULL sign, but there were still no nearby spots. “Wow, I don’t know. And, yeah, that’s smart, but…This could get ugly. You know. Loud? Maybe you should just drop me and go.”
Shay’s heart sank as she looked at him, trying to figure out if he really was merely attempting to spare her the drama—or if there was something going on that he didn’t want her to see.
Everyone was hiding something, but some secrets were darker than others. Shay had learned that lesson a little too well.
Still, she kept her voice light. “And later find out that you’re really a serial killer whom I’ve helped stalk his latest victims?” She followed the maroon sedan slowly past the bank of elevators, where there were still no empty spaces. “I don’t think so.”
The SEAL gave her a look that screamed Are you freaking kidding me? It was pretty clear that this was an officer-to-enlisted look—and no doubt one that had served him well in the past. She, however, was not, nor had she ever been, in the U.S. Navy.
So it bounced off her as she gazed back at him. “I’m a writer, and I’ve written a lot of serial killer books.” It was a good excuse. Easier to use than the truth, which was that she’d seen just how shitty some people could be—even to those they professed to love. Yeah, he seemed like a nice guy. But monsters often hid beneath nice. And she’d known him what, now? All of twenty minutes?
“I’m not just going to drop you,” she continued. “I’ve come this far, I might as well drive you and Maddie home. Especially since we’re all going in the same direction.”
“I’m not going to hit her or hurt her or do whatever other kind of violence you might be imagining,” the SEAL said, seeing through her words to the reality of why she wasn’t going to just leave him there.
I like him even more now, Harry declared. He could’ve played along, but he didn’t. That’s impressive. You have my permission to have sex with him.
“Well, that’s good to hear,” Shay told the SEAL as the maroon sedan kept searching for a parking spot. “But I’m going through a severely mistrustful phase, and it would be irresponsible of me to not verify that you are, in fact, as great of a guy as you appear to be. I have to admit, I’m still struggling with Why on earth haven’t you called her mother?”
“Maddie’s mom is dead,” the SEAL told her. “She was killed in a car accident, three months ago.”
Peter knew that he’d screwed up, the moment the too-blunt words left his mouth.
“Oh, no,” Shayla-his-neighbor’s soft brown eyes widened with shock as she gazed at him from behind the wheel of her progressive-mom-mobile. “O
h my God, Peter, I’m so sorry!”
At least she’d finally called him Peter instead of Lieutenant, but she’d definitely gotten the wrong idea.
He sat there in the front seat of her functional, fuel-efficient little car and realized that he was going to have to explain. And Jesus, he’d already told her so much—things he would never have discussed with a stranger under any other circumstances. He hadn’t even told his closest teammates more than a small fraction of the shit that was going down these days with Maddie.
Most of them were still agog at the fact that he had a daughter in the first place.
But this woman—Shayla Whitman, his across-the-street neighbor—had taken a risk not just by stopping for him but by chasing the car he was certain he’d seen Maddie climb into. She deserved honest answers, regardless of how hard it was to talk about this.
“No, I’m sorry, I really should’ve said that earlier,” Pete started, “but—”
“Oh my God,” Shayla cut him off. “No, Lieutenant, please, I’m the one…I didn’t even consider…I didn’t mean to be so freaking insensitive.” She was really upset, and he was back to Lieutenant. Damn it.
“It’s okay, really, you didn’t know. I should’ve said something when you first asked if I’d called her but…” He tried to explain. “It just…it defines us, you know. Maddie and me. It’s exhausting, and I was trying not to let that into the car—if that makes any sense at all.”
She reached for his hand, nodding as if she actually understood what he meant. It was weird, because as a general rule, people didn’t dare touch him. Well, women sometimes did, but only when he was hanging out in a bar, clearly welcoming an intimate connection.
But Shayla didn’t squeeze his hand for very long—there was definitely no sexual subtext in her comfort-from-mommy contact. She even patted him a little as she let him go, saying, “I’m so, so sorry for your loss.” Her sincerity was off the charts and he found himself not just needing to explain, but actually wanting to.
What was up with that?
It was probably because he found her mindblowingly refreshing. When was the last time he’d met a woman who was so honest and real—and not already engaged or married to one of his teammates?
Shayla didn’t just drive a mom-mobile, she actually was a mom, with her curly black hair worn naturally and super-short in—what was it called?—a pixie cut, and a sweet face that was almost completely devoid of makeup. Probably because she was too busy with her crazy mom-life to take the time to put it on.
Not that she wasn’t pretty enough without it. She was—in a very G-rated, Disney-movie way. She was wearing jeans and a yellow T-shirt that were meant neither to feature nor conceal her curves. But she hadn’t simply dressed for comfort. With her gorgeously rich brown skin, bold colors looked good on her and she obviously knew it—no one wore something in that bright of a hue by accident.
She had lively dark brown eyes and a quick, warm smile in an expressive heart-shaped face. It was the kind of face that gave away everything she was feeling, even when she tried to hide it.
In fact, earlier, she’d shot him one powerful look of vaguely comical disapproval that had amused the crap out of him, mostly due to the fact that in his job not just as a SEAL officer but as a BUD/S instructor, he rarely received that kind of judgment and attitude from anyone.
But he dished it out, all the time.
So yes, even though they’d just met, he already liked her—and that was saying something, since it usually took him years of acquaintanceship before he even considered calling someone a friend.
But right now she was imagining he was recently widowed, and that was far from the case.
“It’s really Maddie’s loss,” Pete told her as the car they were following finally signaled its intention to park.
He scrunched down in his seat, again using his hands to shield his face, because the driver was clearly intending to back into the narrow spot. “I came to terms with mine a long time ago,” he said. “Lisa—Maddie’s mom—and I split up for good when Maddie was about a year old. Thirteen months and four days and…” He’d been at sea for most of those months, and home on leave for less than a week when Lisa had packed the car and left before breakfast, but Shayla really didn’t need to know that much detail. “Anyway, it’s not like my wife just died. I mean, she’s not even my ex-wife, because I could never get her to marry me.”
And that was TMI.
He peeked out at her from behind his hand-shield, but instead of looking like she wanted to jump out of the car, Shayla was nodding as if she appreciated what he’d shared. “You both must’ve been young when you had Maddie.”
“Yeah,” Pete said. “Very.” He cleared his throat. “Anyway, they moved out of state and lived, well, pretty much anywhere that wasn’t San Diego because Lisa grew up here and hated it. That plus my deployments made it hard for Maddie and me to have any kind of real relationship, so here we are. Suddenly Lisa’s gone, and I have full custody of my kid, but we’re strangers. I’m clueless and Maddie’s miserable—apparently enough to run away.”
“She’s still grieving,” Shayla said as the enormous car continued its ponderous twenty-thousand-point turn. “And of course, you are, too. I mean, it’s only natural, regardless of how long it’s been since you and Lisa broke up. Is Maddie going to counseling?”
“We both are,” he said. “Separately and together.”
“Wow,” she said. She was genuinely impressed. “That’s great.”
“It’d be a lot more great if it was actually helping,” Pete told her.
“It takes time,” she said. “Okay, there are two boys in the front seat of the car, and they’ve definitely noticed that we’re just sitting here, not parking. I’m pulling in front of them so they can’t leave. What’s your Plan B if Maddie runs?”
Jesus, he hadn’t thought about that. He hadn’t imagined Maddie would literally run away from him, but now that Shayla had brought it up…“Um…” he said.
“Okay. Maybe she won’t try to run,” the woman pointed out, “if you start the conversation with something like Look, I’m not mad at you; you’re not in trouble. I just want to go someplace where we can sit down and talk.”
Pete made a noise that was almost a laugh. “Except I am mad at her and she is in trouble.”
“Then you better come up with something more productive than um,” Shayla said tartly. “FYI, grabbing her and throwing her into my trunk is not an option.”
“I would never do that,” he said, and this time his laughter was more real.
“Just making sure. The Navy SEAL seems strong in you,” she said as the maroon sedan came to a final stop. “Rumor has it SEALs act rashly and cry a lot.”
“What?” Pete laughed as he opened the door to climb out. “Where did you hear that?”
“I have my sources,” she said with a smile. She leaned forward to look up at him through the open car door, her brown eyes encouraging in her pretty face. “You can do this. Just don’t forget to breathe.”
CHAPTER TWO
Shay watched as the Navy SEAL squared his very broad shoulders, took a deep breath, and started for the maroon sedan.
Teenagers could be bewildering and infuriating—even to parents who’d been-there-done-that starting with the terrible twos and surviving every awful phase in between.
As the primary caregiver of a grieving fifteen-year-old girl, this man was facing the biggest challenge of his life.
The good news was that he was smart and that he seemed, truly, to care.
Although if he’d cared a tad more over the past decade-plus, and had taken the extra effort to forge a relationship with his daughter, he wouldn’t be in this predicament right now.
Judgment on heavy stun! Harry’s familiar voice rang in her head.
“Shh!” Shayla attempted to silence him. But okay, yeah. Harry was right. She was judging. Again.
To be fair, the subset of divorced-fathers-who-don’t-spend-time-with-the
ir-kids is a giant button for you, Harry allowed. Although, hello? You don’t have to give Lieutenant Hot SEAL your parenting stamp of approval before you play a few rounds of naked Scrabble with him.
She’d never played naked Scrabble, not even with Carter. Maybe especially not with Carter. Her musical ex-husband hadn’t been all that into the written word. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d played regular, non-naked Scrabble. And now the boys were more into games like Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne, which, frankly, was one of her current favorites, too.
Harry snapped his fingers to get her attention back as he said, Well, maybe you should start playing naked Carcassonne. Because, damn. With your Navy SEAL, naked Watching C-SPAN would rate five shiny stars on the international enjoyment index.
Ha ha ha, Harry was so funny. His name is Peter and he’s not my Navy SEAL, she thought at him.
Maybe not yet, Harry said. But if you play your Carcassonne tiles right—
“Shh,” Shay hissed again, pushing him out of her mind as she put down her window. She wanted to hear the conversation—
And police it. Harry refused to leave.
Damn straight she was going to police Peter-the-SEAL’s conversation with his wayward fifteen-year-old daughter. She dug through her handbag for her cellphone, because her own Plan B involved calling 9-1-1 if there was trouble. She hoped that wouldn’t be the case, but she hoped if it was, the lieutenant wouldn’t take it personally. She knew, completely, that if Maddie did try to fend him off with a loudly proclaimed This man is not my father! or Bad touch! that the girl was probably just being a dickish teen. But since Shay didn’t know either of them, she wasn’t going to risk that the girl might be telling the truth. If she was, and no one believed her…That would be terrible.
Shay’s Plan B, should she need to use it, was to let the authorities sort it all out.
Excellent. Harry approved. But then again, he would, considering he worked for the FBI. Oh, and jot down the license plate number while you still remember it.
Some Kind of Hero Page 2