[When SEALs Come Home 04] - Heated (3 page)

“The winds shifted unexpectedly, the fire flared up, and the flames cut off our exit points before anyone could respond. We headed for a canyon that we’d designated as our fallback safety point, and then we broke out the portable fire shelters for insurance.”

“What happened to Will?”

He’d screwed up and lost a good teammate. That was what had happened. He couldn’t fix it, either, so he was trying to outrun it. Talking definitely wasn’t part of his plan for tonight.

“We were running, and it was smoky as hell.” He heard his voice from a distance, spouting excuses. Shut up, he told himself. Mercedes Hernandez didn’t really want to hear this. She’d asked to be polite and because she was a nice woman making nice, polite noises. Now she’d put the car in drive, and this evening would be over.

“The newspaper said he tripped and snapped his ankle.” She made no move to turn the key in the ignition.

“I didn’t notice. I got inside the canyon, I popped my shelter, and I hit the ground. I didn’t notice.”

“It’s not your fault,” she said.

He appreciated the lie, but it was. No man left behind. That was the golden rule on the battlefield, and he’d failed.

“It was quick.” He stared forward, out the windshield. The headlights lit up the patch of roadside, and everything was either bright or pitch black. There were no gray or blurry edges. Three seconds could be an eternity, and Will had suffered through it alone, so
quick
wasn’t enough.

Mercedes was talking again, and he meant to listen because he wasn’t that much of a bastard that he’d ignore what she had to say to him, but his throat was tight and—fuck—his eyes stung. He was
not
going to lose it and cry. But the headlights’ beams blurred, and he dug his fingers into his thighs, needing something to hold on to.

Soft fingers wrapped around his. “It’s okay.”

He had no idea what she meant because nothing was okay about this, but instead of questioning her, he squeezed the shit out of her hand. She didn’t complain. If anything, she held him tighter. She smelled good—he noticed
that
much, sitting so close to her—and hitting the car again suddenly seemed like the best idea he’d had in a long time. Why was he here, when he could be riding down the road, leaving all this shit behind him? His cheeks were dry—that was good—but then one drop escaped, and he’d have given anything for a do-over.

But life didn’t issue do-overs, not for tears and definitely not for good men who’d tripped at the worst possible moment.

Mercedes cursed in Spanish, and then she shifted, easing across the seat to wrap her arms around him. He let her pull him into an embrace, planting his head on her chest like he was a goddamned baby. He should pull back. Or kiss her. Rock her world with pleasure. Hell, even getting out of the car would be better. At the very least, he’d still have his dignity. He didn’t move. Her service revolver dug into his side. He could disarm her, hurt her... and she trusted him.

Imagine that.

He swiped the fucked-up tear off his cheek, hoping she hadn’t seen. Her arms tightened, though, and he was busted in more ways than one. He was one hell of a SEAL. A thirty-second hug might have been okay, but he let her hold him up for minutes as time sped up. Slowed down. Fuck. Had she held him as long as the three minutes Will Donegan had taken to die, heat baking him, fire searing his lungs? She didn’t say anything. Thank God. Just rubbed his back—and how humiliating was
that
?—while he did the rough inhale, exhale because he didn’t cry. Ever. She smelled like roses. It wasn’t the perfume he’d have expected from Ms. I Lay Down the Law, but she smelled pretty pink. He didn’t know police officers were allowed to wear perfume. Or maybe he’d just been arrested by the wrong people. He’d been arrested by military police for drunk and disorderly once. Not his finer moment.

Finally, he got it together, reined in his runaway thoughts, and shoved upright. If he’d been more of a man, he would have looked her in the eye and said something meaningful. He would have said
thank you
or
I appreciate the shoulder
or any one of a dozen things the Hallmark people had spelled out for dumbasses like himself in the card aisle. Instead, he stared out the windshield and said the first thing that popped into his head.

“I’m going home.” He reached for the door handle.

She shifted back to her own seat. “I could give you a ride,” she said.

He didn’t want to leave his bike by the side of the road—and he needed to pull himself together. If he hadn’t been falling apart like a pussy, he’d have taken her up on the offer just to spend more time with her, because there was something about his deputy sheriff that intrigued him. Nice wasn’t what he deserved tonight, so he opened the door.

Her sigh echoed in the car. “Tell me you’re okay.”

He flashed a grin he didn’t mean. “Scout’s honor. I’ll even drive the speed limit.”

B
y four o’clock, semi-twilight surrounded the jump team’s hangar. The sun headed south for the winter in February, turning the mountains and roads pitch black by six o’clock. Not that Joey was out on the roads. Nope. After last night’s highway dash and encounter with Deputy Sheriff Hernandez, he was making a command appearance at the hangar owned by Donovan Brothers. Jack, Evan, and Rio had built a crack smoke jumper team out of former military men—and one woman—and then decided to shift their base of operations to Strong, California, when the three of them had met and married local women.

He parked his truck outside the hangar, counting vehicles as he headed for the entrance. One motorcycle. Two pickups. At least the audience for tonight’s ass-chewing would be on the smaller side. Since procrastinating wouldn’t solve his problems, he strode inside and looked around. Bingo. Halfway across the hangar, Rio bent over an engine block, mechanical bits and pieces strewn around him.

Joey laid in a course, trying not to trip and kill himself on the stuff lying everywhere. Rio likely wanted to commit murder, so depriving the guy of the pleasure seemed mean. Since it was the off-season, the hangar currently housed two choppers, the DC-3, and several enormous mountains of engine parts, unsorted gear, and chute packs. Pulaskis, tony tools, and chainsaws had been stacked haphazardly against the walls. Someone had started clearing out the cache and taking stock of what they’d need for summer. The place smelled like motor oil, canvas, and smoke, which was perfect. He didn’t need that flower and cinnamon shit that came in the air freshener cans at the store.

“You got arrested last night?” Rio Donovan lifted his head and glared at him as soon as Joey was in yelling distance.

He thought of what had happened last night. Grief was a fucked-up thing, but he was pretty certain that none of what Mercedes Hernandez had done qualified as an arrest. She’d put him in the patrol car, sure, but then she’d held him.

While he cried.

That portion of the night’s events was definitely high on his
shit to forget
list. Grown men didn’t cry, and SEALs sure as shit didn’t squeeze out a tear. They hit stuff, raged, cursed.
Anything
but break down in the front seat of a patrol car while the woman of their dreams watched. It was humiliating. It was also, he hoped, a secret between the two of them. He suspected she wasn’t the kind of woman who gossiped wildly, but he also knew women talked to their girlfriends. And girlfriends talked to their husbands, so... the question really was: how friendly was Mercedes with Rio’s wife?

“I got pulled over. There’s a difference.”

Rio made an obscene gesture. “You’re splitting hairs, my man.”

“In fact, I didn’t even get a ticket,” he said virtuously.

Rio eyed him. “Mercedes Hernandez pulled you over, and you got away without a ticket? She’s never let me go.”

The deputy sheriff’s speed traps had caught almost every member of the jump team at least once. As far as Joey knew, Gia was the only one who had avoided getting caught.

“What can I say? I’m a lucky bastard.”

“What did you say to her?” Rio wasn’t ready to let Joey’s escape go yet.

“I was my usual charming self.”

Rio didn’t buy it. “Jesus. Do I need to worry about a sexual harassment charge now?”

While Rio went off on a rant about Joey’s stupid behavior, Joey let his mind wander. He posted his own bail and paid his own tickets, thank you very much, so he had no idea why Rio felt the need to ride his ass. It wasn’t like his boss qualified for choirboy himself. Rio had gotten up to plenty of trouble before he’d decided to settle down with the jump team’s only female member. Joey opened his mouth, but Rio gave him a look, not done yet with the lecture, so he shut it. He didn’t have any excuses anyhow.

“You have to stop,” Rio concluded, like it was that simple. “I’m putting you on notice.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re off the team if you keep accumulating speeding tickets. Don’t get arrested, or you’re off the team. Ninety days in county jail. A thousand bucks. And two points on your license. That’s the price tag if Mercedes Hernandez decides she’s done ticketing you and moves on to
you have the right to remain silent.
Nine tickets in two weeks is eight tickets too many. Slow down.”

“You moonlight as a lawyer?”

So what if going fast made Mercedes notice him? He looked at it as ensuring her job security. He made sure she always had someone to chase.
Him
. And if he liked the way
she
looked, well, that was secret number two, right up there with the bawling like a baby one.

Plus, fighting fire made sense. Don’t let Strong burn up. The mandate was nice and clear. He’d read crap in magazines where scientists argued that some fire was a good thing. Fine. He didn’t really give a shit about their theories, just that when he jumped out of the plane the battle lines were clearly drawn. Everything was black and white, both in the air and on the mountainside. When he jumped, there was no question he was fighting for the right side—or that the bad guy was, in fact, bad. No gray shit. No regrets. Not jumping would suck. He opened his mouth to protest the sentence, but Rio cut him off.

“Law school of Google. You’re lucky she hasn’t filed charges.” Rio straightened up. “Now tell me you heard me.”

Loud and clear.

“I heard you.” He just didn’t plan on slowing down. No big deal. He’d just have to avoid getting caught in the future, which was a bummer because he loved the expression on Mercedes Hernandez’s face when she pulled him over.

“Tell me this isn’t the way you go about getting a date, because we’re not in middle school anymore.” 

Joey grinned. He couldn’t help it.

Rio cursed. “Stop tearing up the pavement. Take it to a track. Find a new hobby. Use your words and not your gas—ask the woman out on a fucking date.”

***

M
ercy had no idea where Joey Carter thought he was going or why he needed to get there so fast. Déjà vu. It was past midnight now, and he’d switched out the bikes, but otherwise they were looking at a repeat of two weeks ago, when she’d pulled him over for riding like a madman after Will Donegan’s funeral. It was getting ridiculous. She’d given him three speeding tickets, and every time he just grinned and shoved the paper inside his jacket or—her personal favorite—into the back pocket of his jeans. She definitely liked looking at his butt, which was another problem she could add to the list.

Officer of the law
, she reminded herself.

Man with a death wish.

Chocolate and peanut butter went together. She and Joey? Not so much.

She turned her lights on, and he gunned the bike’s motor, bending low over the handlebars to coax every last ounce of speed from the engine. One of these days, she’d have to arrest him for evading an officer of the law. She grabbed her radio.

“This is Hernandez. I’m pulling over a male on a motorcycle.”

“Again?” Laughter from the dispatcher on the other end flooded the airwaves. They both knew there was only one speedster in Strong who matched that description. “That man’s going to need a frequent-flyer card if he keeps this up.”

“It could be someone different.” Several of the smoke jumpers on the Strong jump team owned bikes, and none of them drove slowly. It was possible.

“Is it?”

She laughed. “No. Of course not.”

Everything about Joey Carter was impossible, right down to his mighty fine butt currently disappearing down the highway in front of her. He leaned up on the seat, low over the handlebars as he negotiated a turn, and she’d bet every dollar in her nonexistent 401(k) that he was whooping encouragement to his bike, that too-sexy grin of his plastered across his face. A smarter woman would have let him fly on past her speed trap. Unfortunately, as an officer of the law, she couldn’t allow his blatant needling to go unchecked. They both knew he could slow down, just like they both knew he didn’t want to.

She wondered what he did
want
.

Besides speed, speed, and more speed, of course. If ever a man was running from something or someone, it was Joey.

She checked her speed gun as she pulled out behind him. Yep. She’d clocked him at one hundred miles per hour in a forty zone, a speed that, for him, practically counted as standing still. Maybe the guy never slept, because every time she saw him, he was either going one hundred miles per hour or his hands were flying every bit as fast, fixing stuff.

“I’ve got a ticket with his name on it,” she said into her radio.

“Honey, you should fill out a book of them. He doesn’t stop.”

More laughter filled the airwaves as the dispatcher signed off. Possibly, the other woman’s comments contained another level of innuendo. Gals talked, and the smoke jumper team was legendary, both in the field and in bed. It shouldn’t have mattered to her if Joey’s name was bandied about as the hottest date in Strong. He wasn’t hers, and she certainly hadn’t staked a claim, but she wasn’t dead. Of course she was curious. Her real problem was that the entire town of Strong kept eyeing them. From her neighbors to the guys at the office, everyone else had decided that she and Joey
were
a couple-to-be and that Joey’s endless stream of speeding tickets was some kind of twisted courtship. Romantic gossip like that could sink her new career. She’d been there and done that at her last job, and she wasn’t making that mistake again.