CODE NAME: NINA’S CHOICE
A Warrior’s Challenge series
Book Three
Natasza Waters
Sensual Romance
Secret Cravings Publishing
www.secretcravingspublishing.com
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A Secret Cravings Publishing Book
Sensual Romance
Code Name: Nina’s Choise
Copyright © 2014 Natasza Waters
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63105-197-5
First E-book Publication: May 2014
Cover design by Dawné Dominique
Edited by Tamara Hoffa
Proofread by Laurie White
All cover art and logo copyright © 2014 by Secret Cravings Publishing
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Secret Cravings Publishing
www.secretcravingspublishing.com
Dedication
For Micheal, Deanna, Mark and Rick.
You allowed a childless woman to know what a mother feels like. Every moment is cherished.
Acknowledgments
Thank you Tamara Hoffa, your magic wand continues to make my novels sparkle.
Matthieu Grondin, thank you for gracing the cover of Code Name: Nina’s Choice, and bringing Petty Officer Mace Callahan to life. May all your dreams come true.
Luis Rafael, photographer extraordinaire. You capture a person’s soul and express a story through pose, not prose.
My street team, Waters’ Warriors, as time goes on we have drawn closer, shared laughter and the challenges life brings to each of us. I am so grateful to you all.
Tonya Smalley, my BFF so far away, but a thousand miles can’t keep us apart. Your sharp eyes, warm heart and words of support never cease to amaze me. Thank you for reading the draft of CNNC and for your honesty.
TJ Mackay, Chief Editor of InD’tale magazine, patron saint of Indie authors, my boss and my friend. You shared your thirty years of experience in the literary world with me. Your pulse, always in tune with the reader. The hurdles in this book are gone because you gave me a new bearing. Thank you.
Finally, to the United States Navy SEALS and the warriors around the world who stand boldly in the way of our enemies, but never lose grip of their humanity. May you all have loving arms waiting for you at home.
The Cravings Ebook Club
The Cravings Paranormal Ebook Club
Have you heard about the newest idea in ebooks, the ebook club? Secret Cravings Publishing has two ebook clubs, The Cravings Ebook Club or the Cravings Paranormal Ebook Club, and we invite you to become a member.
As a new member, you will receive Trouble With a Cowboy* by Sandy Sullivan and Blood Kisses** by H.N. Sieverding FREE, just for joining!
You’ll also receive 4 BRAND-NEW EBOOKS, specially selected by our Editorial Director, every month in a variety of genres for a total price of only $9.99 for all 4. This comes out to barely $2.50 per book, much less than the retail price and you’ll be able to enjoy your books even before they are uploaded to the popular sales sites. One of several privileges of club membership.
*Trouble With a Cowboy, a western, erotic romance:
18 wheels had her heart until one hard-up cowboy found her kickin' up her heels and propositions her to take his bull to Vegas.
Jacie Hawkins drives big wheelers for a livin'. Something not a lot of women do. Littleton Oklahoma is just a dry stopover for a few hours of rest and relaxation at the nearest bar. Jacie needs to find a hot cowboy to release some of her pent up frustrations on for the night, but wannabe's aren't her style.
Tucker Marshall needs a big-rig driver to haul his prize bull to National Finals Rodeo and he needs one fast. Who would have thought he'd find one shootin' pool at the local bar dressed to kill and takin' numbers?
Can some slashed tires and an ornery bull bring two hard-headed people together for some fun in the sun and a little more?
**Blood Kisses (Nightwalkers 1), paranormal erotic romance:
Ashleigh Brown, the author of the popular Nightwalkers series, lives a quiet life free of the limelight. She keeps her real identity secret by writing under the pen name, Victoria Allure. She soon finds herself in a bind when she's kidnapped by a group of handsome vampires seeking Victoria. She then agrees to meet their Master, who's a huge fan of her books. But instead of meeting him, she accidentally crosses paths with her rock star crush. He is the sexy muse behind Nightwalkers and the man she based the hero in the series upon. She would do anything to meet him but little does she know her crush has a secret...
We will try to match your books to your preferences, however, if you’re a major paranormal fan, we suggest you join the Cravings Paranormal Club. Everything is the same except that three of your four books will be paranormal. The remaining book will be of a different genre.
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We hope our Secret Cravings books will delight you each and every month.
Best wishes,
Beth Walker
CODE NAME: NINA’S CHOICE
A Warrior’s Challenge series
Book Three
Natasza Waters
Copyright © 2014
Chapter One
Nina Samson sat at the kitchen table, knees jiggling like a jackhammer. Watching a pot didn’t make it boil faster. Glaring at her phone wouldn’t create a message or land a plane any faster either. Tinman and Tadpole, two SEAL team members waited at the San Diego airport for one very brave, b
ut battered warrior. Her phone beeped. Snatching it up, she gazed at the text from Tinman.
Heads-up, incoming SEAL.
Petty Officer Mace Callahan was home.
She remembered the day Mace walked into Base Command with the rest of his squad, literally minutes after she’d arrived in Coronado. Her friend and mentor, Kayla Banks had been hired almost a year earlier as an analyst for the U.S. Navy. Nina followed in her wake and had applied for a job when another vacancy was posted.
As Kayla introduced Alpha Squad, Mace had hung back, standing in an aura of quiet, handsome strength that tied Nina’s tongue in knots. She learned quickly that Mace was the noblest, most compassionate, not to mention sexiest man, she’d ever met. Within hours she could read him like a book, and she wanted the whole encyclopedia. His boy-next-door features with a knock-a-girl-on-her-ass smile only made Nina desire him more. Rolling, hard-earned muscles roped down his body. Nothing new to her, after working for years with the Canadian Navy, but when their gazes collided his kind eyes made her want to shimmy aboard and take the express train straight to ecstasy with him. A man making her scatterbrained from hello hadn’t happened for nine years.
From the second she arrived in Coronado the shit had hit the proverbial fan. She’d learned a serial killer was leaving a trail of women behind him, and her friend Kayla was on his hit list. Nina joined that list and was put into protective quarantine with Kayla. They were guarded twenty-four-seven by SEALs, but Alpha Squad in particular had closed ranks around them. The captain in charge of the West Coast SEAL teams had fallen madly in love with Kayla, and their baby was due in September.
She’d only known Mace for a couple weeks before he and Alpha Squad were deployed to Syria to rescue an Egyptian diplomat. Mace left for the mission in early February. At the end of April bad luck struck. Mace was injured. He’d been transported to a hospital in Germany, barely alive. Captain Redding, Coronado Base Command’s Officer in Charge and her ranking officer, had given her five days leave. When she arrived in Berlin, she hadn’t expected to come face to face with a very angry Mace.
Kayla had accompanied her because Captain Austen had been badly injured as well, but within an hour Kayla had left and flown back to the states. Minutes after landing in San Diego she’d disappeared, and most people thought the Blood Shark, the serial killer slaughtering women on NAB Naval Amphibious Base Coronado, had claimed her as his next victim. Captain Austen still searched for her friend, never caving in to doubt.
Everything around Nina had gone FUBAR in a very short period of time. In the last three weeks she’d considered packing up her bags and heading back to Canada numerous times. She missed her daughter, and feared for Kayla, but it was the man about to walk through the door and her stubbornness that kept her feet rooted in U.S. soil.
While Mace remained in Berlin under the doctor’s care, she’d tried to contact him, but he wouldn’t take her calls or respond to her texts. Tony “Tinman” Bale, another member of Team One Alpha Squad, gave her updates on his progress. His injuries had taken him down, but not out. The doctors said he’d be fine with therapy, but Mace didn’t believe it, especially since his groin had been badly injured, leaving a guy’s most prized possession unresponsive.
Nina’s thoughts meandered to a night before the squad left for Syria. Kayla and Captain Austen had a meltdown of cataclysmic proportions. Nina learned a few things for certain that night. The infamous SEAL named Thane “Ghost” Austen loved her friend beyond words, but what landed like an unexploded grenade in her lap was his team sniper, Mace Callahan.
Once the excitement died down, she and Mace scrammed for dinner to give Kayla and Ghost some privacy. They never made it past the beach. They’d wandered down to take a walk by the water, and eventually sat down against a log above the tide line. Mace stared off in the distance with a pronounced wrinkle on his brow.
“Mace, she’s going to be okay.”
“How?” he said, his jaw tightening. “She’s so beat up inside.”
“Hey.” She rested her hand on his shoulder, and her heart took up a galloping beat, feeling the marble-like strength beneath his shirt. “Kayla’s PTSD does things to her that would make most people curl up and die. Don’t confuse her barriers for coldness. She’s the most giving person, and she’s always been there for me and my daughter, Gabbs. I think Captain Austen will help her conquer her demons.” She shifted to get away from the sharp shell sticking in her left butt cheek, but what she couldn’t do was shake the growing need for Mace’s hands to roam across her skin. “From what I can tell, Kayla is totally swooned by your captain.”
“It tears me up when she has a panic attack. I’m trained to keep my concentration, but I can’t when she’s thrashing around to save herself, and I can’t do a damn thing for her.”
“I know. It isn’t easy to watch.” She paused to stare out at the gentle swells crawling up the sand. No loud cracks or bangs from exercising recruits invaded the air. The California wind brushed a tepid cloth around her bare shoulders and arms. “She told me about you. Said you were her best friend. I was actually a little jealous.” A grin slipped onto Mace’s lips and her heart took another large step toward a big, fiery hole. “I think Captain Austen is enough of a man to hold her down until she succumbs to his will.” She swallowed suddenly, realizing what that sounded like. It had a double meaning, and she was sure her desire had just one-upped her.
With any luck she would be working in Coronado soon. She shouldn’t be panting over the SEAL sitting beside her, but his essence saturated her like standing under a waterfall.
“Ghost is crazy in love with the woman,” Mace said, turning to look at her. “He’s not an easy man, but they see something in each other, and they both want to hold on to it.”
Under the moonlight Mace’s beautiful eyes embedded hooks in Nina like an anchor catching on the seabed. How could a warrior have such empathy in his gaze?
“Ghost lost his heart to her from the first second he saw her.”
He fingered a small pebble, rolling it slowly with his thumb. Her inner minx imagined him doing that to her breasts. Damn! Stop! “She’s ignoring it, but I know she feels it.”
“I know she does, but they’re like two typhoons colliding in the Pacific. They didn’t see each other coming, and when they met on the same track it turned into the perfect storm. They resisted each other for no good reason.” His voice dropped off when she could only stare at him. Mace’s head tilted and he blinked as if trying to remember what he was going to say. “I think I know why he changed; why he couldn’t resist her.” He swallowed deeply, his gaze intensifying. “You are breathtaking, Nina, and I don’t think I can resist you. Nor do I want to.”
Those few words slammed into her. The immediate heat between her thighs made her shift in the sand.
“Nina.”
He growled her name, carried on a wave of need. “Yeah,” she whispered back, trapped in a cocoon completely woven by the sound of his voice.
He ran his tongue slowly across his bottom lip. “Do you have any idea how exquisite you look under the moonlight?”
Her inner minx took control of her tongue. “No, but I think I want you to show me.”
She’d watched a mega-casino implode on TV once, the triggers set off in rapid fire. Concrete and debris exploded out the windows, and the entire structure trembled before it caved in. As Mace leaned over and traced her bottom lip with his tongue, that’s exactly what happened to her.
Hands that were trained to kill gently slid around her waist, his rough fingers meeting in the hollow of her back. As soon as they grazed her skin, he went rigid and slammed her body against his. The rocket fuel in her blood ignited. Tilting his head, he branded her with his mouth. Confidence flowed through his kiss into her. Full lips nipped at the pulse in her neck. When he licked a sensitive spot behind her ear, her heart stopped, and all good sense evaporated. Awash in this man was like being consumed from the inside out.
She was on her back, t
he sand pressing its residual warmth against her body. As he yanked his shirt over his head, her pulse deepened. Taut, sleek skin covered his powerful shoulders and abs. Her tongue demanded she investigate, as her hips arched toward his with instinctive need. Normally vanilla sex didn’t do a thing for her, but right now she wanted Mace any way he came.
Mace hovered above her. “I want you, Nina,” he breathed on her lips. “Right here. Right now. Under the stars.”
Talking wasn’t necessary. She swiveled to her knees, leaped onto his lap, and pushed him over.
A sexy smile tightened his jaw. The moonlight caught the craving in his half-lidded eyes and told her she wouldn’t be disappointed. His fingers drifted beneath her shirt with a slow, sensual crawl and she wanted to rip it off, but his warm hand engulfed hers, thwarting her impatience.
Eyes too beautiful to be legal, dazed her. “Slowly, baby. I want to remember our first time. All of it.”
She wasn’t known for her patience, and his seductive order just rammed her pistons into carnal overdrive. “I want you to take me now, hotshot.” She leaned over him, speaking her words against his lips. “How does a warrior make love?”
His hips pressed against hers and the bulge nudged against her core. “Until we both forget who we are, Nina.” His voice paralyzed her, allowing his thumb to follow the contour of her breast. Skirting her nipple, it ached to be caressed. “Until I’ve memorized every beautiful curve.” Mace inched closer. “Tasted all of you.” Her breast became heavy with need as the evening shadow on his jaw grazed its soft skin. A tremor of pole-shifting proportions turned her inside out with desire. A pyroclastic blast of passion blew her mind as his full lips circled her nipple and he sucked it deep into his mouth with a low moan of satisfaction.
Code Name: Nina's Choice (Warrior's Challenge) Page 1