Risking It All

Hunt’s phone rang. “What?” he asked, instead of hello, listened for a second and then stood. “Hollywood said the admiral’s on his way over here,” he told them. “Bringing his niece.”

Hollywood, aka Captain Jason Andrews, was their CO. Born and raised in that legendary California town, it was rumored that his parents were both film stars.

Cash surveyed the room, thought about tidying up and then decided that the doc’s orders to take it easy applied to anything that seemed remotely like cleaning. He’d taken the worst of last night’s hit, and wasn’t about to let any of them forget it, either. At least his ribs were bruised and not broken—they’d be healed before the surfing competition in Baja next month, and he had no doubt he’d be cleared for duty tomorrow—Thursday at the latest.

“What for?” Rev drawled, and Hunt shrugged.

“No clue. He did say not to worry about cleaning the place up,” Hunt said. He moved to the window, and abruptly let out a low wolf whistle. “And man, his niece is hot.”

“What’re you looking for? You’re an old married man,” Justin said.

“Carly and I aren’t married. Yet.” Hunt smiled, and Cash rolled his eyes. Hunt and his very own surfer girl were getting hitched in three months and they were happy as hell. It was sickening.

“What’s Mac’s niece look like?” Rev asked.

“Long dark hair, about halfway down her back, maybe five foot five,” Hunt said, and Cash came up behind him to take a look. Cash froze for a second, not wanting to believe what was happening. But it was—happening like a freakin’ nightmare. It was Rina, Rina from Hawaii, and the admiral, known as Mac to his men, marching this way. Together. Directly toward him.

No fucking way.

Luckily, they moved into the officers’ tent rather than continue to head toward him like a guided missile on a path of pure destruction. If there was any means for escape, a trap door, a way to get up to the roof and go over and away as far as he possibly could…but that wouldn’t last for long.

Mac would still hunt him down like a rabid dog in the street, make his death a slow and painful process.

If Mac knew. Cash started to pray, hard.

“You okay?” Hunt clapped him on the shoulder. “You’re breathing kind of funny. Ribs hurt?”

Cash nodded. He couldn’t trust anything to come out of his mouth at the moment. Justin looked over both their shoulders.

Cash wondered if his face was the same ashen color as Justin’s when he asked, “Are you sure that’s Mac’s niece?”

Hunt studied the two of them and crossed his arms. “That’s what Mac said. Why? Has one of you slept with her?” Hunt laughed, and Rev joined in. Justin still hadn’t moved and Cash speculated as to how honestly he should answer that question, and figured there was no way around this one.

“Yes,” he said.

Rev, who’d been rocking his chair on its back legs, pushed a little too hard at Cash’s statement and toppled over. Hunt just stared at Cash, just stared, and he knew that it was as bad as he thought.

“You’re sleeping with Mac’s niece?” Rev’s voice came up from the floor. “Are you out of your mind?”

“The answer to that is yes. It’s always been yes, but even for you, this is bad,” Hunt told him.

“Sleeping with makes it sound like it’s present tense. It happened once. Okay, four times, but over the course of one night.” Four amazing times.

“Do you want to explain how this happened? His niece only got into Little Creek last night, and you were in the hospital until midnight,” Hunt said.

Just thinking about the fall he’d taken last night during training made Cash’s ribs ache.

Justin chimed in with the explanation. “She was the documentary maker from Hawaii.”

Cash was unable to actually process how something like that could happen. How did the world get so small and thrown off its axis at the same time?

“Does she know you took the zip drive from her bag?” Justin asked him. Justin had been in charge of taking the film from the office in Hawaii where she edited.

Cash shrugged. “I’m not sure. I left early that next morning, and I didn’t exactly say goodbye.”

“Holy crap.” Justin buried his face in his hands and Hunt just shook his head.

“You’re screwed, brother. And not in any good way.”

“She’s supposed to be out of here. She told me she was leaving for Africa,” Cash said quickly, even though it was obvious that Rina was no closer to Africa than he was. His teammates continued to stare at him as if he was a dead man walking. “Aw, come on, tell me it’s not as bad as I think it is.”

“Bad? It’s worse than bad.” Justin snorted. “Careerending. Life-as-you-know-and-love-it-ending bad.”

“And now it’s about to get worse,” Hunt said.

“How’s that possible?” Cash asked.

“Gentlemen,” the admiral’s voice rang out through the tent. “At ease. This is a social call.”

They all turned to face their superior.

Cash stood halfway between Rev and Hunt and behind Justin, and for the first time was grateful to be the runt of this particular SEAL litter, standing at six feet two inches.