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He nodded. “Yes. Brawler needs to go as well to pick up Beast.”
“Okay,” she murmured, her eyes going over his face, lingering on his mouth. “Then I need to go out into the field. You game for that?”
“After I get permission from both the ambassador and my CO.”
“Oh, my dad is on board with my research, but you do your military thing. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Yeah…morning,” he said absently. Before he said to hell with the complications of getting involved with her and succumbed to the awareness enticing him to do all the things he wanted to do to her in the dark of the night, he forced himself to turn around and head to his room.
But despite his formidable discipline at the moment, Shark feared it was just a matter of time before this confounding, lovely woman shattered his quickly dwindling willpower. He slipped into the room and shucked his clothes. He reached into his bag and pulled out a notebook, jotted down some lines that came to mind for the poem he was writing, then closed it.
But before he could close his eyes, Twister said, “Did you get distracted by the ambassador’s daughter yet again?”
“Go to sleep, you bastard,” Shark growled.
* * *
Maddy came down the foyer stairs just as the whole team filtered through the front door with all that delineated muscle, biceps, chests, arms, and legs glistening with sweat. Yowza. But she looked for one man in particular and he brought up the rear.
“Watch out,” he growled as one of the guys…Flash she thought, almost brushed against her.
He went sideways on the stairs so as not to accidentally touch his exerted body against hers, no matter how much she wanted to feel every hard line of him.
She grinned at him, but he gave her one of his broody looks. He was very good at those and disappeared up the stairs. She continued down to get breakfast, starving in more ways than one.
The man was a bundle of contradictions, she thought. Pure sex on a stick with a body made for sin, yet so unconscious of his masculine appeal. Fiercely protective of her as she’d just witnessed on the stairs, yet dangerously possessive in a way she found boldly exciting.
Then there was the dark hunger in his eyes that clearly stated he wanted her, yet every time she tried to get close, he put up barriers both physical and mental. Excuses in her mind. And with his lecture about her backing off his CO, women, and relationships, he’d just erected all sorts of emotional walls, too.
She was baffled by his behavior, mostly because men responded to her, easily without any effort. She didn’t understand his reluctance when there was so much sexual tension between them just waiting to be discovered and developed to its fullest. And she was all about the pleasure.
It was as though he was fighting himself and what he truly wanted. She didn’t know why, but considering he’d made it clear during their discussion that he only wanted one thing from a woman, she figured they were pretty much on the same page. She was more than willing and able to explore every hard inch of him.
She was a little mortified that she’d mentioned her seven relationships to him last night, but she consoled herself with the thought that she had been trying to make a point to him. She realized deep down that there were a lot of relationships, but each of them made her happy until they didn’t, and she moved on. She’d learned young when her father got into public service to leave behind the old for new avenues and adventures. She didn’t like feeling sad, so she diverted her attention to feeling happy and excited about where they were going.
She only focused on the positive to keep herself upbeat and flexible.
Some of the hurt from last night seeped in. He didn’t openly reject her, but he did have reasons…more like excuses, to get involved with her. Then he’d gotten mad at her when she was only trying to help him. She felt stung again by his harsh words but pushed it away. She’d much rather focus her attention on interesting activities, stimulating ideas, and future possibilities. Like experiencing all that Shark had to give, her research into the seismic activity here on the island, and how fun it would be to write articles with her name on it instead of someone else’s.
She entered the kitchen, pushing away the sadness that she had missed her parents. Her father was on the job, of course he had to get to the embassy, and her mom had commitments as his wife to attend to. She wasn’t here for a vacation either, so back to breakfast. She opened the fridge and grabbed some cut-up fruit and yogurt, pouring herself a glass of OJ from the jug. The refrigerator was stocked to the gills in anticipation of eight big, strapping men who would be expending a lot of energy like she’d witnessed just moments ago. It was obvious they had been working out.
Personally, she preferred yoga and team stuff like volleyball and basketball. She went to the open patio and set her food down on the table just as their cook arrived.
“Hi, Esther,” she said with a little wave.
The woman had four kids, several grandchildren, and cooked for several people throughout the day. She was plump, sweet, and funny with a wealth of gorgeous tightly curled black hair, her skin coppery with reddish undertones. They were lucky to get her for breakfast and dinner for the time Maddy was going to be there and however long the SEALs would be doing their thing.
Esther had married a Dominican man who had come to Haiti to find work. Haiti shared the Island of Hispaniola with the Spanish-speaking Dominican Republic to the east, and French/Haitian Creole-speaking Haiti to the west. In the past, the island was split between the Spanish and French, but the Haitians took back their home by ousting the French in a bloody uprising. Now they were two separate island nations living on the same piece of land.
As the guys came into the kitchen, Esther asked them what they wanted for breakfast and began cooking up a storm. By the time Shark arrived, he just dished up some eggs, grabbed some toast, and headed for her table.
Before he got there, Brawler sat down next to her and Twister on the other side. Shark, his eyes narrowed, took the seat across from her. The air was fresh, and she could smell the salt in the air. He looked so good this morning, refreshed and rested, yet there was still that silent brooding quality to him that made him seem so mysterious.
“Shark mentioned you’re coming with us to the airport,” Brawler said, demolishing the substantial food on his plate. She bet that guy needed a lot of calories to maintain all that muscle. Geez he was big.
“Yes, I’m expecting some equipment to study the seismic activity,” she said, scooping out some of her yogurt.
“What kind of equipment?” Twister asked. He was another handsome one, about six feet or so with boyish looks, yet a wisdom that seemed to exceed his years shone out of those dark eyes. He had a compact body but was cut like the rest of them.
