by April Hunt
Grinning, Vince wrapped his arm around her waist. “We are really fucking overdue for that talk.”
“No time like the present.” His warmth immediately soaked into her body, and she melted, skimming her hands up his chest.
The ground shook beneath their feet, starting as a tremor and escalating to a steady rumble.
“What the bloody hell is that?” Charlie glanced right as a large blast on the stern side blew metal and debris into the sky.
“That’s our cue to fucking leave.” Vince gripped her hand and tugged her to the edge of the decking. Another detonation literally rocked the boat, close enough to their position that it almost knocked her off her feet. “We’re going to have to jump.”
“Jump? From up here?” There was no disguising her horror.
“The engines are off, so we don’t have to worry about getting sucked under and shredded to pieces.” His grin widened when she released a distressed moan. “Come on now, English. Straight down. Point your toes. Hold your breath. It’s easy-fucking-peasy.”
Vince kicked the deck’s railing free, giving them ample space to maneuver to the edge.
“On three.” Vince tugged her close. “One.”
“Bloody hell.”
“Two.”
“I hate you, Navy.”
His free hand pulled her into a quick kiss. “No you don’t, babe, you love me. Three.”
Charlie screamed, closing her mouth a second before they hit the water, and pointed her toes like a bloody ballerina. Her body shot into the ocean like a missile, submerging her at least a dozen or more feet below the dark water. Lights shimmered above her head, directing her back to the surface, and when she reached it, she gasped, sucking in oxygen by the mouthful.
“See. Easy-fucking-peasy.” Vince was already treading water next to her.
They swam out of the debris zone and looked back at the massive fireball lighting up the sky. One explosion turned into another, each one creating a new series of waves that bobbed them up and down.
“We just jumped from a bloody freighter.” Charlie stated the obvious.
“We sure as hell did. And it was a beautiful dive.” He grinned. “An Olympian couldn’t have done any better. Ten-point-oh, sweetheart.”
Charlie was too mentally drained to dish out her usual snappy comeback. Instead, she focused on what she really needed to know. “Are you okay?”
Vince swam closer until their legs tangled together. He couldn’t stop grinning. “I’ve never been better.”
“You sure?”
“Definitely.”
“Good.” Charlie used every ounce of energy she had and dunked him back underwater.
He came up laughing. “What the hell was that for?”
“For calling me the woman you love and then walking the hell away.” She smacked his shoulder for good measure. “What the hell was that? You better start thinking with your head instead of your testosterone pouch, because the man I’m in love with will not throw out declarations like that and then disappear.”
Vince’s fingers brushed the wet hair from her eyes. Now that she could see him a little better, she lost her breath all over again.
“Say that again.” He palmed her cheek, brushing his thumb over her bottom lip.
“You better start thinking with your head.” She knew it wasn’t what he meant, but she needed to hold on to her mad a little longer.
He smirked. “Wrong part.”
“Disappearing after spewing out declarations?”
“Keep going.”
Staying mad was too damn exhausting. She softened, still not fully believing she was about to say it aloud. “You mean the part about the man I’m in love with?”
Vince’s eyes sparkled in the dim light. “That would be the one.”
“Maybe I should pull a Navy and swim away now,” she muttered.
Vince’s attention flickered between her mouth and her face. “You’re not swimming anywhere. Sorry to tell you this, English, but you’re stuck with me.”
“For now,” Charlie teased.
“Nope. Forever.” Vince slipped a hand around her waist, treading water for the both of them. “I love you, Charlotte Ann Sparks. I love the way you kick my ass. I love the way you keep me on my toes. And I love the way you make me feel. There isn’t a single damn thing about you that I don’t love to infinity and back.”
Tears brimmed in Charlie’s eyes, and she let them fall. “That’s a lot of loving.”
“Hell yeah. I’m a SEAL. Remember, we don’t do anything half-assed and that includes loving our women.” Vince waited for the spark to ignite her ire—which it did.
“Your women?” Charlie challenged teasingly. “Is that caveman mentality what I have to look forward to in this ‘forever’ you’re talking about?”
“Maybe. But I’ll try to tone it down some.” Vince’s lips twitched with his fight not to laugh. He dropped a line of kisses over her cheek, each one getting closer to her mouth than the one before. “And what about you? Are you going to love me even though I’m a brutish Neanderthal with severely lacking people skills?”
Charlie wrapped her legs around his waist, needing to be as close as possible. “As it happens, I already do.”
“About goddamned time.” Chase’s voice, closer than comm-link distance, turned Vince and Charlie to the glaring light shining off the Coast Guard speeder less than three feet away.
“Pay up, man.” Rafe extended his hand out to the former medic. “I won the pool.”
Chase smacked his hand away. “Like hell you did. I won the pool.”
“Oh hell, I don’t think it was either of us. It was probably Rachel. She’s been having some freaky ESP shit happening lately.”
Everyone laughed. Rafe and Chase leaned over the boat, each grabbing onto one of Charlie’s arms and tugging her out of the water. Vince easily hoisted himself over after her. His feet had barely hit the bottom of the boat when he tugged her into an intense kiss.
“Did I mention the other thing I love about you?” he murmured against her lips.
Charlie slid her arms around his neck, grinning wickedly. “No, but I could probably imagine what it is.”
“I love that we can do anything as long as we do it together.”
Charlie’s heart did a somersault, and then kept flipping. She hadn’t expected it. She hadn’t gone searching for it. Hell, she’d run from it at every turn. But Vince Franklin had shown her that it wasn’t so hard to trust and love—with the right person.
And he was hers.
Epilogue
Lebanon County, Pennsylvania
Six weeks later
Vince stayed alert, refusing to let his guard down for a second. His woman called for reinforcements, and he was going to provide backup, even if it meant developing hives from the amount of sugar and sweetness…and wedding cake toppers.
Voices drifted into the main storefront from a room on the left. He followed them, stepping carefully to avoid being spotted prematurely. Penny, Elle, Rachel, and Charlie huddled around an open book, flipping pages and talking excitedly.
“You must be the groom!” came an unfamiliar voice.
Vince snapped to attention. The older woman’s white apron and SWEET TREATS name tag identified her as one of the bakery’s employees—and evident ninja-in-training as she’d taken him by surprise, something not easily done even by the best-trained soldiers.
“What?” He was slow to register her ear-to-ear smile and hopeful expression. “Oh. No. Not me.”
“This one’s all mine.” Charlie settled herself into his side, her wide grin pulling out his own reluctant one. “Took you long enough to get here.”
“It took me five minutes. You said it was urgent.” Dipping his head, he murmured for her ears only, “Although I don’t know what kind of emergency you can have at a freaking bakery, English.”
“It’s a matter of life and groom’s cake.” Charlie held a straight face.
Vince blinked,
trying to tell if there was an underlying meaning—or alcohol involvement. But no one looked to be in distress, or inebriated. “A what?”
Charlie dragged him over the table where Penny pushed a book his way. Cake photos filled the pages, but unlike the elaborate ones he was used to seeing at weddings, these looked more…manly.
“A groom’s cake.” Penny tapped one of the many images. “I need to surprise Rafe with one, and I have no idea what to do. What do you think about this one with the boxing gloves? I mean, he’s Alpha’s trainer coordinator.”
Elle shifted her weight from one foot to the other, hands massaging her lower back. Using anything to distract himself from the question being asked, Vince brought over a nearby chair. “Sit.”
She flashed him a smile and slowly lowered her very pregnant self onto the chair. “Thanks.”
“You brought me down here to pick out a cake?” Vince turned back to the others.
“A groom’s cake,” Charlie clarified. Under her breath, she muttered, “It matters to them, so just go the hell along with it, okay?”
“Can’t they do a combat boot or something?”
Vince waited for the reaction—any reaction. Penny’s smile lit up her face as she glanced to the baker. “Can you?”
“Uh-oh,” Elle’s voice mumbled.
“We can do that.” The Sweet Treat employee nodded excitedly. “We could even make it look worn and dirty—scuff it up like it’s seen some action.”
“Um, guys?” Elle cleared her throat nervously.
“That would be incredible!” Penny clapped her hands. “What does everyone else think?”
“I think it’s an adorable idea,” Rachel admitted.
“I think it’s right up his alley,” Charlie stated.
“I think it sounds edible.” Vince received a wave of eye rolls.
“And I think that I’m going to have a baby.” Elle spoke louder this time.
Five heads swiveled toward the mama-to-be. Grimacing, she clutched her swollen belly and threw a nervous glance to the puddle beneath her legs. “And I think my water broke.”
Thirty minutes of intense cursing later—mostly from the pregnant one—Vince thankfully handed Elle over to the nurse at the Frederick Memorial Hospital labor unit.
“Father?” the nurse asked.
“Here!” Trey shouted from down the hall. He jogged toward them, Rafe, Chase, Stone, and Logan hot on his heels. When he reached his fiancée, he kissed her on the forehead. “How are you doing, baby?”
“About to pass a watermelon through my hoo-ha,” Elle hissed through clenched teeth.
“Now there’s a mental picture I never wanted in my head.” Charlie cringed.
The rest of them settled into the waiting room as the nurse wheeled Trey and Elle into the back. Hours, she’d warned. First babies took a notoriously long time. Vince sank into one of the chairs, losing track of time as he played with a lock of Charlie’s hair. Less than an hour later, the waiting room door opened again.
Trey stood in the threshold, the largest smile Vince had ever seen plastered on his face. “You guys ready to meet Alpha’s newest addition?”
“Wow.” Charlie glanced at her watch, chuckling. “Elle doesn’t waste time, does she? She must’ve really missed her cookie dough ice cream.”
They all laughed and joked around as they tromped to Elle’s room, but at the door, they all sobered. Elle lay in bed, her hair plastered to her head with sweat, cheeks flushed—and looking so damn happy.
“Guys.” Trey carefully took the bundle of blankets from Elle’s tired arms and proudly presented the sleeping baby inside. “Say hello to Violet Mae Hanson. Violet…meet all your aunts and uncles.”
A firm grip tightened around Vince’s hand. He looked down at a teary-eyed Charlie.
“What?” Charlie demanded of him, noticing his attention. Sounding watery, her words lacked any kind of heat. “I’m allowed to be happy. I’ve never been an aunt before.”
“From what I hear, it’s a lot of babysitting and presents.” Vince shrugged.
“I can do that.” Charlie wiped her face dry with the back of her free hand.
“You know what else you can do?” When she looked up at him with a question lighting up her eyes, he added, “Give little Violet there a cousin to play with.”
Charlie laughed until she realized Vince wasn’t kidding. “Wait. What?”
“Not right this second,” he clarified, in an attempt to stave off any panic. “Maybe not for a few years. But you’re eventually going to have to make an honest man out of me, English.”
He hadn’t realized it until he’d said the words aloud, but suddenly, Vince wanted Charlie harassing one of the guys about a goddamn groom’s cake for him. Maybe not next week, or next year. But he wanted to be able to put his grandmother’s ring on her finger, for real this time.
“Well”—Charlie cleared her throat, searching for words—“we do already have a ring handy,” she said as if reading his mind. “But little Violet’s going to have to wait a bit on the whole cousin front, because her Aunt Charlie has a whole lot of arse-kicking still to do.”
Vince laughed, bringing Charlie’s hand up to his mouth. “We have a whole lot of arse-kicking to do.”
Penny Kline didn’t come to Honduras on a pleasure trip. But when she walks into the middle of a covert ops mission, she finds herself swept into the hard-muscled arms of Rafe Ortega—and on a thrilling ride of danger and desire…
Please see the next page for an excerpt from Heated Pursuit.
CHAPTER ONE
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Penny’s damp underwear stuck to her skin in an uncomfortable bunch, but it wasn’t a man’s skillful pair of callus-roughened hands or his dirty, talented mouth that had caused the problem. The blame lay entirely with the god-awful Honduran humidity.
It didn’t matter. No degree of sweaty undies or unfortunate chafing would slow her down. Nothing could make her turn back, because her family meant the world to her—and Rachel was the only one she had left.
A tingle at the base of her neck made Penny skid to a stop. Her gaze snapped left and right, heart trilling as shadows stretched into human-sized figures and melted away with the twinkle of a far-off light. Nothing looked amiss, but two torturously slow seconds later, the sound of a boot scraping asphalt had her spinning around with fists raised.
Half-hidden in shadow, the man ducked her sweeping arm and pivoted much too fast for someone his size. In a blink, he reappeared over her shoulder. Months of training and practice brought her heel down onto his large, booted foot and she turned…straight into a hulking black-camo-clad figure.
Holy ever-lovin’ god of iron giants.
Behind his ski mask, the man’s piercing blue eyes raked down the length of her body. He towered over her by more than a foot, and given the width of his broad shoulders and massive chest, he outweighed her by at least a hundred pounds of solid muscle.
Penny swallowed the fear rising in her throat and did the first thing that popped into her head—she aimed a swift kick between his legs. And then she ran like hell.
Each painful inhale rattled in her lungs as she pumped her legs harder. Her hair whipped across her line of sight, temporarily obstructing her view. Seconds ticked by at an agonizing crawl. Fifty yards. Twenty. The closer her rental Jeep came into view, the louder the echoing pound of footsteps behind her became.
An inch away from the door, strong hands propelled her face-first into the grimy driver’s side window.
“Let go of me.” She twisted and squirmed, cursing as he yanked her arms sharply behind her back and pinned them into place with his two hundred–pound frame.
“Ya era tiempo,” her captor said, tossing a deep growl of Spanish to their left.
About damn time. Years of studying the language had Penny’s heart sinking to her stomach…because she knew he wasn’t talking to her.
One dark figure after another emerged from the shadows. They were dresse
d head to toe in matching black fatigues and masks with the metallic glint of weapons flickering off the four bodies like a commando’s version of bling. The fact that not a single gun was pointed at her head became a small comfort when a dark van screeched to a halt in front of them.
“Oh hell.” She took a deep breath and choked on burnt rubber fumes.
She needed to think, and the hard erection nestled against her ass reminded her there wasn’t room for mistakes. If something happened to her, Rachel would be lost forever in the hands of a monster. She couldn’t let that happen. She wouldn’t let that happen.
As if sensing a forming plan, her assailant bent down, his mask brushing against her ear. “Play nice and you won’t get hurt, sweetheart. But if you don’t stop struggling, I can’t make that same promise.”
Penny fought against the ice-cold tingle his rough whisper zipped down her spine. Her joints screamed in protest, but she edged closer to the only area susceptible to attack. The second fabric brushed against her palm, she curled her fingers and squeezed with everything she had.
“Fucking hell!” Blue Eyes wrenched her grip free of his balls and tossed her over his shoulder as if she were nothing more than a rag doll.
“Damn it! Let me go!” She elbowed the back of his head, and when that didn’t get a reaction, she plowed a fist into his left flank—and the damn man kept walking, not once losing his stride. “Put me down! Entiendes?”
Behind her, someone bound her kicking legs while another did the same with her wrists. When a gag came next, she snapped her teeth, nearly catching the hand that tied it into place. A sack over the head later and her world plummeted into darkness before they shuffled her into the waiting van.
Between the musty, stale air and being bracketed between her assailant’s rock-hard thighs, it didn’t matter that she couldn’t see her snug confines. Walls closed in around her, making each breath feel as if it would be the last. She made one last-ditch effort to squirm from her captor’s hold.
Blue Eyes’s grip locked her into place, her back plastered against his chest.
“Little viper,” he murmured—in Spanish—into her ear. “It’s a damn good thing I wasn’t thinking about having children anytime soon.”