by Elle James
Pitbull slowed as he passed Marly. “You should let the doctor check you over.”
Although it was nice that he was looking out for her, Marly didn’t feel the need to see the doctor. “Other than a few scratches and bruises, I’m fine.” She raised her eyebrows. “What about you?”
He pressed a hand to his ribs. “Like you, just a few bruises. I’ve had worse.”
They stood for a moment in silence. The closeness they’d shared on the trip back to the resort seemed to be slipping away, and Marly didn’t know what to do to hold on to it. “I’ll see you in fifteen.”
“I’m sure Talia wouldn’t expect you to be ready that quickly.”
Marly’s lips thinned. “I can be ready in five.”
Pitbull held up his hands. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to imply that you were slow.” He bent to press his lips to her cheek. “You’re an amazing woman, Marly Simpson.” Then he left her standing there and hurried toward his bungalow.
Marly touched a hand to her cheek and watched until Pitbull disappeared around the corner of the house. She couldn’t make heads or tails of that man. One minute he was pushing her away, the next he was kissing her.
Hell. She didn’t know where this was going or how it would end, but she did know she wanted more.
* * *
PITBULL FELT LIKE his entire body had been tossed around in a rock tumbler. Every muscle ached and he knew he’d be covered in bruises, but he didn’t care. He wanted only to shower, change into his fancy clothes and get back to Marly. Damn. When had he become obsessed with the woman?
Oh, yeah. Somewhere between crash-landing her airplane and being rolled by an angry bull elephant.
After a quick shower and a once-over of his body, he shrugged and dragged on his clothes. Bruises to his body he could live with. What about his heart, though? He’d never found a woman he’d even considered falling in love with. What if she got cancer and died, like his mother? Or was hit by a train, or crashed in an airplane?
And then there was his job. He’d be deployed, and she’d get lonely and leave him while he was gone. That’s what happened to so many of the SEALs he’d known. Nothing like getting a Dear John letter, or worse, divorce papers served while away at war. Why risk his heart, only to have it broken?
Yeah, he’d be smart to keep this light. Just a fling. No commitment and no strings attached. As long as Marly understood that, why shouldn’t they spend the rest of the week in each other’s beds? Assuming her offer of the night before remained open.
He dressed in his shirt and trousers and pulled on his boots. After briefly finger-combing his hair, he slung his tie around his neck and left the bungalow. Ten minutes had passed when he found himself half walking, half jogging back to the main house.
“Where’s the fire?” Buck called out from the doorway of his bungalow. “Hold up. I’ll walk with you.”
Pitbull stopped and waited for his friend, a little frustrated at how slowly the man was walking. But he told himself Marly couldn’t have gotten through her shower as fast. Women had to blow-dry their hair and shave their legs or something. She wouldn’t be ready as quickly as him. No way.
“I heard Talia say you guys had some trouble with a bull elephant,” Buck said as he joined Pitbull.
“I’d rather tell the story once when we’re all at the dinner table. Same with you. I want to know what happened with the poachers.”
“Well then, what should we talk about while we’re waiting for everyone else?”
“Who said we have to talk?” Pitbull’s concentration centered on getting to the house—and Marly.
“What’s with you and our Marly girl?” Buck shot him a sideways grin. “And don’t play dumb with me. You had your arm around her the whole way back to the resort. Are you two a thing?”
Pitbull wasn’t ready to talk about Marly or what he was feeling toward her. Not yet. He didn’t even know where it was going. “We’re not a thing.”
Buck nodded, his lips twisting as he walked beside Pitbull. “I hear Talia is planning on having music after dinner. There might be dancing. I think I’ll ask Marly to dance with me.” He tipped his head toward Pitbull and raised his eyebrows. “Since you’re not a thing, I figure she’s fair game.”
Pitbull’s hands balled into fists. After the day he’d had, he was one breath short of slugging his friend. Instead he forced a shrug. “You can ask her.” Hopefully, she’d spit in his face and turn him down flat.
“You know, she’s not a beautiful woman, not in the classical sense. Not like Talia,” Buck said. “But she’s feisty and tall. Until she wore that dress last night, I didn’t realize just how long her legs were.”
Pitbull rounded on his friend and jabbed him in the chest. “You hurt Marly and you’ll have me to answer to. Do you understand?”
Buck held up his hands as if in surrender and chuckled. “Just poking the bear. I figured you had a thing going with Marly, but I wasn’t sure you knew it yet.” He nodded. “You know it now, don’t you?”
His breathing came in ragged huffs, anger simmering so close to the surface, Pitbull could erupt at any moment. “Don’t push me, Buck. Marly’s a good woman. She deserves to be treated with respect.”
“And you’re just the man to do that, right?” Buck grinned.
Pitbull wanted to knock the man’s teeth out, and danged if he knew why. This was his friend.
“Hey, what’s going on out here?” Big Jake’s voice carried to them from the front entrance to the house. “Do I need to break you two up and send you to separate corners?”
Buck waved at Big Jake. “No. We’re good. Just getting a few things straight. Aren’t we?”
Still caught up in his anger, Pitbull fought to calm the fire burning inside. He nodded and turned toward the house, falling in step beside Buck. “We’re good.”
“Oh, and Big Jake?” Buck said as they climbed the steps to the front door. “Just to set the record straight, our man Pitbull doesn’t have a thing for our pilot, Marly, but he doesn’t want anyone else to dance with her. Got it?” Buck tapped Big Jake’s chest and ducked past him before Pitbull could take a swing.
Big Jake frowned. “Is that so? You and Marly?” He grinned. “Doesn’t surprise me in the least. I knew it all along.” Big Jake held open the door.
“What do you mean, you knew it all along?” Pitbull passed through.
“Seriously?” Big Jake shook his head. “You two are all googly-eyed with each other. It would take a moron to miss it.”
“Googly-eyed?” Pitbull stared at the big guy. “Since when do you say things like googly-eyed? What’s happening to my teammates?”
“Yeah, and you’re trying to change the subject.” Big Jake chuckled. “I’ll let it go. But you should know the rest of us aren’t blind. We saw you two kissing in the garden last night.”
Great. His entire team thought he and Marly had something going on. Well, at least that might keep them from making moves on the pretty pilot until they left the resort.
Why he cared...
Reason kicked in. So many of the SEALs he knew who’d dared to have a relationship with a woman ended up dumped after the first deployment. One guy he’d known had quit the team when his wife demanded that he be home more often. Then she’d dumped him for an accountant. He’d been heartbroken on top of giving up a job he’d loved.
As he entered the house, his gaze whipped to the top of the staircase Marly had descended the night before. She wasn’t there. Good. That gave him time to get his act together so that he didn’t make a complete idiot of himself.
One by one, the men assembled in the open living area. Talia stepped into the room wearing a black-and-white gown in a bold geometric pattern with black spike heels. She had smoothed back her hair and pulled it up into a modern design that exposed the long line of her neck and her high cheekbones. The petite woman
was pretty enough to be in a fashion magazine. But she wasn’t Marly.
Talia swept her arm to the side. “We can head for the dining room. Marly will be joining us momentarily.”
The SEAL team followed Talia into the entryway and toward the dining room.
Pitbull lagged behind, his gaze going to the top of the stairs again. And there she was.
Marly’s gaze connected with his and she lifted her chin.
Pitbull swallowed hard.
The gown she wore was a magnificent, vivid red. The neckline dipped low in a V between her breasts, and a slit ran all the way up, almost to the top of her thigh. Her long, slender leg peeked out from between the folds of the red fabric to showcase a silver high-heeled sandal.
“Holy hell, Marly,” Pitbull said, his voice choked with desire.
Her cheeks flushed a pretty red that complimented the gown. “I know. It’s too much, right?” She turned and started to walk back to her room.
“No, it’s not.” Pitbull found himself walking up the stairs. “You just look...” He fought for words that could accurately describe what he was seeing. “Stunning.”
The red in her face deepened. “You think so?”
“I say what I mean.” He walked the rest of the way to the top of the stairs and held out his arm. “May I escort you to the dining room?”
She smiled. “Thank you. I wasn’t quite sure I’d make it down the stairs in these shoes.” Marly chuckled softly. “I think Talia likes to dress me.”
“She knows what suits you.”
“I never was one to wear dresses.” Marly gathered the skirt in her free hand and started down the wide staircase at Pitbull’s side. “But I think I could get used to it. I’ve never felt more feminine.”
They’d reached the bottom and stepped out across the foyer to the dining room.
Pitbull leaned close. “I still like you better in your flight suit,” he said, and meant it.
The men stood around the table, waiting for the last members of their party to join them.
Buck was the first to see Marly. This time he didn’t whistle. His mouth dropped open and he simply stared. “Wow.”
“He said it.” Harm shook his head. “Wow.”
“Wow.” Big Jake cupped the side of his cheek. “What happened to the badass pilot in the jumpsuit who landed a crippled plane in a field full of wild animals?”
Marly turned away. “I’m going to change.”
“No, no. Marly, stay.” Talia hurried forward and gripped her arm. “You look absolutely fabulous. I never made that dress look like that. For one, I tripped over the skirt. It was too long. And two, it needed a longer, leaner body to do it justice.”
“Darling, you do it justice,” Buck said.
Pitbull glared at the man.
Buck grinned. “All bets off tonight, dude. I’m dancing with the lady in red.”
“Me, too,” Harm said.
“Count me in,” Big Jake added. “We can’t let a dress like that go to waste.”
“Watch out, guys,” Buck warned. “Pitbull might take offense to everyone stealing his girl.”
Marly shot a quick glance at Pitbull. “What are they talking about?”
Pitbull clenched his fists and held his temper, trying to appear calm when he wanted to land a fist in the face of every man in the room. “We should be seated before the chef decides we aren’t interested in the meal he’s prepared.” He held the chair for Marly, while glaring around the room at any man who dared to sit to her left.
The others took the hint and left the seat beside Marly open. Pitbull took his seat next to her and counted the minutes until they could quit the dining room and go back to the garden to stare at the moon and make out.
“Now that we’re all in the same room and we don’t have a diesel engine roaring in our ears, could you tell us what happened with the poachers?” Marly said, starting the conversation.
Pitbull liked that she didn’t wait long, but jumped in, demanding the story.
“Sure.” Diesel popped his napkin out straight and settled it in his lap. “By the time we got to where the poachers were, the elephants had pretty much handled the situation. Apparently the poachers were trying to kill a female with long ivory tusks and snag her baby. They had a truck with a trailer.”
Big Jake picked up the story. “They had shot the cow several times.”
Marly gasped and reached for Pitbull’s hand beneath the table.
“But they didn’t use an elephant gun. The bullets were too small and hit the wrong areas to kill her.”
“But they shot her?” Marly asked.
“Yes,” Harm said. “Which only managed to make her mad. She was calling all of her buddies to come help.”
“We circled wide, seeing as the herd had converged on the poachers and their vehicles. They were stomping the crap out of them.”
“Like what the bull elephant tried to do to us,” Pitbull muttered.
“Yeah.” Buck grinned. “I’d like to hear that story.”
“Next.” Pitbull waved his hand. “Continue.”
“The poachers were aiming out the windows of their vehicles and firing randomly, hoping to scare off the elephants,” T-Mac picked up. “We couldn’t let them hurt another animal, so we moved in as close as we could get without letting the elephants see us. We figured they’d think we were with the poachers and attack us, too.”
“Like T-Mac said, we moved closer,” Big Jake said. “We fired at the poachers. They were so shocked by our presence they spun out and drove off.”
Buck grinned. “We followed them a little way on foot to see which way they were going.”
Talia set her fork on the table beside her plate. “Which way was that?”
“South. Due south,” Diesel said. “As fast as they could go. When we turned around to come back, the herd of elephants were in the way, and they were twitchy.”
“By then, the big bull had joined them and stirred the womenfolk up again,” Buck said. “They didn’t seem to want to settle down.”
“Bottom line, we had to swing really wide to stay out of their sight and out of charging distance.” Big Jake grinned. “I don’t know what you did to that bull, but he was madder than hell.”
“Yeah.” Buck stared across the table at Pitbull and Marly. “What did you do to make him so mad?”
Marly laughed. “We crossed his path.”
“No, really. Did you poke him?” Buck asked. “Or did you tweak his nose hairs? Because that dude came lumbering in, trumpeting as loud as a trombone player on steroids.”
“Then we came back and found you had tipped the truck over,” Buck said, laughing. “How?”
“Well, for one, we didn’t tip it over,” Pitbull said. “That bull elephant must have heard the distress calls of his female harem, because he came running, determined to shut down anything that might scare or harm his girls.”
“To keep his women safe, he displayed his powerful alpha male side and tipped the truck over?” Buck pressed a hand to his chest. “A guy after my own heart.”
Pitbull laughed. “Sadly, that’s exactly how it happened.”
“Holy hell, Pitbull,” Diesel said. “An elephant did that?”
“Yes,” Pitbull said.
Talia drummed her fingernails on the table. “Did you see the faces of the men who tried to kill the cow?”
“We did better than that,” Harm said. “Show them, T-Mac.”
T-Mac took his cell phone from his shirt pocket, opened the device and displayed an image of a lot of grass. He enlarged the image and pointed at the middle. “I got a pretty clear shot of two of the guys before they scrambled for their truck.” T-Mac pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and zoomed in on the faces of the two men. They wore black clothing.
“They dress like the guys w
ho kidnapped Diesel’s girl and hid her in the jungle along the Congo.”
“Let me see the picture.” Diesel grabbed for the phone and frowned down at the men. “Hell, they could also be the guys I chased off from trying to kill the gorillas we ran into along the Congo. At least, I thought they were trying to kill the gorillas. I wonder if they were trying to steal the babies, killing the mamas in the process.” He shook his head. “It all happened so fast and I was just trying to keep them from massacring the entire group.”
“Whoever they are, they can’t keep savaging the animals,” Talia said. “Not only does the All Things Wild Safari & Resort rely on the safaris to keep it open, the animals need to have a safe place to be what they are—wild.” She sat back in her chair. “I reported the attack to the game warden. Hopefully they can chase down the culprits and put an end to the killing and stealing.” Talia pushed back from the table and stood. “In the meantime, we need something to cheer us up. We’ve all had a helluva day.” She walked to the doorway. “If you’ll follow me to the parlor, I’ve had the staff roll up the carpet so that we can dance.”
Big Jake cleared his throat. “In case you haven’t noticed, there are only two women and six men.”
Talia smiled. “I know. We women will take turns dancing with anyone who wants to dance.” She grinned broadly at Marly. “Right?”
Marly started to stand. “I’m not much of a dancer, but I’m game. Besides, I’ve already been told this dress needs to dance.”
Pitbull leaped to his feet and held her chair as she rose.
When Marly stepped around the chair, Buck was there with his arm held out.
Pitbull puffed out his chest and gritted his teeth.
Buck only grinned, hooked Marly’s hand in his elbow and marched out of the dining room.
“Jerk,” Pitbull muttered.
Big Jake clapped a hand on Pitbull’s back. “You’re not giving up that easily, are you?”
Pitbull unbuttoned his sleeves, shoved them up his arms and then stalked after Buck and Marly. The man knew better, but had still stolen Pitbull’s girl out from under his nose.
Harm, Big Jake, T-Mac and Diesel followed Pitbull, laughing behind him. He figured they would all torment him by dancing with Marly. Well, he’d show them.