Brett Weaver, Zoe’s brother, dangled a beer between two fingers while he hugged his wife Tess to his side. He gestured with the bottle at Hawk, Zoe’s husband, while he made a point about something.
Tess, his wife, was everything Kathleen wanted to be. Tall, slender, gorgeous, and successful in her job. Kathleen wanted to hate her, but it was damn hard to hate someone you’d spent the afternoon cooking and talking with, and who was genuine and a straight shooter.
Samantha “call me Sam,” Zoe, Trish, Tess, and Selena were all special. Independent, strong, funny, and open. They fit into their husbands’ lives in the same way her mom fit into her dad’s. They could stand strong alone when they had to, and were fiercely loyal to their husbands, and each other. She had never laughed or cried so much in an afternoon in her life. It had felt wonderful to be part of their group. She missed the female bond she’d had with Tamara and some of her friends.
Selena’s husband Oliver, aka Greenback, arrived with their daughter Lucia and his parents. Selena jumped up from the picnic table to greet them. Lucia was already stripping her clothes off in preparation for hitting the pool. Greenback held her back long enough to put floaties on her arms before turning her loose.
Sam sat down next to her. The pretty strawberry blond had a flush to her cheeks. She was so starry-eyed in love she practically glowed with it.
Did Kathleen look like that when Cal was around? She hoped it wasn’t that obvious. Not yet. Not until she knew if he felt the same way.
“Think they caught anything?” Sam asked. “They wouldn’t be late if they hadn’t, right?”
“There’s going to be a lot of disappointed people if they didn’t.”
“I hope they took showers. The last time Flash went fishing with Travis, he had fish guts all the way down his shirt and smelled worse than road kill.”
Kathleen giggled. “Well if they haven’t, we can always hose them down out here. Is Travis another member of the teams?
“No. He’s Flash’s foster father. Actually the only father he’s ever had. He and Juanita, his foster mother, wanted to take Joy down to Mexico for a few days so we could have some alone time. It’s been a little hectic with all the wedding arrangements, even though we’re doing a simple ceremony in church and a barbecue similar to this.”
“Sometimes the simple things are more memorable, and they don’t smart nearly as much as those five thousand dollar price tags.” She regretted every last dime she’d spent on the wedding. All the time and effort as well.
Sam nodded. “Since neither of us has any biological family left, Travis and Juanita and their two sons, Josh and Javier, and Flash’s teammates have become our family. As long as we’re with them, that’s all that matters.”
A car horn sounded from on the street and they both looked up.
Two minutes later Flash and Bowie came through the side gate, a cooler between them, and wearing clean shorts and T-shirts. Zach and Cal followed behind them. When Kathleen realized the lower half of Cal’s leg was visible in a pair of shorts, she half rose from her seat. Cal was strutting his prosthetic as though it was nothing at all. Kathleen’s chest filled with pride and her vision blurred.
“Well, they all look like they’re in one piece,” Samantha observed. “And they must have something in the coolers.”
Having to answer helped her gain control of her emotions. “Hopefully it’s not just empty beer cans.”
“They’re all walking upright, so they couldn’t have consumed that much beer.”
Kathleen flashed her a look. “You haven’t seen my family at gatherings and picnics. All the guys have a tolerance. But I think you may be right. They all seem to have that self-satisfied swagger of a job well done.”
Sam grinned. “I thought that was just their normal walk.”
Kathleen chuckled. “You could be right. None of them lack confidence, do they?” Callahan had that same swagger despite his prosthetic. How much had he had to practice to regain it? She’d never felt such joy for anyone in her life.
“Was Cal a SEAL too?” Sam asked.
“No. He’s an ex-Marine.”
“How did you two meet?”
“He works on one of the buildings my company is constructing.”
“He fits right in with the others.”
He did. He and Zach were verbally batting something back and forth. Zach threw his head back and laughed at something Cal said. The two of them seemed to have really bonded over the trip.
Flash and Bowie dropped the cooler next to the grill. Bowie headed for a beer and Flash ambled over to Sam.
“Hey, babe.” Flash grabbed her hand, tugged her to her feet and wrapped his arms around her. “How was your day?” He kissed her lightly, but the emotion in his face was so open and intimate, Kathleen had to look away.
Cal was suddenly there to distract her with her own feelings of intimacy as he slid in next to her and slipped his arm around her waist. “Hey, Rose.”
Oh, God! Every time he said it now her body went into sexual hyperdrive. Kathleen rested a hand on his knee where the liner and sock covered his thigh. “You had a good time.”
“Yeah.” His lips twitched. “I’ll tell you about it later.”
She raised a hand to touch his cheek. “And you’re wearing shorts.”
“Yeah. And I’ve already heard several comments about my lily white leg.” He was smiling as he stretched it out for her to see and she smiled back in relief even though she felt a little teary.
“How does it feel?” she managed though emotion had her voice bobbling a little.
“It’s good. It feels normal.”
If nothing else came out of their being together… He’d broken through the boundaries he’d erected, leaving himself open to more possibilities. Had she just come along at a time he needed a nudge to do it? However it had happened, she was happy for him.
When he leaned forward and kissed her, what would have been a soft brush of his mouth, she turned into something warmer by holding his mouth to hers.
Cal searched her face when she drew back.
“I missed you today,” she admitted.
The pleasure she read in his face brought heat to her own. “We can make up for it later.”
Warmth lit her cheeks. “I’d like that.”
Zoe came out of the house and limped toward the picnic table. “Cal?”
Surprise crossed his face, then he smiled and got up to greet her. “Zoe. It’s good to see you.”
She hugged him, and for a moment Kathleen thought Zoe might cry. “I want you to meet my husband, Hawk. I’ve told him all about you. Kathleen, would you like to join us?”
She followed them across the yard to where Hawk stood with Langley. He carried a toddler on his hip, his son A.J. The child had his same dark hair and features in miniature. He reached for Zoe as soon as she was close enough. She took him and hiked him on the hip supported by her stable leg.
“Adam, this is Cal Crowes, the man who saved me when the explosion went off at the hospital.”
Hawk’s brows hiked up and he extended his hand. Cal shook it.
“Thank you for saving my family. Zoe told me what you did that day. I can’t tell you how much it meant to us both.”
The intensity and emotion in Hawk’s face and voice brought tears to Kathleen’s eyes.
“I was pregnant with A. J. when you pushed me out of the hall and covered me to keep me safe, Cal. If you hadn’t done that, neither of us would be alive.”
“I’m glad what I did kept you safe. But I didn’t do anything that anyone else faced with that same situation wouldn’t have done.” He drew Kathleen forward. “Your team protected me and got me to the chopper. Doc and Bowie saved my life. Your wife helped me get back on my feet and back into life. I met Kathleen, and now we’ve come full circle. It must have been meant to be.”
Hawk nodded. “It must have been. How about I buy you a drink?”
Cal looked to Kathleen.
“I’ll
be around. You two go talk.” Kathleen turned to Zoe, and mindful of her leg and noticeable limp, held her hands out to A.J. “Hey handsome, how about keeping me company?”
The toddler leaned forward and came right to her. She hefted him onto her hip. She and Zoe strolled back to the picnic table together. “If I hadn’t already cried and laughed so much today, I think I might be tempted to start all over again.”
Zoe slipped an arm around her. “Me too.”
*
The smell of chlorine from the pool and the smoky scent of mesquite burning in the gas grill sent Cal’s mind spinning back to barbecues in his parent’s backyard. He wondered what Nora had said to his brother to get him to betray his family’s privacy. No doubt she could charm men…all but him, anyway.
When Flash yelled down the table. “Hey, Cal aren’t you going to watch Harping on the Truth? It comes on in ten minutes.”
Cal’s stomach knotted. He was well aware of the time, and had hoped no one would notice. “Taping it was enough, thanks. I’m not interested.” He kept his tone flat to cover his sudden nerves.
“There’s a television in the weight room. You could step in and watch it. It’s only a fifteen-minute segment,” Kathleen said.
Cal shook his head. “I’m really not interested.”
“What if she somehow slanted the footage in some way?” Kathleen asked.
“I want to see it,” Zoe said and scooted off the picnic table bench.
Kathleen joined her. “I’ll let you know if she tried to pull anything.”
The other ladies went inside with her and Zoe, including Greenback’s mother.
Well, shit. He continued to chew his food, but it suddenly tasted like sawdust. He had to drink some water to wash it down. His gaze strayed to the door leading into the downstairs weight room.
“You’re really not curious how it turned out?” Bowie asked.
“No.”
“Well, what was she like, Nora Harper?” Bowie asked.
Cal looked around to make sure no women were still at the table. “You know that shark we ran into today?”
“Yeah.”
“The only difference in it and her is it has more teeth.”
The man’s brows rose. “Whoa. Why did you do the interview, then?”
“My boss at Wiley Design asked me to. They caught some flack about hiring practices because I happen to be their only worker with a prosthetic. He didn’t like the negative publicity Nora Harper was stirring up.”
“I hate that shit,” Brett commented from down the table. “Tess reports, but she digs deep to make sure what she publishes is the full picture. I’ve seen some of the pieces Harper has done. She’s all about the hype, whether it’s the full picture or not.”
Cal pushed his plate away. “That’s the read I got, too. She’s using each interview to further her career.”
The women were strangely quiet when they came back to the table. Cal searched Kathleen’s face. “What’s wrong?”
“You’ll have to watch it later on You Tube or one of the television replay services. She used some of the footage of you on the building site, but it was mostly what I filmed the day you changed my tires. She taped what you said at the end of the interview about it taking a lifetime to heal. So it ended well, but there was just something exploitive about the way the footage was done.”
Heat climbed in his face, along with a familiar tightening in his chest. “I’m glad I didn’t watch it, then.” His phone vibrated and he reached for it. An unfamiliar number showed on the screen, so he walked away from the table to answer.
“Hey, Cal. My name is Patrice and I just saw you on Harping on the Truth. I’d love to meet you and have a drink.”
Stunned Cal looked at the number again. “How did you get this number?”
“I just went through a cell phone directory service and paid a fee. Don’t be mad. I just thought we could hook up.”
“Look, I have a steady girlfriend. I don’t cheat. I’m flattered, but no thanks.”
“They should have mentioned that on the show. You have my number if you change your mind.”
He hung up without comment, but the phone vibrated again. Another unknown number came across the screen. Oh shit! He darted a quick look at Kathleen. She was talking to Tess and had her back to him. Maybe this was just a fluke and it would stop. The phone quit vibrating. He breathed a sigh of relief. It started again, a different unknown number. Cal turned the phone off. If this continued, he’d have to change his number.
When he returned to the table, Kathleen asked, “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, just a wrong number.” He’d tell her about the phone calls later.
Chapter 19
‡
It was nearly ten when Kathleen and Cal said their good-byes and left the Marks’s house. Cal’s hand rested against her hip as they ambled to the car. “Would you like me to drive?”
“No. I think I’m good. I’m trying to learn my way around. If I get off on the wrong street, you can give me directions.”
“Okay.”
She was grateful he was secure enough to let her drive. She wove past long streams of residences and pulled out onto Palomar Street. She’d purposely made a point of encouraging Cal to catch a ride with her brother so she could drive him home. She’d call Zach if she decided to spend the night.
Cal had saved Zoe’s life and Kathleen’s curiosity had been piqued about the terrorist attack at the hospital. “Tell me what happened at the hospital. I heard the news reports about the explosion, but reporters usually share only enough to leave you curious as hell.”
Cal ran his hands down his thighs to his knees and back up. “Terrorists targeted Zoe’s brother, Brett Weaver, and his family. One of them decided to go after Zoe. I had just arrived to do my therapy, and this guy followed me down the hall to the therapy room. He had a prosthetic arm and was holding something in his right hand.
“He called Zoe by name, like he was making sure he had the right person, so I turned to look behind me and caught a glimpse of the C-4 he’d strapped around his chest. I shoved Zoe through a door into the therapy wing and covered her just as he hit the switch and set the bomb off. The place was pretty beat-up, but the solid cinder block walls limited the damage to part of the ceiling structure, and the only one hurt was the guy who blew himself up. He was pretty much dust.
“It set off a few electrical fires and smoked the place up. I helped Zoe get out of the building and took her to the emergency room to be checked out.”
“Amazing.”
He wasn’t bragging, just telling what happened as though it was an everyday occurrence. He’d just gotten back from a war zone. Just recovered from the IED explosion. How had he dealt with the aftermath?
She quickly found her way onto one of the main roads north.
“It was pretty cool seeing the little guy, A.J. I didn’t know Zoe was pregnant, she never said, but then she wouldn’t have. I was a patient, not a friend. Well, we were sort of friends after the bombing.” He glanced at her. “Completely platonic.”
Kathleen nodded. “You seemed to hold your own pretty well with the guys today.”
She turned east a few minutes later and merged into the heavier traffic a block from Cal’s apartment.
“Doc and the guys kind of took me into the fold.”
“Do you still miss it? I know there’s a kind of brotherhood among military guys.”
“Yeah, I miss it sometimes. Today felt good.”
Kathleen studied his face in the dim glow from the streetlights. “I’m glad you had a good day.”
“You could make it perfect by coming in with me.”
Kathleen turned into the parking lot and her lights flashed over Cal’s truck parked in its regular spot. “I thought you’d never ask. …what’s that in your truck, Cal?”
His attention jerked away from her to his pickup. Something large sat in the bed, a heavy gray tarp covering it. “I don’t know.”
She pulled up and parked next to his truck. Cal was already climbing out before she turned the engine off.
He pulled up a corner of the tarp to look under it. “It’s one of the welder/generator units from the construction site.” The tension in his stance, in the way he continued to look over the unit triggered her own tension. “I don’t know where it could have come from.” He circled the truck to see if anything else was disturbed. “I’m calling Tom.” He jerked his phone out of his back pocket and dialed the number.
Kathleen leaned against the quarter panel of her car and watched Cal pace back and forth while he waited for the foreman to pick up. “Hey, Tom, it’s Cal. Did you send a welding unit over to my place for some reason?”
He listened for a moment. “I’ve been out on a boat all day fishing and just got home. It’s in the bed of my truck, covered with a tarp.” They spoke for a moment longer.
Once he hung up, he leaned back against the car beside her. “He doesn’t know what the hell’s happening, either. He hasn’t sent anyone over with any equipment, and he doesn’t have any idea why it’s here. He’s coming over.”
There went their plans, but they could make up for it another time. Kathleen looped her arm through Cal’s and leaned in against his side. “When he gets here, you could drive it back over to the site and the two of you could unload it.”
“We probably will, but first we need to figure out who parked it in my truck and why. Even though it’s on wheels, the unit is very, very heavy and hard to maneuver. You’d have to have access to a truck to move it…and why leave it here in my vehicle? That’s what I don’t get.”
Cal remained motionless for several seconds. “If whoever did it sicced the police on me, I could be charged with possessing stolen property. Since one of these units costs a bundle, I’d be in big trouble. If this is a prank, it’s not goddamn funny.” His body was rigid, his voice rough as sand paper.
“You’ve called Tom. He knows you didn’t take it. Why would you report it being here if you intended to steal it? Besides, it wasn’t here this morning when Zach picked you up, and you’ve been gone all day. And you had witnesses with you all day.”
Breaking Boundaries (SEAL Team Heartbreakers Book 5) Page 19