“With all due respect, I wanted to be on the teams for the long term. Officers have a short shelf life, combat-wise, and are required to move on. As it should be. The teams need good leadership as well as tough, tactical minds. Also, I want to be a SEAL more than anything and my chances of getting a contract were better as an enlisted member.”
“So you did it the SEAL way, eh?” Cheezer sat back and a couple of the instructors nodded. “Well, we’re all in consensus. You would make a fine officer, but as enlisted men ourselves, we respect your motivations. Keep up the good work.”
Max could barely contain the pride he had for Hemingway. They had mentored him and believed in him, and he was doing an exemplary job. Max beamed.
But Hemingway and the rest of them were going to be tested. Hell Week was next and it would weed out the mentally and physically weak, leaving the strong and worthy to move forward as SEALs.
Max had no doubt Hemingway would be one of them.
“Nothing will ever prepare you for what you’re going to go through,” Ruckus said, lifting the beer bottle to his mouth. The guys around the table agreed with nods and a knowing look in the eyes. Something Hemingway realized was happening to him, a shared experience among the elite forces that worked undercover of secrecy to protect the US every waking moment. It was a heavy burden to bear and everyone at this table had gone through it.
During BO, the trainees had been cautioned about going to any of the SEAL bars downtown, but Hemingway had been invited by Mad Max.
“Nothing. The only thing you can do is dig deep for who you are and hold onto that. If you never quit, you’ll never know how to.”
Those words stuck in Hemingway’s head. Getting prepared to go through Hell Week was just about accepting it was going to suck big time and then giving all he had to give. Part of him was apprehensive about what he was up against and the other half of him was psyched to see exactly what he was made of. If all the preparation and the work would lead him past this first major obstacle to realizing his goal, the trident and admission into one of the most elite fraternities in the world would be his. It wasn’t a matter of if his body would hold up, it was a matter of whether his spirit was strong enough.
Then, as if the floodgates opened, there was a rash of BUD/S stories from the fifteen men seated around the big table. Kid Chaos and Dodger had the funniest stories. As for Dodger, he said, “Some wanker kept thinking I was Australian, and he had nothing but Crocodile Dundee in his head. That’s what he called me all the time…Croc. He’d adopt this terrible Australian accent just to cheese me off and kept asking me when I was going to put shrimp on the barbie.”
“Knucklehead,” Fast Lane said. “No one messes with Dodger.”
“What did you do? Because I know you did something,” Hemingway asked, on the edge of his seat.
“I know—”
“—this guy,” everyone said in unison and Dodger grinned.
“I do. I know this bloke at the San Diego fish market.”
Everyone laughed and gave him a hard time.
“He got me a chockablock load of shrimp and barbequed it his way. He delivered it to me at the SEAL compound, and I dumped all of it into this wanker’s rack. He stopped calling me Croc. Everyone in BUD/S knew it was me, including the instructors, but they got such a kick out of it, they left me alone. At the end of BUD/S, our class donated a shrimp plaque and it’s hanging there still.”
He leaned back and Hemingway had to admit that he was glad to be back in their company, especially Dodger, who seemed to always move with a languorous grace as if he was adapted to living in a liquid form that defined their elite branch, as if air was thicker to wade through than water.
After that, the group broke up, and Hemingway and Dodger walked out together. “Thanks for the encouraging texts. It helps.”
“It’s a ballbuster, that’s for certain, mate, but it’s a rite of passage. We’re all pulling for you.”
Hemingway nodded, the sense of community with these guys a warm glow in his gut.
“How’s your sister doing?”
“Recovering and enjoying her daughter and her husband.”
“Kid is an experience. That is for sure. And your dad? How is he doing with you becoming a SEAL?”
“He’s proud of me.”
“Brilliant. Sounds like you have a good base of operation. Keep a stiff upper lip and you’ll come through.” He punched Hemingway lightly on the arm. “The most important things to remember are to eat as much as possible on Sunday. Just graze all day, mate.”
“The other?”
“You gain a team of men that will never let you down, will always have your back, share a special bond and greater strength as a team than you could ever find as an individual. We live, train, travel and fight as one. We’re together more than we are with our loved ones. We are each other’s family.”
“Hoo-yah,” Hemingway said softly, his throat a bit tight. He’d been in touch with his family as much as he could. They were happy for any word from him on the progression through BUD/S.
From downtown he headed to Shea’s condo and the woman he hadn’t been able to get off his mind. Along with thinking about training, she occupied a lot of mental real estate. He wanted sex with her, that was a given, but it was the comfort of her body, the female feel and taste of her he craved—a softness in his hard world.
When he entered, she was sitting on the floor with her laptop and a slew of files. She barely looked up when he came in, she was so preoccupied with her job, weeding out the bad apples in their BUD/S barrel. Her dedication and commitment to the mission only made him want her more.
“You narrowing it down?” he asked, and she nodded, closing her eyes and arching her back, giving him a view of pure, unadulterated heartbreak.
“I think so.”
How could she not know his mind had been on sex with her since the last time he’d left here? Even in the bar with the guys, part of his horndog mind was on her and getting inside that beautiful body, twisting himself around her.
“My list holds twelve names, and all I have to do is get one of them to break on the others.”
“You have a primary target?”
“Well, to be honest, Hennessey was at the top of my list for being torn between his loyalty to NWO, and his newfound connection to actually becoming a Navy SEAL. I had been working on him every day once I discovered he was wavering. I think I could have broken him.”
He let her talk as he moved closer. She had no freaking clue she was being stalked.
“His link to NWO was weaker than his moral conscience would allow. He couldn’t betray the men he’d worked and suffered alongside.”
“That’s a pretty sexy brain you got there.”
She looked up at him. Maybe it was his husky voice, or she finally picked up the heat he was generating. She stared at him, meeting his gaze directly as he stood there taking her in.
“Right back ‘atcha,” she murmured, reaching up to his hand. It was all it took.
An hour later, they were snuggled together on the couch, both of them naked and too sated to make it to the bed. He clenched his jaw against the tumbled emotions rifling through him.
He was falling in love. This is what it felt like and it was overwhelming, more than he could ever imagine. He was starting to feel uncomfortably vulnerable, something he would have thought would have taken a major threat, not this kickass woman who had taken his heart by storm.