Accidental SEAL (SEAL Brotherhood #1) (29 page)

“I’ve never had a SEAL turn rogue. I’ve trained some crazy-assed men, though.”

Mayfield nodded and sipped on a diet Coke the waitress brought.

“Despite what the papers have said, I don’t think there’s been more than a handful. Certainly nothing like any of the other branches,” Mayfield replied.

“None of these special ops guys go evil, but they do get snagged with money problems occasionally. Compromised, but not often. I worry about the ones that almost get through the training and then quit. Not because they can’t do it—they quit sometimes because they decide they don’t want to. And there’s no shame in that. There are a few that the training just picks a scab, opens up an old wound, and they are so filled with hate they can’t function and are never the same. We get only a few a year. And it’s the part of the training I don’t care for. Letting those young guys loose on society.”

“Those guys become my problem,” Mayfield said.

“I’m sure they do.”

“So you called me over this afternoon to apologize?”

Timmons chuckled and cocked his head, as if regarding Mayfield’s casual demeanor. “I met you once before, you know?”

“Sorry. Don’t remember.”

“You’d come by to pick your wife up at the hospital where my kid was. Your wife took real good care of my Cassie when she fell from a horse and broke her arm.”

That had been another irony. Maria had worked as a nurse on the children’s ward. It was difficult for her when she lost one of her charges, Mayfield thought, almost as bad as losing one of her own. He didn’t remember meeting Timmons.

“I’m sure she did a great job. She was known for it.”

Timmons looked up at him quickly. “Was?”

“She died almost a year ago.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Don’t be. Got almost thirty years with her. I’m the lucky one.”

Timmons mumbled something before he took another sip of his beer. Mayfield got the impression his marriage wasn’t as special. But the man had a kid. And that was something he could take pride in. And live for.

“We could sit here and reminisce, but there are people after someone you and I both know will need help if he’s to get out of this jam,” said Mayfield.

“So you believe Kyle?” It was more of a statement than a question.

“Never met him. But I saw his lady. She’s a nice package. Perfect for him.”

“And I’ve never met
her
. I’m sorry to say he’s had to distance himself from her,” Timmons said flatly.

“I know about it. She told me the same.”

Mayfield looked at the walls around them, the history of the lives lost and lives lived to the maximum, the rush of history and years of joy, years of pain. There they were, two men with very different tastes, needs, and desires, on two different career paths. But both with the same focus.

To get Kyle out of this mess. And find his team buddy.

And like members of his team years ago when he was running little boats down the beach, Mayfield knew the team he and Timmons had set up today was dependent on both of them giving their all for the cause.

And that would be the only way any of them would survive.

Chapter 29

The drive from San Diego to San Francisco was easy, especially since Christy decided to break the monotony of the nine-hour trek by listening to a book on tape. It was a steamy romance by one of her favorite authors. She was in tears when she pulled up for gas mid-way, as she had just listened to a breakup scene. She knew the reason the story had affected her more than it might have ordinarily. Kyle was probably history, a none-too-pleasant part of her past, when he should have been the best part of her future.

She couldn’t stop herself from missing him and felt her wound get deeper the more she thought about it.

Four hours later, when she arrived in San Francisco at the huge house on Stanyan Street, she felt a part of her had arrived home. Tom Bergeron kept this place for clients he entertained who came from outside the country. He’d agreed to let Christy stay there until she got herself settled—whatever that meant.

Tom was one of the handsomest older men she had ever met. He frequented Madame M’s shop, which had become a kind of a liaison between eligible men and the young ladies looking for them. That was part of the service Madame loved: being a matchmaker. Everyone on the Peninsula knew Madame liked to keep her customers paired with partners who liked expensive lingerie and a healthy sex life. It was, after all, good for business.

Tom was in his mid-fifties, had graying hair, a trim physique and a nice, soft-spoken, well-educated style. He could afford the finer things in life. He’d made no secret he liked Christy, but he had just married a former model and had a lavish yacht wedding on the San Francisco Bay. Over the three years Christy had worked at the shop, she would hold up little frilly things he bought for some of his gorgeous, high-profile girlfriends, and later, his beautiful wife. But he always flirted with Christy, making her blush. She actually enjoyed it.

“You’re a good girl, Christy. I hope you find someone who will treat you like the lady you are,” he’d said one day as she wrapped a lacy purple bra and thong set in matching purple tissue. When she looked up into his cool blue eyes, she knew he would be someone she might have broken the rules for. Maybe marrying an older man could work, she thought that day.

But then she’d realized that was folly. She wanted a family.

Since Tom was now happily married, staying at his cottage behind the main house on Stanyan Street didn’t pose a problem for her. Though she didn’t need it, the thought of having a protector was a pleasant one. She trusted Tom.

She parked her red Honda on the street, the hood pointing downhill, the tires curbed. She removed her bag, then walked up the brick and cobblestoned steps alongside the driveway and rang the doorbell at the main house. The front porch was the size of her condo’s kitchen; its large columns and half-walled wooden railings allowed an expansive view of the bay below.

Tom came to the front door, barefoot and in jeans and a light blue shirt, which was buttoned a little low, Christy thought. He had a glass of red wine in his hand. As he opened the large glass and metal sculptured door, she heard jazz coming from inside and caught the faint smell of fresh soap.

“Christy. Lovely to see you again.” He took her hand and kissed it tenderly.

Her back was ramrod straight as her knees buckled from his attentiveness. She was conscious of his breathing, the tanned skin with a light dusting of hair on his well-formed chest.

“Thank you, Tom. I appreciate this.”

“Please,” he said as he gestured to the rest of his kingdom. He grabbed her bag as she passed him.

He collected grandfather clocks, and the incessant clicking of small metal pieces inside massive wooden chests was both stimulating and reassuring. Measured. Organized. Tom had an attention to detail as no other man she had ever met.

Except one.

Across thick deep burgundy carpeting, she walked down the walnut-paneled hallway and into the kitchen at the rear, which overlooked a peaceful garden with a running water fountain. The music, the bubbling water, the smell of basil and tomato coming from the stove, all felt like a stage had been set. And so she asked.

“Where is Johanna?”

Tom’s back was turned as he got down two plates from his upper cabinet without asking Christy of she wanted supper. He was going to make one for her anyway. “Gone,” he said to the cabinet.

“Gone?” she asked.

“She’s left me, Christy.”

“I’m so sorry, Tom.”

“Don’t be.” He looked up and smiled. “She was not wife material.”

Maybe Christy’s radar was set higher than normal, but there was something else behind his eyes that he did not say.

Christy stumbled on a couple of responses she couldn’t finish.

Tom interrupted her. “She neglected to tell me she intended to keep one or two of her very close girlfriends, and I didn’t want to share.”

No, why would he?
The vision of Kyle’s tattooed arms holding another woman’s body loomed large and she felt her stomach lurch as tears painfully forced their way to her eyes.

Tom was perceptive. In an instant he was in front of her, holding her face between his massive warm hands, wiping her tears away with his thumbs. “Madame M has told me about your SEAL, Christy. Perhaps…” His hands were trembling slightly. He licked his lips and continued. “Perhaps we could heal each other…” He bent to kiss her in what she knew would be a tender kiss, but she just couldn’t do it. She turned away from him and broke free.

“Sorry. If…if…Madame…” she began.

“No. That was me, just being a man seeing a beautiful woman in pain. I want to help.” He went back to the plates, turned, and said softly, his eyes downturned, “Forgive me.”

God, there was nothing to forgive! Was she nuts?

“Thank you, but your apology is not needed. I’m overly sensitive right now. But I’ll land on my feet eventually. I always do.” She gave a brittle, victorious smile he didn’t buy, and watched him dish up a tossed green salad next to a red pasta dish.

“Come. We’ll eat, have a glass of wine, and then I’ll take you to the cottage so you can take a hot bath and fall asleep, okay?”

Of course she was okay with that. Who wouldn’t be?

They ate at the formal dining room with large picture windows, overlooking the sight of the city at dusk. It was unusually fogless. Lights began to twinkle as the sky overhead turned deep turquoise.

The food was perfect. The wine was perfect. The man sitting before her was perfect, except he wasn’t Kyle. She wondered why she couldn’t just lose herself in the moment, let Tom care for her, heal her, as he had said. But she couldn’t.

“So, how is your real estate career going?” he asked as he looked at her lips from across the table.

“Good. I was just holding my first open house—well, it was actually sort of a fiasco—I mean…” She couldn’t finish. “Oh, I’ve just been making all the mistakes a newbie agent makes.”

“Then you are learning, if you know they are mistakes.”

“It is a cutthroat business. People are only too kind to let you know when you’ve screwed up,” she finally said.

“I understand completely. I used to have a license, too. I know how those offices can be. Can’t say I miss it.”

“Once I build a little confidence, I’ll be okay. I’m just not sure what I’m doing yet. I don’t want to waste someone else’s money.”

“Yes. I used to tell people I’d made all the mistakes with my own money first, so I ought to be good with theirs.”

Christy laughed.

“You have a condo, Madame M tells me.”

“Yes. My mother left it to me. It’s a nice place, overlooking the water, the boats, Coronado Island.”

“And you will think of your SEAL friend when you look at the island?”

Christy blushed and looked down at her lap. Her fingers smoothed over crease lines of the ironed linen monogrammed napkin that matched the tablecloth. Her fingers couldn’t stop the little tenting of the fold. She felt the heat from her body radiating through to her palm. She looked up and Tom was studying her, his head slightly tilted. Handsome, available. Waiting for her move. She smiled as she thought of Madame M’s favorite sayings, so repeated it to him.

“Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”

At first he didn’t react, but after noticing an extra flutter of his eyelids, she could see she had speared him in a most delicate place. Where he hurt. He inhaled and raised his crystal wine glass to her.

“To our broken hearts, then.”

It would have been easy to fall into the rhythm of this household, she thought as she walked into the two-story living room with her glass of port. The antiques, the clicking of the well-timed clocks, the sounds of foghorns over the bay, the glistening lights of the bridges and water at moonlight were pleasant details of a life she could have. What was there not to love about the man who stood behind her but just far enough away so as not to intrude? She could feel his heat, feel his desire, and knew she could heal him at the cost of herself.

But that is what this relationship with Tom would be, sacrificing herself for something that didn’t make her whole. She’d always had her standards. But now she had a taste of what her life could be like, and this wasn’t it. She could pass all this up for a picnic on a park bench or a ride in a rusty rowboat powered by arms she longed to hold her. For a cup of chowder or sandwich at a bar that held pictures of fallen heroes on its walls.

“I’m tired. I’d like to turn in,” she said.

His grave response was, “Yes.”

He followed behind, carrying her bag as she walked the brick path to the cottage. The fire was lit. Through open French doors, she couldn’t help but notice the bed had a centered view of the flames. She heard her bag drop to the floor. His hand was on her shoulder, and he turned her, but did not step closer.

“If you change your mind, I will leave the back door open, Christy,” he said softly. He bent, held her face between his hands, and kissed both cheeks. “Goodnight.”

And he was gone.

Her fingers fumbled as she placed her bag on the bed and started to unzip it. She removed her toiletry kit, then hooked it on a custom gargoyle loop above the white marble vanity top in the adjoining bath. She poured a generous portion of lavender bath gel into the two-person tub and turned on the water. She stripped off her traveling clothes, then walked naked to her bag and took out her sets of black pants and stretchy tops like Madame M liked her to wear and hung them up. She put her hair up in a ponytail and stepped into the warm bath water, and melted.

The full moon hung heavy over the arched window as she lay her head back against the cool marble. It was the same moon Kyle would see.

If he looked up.

Chapter 30

Kyle brought the Karl Gustav and its deadly ammunition to Gunny’s gym in an old bank safe he kept there. They were running out of places to stay. Coop’s motor home was under surveillance, Gunny’s truck was going to be impounded sooner or later, and Gunny was a fugitive from the hospital, thanks to the trio. They were running out of time.