Gunner glanced over at Chas thoughtfully before saying, “Tell me more.”
Spencer and Gunner took off talking about the types of jobs they could do, and Drago came over to refill Chas’s wineglass to the brim.
“Are all of you in on the plot to get me drunk before you spring your plan on me?” Chas asked.
“Oh yeah,” Drago replied, grinning. “It’s actually part of the plan.”
Chas exhaled hard in disgust. “All right. Lay it on me. How dangerous is this plan of yours, and how likely am I to be maimed or killed?”
Chapter Thirteen
GUNNER POINTED the car to the west and accelerated away from the luxurious estate where Poppy was now safely installed. Charles Favian had called a woman he knew—a training officer with the CIA’s Special Operations Group—to come act as her temporary nanny and bodyguard. The SOG was generally considered to be among the best of the best in the Special Forces community.
It surprised him when a middle-aged woman had shown up at Spencer and Dray’s place and tartly informed Gunner that she had grown children of her own and was plenty old enough to be Poppy’s grandmother.
He’d been even more surprised when Spencer and Drago had driven them all out the front gate and directly across the street to another tall iron gate. The estate they’d wound back into had been so elegant, it was frightening.
Drago explained that the neighbors, Jessica and Gershom Brentwood, had hired their fledgling security firm to beef up their estate’s security, and that he and Spencer had turned the property into a virtual fortress. They couldn’t think of anywhere safer to put Poppy until the mess surrounding her was sorted out.
Gunner quizzed the security guards closely, and it turned out that Spencer and Drago had been running weekly exercises with them for several months, teaching them all kinds of advanced surveillance and security protocols.
“You’re sure Poppy will be safe?” Chas asked.
Gunner snorted. “Are you kidding? She has her own personal sniper for a nanny. Not to mention, the Brentwood home has every security bell and whistle money can buy, and their staff knows how to use it all. Besides, who’s gonna look for a missing kid at the estate of a stupidly rich, gray-haired hedge fund manager and his much younger trophy wife?”
“I hope you’re right,” Chas fretted.
“I’ll miss her too,” Gunner said quietly.
“Bet you never thought you’d say that in your lifetime.”
Gunner glanced over at Chas. “Nope.” He added reluctantly, “In the past week, I’ve been saying and doing a whole lot of shit I never thought I ever would.”
“Sheesh. The munchkin is gone for two minutes and you’re already back to swearing like a sailor.”
“In case you forgot, I am, in fact, a sailor.”
Chas rolled his eyes and laughed. “Did you like being in the Navy?”
“The general Navy is okay. Being a SEAL is nothing like that.”
“What’s it like being a SEAL?”
Gunner frowned, searching for words. It wasn’t something he’d ever talked about. He just did it, and everyone he worked with just did it too. “It’s… hard. Every day is hard. New challenges, new things to learn, new problems to solve. It’s a constant fight to be stronger, faster, better, stay healthy, ignore pain.”
“It sounds miserable.”
Gunner shrugged. “I guess it would be for most people.”
“What does that say about you, then? Do you have a mile-wide masochistic streak I don’t know about?”
“No. Although I admit, I wondered about that during BUD/S.”
“What does that stand for? ‘Beating up dumbsquats’?”
Gunner grinned. “Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL. It’s the initial training course to become a SEAL. It was… not fun.”
“Then why put yourself through all of that? Were you punishing yourself or something?”
The notion startled him. “Not that I’m aware of. It was a challenge. A personal mountain to climb. And it looked like interesting work. The kind of job that would be all-consuming.”
“So much that you would never have time to stop and admit to yourself that you were gay?”
“Damn, Chas. Do you have to dissect me like some dead animal?”
Chas sat back, looking smug.
“Fuck off,” Gunner mumbled with no heat.
“Right back atchya, big guy.”
“So why are you a kindergarten teacher? On the list of most masochistic professions, that has to rank high.”
“Why do you say that?” Chas asked, sounding surprised.
“Screaming kids running all over the place. You’re basically babysitting twenty heathens all day long.” He shuddered just thinking of it.
“Aww, they’re not that bad. You do have to establish authority with them right away, of course, and it takes a world of patience. But they’re fun. They’re still innocent at that age. The world is still a good place for most of them. I enjoy their optimism and enthusiasm. Five-year-olds aren’t self-conscious yet. If you ask them who can sing or dance, they all raise their hands. I love nurturing that. And they’re endlessly curious—” He broke off. “Sorry. Little kids get a bad rap. It’s a pet peeve of mine.”
“You sound pretty passionate about your work.”
“I am. It’s exhausting, but I love it.”
Gunner nodded. “I would say the same about my job.”
“How homophobic are the SEALs these days?”
“That’s a hard question to answer.”
“Try.”
“Most guys don’t give a damn who anyone else sleeps with. But SEALs do live in extremely close quarters with each other. We eat, sleep, bathe, and shit—sorry—literally shoulder to shoulder with each another sometimes. If a guy is the least bit hinky about being around a gay man, living in such close quarters could be a personal nightmare. And the guys in a platoon have to depend so completely on one another—our lives depend upon our brothers—that any disruption to that total trust is a huge problem.”
“So it’s not that the homophobia is bad or even prevalent. It’s just that even the smallest hint of it could cause a problem,” Chas said.
“Exactly.”
“How are the guys in your… platoon, is it?”
“They’re fine. Not that they knew I might swing the other way. But they wouldn’t care—make that wouldn’t have cared. Past tense.”
“You’re done being a SEAL? As in done, done?”
“Yup. Paperwork’s already signed,” he answered hoarsely.
“I’m sorry,” Chas said quietly.
“What are you sorry for?” Gunner exclaimed.
“I didn’t realize it was a fait accompli. That sucks.”
He’d avoided thinking about it for most of the past week. Poppy and Chas had provided plenty of distraction, not to mention the carload of assholes trying to chase them down and kill them. But now, on the road, with days of travel ahead of them and nothing to do but think, he couldn’t avoid the stark truth any longer. He was done as a SEAL.