Navy SEAL Seduction (5 page)

But he sure as hell was going to find out.

* * *

The dead chicken bothered Lacey more than she admitted.

After checking on Fleur and giving her a reassuring hug, she talked with Rose, her cook, and Collette. Neither had seen anything unusual.

Pierre, the guard at the gate, finally admitted he had been dozing off last night. He wasn’t certain how long he’d slept.

Yelling at him did no good. Part of her challenge in running operations at the coffee plantation was hiring good help. Pierre was the son of a factory worker who begged her to hire him. He was a decent employee, and when her regular security guard took two weeks to visit his family in New York, she put Pierre in charge.

She had a bad feeling her security guard wasn’t returning.

Lacey told Pierre she was withholding his wages for the day and told him to go home. She called a friend about hiring a new guard. That was life here in this country. One must constantly improvise.

But the dead chicken was a new twist. Ever since she’d fired some of the local single men for laziness, replacing them with women, there had been grumblings in town. She did have enemies. Because of this, she’d made friends, as well, and hired four older, more muscled and trustworthy men, brothers and fathers to the women she hired, as caretakers to work in the cornfield and keep the grass cut around the property. Some slept in small storage sheds on the property, glad to have a place to bunk. Lacey reasoned if they stayed on the property, they could keep a close eye on things.

But it was a large piece of land, and the caretakers couldn’t oversee everything at all times, especially at night.

Fifteen minutes later, after a quick check of the outside of the house, she went into the kitchen. Jarrett was inside. Straddling a chair, he rested his muscled arms upon the back and chatted with Rose as she chopped carrots.

He flashed Lacey a warm smile as she entered the room, which she ignored, despite her rapidly beating heart. She couldn’t fully ignore him, though. A subtle tendril of scent threaded through the air as he neared—the spicy scent of his cologne. Jarrett still wore the same cologne and it opened a floodgate of memories. The smell of him, delicious and spicy, on his pillow the mornings after they’d made love. For months after the divorce, every time she smelled that particular aftershave, she wanted to cry, because it reminded her so vividly of Jarrett.

Sometimes when he’d deploy she would roll over at night and hug his pillow, breathing in his scent so she’d feel a little less lonely.

And then when he came home, the sex between them was good, so very good. Jarrett had been insistent on spoiling her, feeding her breakfast in bed, making sure she was covered and warm. Sometimes they spent two days in bed, exploring each others’ bodies, getting reacquainted in the most delightful of ways.

Now, staring at her ex, the old desire surfaced. Jarrett was solid muscle, all grace and strength. It showed in the way his powerful biceps flexed as he talked with Rose, but more than that, the man gave her cook his undivided attention. When he centered that emerald-green gaze at you, a woman couldn’t help but melt. Do anything he asked. And if the anything involved getting naked, even better.

Down, girl.

So what if she hadn’t had sex in more than two years?

It didn’t mean she was going to entertain thoughts of getting cozy with her ex, no matter how much her body said
Go for it.

She had a compound to run, a daughter to adopt and someone trying to hustle her out of her compound. At least she could rely upon her staff’s discretion.

“Rose and I have been having a delightful little chat. She told me last week someone set fire to your best truck,” Jarrett said softly in English.

So much for discretion.

“It was an accident, I’m certain.” Lacey picked up a bright orange carrot piece and chewed it. “Someone probably tossed a lit cigarette into the cab, which I was foolish enough to leave open. It was extinguished in minutes.”

“Rose also told me that the women have been spooked by things left hanging from the gate. This is not the first dead chicken.”

Jarrett’s even gaze met hers. She shrugged, hiding her thoughts. The man could smell anxiety from miles away.

“She’s only upset because it was the waste of a good chicken for dinner.”

He did not smile at her little joke. She walked over to the counter to peer out the window. Fleur was outside, playing jump rope with the two other little girls who had accompanied her into the compound. Their mothers worked at the mango factory.

Lacey turned, studying her ex. Her gaze fell to the curve of his spine against the tight white T-shirt, the muscles on his back, down to the pistol tucked into the leather holster.

Jarrett was walking, talking security. He wouldn’t have fallen asleep at the gate. He’d have tracked down the trespasser and squeezed out the information about who wanted to scare her.

He rose off the chair, all six feet, three inches of muscled male. Her heart pounded faster.

“I think I’ll have a look around your house before I start on whatever manual labor you have assigned to me.”

For a big man, he had a quiet, graceful stride. She supposed it came from the nature of his work. And he was very security conscious. Lacey watched him check all the downstairs windows. Funny, she’d always felt safe when he was home.

When
being the operative word.

But before he’d left for a mission, Jarrett had always ensured that the house was tight and secure, the alarm system working and emergency contacts within easy reach.

Jarrett went to the front door and ran a hand over the edge then jiggled the lock.

He turned, dusting off his hands.

“One well-placed kick could knock down this door.”

“We’ve never had anyone try. Usually they’re more polite and open the door.” She tried to hide the worry he’d put into words. When she’d been alone with Rose, she never worried about sleeping here. Now that she had Fleur, she constantly worried.

“Lacey, I don’t like it,” Jarrett began.

She held up a finger as her cell phone rang. Lacey’s heart sank as she answered and heard the news. Frightened by the spreading violence in the city, one of her best donors was packing his bags and heading back to France.

More and more wealthy donors were pulling out. Her chest constricted. She had to ship out jam and make good on her new contract or she’d lose all her profits.

She crooked a finger at Jarrett. “Come on. I have work for you.”

They walked outside, down the dirt path that led to a large, wood-frame shed where she packed the marmalade. Lacey fished a key out of her pocket and unlocked the door.

He picked up a jar of jam with the labels she’d made on her computer. Lacey took it from his hands.

“This one’s crooked. I’ll save it for the house.”

“You always were a perfectionist.” Jarrett smiled at her and the power in his smile made her weak. That smile...it was what attracted her to him long ago. Not his great, killer bod or his quiet intellect. That 10,000-watt smile. When he turned it on her, giving her his full attention, she felt like the center of his universe. She, who had been ignored by a father more interested in his business and a mother more concerned with her society parties, mattered the most to this man.

Lacey set the jar on the shelf among those she’d intended to keep, her heart squeezing painfully. Jarrett had another lady who came first—the Navy.

Duty before love.

They walked into the room. Jarrett’s gaze went from the stacks of crates and packing to a bottle sitting by the table. He went to the empty bottle, turned it upside down. There was a set of keys beside the bottle.

Her temper rose as she grabbed the keys. “Now I know why Pierre didn’t see anything.”

Jarrett sniffed the bottle. “Doesn’t help when your security guard has been drinking all night.”

“Job hazard in this country. I’ll have to fire Pierre. Total security fail. Damn it.”

He raised a dark brow, and the cynical expression on his face kicked in all her defenses. Maybe he perceived this as evidence she couldn’t hold her own out here, even though she had done it for years.

“One bad call in giving a guy a chance doesn’t make it a total failure.”

She blinked in surprise at his understanding and sought to regain her lost composure. “I’m not upset about that. I’m mad because that was a damn fine bottle of wine I’d been saving.”

His full mouth quirked in a sexy little grin. “That’s the spirit. I’ll find you a new security guard, screen him and have him start right away. I’m sure there are guys Ace can recommend on the island.”

Her mind zipped through the figures it would cost. The type of security Ace would recommend would strain her already screaming budget. “Things are a little tight in the pocket...”

“I’ll pay for his salary.”

“I don’t need your help,” she started. Jarrett raised a brow and she sighed. “All right. But I’ll pay you back after I get the check from the restaurants that ordered the mango marmalade.”

“Deal.” He whipped out his cell phone and sent a text.

As he tucked the phone away, his relief was obvious. “You’ll be doing me a favor, Lace. If you had someone on that front gate who knew how to hold a weapon, a trained professional, I could sleep at night.”

“Me, too. Maybe. Lately that’s a challenge, even with a glass of red wine.”

Jarrett smiled, looking lost in thought.

“Remember when we made the wine after I came home from the tour of Iraq?” He stepped closer, ran a hand down her arm. She shivered with pleasure at the contact.

“I remember how drunk you got me.” Her voice dropped. “I remember...what we did afterward.”

Jarrett’s gaze grew heated. “Every time I cracked open a bottle of wine, I remember what I did with you. Every single moment.”

Lacey hurried through the room, her body tingling. She had to put him at a distance. So many memories, and here he was before her, like a gift she never asked for.

A gift that could lead to heartache all over. She didn’t need this heartache.

And even if Jarrett Adler meant to stay for the foreseeable future, it didn’t matter. She couldn’t risk falling in love with him and ruining her life again.

This time it would be different. He wasn’t going to stick around, anyway. He’d get the call to return to base, and return to being a SEAL. Men like Jarrett Adler never did stick around.

CHAPTER 5

T
his time it would be different. Jarrett planned to stick to her side until she screamed.

Once he’d made her scream a different way...in bed. That memory had his blood surging hot and thick. He remembered her blue gaze dazed with pleasure as he’d slowly thrust into her, their naked bodies achieving a mutual rhythm and pleasure that sent him sailing into the stratosphere. Sex with Lace had been the glue in their relationship.

But now he needed more to get her back into his life. He needed to give her a safe haven where she could raise her daughter without either of them harboring the fear of someone tossing a firebomb into their car or shooting at them on the street.

Until Ace got back to him with more intel, he would try to glean as much information as possible around her compound. Good thing he was fluent in French.

She pointed to the wooden crates and neatly stacked boxes by a table topped with glass jars filled with jam. “Help me get these ready for packing. Each wood box can hold four containers of jam. Seal them with the staple gun.”

As she picked up the gun, he gently took it from her. “I know how to handle one of these. I’m the weapons expert, remember?”

“Yeah, Mr. Weapons Expert. I remember how you spent a whole weekend trying to fix the gate and the first time you used the nail gun you ended up in the ER with a nail sticking out of your hand.”

He laughed. “It almost ended up in my ass. That would have been special.”

A ripple of sensual appreciation passed over her face as she glanced at his bottom. “A real shame to hurt that part of your body,” she murmured.

Pleased he still had that effect on her, he loaded up the staple gun.

They worked in companionable silence for a few minutes. Lacey wiped the sweat off her brow.

“Most of the jam goes across the country to restaurants, but I’m shipping a box to Mom as she and Dad love the stuff.” She pointed to the box he worked on. “Set that one aside. I’m going to ship it via air freight.”

Her face fell and her lower lip wobbled a little. “I was planning to hand-carry them when I took Fleur with me back home as a welcome home gift. Now I don’t know when I’ll get her home.”

He knew she was fighting emotions. Knew how she tried to hide it, because she’d always tried to be brave in the past, but that little wobble in her pretty mouth gave it away.

Jarrett set down the staple gun, making sure to switch it off. He put his hands on her shoulders, feeling delicate bone beneath the soft skin. Lace wasn’t frail, but she had a soft heart and it had to kill her to be put into this position.

“Hey,” he said gently. “Everything’s going to be all right, Lace. Have faith.”

Have faith in me. I won’t let you down. Have faith in the job I do. It comes first. But I’ll always be there for you
.

In the end he wasn’t there when she truly needed him. Jarrett gave her shoulders a reassuring squeeze, fighting the urge to kiss her senseless as he had in the past. Kiss her and lead her into the bedroom where he’d made all her woes fall away.

When the last staple secured the last box of jam, they stacked them inside the shed, making certain to set apart the four jars destined for sending to Lacey’s father. Tomorrow a truck would collect the crates to distribute to restaurants.

After they stacked the boxes, she wiped off the sweat from her glistening forehead with the back of one hand. “Thanks. You really helped. Now I have one less chore.”

He brushed off his jeans. Lacey gave him a friendly smile as she pointed to her soaked shirt.

“How do you do it, Jarrett? You never break a sweat. Not even that day when you nailed your hand. Do you even have sweat glands?”

Oh yeah, he had plenty of times on ops. Down range, he sweated quite a bit, waiting in hiding for the moment to move in and take down the enemy. Sweating profusely while sitting in a plane at 30,000, waiting to do a HALO jump.

Sweating as he waited in a courtroom for the judge to declare the divorce final...

But he’d never let on, because he was tough. A man’s man who never showed his emotions. Emotions killed you in the field; they slipped beneath your collar and taunted you, distracting you from the mission, the target...

Had to steer this disturbing thread of conversation in another direction. He eyed her shirt and the curve of her full breasts.

“You’ve made me sweat plenty, babe.”

Lacey didn’t return his grin. “Don’t call me that. I hate that word.”

She turned and left and he inwardly cursed. Any inroads he’d made with her in packing the boxes had been lost.

He could regain that ground. Had to, because she needed to trust him again, this time with her life.

His cell phone quietly buzzed. Ace. His friend recommended a private firm he worked for on occasion when wealthy islanders held private parties.

Guy by the name of Marcus. We did a few details together. Knows the business end of a shotgun, but prefers to work with more reliable firepower.

Jarrett called the firm, who promised to send over a security detail in an hour.

Near the house he spied Lacey’s daughter skipping rope with two other girls. Jarrett didn’t follow his ex into the house. Deciding to give her time to cool down, both emotionally and physically, he headed for the girls.

Wearing blue shorts, blue tennis shoes and a white T-shirt with the logo of Marlee’s Mangoes, Fleur skipped rope. She did not smile, even as the other girls laughed and sang a song in French.

He wondered if she ever smiled.

Such a thin little girl. He rubbed his chest. Jarrett imagined how terrified the child had been to seen such violence and lose her mother. And how brave Lacey had been to step out and adopt her, give her a home instead of losing her to an orphanage where Fleur might not receive the help she needed.

He pointed to the jump rope the girls were twirling. “Mind if I join?” he asked in French.

The three girls stared at him as if he’d lost his mind. Jarrett smiled. “I’m good, but I bet you can teach me a thing or two.”

That started the two twirling the rope to giggle. But little Fleur, with her skinny shoulders and solemn eyes, did not react. She stepped aside.

The two on either end of the rope moved closer to accommodate his height. Jarrett stood at the center and nodded. “I’m ready.”

They began turning the rope and he made a big exhibit out of bending over to accommodate the twirling rope, jumping slow and stomping on the ground. Every loud
whomp
evoked a giggle from the girls. Finally, he turned and stepped aside.

“This is tough,” he complained. “Fleur, can you show me how it’s done?”

Fleur still stared, but took his place. She began to jump rope and he nodded. “You’re fast. Let’s see how fast when I take over.”

Beckoning to one of the girls, he took the rope from her and began to twirl it. Fleur jumped harder and faster to the shouts of the girls.

And then he stopped and grinned at her. “You’re pretty good,” he told her. “You’re faster than me.”

Fleur blinked, but not before he caught a glimpse of something faint and precious in her dark eyes. Connection.

As he started to turn, Fleur saw the handle of the pistol tucked into his waistband. Her eyes widened.

He turned and saw Lacey standing on the porch, a smile on her face. “Fleur! Time for homework. Tell Michelle and Catherine you’ll see them tomorrow,” she called.

The two little girls ran away toward the mango factory, where a stream of women had begun to leave the shop.

Jarrett had a sudden memory. Touring Iraq, teamed with the marines. They’d infiltrated a nest of insurgents. He’d done his duty, but the kills that day had haunted him. And then he’d called home and heard Lacey’s voice, her low, sweet dulcet tones, and the tightness in his chest had eased a little. She’d told him the baby was doing fine, and she expected him at the sonogram when he got home in three weeks...

The thought of seeing their baby, making it real, had carried him through the next three weeks through blood and death and everything bad...

He turned to Fleur, struggling to regain his composure. “Hey, little one,” he said in perfect French. “Thanks for letting me play with you.”

She pointed to his jeans and said in a small voice, “Gun.”

He squatted down. “Yes. It’s my pistol. I keep it close.”

“To hurt people?”

Damn, this was not the way he’d anticipated conversing with his ex’s daughter. He’d wanted to talk about playing games, what classes she liked, not firearms.

“Yes, but only bad people who want to hurt you and your mom.” Awkwardly, he patted her shoulder. “Go do as your mom says.”

Fleur gave him a shy smile then skipped away toward the house.

Do as your mom says.

How he’d dreamed of saying those words to their son or daughter. He fisted his hands and turned away from the house, staring at the distant fields. Then his gaze swung to the gate, that gate with the dead chicken.

He couldn’t return to the past and change things. But he could help Lacey now, and her daughter.

While waiting for the security detail to arrive, he went to the front gate and did a thorough check. The eight-foot gate was solid steel and required someone to open it by hand, like typical front gates in St. Marc that guarded private homes and businesses and schools. Effective, if you had the right person standing guard.

The man at the gate right now had a careworn face and gray hair. There was a spark to his dark gaze as he greeted Jarrett. He didn’t carry a firearm, but the sun glinted off the polished steel machete he held in a firm grip.

“Afternoon,” Jarrett greeted him in French. “I’m Jarrett Adler, friend of Lacey’s.”

“Joseph.” The man shifted the machete to his left hand and shook Jarrett’s outstretched palm. “I work in the fields for Miss Lacey. She asked me to take over guard duty for now.”

He nodded at the gleaming blade. “Know how to use that thing for something other than cutting corn?”

White teeth flashed at him in a knowing grin. Joseph picked up a coconut fallen from a nearby palm tree and placed it near him. The machete whistled through the air and two halves of the nut spilled to the ground as he cut it.

“Don’t you worry, Mr. Jarrett. Anyone try to hang dead chickens on this gate I go
chop chop
with my big knife,” Joseph told him. “I’m not that young fool Pierre. He had no respect for the job. Miss Lacey’s good people. She deserves better.”

He liked him. Joseph had years on him, and the kind of wisdom and experience that indicated he wasn’t about to put up with anything.

They made small talk for a few minutes. Joseph was a wealth of information. Most of the locals liked Lacey and were grateful she saved the coffee factory from closing—news to him—and gave the community much-needed jobs. And many were appreciative of her charity.

A few “big talkers” dissed Lacey and didn’t like her because they saw her as a rich American, but those were the men she’d fired for laziness.

A car honked at the gate and he and Joseph stepped through the door at the side of the gate. It was the security detail Ace had recommended. Joseph let the car through. They parked inside and all four men got out. Marcus, the leader, was all muscled bulk, tall and dressed in neatly pressed trousers and a tan shirt with the firm’s logo on it.

Jarrett talked with him, liking his quiet intelligence, and his alertness. He really liked the M45C handgun he carried. “Nice piece,” he told Marcus.

“Gift from Ace from the last job we did together,” Marcus replied in his singsong accent. “I have a suppressor, but for jobs like this I need to make loud
bang bang
to let intruders know I mean business.”

Between Marcus and his security detail, and Joseph, any perp trying to get through the front gate would be toast.

Marcus knew the area, too, and had been born and raised here, which was an additional bonus. If trouble flared in town, he’d hear about it.

After extensive interviewing of Marcus and his men, with additional questions by a sharp-eyed Joseph, Jarrett agreed to let them to work out details of guarding the gate around the clock.

Of course, it was the gate and this was a big compound, which worried him. He needed to check for weaknesses in the wall ringing the complex. Not for the first time that day he itched to have his regular weapons. The Sig was a constant friend, but more firepower would come in handy if things got rough and the violence spilled from the capital to the countryside.

Satisfied with the gate security, he headed toward the house. Lacey met him inside.

He told her about Marcus and added his praise of Joseph.

“Joseph is a loyal employee, like most of my staff. He lives here on the compound and he’s a very hard worker, typical of most men in St. Marc. The ones like the men who beat the women in my compound are outnumbered by the good ones in my book,” she said.

He wondered if he’d ever rank as a
good one
in her book again.

“Thanks for taking care of that for me,” she told him. “Have a drink with me. I’ve got a bottle of the finest island rum. Dinner won’t be ready for another hour. Rose is making chicken and gravy and rice.”

Sounded good. The smells of chicken coming from the kitchen smelled good, too. But never pleasure before business. “Want to check the place first.”

He went to the guest room, changed into running clothes and tucked his pistol into a special jogging holster around his waist and pulled his gray T-shirt over it. After lacing up his running shoes and grabbing dark sunglasses, he headed outside.

He chose the perimeter near the gate and broke into his normal stride, his gaze sharpened as he scanned the compound. Feet pounding against the hard earth, Jarrett fell into an easy rhythm, relishing the pull of his muscles and the burn of his lungs. Sweat dripped down his back and temples.

Jarrett finished his run without incident and went into the house.

Lacey sat in the living room, a glass half-filled with dark liquid. She carried her drink as she followed him into the kitchen as he fetched a bottle of cold water from the refrigerator. Rose stirred a big pot at the stove and then vanished into the next room.