Page 62 of Beast

Book One in THE TRIDENT CODE

Copyright © 2014 by Alana Albertson

Cover design by Regina Wamba of MaeIDesign.com

Cover Models: Julia Plan and Michael Alexander

Formatting and interior design by JT Formatting (http://www.facebook.com/JTFormatting)

Bolero Books, LLC

11956 Bernardo Plaza Dr. #510

San Diego, CA 92128

www.bolerobooks.com

ISBN-13: 978-0-9896243-8-1

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Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products, bands, and/or restaurants referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

I’LL BE HONEST WITH YOU—I’m no hero. Sure, the media tries to brand every Navy SEAL as some kind of Batman dressed in cammies. There’s even a line in one of our cadences: Superman is the man of steel, he ain’t no match for Navy SEAL. You’ve seen the movies—we’re infallible, invaluable, invincible. But that night, the one you read about in the papers … all I really wanted to do was get laid.

One harmless fuck with an Aruban whore, no strings attached. I picked her out of a lineup—wild, dark hair, long legs and a crooked smile. After she sucked me off, I relaxed back onto the creaky, cum-stained cot, thankful for the blissful moments she gave me when I actually forgot for a second the faces of my buddies who died because I made the wrong call, the tears of the children I couldn’t save, and the eyes of the enemies I slaughtered during their last seconds of life.

But before I left, her hazel eyes peered into my soul. She whispered in a distinct Californian accent, “My name is Annie Hamilton. I’m an American citizen. I was kidnapped on spring break five years ago. You’re my last hope. Please save me.”

One desperate plea. This wasn’t a Hollywood blockbuster or a New York Times best-selling thriller. I knew this time there was no room for excuses, no margin for errors. I had one chance to put on the cape and be her hero.

1

Patrick

LIBERTY. FINALLY, A NIGHT OFF. Fuck yeah!

Petty Officer 2nd Class Victor Gonzales slicked some gel into his dark brown hair and slathered on some after-shave. “Hey, Walsh—you wanna go to that club tonight? Near the plaza?”

Another tourist hotspot in picturesque Aruba—drunken college girls on spring break, wayward daughters escaping their parents on family vacations. I had no desire to spend my first night on land in six months making small talk, hoping to get lucky. I wanted a sure thing, with no strings.

“No thanks, man. I’m just going to head on into town and get a bite to eat.”

Lieutenant Commander Kyle Lawson trimmed his short black beard and nodded toward me. “You sure? You’re my wingman, bro. Vic over here can never close the deal.”

Vic threw the bottle of hair gel at Kyle. “Fuck you, Kyle. I have standards—I don’t just sleep with every girl who says hi to me.”

Yeah, I definitely needed to go solo tonight, even though the three of us always made our mark when we hit the town. Three United States Navy SEALs didn’t exactly blend in with the local tourists. We were all ripped, especially since on deployment we spent all our free time in the ship’s gym. Vic’s huge arms were decorated with tattoos. Stupid motherfucker, identifying markers weren’t a plus in the Teams. He’d never make SEAL Team Six. And at six feet five inches tall, former NFL linebacker Kyle towered over Vic and me, though we could hardly be considered short since we both measured in at over six feet. People would stop Kyle all the time and ask him for an autograph, confusing him with a Hollywood movie star or a rapper. Not to mention, the two of them looked like a walking Navy SEAL diversity outreach recruitment poster, with me standing out as the blond-haired, blue-eyed boy.

“I’ll meet up with you two fools later.” For the past six months, I’d spent every waking minute with my Team—SEAL Team Seven to be precise. We’d been circling the Caribbean Islands, working our asses off, patrolling and hunting “go-fast” boats run by South American drug cartels. Tomorrow, I planned to snorkel, relax on the beach, and rest before we returned home from deployment. And later tonight I’d meet up with Kyle and Vic and get hammered.

But first things first—I needed some pussy.

I pulled on my civilian clothes, which felt foreign to my body. Sandals and shorts instead of boots and “utes.” I glanced in the mirror and debated whether to shave off my full beard. No point. One benefit of being a SEAL was our relaxed grooming standards. The Marines on our carrier still had to shave daily and cut their hair within regulation. We SEALs could grow full beards and keep our hair longer, to blend in undercover. I certainly wasn’t trying to impress anyone tonight, so I grabbed my wallet and headed out.

Where the fuck was that brothel again? I’d visited it last time we were here. Some of the Team guys refused to pay for sex—they’d rather cheat on their wives or girlfriends with unsuspecting coeds or stay on ship all night reading the Bible. Fuck that. I didn’t have a wife, or a girlfriend. Some woman back home to screw around on me while I was off training or deployed nine months out of the year? No thanks. I’d tried that once—our ship hadn’t even left the dock before she had another guy’s cock in her mouth. Never again. At least I wasn’t one of those guys slipping in and out of women’s lives, filling them with empty promises. I’d seen enough of those men growing up—assholes taking me to baseball games, vowing to be my new dad, fucking my mom and then vanishing. I never made any commitments—except to my country and to my men. Sleeping with a prostitute was the definition of safe sex to me.