Keeping It: A Navy SEAL meets Virgin Romance

by Rachel Robinson

  Leif quirks one bushy brow. “You mean fuck a waitress in uniform. Not be one, right?” he asks, then realizes I’m standing right here. “Not you, though. I’m not suggesting he wants to fuck you.” His face is horrified as he tries to talk around his blunder.

  I grin. “Of course not. Why would anyone want to fuck me?”

  Leif swallows hard. Aidan clears his throat awkwardly. “Go talk to him. Just thirty seconds. Aidan can pour coffee. I attest on his behalf. I’ll supervise everything.”

  “I have nothing to say to him,” I say, putting one hand on my hip.

  Aidan ushers me to the front door, one arm on my shoulder. I ask Bob on my way by if he needs anything. He winks in response.

  I hand Aidan the ticket book and tell him the guy in the suit needs his check. He smiles widely like I’ve entrusted him with a billion dollars. Tahoe is kicking the tires of the truck in the muddy parking lot.

  “What do you want?” I call out.

  At the sound of my voice, he hangs his head. “They told you to come out here?”

  “Said you wanted to talk to me,” I say.

  He looks like crap. His face is haggard and his tan skin is a pallid color. “Tyler, I really don’t have anything else to say to you.”

  “I fuck virgins,” he says, a hint of meanness inside his words.

  I raise my brows. “That’s great. Just not me then. What a compliment. I didn’t come out here to fight with you about your drunken declarations. Aidan is in there waiting my tables.”

  He kicks the chunks of wet mud with his big combat boots. “I fucked everything up, okay? Stay away from me and them,” he says.

  I laugh. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

  “Caroline, I’m telling you for your own good. We aren’t good men. I saved you. Stringing you along for all this time was one of the worst decisions I’ve ever made. I’m sorry for that. I am.”

  Frustration rears, leaving me furious. “I don’t need a good man to take my virginity. At this point I just need someone who isn’t afraid to do it. Aren’t men supposed to want a virgin? I saw on the news one woman auctioned hers off. Maybe that’s what I’ll do. Get it over with so you’ll find me attractive.”

  He spins, looking at me dead on for the first time since I came outside. “That’s seriously what you fucking think? That I don’t find you attractive enough?” He steps toward me. I look away, at the window where his friends are staring at us from their booth. The soft glow of the light behind them masking the expressions on their faces. “A war doesn’t have anything on what you make me feel.” He gets so close that I can feel the heat from his breaths.

  I have to close my eyes. To get away from him in one way, because it’s too much. Having him this close but not being able to touch him. “You are dangerous, Caroline,” he says. I open my eyes as his flutter closed. “You threaten everything I’ve ever stood for. Everything I thought I needed. Wanted. I’m doing you a favor. Be reasonable please.”

  “That’s it then?” I ask. “We’ll just pretend there’s nothing between us? This is a small town in case you haven’t noticed.” His B&B comes to mind and how entangled he is with my world now.

  He backs away a step and inhales deeply. “Pretending is going to be hard for a while. I need to get the fuck away from you.”

  “How can you do this? I don’t understand. How can you throw this away so easily? For something so trivial?” Before it ever really started. Maybe my hesitance was warranted, maybe he was never that into me. Reading things this wrong is something I’ll probably never recover from.

  “You’re asking the wrong questions,” Tahoe replies. To his credit, he looks tortured and crestfallen. Like someone else made this decision for him and there’s nothing he can do to change it.

  Licking my lips, I take a step back toward the diner. “What a joke. Have fun in New York.” All of it was too good to be true. Something picked from a movie and inserted in my life. The happily ever after doesn’t transfer over in real life though. I’m not that naïve.

  He raises his brows. “If I’m lucky I won’t make it back.” My stomach sinks at what he’s insinuating. I can’t have him, and I don’t want anyone else to have him, but he needs to always exist. To prove what I felt, for even a small amount of time was real.

  Shaking my head, I try to process that sober Tyler Holiday is saying the same things that drunk Tyler said last night. He stares at me. Hard. Like he’s trying to figure me out. “You are something special.”

  “Not special enough, though. Too small town. Too simple.” He watches my mouth as I speak.

  He stalks toward me quickly and the sudden movement takes my breath away.

  “Know that anytime you move your lips I want to be kissing them,” he growls. This close I see everything he tries to hide. The specks of lighter blue in his eyes, the way his jaw ticks as he holds himself back. I know what it used to mean. Does it still mean the same thing now?

  Blinking away tears, I enter the diner. Aidan has a tray of food haphazardly balancing on one hand, and Caleb is wearing a scowl fit for the Grinch.

  One glance at the morose demeanor of Tahoe’s table of friends tells me they watched the whole sad, sorry conversation deteriorate. Who knows, maybe they can read lips. I could punish them for their friend’s behavior, but that would take more effort than I can muster at the moment. When Shirley joins me a few hours later, I give her the lowdown. She makes me feel better, because aftermath is what she’s good at. I listen to her advice, forcing it to be applicable to me. She tells me men aren’t worth it. They are only good for one thing. I tell her that one thing is why he decided I wasn’t worth the effort and she does her best to conceal her confusion, but can’t.

  I shove my apron in the dirty clothing hamper near the kitchen. “You have to do it, Caroline. With anyone. It doesn’t matter if they aren’t up to your standards. Make him think he’s a blip on your radar, not worth the dirt on the bottom of your shoe.”

  Swallowing hard, I think her advice through. “Isn’t that kind of the opposite of what I want?”

  “He is not a nice person, Care. Move on. With one of the Bronze Bay boys. They won’t hurt you like that. I guarantee it. It sounds like he has some weird hang ups. You’re ready to settle down with someone?” Not with a Bronze Bay boy. I can’t even fathom it now.

  “I’m ready to lose my virginity,” I reply.

  Shirley smiles. “Let’s focus on that.”

  I shrug.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Tahoe

  There’s a brunette in the kitchen when I walk out of the bedroom, a towel wrapped low around my waist. She’s wearing a t-shirt, the curve of her naked ass peeking out of the bottom. Her legs are short and lean as she leans forward to look on a bottom shelf inside the fridge.

  Aidan gallops into the room from the other bedroom. Gallops. Like a fucking horse. He blows a noisy breath through his mouth and nose before he neighs.

  “Please take the pony play to the bedroom,” I say, wincing. It’s been a while since we’ve been in this kind of situation. Not since before Bronze Bay. To say the guys are going balls to the walls with the freedom in a big city is an understatement.

  Aidan cackles and pulls the dark beauty into his arms. She leans back to kiss him and I have to look away. “You can come be a stallion in my stable if you want to,” she says, breaking up their kiss to talk to me. The brunette winks.

  “Yeah, man. I’ll share,” Aidan replies when I don’t. It’s more of a growl. It doesn’t tempt me in the least. Not anymore. I’m convinced the only things that do it for me are the ones I’ve sworn off.

  Shaking my head, I brush past them to grab a bottle of water from the hotel fridge. “While it’s an offer that’s hard to refuse, I’m going to have to bow out gracefully,” I say, making my way back to my room. “Use a saddle, Aidan,” I call out before closing, and locking, my bedroom door behind me.

  Their laughter carries through walls and it reinforces the lonely, awf
ul feelings coursing through my body. I take a long swallow of the water, as sweat beads on my chest and arms. I just went for a run in the bustle of NYC and the shower didn’t cool me down. It didn’t do anything to clear my head either. My comrades are on a Tinder rage and I’m hung up on a woman, trying to come to terms with what that means.

  Caroline was supposed to be here with me. This was supposed to be it. The time of my life. When I finally gave in and let myself have what I’ve been lusting after. Instead, I’m masturbating twice a day, in a penthouse suite while thinking about the woman who I’ll never have. Not in the capacity that I thought I would. My brothers decided to come early with me because I wasn’t able to cancel the hotel reservation, so they added several rooms. To fill the rest of the day, I’ll need to distract myself. I need something. Want to forget that I fell so hard for a woman so effortlessly I didn’t realize it until now. Until I couldn’t call her mine.

  A few loud raps sound on my door followed by Leif’s baritone voice telling me to let him in. I throw on a pair of jeans that are on the floor next to my bed and slink over to let him in.

  “You’re a fuckin’ mess, dude. Aidan is across the hall screwing a celebrity lookalike, my room looks like a brothel, and here you are,” he says, waving his hand to my room, and then me. “Working out and moping like a sorry sack of shit.”

  I run my hands through my wet hair a few times to dry it. “I have to see her every day. It’s a small, fucking town.” Deviate from the real problem. My feelings. At any cost.

  “Go back to San Diego. Ask for a transfer to another satellite base. They’re popping up everywhere now. They wouldn’t tell you no.” The thought of moving makes my stomach sink.

  Shaking my head, I say, “I like it there.”

  He comes in, and cracks open the mini bar and fishes for a bottle to down. “You need to get over the chick, then. You can’t possibly be that hung up on her,” he says. It’s a question, though, not a statement. He’s eyeing me in the way we look at bad guys we’re questioning, trying to seek out truths inside blatant falsities. Without taking his gaze from mine, he screws off the top of a mini bottle of Jack and downs it.

  “I’m in love with her,” I reply. When it’s this obvious how miserable I am, there’s no sense lying about it.

  “I thought you might say that,” Leif says, setting the empty down on a dresser. “I called her.”

  Narrowing my eyes, I respond, “You called who?”

  He shrugs, like it’s just a mundane everyday occurrence, a wide grin playing across his chiseled, severe face. “The root of all of this unnecessary drama.” Leif finds another bottle of the same, and tosses it to me. “Stella.”

  My head swims and the jagged hole inside my chest feels a little wider. The sweat beads faster now, rolling down my chest and the sides of my face. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I ask.

  A bang from Aidan’s room ricochets throughout the suite. Then a loud neigh. I block it out in favor of fury. I step toward my friend. “Drink it. She’s in the lobby waiting for you,” Leif says, nodding at my hand. “Actually you should empty the mini bar as fast as you can. Don’t look at me with that rage face and your balled up fists, man. You know as well as I do, that she’s the hang-up. The reason you can’t be happy. The ice bitch. The queen of blue ball happiness blocking. Instead of fighting me. Thank me.”

  Looking to the ceiling, I yell. It’s a war cry of frustration. My breaths come quicker. “I’m not going down there.” I drink the Jack.

  Leif tsks. “She didn’t want to see you either and she’s still down there. Instead of fucking a redhead with the stage name of Jessica Rabbit, I’ve spent the past twelve hours tracking down Stella. Do us all a favor and at least speak your peace. We have to work tomorrow and we need you there with us.” Leif taps the side of my head, and then wipes off my sweat on the side of his pants.

  I drink another Jack, then another. I pace the room and Leif talks to me. About things I haven’t brought up for half a decade. Horrible things that make me feel. Did I stop to consider the fact that Stella, and our past could be the hang-up preventing me from moving forward and taking what I want without thought for the future? Maybe for a half a second. Some memories are too painful to bring up even if they further the dissection of a current problem. What if Leif is right?

  “Put on a fucking shirt,” Leif says. I’m still sweating, but I pull on the first shirt I find on top of my bag. The mirror in front of me shows an image of a stranger. Sweat immediately bleeds through the black cotton fabric.

  “I hate you so much,” I tell him, shaking my head. “This is the last thing I need right now.”

  “It’s one of the only things you need right now. Give me some credit. How long have I been your friend?” I shake off his fact. It doesn’t matter right now.

  Pacing once more to the window overlooking NYC, the place that stole her from me in the most dubious, sneaky way. There wasn’t closure. There was a deployment the next day and a Dear John letter in the form of an email. I looked at the email every day for ten months. I woke up on the first of the eleventh month and instead of reading it, I deleted it. Buried it. Tried not to think about her or what I lost again. It worked on most days, and on others, I obsess over the failure.

  At the thought of the failure, anger rises. Just enough to force my feet forward, one ahead of the other to the elevator and down to the lobby of the five-star hotel. I’m a fucking mess and the fact that this is happening right now, is hard to fucking swallow.

  I see her from the back. She’s sitting at the round bar in the center of the lounge, her blonde hair hitting just below her shoulder blades. It’s shorter than it was the last time I saw her, but after spending years with her, she’ll always be someone I recognize anywhere. She senses my presence, swiveling in her chair to face me.

  She looks older, the skin on her face a little less glowing than I last remembered. I swallow down the last of my hesitation and approach with leaden feet and a pounding heart.

  “Stella,” I say, my voice cracking.

  She looks down at the gin and tonic in front of her instead of looking at me. “What is it, Tyler? I can’t believe I’m here right now.”

  Okay. Patience. I won’t kill Leif. Not today, anyways. He has my best interests at heart even if he’s a fucking moron. Her cell phone beeps on the bar and she looks at it sighing. “My husband,” she says, waving the screen at me. “Worried because I left the house to visit my ex-boyfriend.” She waves an arm at me. “Why he’s intimidated by you, I have no idea, but dear Lord, make this fast.” She sips her favorite cocktail, sighing in annoyance.

  I laugh. That’s what you do during awkward pauses when you have no clue how to respond. “You wrote me a fucking email, Stella,” I growl lowly. “Why?” Might as well get what I came for, right? The ten months of holding onto broken promises requires this to survive.

  Her lips, ones I’ve kissed so many times in the past, purse. Looking at her doesn’t feel like I thought it would. She’s not some mirage, she’s just a woman who I once loved, and it brings awareness to one fact, Stella doesn’t hold a fucking candle to Caroline. My stomach drops. I brush my brow with the back of my hand.

  The bartender catches my eye and I point to drink in front of her and hold up the number one with my finger. He squints his eyes and I remember my own messed up eyes. He nods and begins fixing me the drink I detest the most. “Is that really what you want to know? It was easier that way. We were so entwined that a clean break was needed. A new life presented itself in New York and you were always going to do…what you do,” she explains, looking around to make sure we’re out of earshot. “You can’t possibly need closure. That email explained everything and then some. I’m not a woman to leave without cause. It was time to part ways.”

  Her tired eyes meet mine and I notice her exhaustion. It reminds me of the probable reason why. Her baby. “Why am I here?” she asks again. “Leif told me about your new base. I’m glad you’re sw
itching up your work pace. Maybe…it will be good for you.” She has no clue. Leif didn’t tell her anything. My drink arrives and I swallow down half of the nasty tasting liquid, and wince. “Still don’t like a gin and tonic either. Your eyes are awful, by the way. I remember when Smith got a mask squeeze, so I won’t ask how it happened. I’ll just assume the drunken worst.”

  Sighing, I look away, trying to compile my thoughts. At least I don’t have to worry about my demon eyes right now. “You’re happy,” I ask.

  “Is that a question?” she narrows her eyes at the side of my face. “I’m happy,” she says, when I don’t answer. “My life is full. I love my husband and family. I would do the same thing all over again, Tyler. The same exact thing.”

  My jaw ticks, and I clasp my glass tightly in both of my hands. Looking at her, I let myself feel the pain from the past. The terror attacks changed everything. Perhaps that truly is why she wanted to move on from my life style. Not because of me. Maybe I didn’t do anything horribly wrong. “I’m in love with a woman,” I tell her.

  She coughs. A nervous tick because I’ve surprised her. “Oh,” she says. “So this isn’t some attempt to get back together?”

  That makes me laugh. “Fuck no, Stella. Fuck. No,” I say. “After what you did?” She looks down and away. She should be ashamed of that fucking email. Of the no contact. Of the years wasted on our commitment to one another.

  When she remains silent, it’s my turn to tell her a truth bomb. “I love this woman more than I thought I was capable of.”

  Her gaze meets mine and I see tears shining—the hard facts surfacing. “Caroline reminds me of you in that one way that I’ve never been able to reconcile. This isn’t me trying to get back together with a married woman, Stell. This is me trying to figure out if you’re the one who blew my chances with the only woman I’ve ever truly loved.”

  She raises her brows. “Ouch,” she says, smiling. “I’m glad you finally see. I’m sad this is what it took for you to realize you didn’t love me in that forever kind of way, though.” I down the rest of my drink while Stella sips hers, a thoughtful look on her face. Her eyes are narrowed, actually curious. She’s relieved now that she knows what this is about. I grab a cocktail napkin and wipe my face and forearms, breathing deeply. “You look like shit, by the way,” she adds. She’s grinning when I meet her eyes. “You made a Tahoe sized mistake, huh?”