Text copyright ©2016 by the Author.
This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by Cat Johnson. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Hot SEALs remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Cat Johnson, or their affiliates or licensors.
For more information on Kindle Worlds: http://www.amazon.com/kindleworlds
A DAYE with A SEAL
A Dangerous Curves
Hot SEALs KW Crossover Novella
NYT & USA Today Bestselling Author
by Donna Michaels
About this Book
Medically discharged after a mission gone bad, Navy SEAL Gabriel ‘Hawk’ Barrett regains his sight, and when hired by GAPS and the Knight Agency, most of his self-worth. Assigned to go undercover as a gun for hire, he’s determined to do whatever it takes to complete the mission, but his restraint is tested when his buddy’s hot sister becomes mistakenly involved.
When her brother disappears, coffee shop owner Gina Daye seeks help from his former teams members, only to have the almighty Hawk turn her down. But before she realizes he’s in the middle of an assignment, she’s embroiled in the mission.
Sequestered together to avoid an international incident, the pair face down the enemy, a multitude of bullets, and even more dangerous—their long denied attraction.
**A DAYE with A SEAL is a Kindle Worlds crossover novella between the Dangerous Curves Series and Cat Johnson’s Hot SEALs Series. This story can be read as a standalone, but I recommend reading the other books in the Dangerous Curves Series in order to get maximum enjoyment.**
Thanks for reading,
~Donna
www.donnamichaelsauthor.com
Author’s Note
Visit www.donnamichaelsuathor.com for more titles and release dates and to join Donna Michaels’ Newsletter. Enjoy exclusive reads, enter subscriber only contests, and be the first to know about upcoming books!
Table of Contents
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
ALSO BY DONNA MICHAELS
About the Author
Can’t get enough Hot SEALs?
Dedication
Once again, I’d like to thank Cat Johnson and Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing for the opportunity to write in the Hot SEALs Kindle World!
I appreciate the chance to cross my military romantic suspense series, Dangerous Curves with this wonderful, hot SEAL world.
Again, I was honored to be included in a launch with amazing author’s I personally love to read!
I had a blast, and hope the readers enjoy, too!
♥
Prologue
Five Years Earlier
Ramadi, Iraq
“Get out, Hawk! It’s going to blow!” Birddog’s voice boomed over the com.
Navy SEAL Gabriel “Hawk” Barrett charged for the stairs in the makeshift lab, taking the steps two at a time while his team leader rushed toward the back door. Excel and Python were scouting a different building, and Nightwing and Turbo had already left with the rescued hostage five minutes earlier.
So much for their simple snatch and grab.
As he bolted outside, percussions ripped through the night’s silence, its distinctive melody deafening to his ears. He dropped to the ground and covered his head as pieces of the two-story concrete building fell around him.
With his night vision goggles laying in pieces beneath him, he made the mistake of turning to check for tangos, only to weather a swift-moving barrage of smoke, dust, and debris. Pain ripped through his eyes. The sting and burn gripped tight as he covered his head and rode out the remaining hail. When the rain of rubble subsided, he tried in vain to open his eyes. Something warm ran down his face while an automatic irrigation of tears spilled down his cheeks.
Neither offered any relief.
Gabriel forced his pain aside and tried to raise his commander.
Silence.
Fuck. He hoped Birddog made it out. The commander was getting married in two months.
With his earpiece only communicating static, he pushed to his feet and instinct took over. Keep moving.
Fire crackled and heated the air on his right. Shit. This was not going to be easy. He needed to find his SEAL brother. He tried the com again. “Birddog?”
“Hawk,” his buddy called. “I’m over here.”
He couldn’t tell from what direction. And he still couldn’t fucking see. He yanked out the earpiece. “Birddog?”
“Over here.”
His ears picked up a faint voice to his right.
The intense heat of the fire fused his sweat-soaked uniform to his skin, but he edged closer anyway, one ear focused on his commander while the other listened for tangos. He stayed low and out of sight.
He hoped.
A few missteps brought him to all fours. Hard. He grit his teeth, stumbled over the debris, righted himself, and ignored the cuts that throbbed in his hands and knees. When he tripped a third time, he braced himself for the impact of broken concrete under his fingers again. A wave of sickness gurgled into his throat at the feel of warm, wet, mangled flesh and bone instead.
Shit. A body.
“Birddog?”
“Here,” the SEAL responded further ahead.
Relief flooded Gabriel’s veins. It wasn’t him.
He searched the body for a pulse, but found none. A khet, a type of loose-fitting tunic, and no weapons told him it was a villager. Momentarily relieved it wasn’t one of the team, he suffered through a round of guilt for feeling relieved. The deceased would still leave family behind. With a heavy heart, he pushed to his feet.
Distant gunfire and the whine of engines set his adrenaline into high gear again. “Birddog! Where are you?”
“Here, Hawk,” came the quick reply.
“I can’t see. Keep talking.” He pushed aside his frustration and concentrated on his team leader’s low instructions to lead the way. Relief surged through him as his hand found his buddy’s shoulder. “Are you hurt? Can you walk?”
“With your help,” Birddog grunted. “Let’s go.”
“My com is out. Do you have a SITREP on the others?”
“Excel, Python, Nightwing, and Turbo made it to the rendezvous with the rescued hostage,” Birddog informed with another grunt as he leaned on him and stood. “We were lucky. This place was booby trapped with faulty wires. It gave us enough time to get out.”
“Barely,” he scoffed.
“Yeah, but we rescued the hostage and I found a map marking the existence of three more bio labs.”
Shit. “More labs?”
“Yes,” Birddog replied. “We need to get it to command.”
“Roger. Which way to the rendezvous point?”
Given the nickname Hawk because of his keen eyesight, he fucking hated the fact he couldn’t even keep his eyes open. Especially now that their lives depended on it.
It wasn’t lost on him that his friend never confessed his own injuries. Instinct, and the fact Birddog’s breathing sounded shallow, told him his buddy was in bad shape.
> “The airstrip is one and a half clicks south. This way.” Birddog tugged on Gabriel’s arm.
After what felt like hours, they stumbled and cursed their way to the safety of an abandoned building a mile down the road. The pungent odor of chemicals, wood, and flesh hung in the air and assaulted his nose, forming a vile vapor that clung to the back of his throat and brought a bitter taste to his mouth.
“I need to rest,” Birddog grunted, leading them to a cool corner, his clothes rustling as he slid to the floor.
Exhaustion ached through Gabriel’s bones while his cuts throbbed and the burning in his eyes seared through to his skull. And he was thirsty. God, he was so damned parched. But they couldn’t stop, shouldn’t stop. They had to keep moving. “We can’t stay here, Birddog.”
As if to confirm his point, the sound of enemy troops searching through the rubble echoed in the distance.
“Give me your canteen,” Birddog ordered.
He fumbled till he got it off his belt and held it toward his buddy’s voice.
“Kneel down and tip your head.”
Shit. “We’re doing this now? We should leave, sir.”
“No. Now. Tip your head back. That’s an order, Hawk.”
He dropped to his knees and did as he was told. Birddog worked one eye at a time, forcing the lid open while he poured the water. Gabriel sucked in a breath, clenched his fists and teeth against the searing agony, and fought to keep from passing out. Then suffered the same torture with the other eye. As the flushing irrigated chemicals, dust, and debris, the blessed water washed away some of the pain, too.
But didn’t restore his sight.
Not exactly. His eyes still burned and refused to stay open, but he could make out shapes and light between blinking.
“Thanks.” He’d dwell on his situation later. Right now, they had bigger problems. “What about you? Let’s get you patched up and get moving.”
“I’m contacting command. Take these.” Birddog thrust a canteen and what felt like a pair of NVGs into his hands.
He allowed himself a small sip of water, silently thanking the stars as the liquid traveled down his parched throat, relieving some of his thirst and the fuzziness from his head. While he listened to his buddy make contact, Gabriel twisted the cap back on. Then stilled. The weight of the canteen was off. It should be empty after using it to flush his eyes. It was nearly full.
It was Birddog’s.
“Yes, sir. We have a bone. A lame wolf will deliver,” Birddog stated.
“Wolves,” Gabriel corrected.
He felt his buddy shove something into his breast pocket. “Get this to them,” his friend said on a raspy breath. “Commander, I’m not going to make it. I need you to order the wolf to leave me behind.”
“Hell-fucking-no!” Gabriel knew what the enemy did to the bodies of dead American servicemen. “I’m not leaving you, sir!”
No way!
“Get this to them.” Birddog’s breathing turned rough. “Tell Susan…I love her.”
“Tell her yourself,” he growled.
His buddy cursed. “Don’t be…an…idiot.” He thrust his com in Gabriel’s hand. “Take it. Go!”
“We’re only a half a click away. I can carry you. We’ll make it.”
“No! Take this… Go…”
His chest was tight and his throat hot as he slipped the com into his ear.
“Hawk? You know who this is?” Commander Knight’s calm, lethal tone filled his earpiece, following protocol by not using names. “I’m ordering you to leave Birddog behind and get that bone to the kennel.”
“I can’t…”
“That’s an order! Retrievers are already on their way for the pack. Now move!”
Chapter One
Present day
Gina Daye was having a bad day. Hell. A bad week.
Between a stolen computer, a break-in at the coffee shop she owned, a series of prank calls, and a flat tire, she was ready for a vacation.
On a tropical island.
With a gorgeous hunk.
Feeding her grapes…between pleasure-filled rounds of hot monkey sex.
Well, if she was going to dream big, might as well go for the gusto.
Too bad she didn’t put that much effort into her actual social life.
Her nonexistent one.
She hadn’t been on a date since last summer. It was now early April.
And what better way to top off her fabulous week than to spend all day Saturday searching bars in Virginia Beach for some of her brother’s former SEAL buddies to see if they’d heard from him?
Cam had up and disappeared a week ago. She wanted answers.
The sun was beginning to set behind a row of rundown buildings, casting shadows across the parking lot where she pulled in and cut her engine. This bar made number twenty-two. It was even seedier than the last, with metal rusting on faded awnings and litter scattered around the choppy pavement. Classy joint.
Her phone started to ring.
“Any luck?” her friend Paige asked.
“Yeah, I found plenty of SEALs. Just not the ones I’m looking for.” She snickered as she got out and locked the doors of the little red mini she’d scrimped and saved three years to buy. The cute car looked like a tiny kid’s toy parked between the two enormous black trucks.
Talk about over-compensation.
Every girl knew the unwritten fact: the louder the motorcycle or bigger the truck, the smaller the man’s…dipstick.
Considering she hadn’t seen a dipstick in months, she probably shouldn’t judge.
But, she wasn’t there looking for a dipstick.
She was looking for her brother.
“Oh, I wish I could’ve gotten the day off and gone with you.” Paige sighed. “I bet you saw some great-looking men.”
She shrugged. “A few, but I’m not interested. You know I don’t date men in the military.”
A snort sounded in her ear. “Or agents. Cops. Firemen. First responders. You’ve eliminated seventy percent of the men in Virginia. No wonder you haven’t had any—”
“And I don’t want any from them,” she cut her friend off. She wanted a normal nine-to-five guy, not someone who’d put their life on the line for her. Been there. Done that.
Had the tombstone to prove it.
No thanks.
“Gina, not all men die like your dad, or Suzie’s fiancé.”
“I know.”
“A teacher, cook, doctor, construction worker, they could just as easily die risking their life to save the one they love, so you need to rethink your strategy,” her friend pointed out.
True. “But they’re not put in harm’s way risking their lives every day like the others, either.”
“So…you don’t want a guy to risk his life for you…and you don’t want him to make a living out of risking his life for others, too?”
“Exactly.” She nodded. “They are very admirable, and there are plenty of women who’d appreciate that. I’m just not one of them.”
“I am.”
“Good.” She smiled, walking toward the sidewalk. “You have at ‘em and leave me out of it. Right now, the only guy I’m looking for is my brother.”
When Cameron Daye, a.k.a. Nightwing, was a SEAL on active duty, she knew his disappearances and sudden drop-ins were part of the lifestyle. But, last year, he’d dropped his packet and retired from active duty. He was a civilian. A security guard at the same museum where her archeologist friend Paige worked. His sudden departure a week ago—without a word, text, or call—was not like him.
She was worried.
“Yeah, I asked at work, but all they told me was Cam was on leave,” Paige said.
That only increased Gina’s anxiety. “He never told me,” she muttered. “It’s the reason Mr. Knight advised me to seek out Cam’s friends.”
One of the perks of owning a coffee shop frequented by secret agents. Free advice.
“I wish Mr. Knight had gone with you.”
She eyed the dreary neighborhood and shivered. “Me, too.”
“For a man in his fifties, Jameson sure is handsome.” Her friend sighed in her ear. “Those silver temples, square jaw, and mesmerizing blue eyes make my heart flutter.”
And half of Gina’s patrons.
Until recently, the Knight Agency worked in the same building as her corner shop. Even though they’d relocated, the agents still stopped in for coffee. This morning, the owner, Jameson Knight, ordered his favorite Columbian dark roast…and her to join him. Those gorgeous eyes of his were also capable of sizing you up in just a glance. He did exactly that, then asked her to take a coffee break with him. By the time she’d finished her spiced latte, she’d confessed her concern over Cam and was shocked to discover the men knew each other. Jameson Knight had been one of her brother’s former commanders.
“He apologized for not being able to help me himself, but he gave me his number and made me promise to call him if I don’t have any luck finding my brother’s former team.”
“Well, I still hate that you drove two hours south on your own, and now it’s getting dark.”
She could practically hear her friend frown over the phone.
“It’s my fault. When Jameson told me the guys still hung out at a bar in Virginia Beach, I hadn’t realized there were a gazillion of them. I should’ve asked for the name of the bar.”
Hindsight was twenty-twenty.
Which was becoming increasingly apparent as she stepped over a broken bottle, a fast food bag, and a cluster of empty beer cans in an attempt to avoid scuffing her favorite black boots.
Probably not the best place for her to be alone, especially now that the sunlight had disappeared.
Exactly what Paige had stated.
It wasn’t that Gina couldn’t defend herself, because she could. Fairly well. Hello. Her brother was a former SEAL, and some of her good friends were kickass secret agents. She’d learned a thing or two over the years. But she knew better than to put herself in a bad situation.
Hot SEALs: A Daye with A SEAL (Kindle Worlds Novella) (Dangerous Curves Series Book 3) Page 1