A SEAL’s Desire

by Seton, Cora

  “What happened this time?” Fulsom asked. She could hear him tapping on a keyboard in the background. She only had half his attention, if that. Meanwhile Clem had sidled up next to her, listening in blatantly.

  “He knocked over all the outdoor composting toilets. Before that he covered all the solar panels with snow.”

  “Solar panels can’t be generating much energy in the dead of a Montana winter,” Fulsom pointed out. “And you still have the inside bathrooms, right?”

  “That’s not the point! The point is—” She cut off. She couldn’t finish her sentence with Clem standing right there. The point was that Fulsom already had her to direct the show. Why wasn’t she enough? She’d given up everything she’d wanted to do for him—and for the girls back in Peru.

  “The point is we’re entertaining the masses. And teaching them a few things, right?” Fulsom asked.

  “About what? Harassment? Hooliganism?” Renata pressed.

  “About not kowtowing to bullies, I hope,” Fulsom countered. “Come on, Renata, you can handle Clem. If not, you aren’t the woman I thought you were. Gotta go.”

  He cut the call before she could think of a proper retort, leaving Renata fuming. Clem’s sardonic smile didn’t help.

  “You’re going to lose,” she told him. The wind whipped a tendril of her hair into her eyes, and she tossed her head.

  “Not if you lose first. Your boy’s not going to marry anyone else. We’ll wrap this show in less than thirty days with a big ol’ bulldozer flourish.”

  “Boone’s lining up backup brides, you know. He’s got a whole list. Pretty soon they’ll start arriving for interviews.” She was making it up, but she couldn’t be too far wrong, could she? Boone always had backup brides waiting to go.

  “Leave her alone.” Greg approached and stepped in between them. “Come on,” he told Renata. “I have an errand in town. Let’s go.”

  She let him lead her away before she really embarrassed herself. Had Greg heard their conversation? Had he talked to Boone about backup brides?

  “What about these toilets?” Clem called after them.

  “Better get them upright again,” Greg called back.

  “He really knows how to push your buttons, doesn’t he?” Greg said when he turned the truck onto the highway at the end of the lane.

  “You don’t know the half of it.” Renata kept her head turned away, her gaze on the snow-covered fields they passed, where the wind whipped along the ground, lifting sprays of snow into the air. Greg searched for a way to distract her. He didn’t know what Clem had said right before he’d caught up to them, but it had hurt her, that was clear.

  “If you could be anywhere right now—anywhere in the world—where would you go?” Could he distract her? He’d give anything to take away her pain.

  She didn’t answer for a long moment, her face still turned away. Then, to Greg’s surprise, she reached a hand out toward him.

  He took it, not saying a word, afraid to ruin the moment. Was she saying she wanted to be with him?

  He’d follow her just about anywhere. Already had.

  When the silence stretched out too long, she wriggled her hand in his, and he let go reluctantly.

  “I know how to deal with guys like Clem.” She shifted in her seat. “I ran into a lot of them growing up.”

  “In foster care?”

  She nodded. “The trick is to figure out what they’re afraid of. They’re always afraid of something.”

  “What do you think Clem is afraid of?”

  “Losing the spotlight altogether. He might be director, but he wants time in front of the camera, and he can’t compete with all of you. He was front and center on Tracking the Stars.”

  “Which means he’ll fight hard to keep on top here. You’ll have to fight harder if you want your old job back.”

  Renata sighed. “What if I don’t want it?”

  Greg kept driving, unsure what to think of her question. All the months he’d been at Base Camp so far, Renata had kept up a solid facade that had left him thinking there were no chinks in her armor. She’d been professional, punctual, driven—

  What had happened to change that?

  Landing on the show as his potential wife?

  If anything, he’d have thought that would propel her into being even more driven, more hard-bitten, more determined than ever to stay on top. Instead, she was… falling apart.

  Greg gripped the steering wheel harder. He hadn’t meant to make her fall apart. Certainly hadn’t meant to ruin her career.

  “Renata, you know how I feel about you—”

  “Do I?” she challenged him.

  “Don’t you?” Coming to a decision, he pulled off the highway and parked on the shoulder. “I fell for you the minute I saw you—” He cut off. They still hadn’t talked about Peru. “I love you,” he said instead of opening that can of worms. “I have for a long time. I want you to be my wife.”

  “I can’t be your wife and direct Base Camp at the same time, and I can’t just… fade away. I have to get Fulsom to give me my job back, or no one will hire me to direct anything again.” Her frustration was palpable, and understandable, too, but he wasn’t clear if she meant she was giving his proposition any real consideration. She felt… something… for him, that was clear, but what?

  “I know your work is important to you.” He hesitated, not really wanting to ask the next question but knowing he had to. “And I know you want more than to direct television shows. You want to do movies. And you probably don’t want to do them in Chance Creek.” He remembered how surprised she’d been when he suggested it.

  It had been a stupid idea.

  She shook her head.

  Just like he’d thought. “What would you do if you could do anything?”

  Renata lifted her shoulders in a delicate shrug. “What does it matter? When have I ever gotten to do what I want?”

  “What about Peru?” He’d gotten the sense back then of a woman entirely dedicated to her goals.

  “Peru?” she echoed and finally looked at him. After a moment she nodded. Half smiled. “Going there was the last time I made a choice that actually felt like a choice.”

  “You didn’t want to work for Fulsom?” He would have thought landing work with a billionaire would make any aspiring filmmaker happy, but maybe he had it all wrong, Greg thought. If choosing to document the lives of a group of poor but aspiring young Peruvian girls was Renata’s idea of happiness, then working with a billionaire as self-centered as Fulsom had probably been frustrating from the get-go.

  Directing a reality TV show must be her idea of hell.

  A gust of wind rattled the truck. It had been blowing all day, but it was getting worse. Did Renata think she needed to get away from Fulsom—and Base Camp—to be happy? If so, what was keeping her here?

  Something else occurred to him. Something so obvious he didn’t know why he hadn’t thought of it before. She’d been in foster care for years. Had traveled endlessly working for Fulsom.

  “Are you looking for a home?”

  Renata closed her eyes, immediately picturing the small, tidy home in which she’d lived her first six years. Sometimes she thought she must be making up her memories, but one image was clear as anything in her mind. She and her father sitting at a kitchen table with a red tablecloth. Red had always been her favorite color, and it was her birthday. Her father sat across from her. Her mother had just lit the candles on her cake. Her favorite: Devil’s food. Both of them were singing.

  “Make a wish,” her mother said, setting the cake down in front of her with a flourish. Renata didn’t remember the wish, but she remembered this moment. The cake. The candles. The tablecloth. The small, homey kitchen.

  Her parents, beaming at her.

  Two months later, they were gone.

  No one had ever looked at her like that again.

  Was she looking for a home? Renata struggled to swallow the pain swelling her throat. How could there eve
r be a home with her parents gone from the world? She was on her own. She knew that. She simply couldn’t depend on anyone else—for love or money.

  Renata turned to Greg to tell him so.

  Saw the way he was looking at her.

  She must have made a sound, or Greg must have seen something in her face.

  Suddenly he was gone, out of the truck, the door slamming shut behind him, a chill blast of air in his wake. Renata straightened. Where was he going?

  When her door opened, she nearly fell out of it into his arms. Instead Greg bent inside, undid her seat belt, lifted her up and climbed into the passenger seat underneath her. Perched precariously on his lap while he shut the door again, her head nearly brushing the ceiling, Renata cried, “What are you doing?”

  “Holding you.”

  His strong arms came around her, and he eased her down until her cheek rested against his shoulder.

  “But—”

  Renata didn’t know when she’d been ensconced in such a circle of warmth. Greg’s jacket was open, and she could hear his heartbeat. He’d gathered her against him and was holding on as if he wanted to protect her from anything that might do her harm.

  “I’d make a home for you,” he said. “Forever, if you’ll let me.”

  “But—”

  “You could do whatever you wanted. You could do nothing at all—or everything. I would be your family.”

  She had to tell him no. She had a job. Goals. Responsibilities. The money—

  “We could have babies. As many as you want.”

  She already had children to raise. Seven of them still needing her support. Sixteen who’d moved on to bigger and better things. They were her responsibility, and she wasn’t going to let them down for anything.

  “I have savings, Renata. If you need a break, I can cover the bills.”

  And that was when the tears came. Because she’d worked so hard and so long to get this far, always alone with the fear that she’d let everyone down. She knew what it was like to trust someone—and have it all taken away.

  She would never, ever do that to her girls.

  Even if it meant she’d miss this chance with Greg. Even if they grew up one by one and moved on, leaving her alone.

  Like always—

  Greg’s arms tightened around her, and new tears slipped silently down her cheeks.

  “It’s okay,” Greg kept murmuring, but it wasn’t okay. It never had been, and it never would be.

  She didn’t want to be alone.

  “I’m here,” Greg told her. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  But he would, in roughly thirty days when he had to marry or lose Base Camp forever.

  For now she clung to him like she’d never let go.

  Chapter Eight

  ‡

  “Thank God for Riley,” Greg said sometime later when he’d fished a package of tissues out of glove compartment of the truck and handed it to Renata. “I swear she’s stashed these in every vehicle Base Camp owns.”

  He was rewarded by a small smile as Renata wiped the tears from her face. She was still sitting in his lap, a minor miracle, and she was calmer now, although every now and then another tear streaked down her cheek.

  Greg wondered if she’d held in those tears since Peru, or maybe even longer. Maybe since she’d been a girl. He tried to fathom losing his family as a boy and living with strangers. He couldn’t. He’d grown up in a community so tightly knit every member felt like family. Renata hadn’t mentioned keeping in contact with anyone she’d been placed with. That spoke volumes about the quality of care she’d received. From what Greg had read, the foster system was full of people who genuinely meant well, but the system was overburdened and understaffed, so oversight wasn’t always what one might wish.

  Renata clutched the damp tissues in her lap, her shoulders slumped. “I can’t believe I did that,” she said dully.

  “Cried?”

  She nodded.

  “Everyone cries sometime. It’s healthy.”

  “Like you ever cry.”

  “Not too often,” he admitted. “It’s not a big tradition in the SEALs, but I grew up in Oregon on a commune,” he pointed out. “Manly tears are completely acceptable there. Besides, seems like those were building for a long time.”

  “I guess.”

  “Renata, it’s okay to change your mind, you know that, right? Just because you wanted to be a movie director in the past doesn’t mean you always have to. You can do more than one thing in your life. More than one thing at a time, if that’s what you want.”

  “Directing movies doesn’t work as a side gig,” she countered.

  “And if that’s what you want to do, that’s great,” he told her. “All I’m saying is there’s nothing keeping you trapped in that concept of yourself if you want to do something else.”

  Renata wouldn’t look him in the eye. There was something she wasn’t telling him. Did Fulsom have some kind of hold over her? Was that what was keeping her at Base Camp? Or was she the kind of person who simply couldn’t leave a job half-done?

  “You don’t want to break your contract?” he hazarded. She must have some kind of agreement with Fulsom.

  “Something like that.”

  “Renata—” Greg didn’t have anything else to add; he just liked the sound of her name. Liked saying it. Liked holding her, too. He didn’t want to let her go.

  When he bent to kiss her, she didn’t pull back. Instead she met his kiss as naturally as if they’d done it hundreds of times before. Greg shifted beneath her, and she leaned into him, her arms twining more tightly around his neck. No matter what obligation was holding her back from being with him or changing her life, she was attracted to him. When they broke apart, he dropped a kiss along the neckline of her old-fashioned gown. Her jacket had come unbuttoned along the way, affording him access, and he couldn’t resist the temptation.

  He thought she’d put an end to things then, but she didn’t. Instead she leaned closer, and he brushed another kiss over the softness of her skin.

  Renata sighed, and he wondered what she was thinking. He let the silence extend, hoping she’d speak up.

  She finally did. “I don’t suppose…”

  “What?” Greg held still. Did she want him as much as he wanted her? He was hard, having difficulty keeping himself in check with her in his lap, her every move shifting her weight against his crotch.

  “We could be together—without it meaning anything.”

  He chuckled. “We can be together any time you want, but it’ll sure mean something to me.” At the pleading look in her eyes, he brushed a kiss at the base of her neck. “How about this? We can be together, and I won’t think you’re making me any promises. Does that work?”

  After a moment she nodded.

  “That works.”

  “Are we talking about some specific time?”

  In answer to his question, Renata kissed him again, moving her mouth over his lightly at first but then leaning in and asking for more.

  “Here?” As surprised as he was, Greg was all for it, but they were in a truck on the side of the highway. Someone might stop to check on them.

  “I can’t take you back to my motel room. Fulsom made me give it up.”

  Greg wished she could. A real bed and a room with a locked door sounded perfect right about now. “Let’s at least get farther off this road.”

  Untangling themselves wasn’t easy. Nor was finding a place to turn far enough off the road that they wouldn’t be visible from the highway or some ranch house. By the time he found a turnoff that took him around a bend behind a copse of trees, he was worried Renata would change her mind. He parked and turned to her, ready to offer her an easy out if she needed one. He wasn’t going to push her and ruin his chances for the future he wanted.

  “In back?” she asked, cocking her head toward the bench seat.

  “Hell, yeah.” Greg was out of the truck and into the back seat in a matter of moments. Renata foll
owed a little more slowly, taking care for her gown, but when he pulled her into his lap and growled, “Where were we?” she smiled, a wry twist of her lips.

  “Oh yeah, you were about to rock my world.”

  He’d do his best.

  Renata shimmied out of her jacket, and Greg was thankful the cab of the truck had heated as they’d driven. He knew the warmth wouldn’t last and was happy to find a couple of blankets half shoved under the seat. He shrugged out of his own jacket, shook one out and wrapped it around them. “How’s that?”

  “Perfect. Warmth and protection from prying eyes.” Renata was fiddling with something behind her back. “Gathered neckline,” she told him. Greg had no idea what that meant, but when she moved her hands to the front of her gown and loosened the neckline, he was intrigued.

  When she lifted her breasts out over the top of her corset, he groaned with approbation.

  Renata kicked off her boots, shimmied out of the yoga pants she was wearing under her Regency dress and shifted to straddle him, her knees braced on the bench seat to either side of his legs. Pressed up against him like that, her skirts hitched up around her bare legs, she had to be able to feel every inch of his hardness. His hands fell to her hips, and he snugged her in tight against him, wanting more of her warmth. She leaned forward, and Greg grazed his lips over her breasts, then teased one perfect nipple with his tongue. It hardened beneath his touch. Renata rocked against him, and Greg knew this wasn’t going to be the most sophisticated bout of lovemaking. He wanted her too badly. Needed to bury himself inside her and prove their connection was real.

  “Can’t we get all this off?” He plucked at her gown. Underneath it, the hard frame of her corset blocked his hands from getting to know her body better.

  “It takes time.” She hesitated. “It’ll be a pain to get back on again.”

  “I’ll help,” he promised.

  After a second, she nodded. Then she turned on his lap, an exercise in agility in itself, keeping the blanket covering them mostly. Presented with the fastenings of her gown, Greg surveyed them and got to it, Renata issuing instructions as he went.