by Cora Seton
“Mason doesn’t act like that.”
Sarah crossed to the window to look out over the ranch. “Maybe not around you. Back in the military I bet he had as sharp a tongue as everyone else. Don’t worry; I’m used to it.” Far below her the front door opened and shut and Mason and Dan crossed the yard toward one of the outbuildings. She could barely make out Dan’s handsome features, but everything about him exuded a kind of confidence she found all too sexy. It wasn’t the bravura of a younger man—it was the knowledge of a competent warrior that he could face whatever life threw at him. It was too bad he was such a cocky jerk.
He looked like he could be a heck of a lot of fun in bed.
Sarah closed her eyes. Damn her hormones. She’d been like this for months, scanning every man she met, searching for something although she wasn’t sure what. It was like her heart had taken on a mission without informing her mind. Not that it mattered; she was determined to stay single, which might explain why so far no man had measured up.
Dan might measure up, she thought, then scowled. She didn’t care if he was handsome; she refused to get involved with that SEAL.
“Lunch will be in half an hour.” Regan broke into her thoughts. “You have plenty of time if you want a quick shower or rest beforehand.”
Sarah nodded. A cold shower just might do the trick.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to do the obstacle course when there’s snow on the ground,” Regan said later as she helped serve lunch to the gathered crowd. Mason nudged Dan. “Told you she’d say that.” Dan and several others laughed. He was enjoying the hustle and bustle of this gathering. Aside from Mason, his brothers and their wives, two other couples had come to stay for Christmas. John Bowton and Rafe Feuerstein both had served with Zane in the Marines, and their wives, May and Carolyn, knew each other well. The happy clamor in the dining room made it hard to hear.
Dan sat between Mason and his brother Austin. Sarah sat far down the table, helping herself to salad, pointedly ignoring him, the way she had since he’d made the crack about the Army earlier.
Dan wasn’t used to being ignored. He wasn’t stuck up about it, but he knew he turned heads when he walked into a room. Women liked his height, his strength and the fact that he had served in the military. He couldn’t remember the last time a woman had simply turned her back and walked away, especially after delivering a zinger in the cool, poised way Sarah had.
He wasn’t used to the slow burn of desire that had threaded through him the minute he’d seen her climb out of the truck, either. Sarah wasn’t at all his type. He didn’t date women in the military. He preferred civilians. They were softer, more generous with their praise, more in awe of his status. Female soldiers brooked no nonsense and were more likely to compete with him than worship him. Dan got enough competition from the men he served with. He figured he could use a little coddling when the work was done.
“We ran that course in all kinds of weather when we were kids,” Mason told Regan. “Didn’t hurt us none.”
“Except the time—” Austin began. Mason elbowed him. “I mean, right. It was just fine.”
Austin’s wife, Ella, rolled her eyes. “You men and your obstacle course.”
“Don’t pretend you don’t like the course,” Austin said. The two of them shared a private smile. Dan wondered what the story was behind it.
He liked the idea of running the mythical Hall obstacle course. Mason had told him all about it. Anyone who’d seen Mason run one in the military had to know there was some secret to his success. Mason’s father, Aaron Hall, had built his four sons the side-by-side set of obstacles when they were just boys, and used it as a kind of back-country parenting tool. Personally, Dan thought that was brilliant.
“We’ll give it a go after lunch,” Mason told him. “I bet I can beat you.”
“Just don’t break your leg. I’m not taking over your chores at Christmas,” Regan said.
“It’s been a while since we raced, Austin. What do you say?” Zane said.
“Sure thing.”
“What about you, Sarah?” Everyone looked at him when Dan spoke up. “Are you going to run the course?”
Sarah shook her head. “I don’t think so. I’m going to help Regan.”
“Too chicken to try it out? I should have guessed.” Why did the hazel-eyed, dark haired woman grab his attention so effectively? She didn’t have the long, thick tresses he usually was drawn to. Her curls were short enough for active duty. Her eyes were expressive, her lips full enough to be sensuous, but he knew damn well that under her cable-knit sweater would be muscles, not the full curves he liked so much.
Although she was pretty curvy.
“I’m not chicken.”
The clipped tone of her voice brought his gaze up to meet hers. Damn, had she caught him speculating about her body?
“It wouldn’t be fair,” Ella spoke up. “Her racing against you.”
“Why—because she’s just a girl?” He couldn’t have asked for a better setup. Sarah wouldn’t be able to ignore him now. He could see the flare of resentment in her eyes, coupled with a tightening of her mouth that told him she didn’t want to hurt Ella’s feelings by snapping at her.
“I’m not just a girl. I’m a soldier and I’m every bit as fast as you.”
Dan smiled. Gotcha. “Then we’ll race. I’m looking forward to kicking your ass.”
“Good luck.” She picked up her sandwich and took a bite, as cool as a cucumber.
She wouldn’t be cool for long. She’d be huffing and puffing as she tried to keep up with him. No woman could beat him in a race.
And then what? Winning a contest wasn’t really what he was after, was it? He wanted to get close to Sarah in an altogether different kind of way.
“How about we make the race more interesting?” he said loudly, cutting across the conversations that had sprung up around the table again.
Sarah sighed. Turned to him. “What do you have in mind?”
“A bet.”
“No bets,” Regan said sternly. “I don’t want this to get out of hand.”
“It won’t get out of hand, will it, Sarah?” Dan kept his gaze squarely on her face. Was it his imagination or were her cheeks turning pink?
Just his imagination.
“What kind of bet?” She took another bite of her sandwich, still unperturbed.
“I said, no bets!” Regan looked exasperated. “Mason—”
“A kiss under the mistletoe if I win.”
Sarah chewed slowly. Swallowed. “And if you lose?”
“Name your penalty.” He was enjoying this all too much. He hoped she’d ask for a kiss, too, but doubted it.
“You run a loop around the Hall naked.”
A chorus of whoops filled the dining room. “Now we’re talking!” Zane guffawed. “Mothers, cover your daughters’ eyes!”
“Don’t worry—there won’t be any nudity,” Dan said. “I’m not the one who’s going to lose. Sorry to disappoint you, sweetheart.”
“We’ll see about that, pretty boy.” Sarah looked unconvinced.
Pretty boy? He narrowed his eyes. She’d pay for that.
With a kiss.
Chapter Two
‡
“It’s crazy to run an obstacle course in this weather,” Regan said when everyone trooped out to the starting line after lunch. They had all bundled up against the cold, but once they reached the two sets of monkey bars where the course started, Dan began to strip off his outer layers.
“You don’t have to get naked until I beat you,” Sarah said, pushing past him.
“You can kiss me right now; I won’t even make you chase me first,” he retorted with a grin.
“Don’t you two think you should look the obstacles over before you begin?” Ella said.
“Baby, these are both trained members of the United States military. Have a little faith.” Austin squeezed her shoulders. “My money is on Sarah.”
“Go, Army!” El
la agreed, snuggling into her husband’s embrace.
“I’ll gladly take that money when I win. Twenty bucks?” Dan got into position. So did Sarah.
“No bets!” Regan said.
“Twenty bucks,” Ella said. “Deal.”
Regan threw her hands up in the air. “I give up.”
Mason moved to stand between Sarah and Dan. “On your mark, get set, go!”
Dan leaped for the monkey bars and went hand over hand as fast as he could to reach the other side. When he jumped down, he heard a thump to his right that told him Sarah had kept pace with him and was dashing for the climbing wall just like he was.
He put on a burst of speed, flung himself toward the top of the wall and gripped it, swinging his legs up. Something crashed into his shoulder just as his feet reached the top of the wall.
“Fuck!” Dan lost his grip and fell to the ground, landing in the snow. Sarah’s laughter rang out as she scrambled up and over the wall and dropped to the other side.
“She kicked me!” She must have swung her legs up and booted him for all she was worth, but he regained his feet, leaped up and caught the top of the wall again. SEALs didn’t whine—not even when soldiers cheated.
By the time he landed on the other side, Sarah was through the tire course that came next and was diving under the first length of barbed wire stretched across her path. As she army-crawled under fifteen feet of criss-crossed wire over a layer of slushy snow, Dan put on a spurt of speed, determined to catch up.
The rest of the family kept pace with them on a path that bisected the obstacle course.
“Go, Dan!” Mason called out. “Show that soldier how it’s done!”
“Go, Sarah!” Austin joined in. “Army rules!”
Dan finished the tire course and dove under the barbed wire, but Sarah had already regained her feet and was dashing toward a rope swing. Dan crawled for all he was worth and seconds later he too was running for his rope swing. Sarah, on the other side of the frozen creek, disappeared among the trees as she hit more obstacles, her dark curls bouncing as she moved.
He picked up the pace again. He’d never live it down if he lost to a mere soldier.
A mere female soldier.
Sarah raced on, proud of her steady breathing and her controlled strides in her heavily-treaded winter boots. Under the trees, the snow wasn’t as deep, and while the conditions weren’t optimum for running, she’d handled far worse.
She thanked goodness for the extra training she and two other soldiers engaged in every day. All three of them female, all three of them denied the chance to join the Special Forces, they’d agreed that they’d keep their bodies in tip-top shape, just in case that ever changed. As competitive as she was, Elsa and Janie had kept her on her toes and they’d taken turns beating each other’s records and pushing each other to the limit.
All that was paying off now. She was sure Dan would complain about her kicking him on the climbing wall, but all was fair in love and war and she’d made sure to make it look like an accident when her feet had connected with his shoulder on the way up. The onlookers wouldn’t be able to say for sure what had happened, and she’d do her best to play up her innocence.
Sarah blinked as she rounded a curve and took in the next obstacle; a balance beam made from an enormous log nearly ten feet off the ground. She kept running and made it half-way up the inclined log placed to give her access to the beam before she slipped on its icy surface. She fell heavily on it and clutched the slippery log tightly to keep from sliding right off.
Dan’s laughter echoed behind her. “That was graceful!” He ran right up the inclined log to his balance beam, but hesitated at the top. Sarah, managing to scramble up to the top of hers, saw why. The logs that formed the beams were wide enough that traversing them shouldn’t have been a problem. Except they were covered with snow.
Dan took a step and wavered. “Shit—it’s icy.”
Sarah tried a step and found the same thing. Earlier snowfalls must have melted, then frozen again to make a compact icy layer under the latest couple of inches. Her foot slid before she stabilized her stance.
“Don’t you dare fall off those beams and break your necks,” Regan called out. Their audience had caught up to them.
“You could give up now,” Dan said conversationally. “Regan’s right; you don’t want to break your neck.”
“You could give up now.”
He took another step. Wavered.
Sarah made a decision. If either of them fell off the beam, they’d have to go back to the inclined log, climb up and start all over again—that meant time lost, if not an injury. She didn’t have time for injuries, and she didn’t want to get halfway across the log, fall off, and then have to start again. She’d take the safe route.
She crouched down, braced her hands on the log ahead of her, and sat down, straddling it. She began to inch her way across, using her hands to lift her forward in a rocking motion that moved her down it more quickly than she might have expected.
“What the hell are you doing?” Dan taunted her as he took two more tentative steps. “It’s not a rocking horse, Metlin. Stand up, for crying out loud.”
Sarah ignored him. Her safe, rocking motion had already taken her a quarter of the way down the log. But now Dan was moving again, his short, nimble steps quickly passing her.
Fall, damn it. He moved halfway across with no sign of stopping. Had she played it too safe? Sarah moved faster.
Dan reached the three-quarter mark. Hell, he was leaving her far behind. The log must not be as slippery as she thought. She was blowing it!
“Eat my dust, Metlin!” Ten feet from the end of the log, Dan slipped and tumbled to the ground, landing with a heavy whump.
“Dan!” Regan raced toward him, Mason quickly passing her.
“Dan, you okay?”
Sarah kept going. She’d stop when and if she knew his injuries would take him out of the race. She had reached the three-quarter’s mark when Dan managed to lurch to his feet with Mason’s help. “I’m fine. I’m fine.” But he was limping a little as he turned in a circle. “Go ahead and gloat while you can, soldier. I’ll be ahead of you again in a minute.”
“Big words from a clumsy man.” She picked up the pace again now that she was sure he was okay. She knew he wouldn’t hold back; SEALs were trained to push through any pain.
By the time she reached the end of the log and slid down the incline on the other side, Dan had climbed up on top of his balance beam again. He began to cross it as he had the first time—walking in short, tentative steps—but when she glanced back a moment later, just as the trees closed around her again, she noticed he had dropped down into a sitting position.
She bit back a smile.
Chapter Three
‡
If he’d set out to take Sarah down a peg, his plan had certainly backfired, and he couldn’t even cry foul on her for his latest setback. It was all his own damn fault. Humping it over this log wasn’t manly, or fast, or comfortable, for that matter, but it was the quickest, safest way to reach his goal and catch up with Sarah.
Still, Dan wasn’t unhappy to get the balance beam behind him and a minute later, after several more obstacles, he’d caught sight of Sarah slowing to a halt before a set of salmon ladders. He laughed, even as he put on a burst of speed. No way she could do a salmon ladder; no woman could.
Except… shit, she was doing it.
Dan slid to a stop next to his salmon ladder—a double set of notched uprights screwed to two trees standing close together. A metal bar rested in the bottom most set of notches. The trick was to jump up, grab the bar and use a kind of chin up motion to pop it up the ladder from the lowest to highest position. It took incredible core strength and coordination.
And Sarah was popping up her ladder like a pro.
Whoops and whistles from their audience filled the air as Sarah popped right up to the top. When she dropped down and came face to face with Dan, she looked start
led, but recovered quickly. “Better get to it, SEALman. Or are you afraid you can’t?”
Dan wasn’t distracted by her banter, though. He was man enough to admit when someone had surprised him. “I’ve never seen a woman do the ladder.”
“Lots of practice. That’s all.” She moved to brush past him, but he caught her arm.
“Learn to take a compliment, Metlin.”
She hesitated. Nodded grudgingly. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Now step back and see how a man does it.” He hoped she understood what he meant to say—that he respected her ability. That he would treat her like one of the guys now.
“If I see any men, I’ll be sure to watch them do the ladder.” She shrugged out of his grip and loped away. Dan watched her go.
“Quit ogling the competition and get a move on, Hemmins! Don’t let the team down!” Mason called out.
Dan jumped for the bar on his salmon ladder, but he had a smile on his face as he completed the obstacle.
Sarah glowed with pride as she dashed through the rest of the course. She, Janie and Elsa had worked their butts off for nearly a year before they learned how to do the salmon ladder and it had been worth every minute to see the look on Dan’s face. But then, how could he have had an inkling of her strength? It was the middle of winter and she’d been wearing so many layers since she got to Montana that he wouldn’t be able to guess her weight within twenty pounds, let alone see her muscles.
He had been checking out her breasts, though. She’d caught him at it at lunch time. Sarah held back a sigh as she raced along. These breasts of hers were a blessing and a curse. When she wanted to make heads turn, they certainly helped, but in terms of athletic training? They just got in the way. Both Janie and Elsa were small-chested women and many of the exercises they did came easier to them.