Hot SEALs: Reclaiming the SEAL (Kindle Worlds) (Lost and Found Series Book 11) (4 page)

JULIE DIDN’T KNOW what to do when she saw that look seep into Gabe’s eyes. The look that said he’d been gone a long time and he needed loving. The timing was completely inappropriate but she still felt herself responding, her body warming.

The time they’d been apart had dragged. Yes, she’d gone on with her life but there was a huge gaping hole where the men had resided. Yes, even Butter. Though he’d ruined things between them, she still missed his irrepressible sense of humor.

But she didn’t know if she was ready to address the need she could still feel simmering between her and Gabe.

Needing a distraction, she pushed up from the floor. “I say we order pizza and have dinner Butter style. Stuff ourselves until we can’t breathe and chase it with beer.”

A glimmer of a smile crossed Gabe’s lips. “Sounds good to me.”

Yeah, right. He was probably as
not
hungry as she was.

They ordered the pizza though, and went through the motions of getting ready for it. Julie got them each a beer and utensils. Then she sat and stared at the note again, trying to decipher what he’d been talking about. There were claims of the watchers watching him during the purple phase. It didn’t make any sense to her at all.

But the one thing she did understand was that he truly believed that they’d been together. Not just recently, either. It sounded like he meant long-term.
Can’t wait to see Julie tomorrow
.

“Why was he thinking this? I haven’t talked to the man forever. But he makes it sound like we had plans to get together again. Why would he talk about that if he were taking his own life?”

Gabriel shook his head. “We may never know. He seems to have had moments of clarity then … fogginess.”

“In addition to this I think he also sent out a few text messages. Maxwell Tate got one, but he didn’t recognize Butter’s number.”

All Gabe could do was shake his head. “We haven’t seen Tate for the better part of a couple years, not since he left the Team for medical issues. And though they were kinda close, I don’t understand why he would contact him and not me. He was in a different squad. I mean, I was Butter’s best friend, I thought. I have no idea how he was like this without one of us seeing any signs. I mean, I’ve seen him do some crazy things, but not
crazy
crazy, you know what I mean?”

“Maybe some of those daring things he did were actually impulse control issues,” she murmured.

One of his dark brows quirked. “I’m almost sure, now.”

“Did you talk to his mom?”

His lids drooped. “She’s as confused as we are. More so, even. He was supposed to go home this week for leave. They had reservations at several places in Savannah he had wanted to see. They’d planned on going to his favorite restaurant for fried chicken.”

They sat in silence for a while. Julie knew that Gabe had to be beating himself up for not seeing the crash coming. “If a person doesn’t want you to know something, they will find a way to keep it private. You can’t beat yourself up about this, Gabe. Butter obviously had something, some switch, flip or something.” She waved a hand, frustrated because that sounded ridiculous but she couldn’t give him more concrete answers. Heaving a sigh, he dropped his mostly untouched plate to the coffee table. “I know that. The curiosity could drive me insane, though.”

He gave her a sad smile and she couldn’t help but reach out to stroke his hand. Turning his hand over, he wove his fingers between hers. “I’m really glad to see you again, Julie.”

“I’m really glad to see you again too, Gabe.”

“What have you been doing for all these months? Nobody seemed to know.”

Julie loved that he’d asked around about her. She’d hoped that he would call her or text her, but he hadn’t. She worked with men every day that were struggling with amputations, and cutting Gabe and Butter out of her life had felt like part of her heart had been amputated as well. “I still work at Dr. Petrovic. Been there for a couple years now.”

And was dissatisfied as she possibly could be. Julie didn’t say that out loud because there wasn’t anything he could do about it. And she couldn’t decide if she was actually dissatisfied with the job or because her personal life was in the toilet. She loved working with the vets and their families that made up most of the practice’s clients, and maybe that in itself was part of her problem, seeing the vets and their families together. In the not too distant past, she’d imagined that being her and Gabe.

After she and Gabe had broken up, she’d started picking up shifts at Walter Reed. She’d left the hospital originally because she was stressed out from dealing with the hardest, most desperate cases. Lacey had left for the same reason. But Julie had needed something to fill her time and a part of her
needed
to be needed like that. She felt like it was her true calling as a nurse to be there. She just needed to find some middle ground between the urgent and desperate and the mundane, like Petrovic’s general practice.

Gabe watched her narrow-eyed. “But are you happy?”

“Enough,” she told him eventually. “Lacey left last year for Colorado and it’s been quiet there ever since. She just mentioned that her VA in Colorado is hiring. That was kind of an intriguing tidbit. I’ve really missed her.”

For a moment, she thought alarm drifted through his eyes but it was gone too quickly to be sure.

That calm expression settled across his face, as if he understood exactly what she meant. “I can’t imagine being deployed again and Butter not being there with me, nearby, at least, if not in the same boat, you know?”

Julie nodded, totally familiar with the feeling. “You’ll take it one day at a time and every time you do something, it will get just the tiniest bit easier. Believe me, I had to completely reconfigure my life after we separated.” She choked out a laugh and waved at the pizza box on the table. “I couldn’t even order frickin’ Dominoes without thinking about you guys and crying.”

Gabe winced. “Things were pretty tense between Butter and me when you left. I didn’t talk to him for a couple days and he seemed totally confused. He didn’t understand what he had done.”

“No,” she agreed. “He came to see me a couple days after the fact and tried to kiss me into coming back. Said something about dreaming about loving me for a long time. Did he tell you that?”

Gabe’s face had closed down with anger. “No, he didn’t.”

Julie felt like she was talking ill of the dead. “I shouldn’t have said anything.” She started to pull her hand away but he stopped her.

“Julie, don’t pull away. I’m just struggling to deal with some of the things he did that I didn’t know about. He didn’t say a word about coming to see you. What do you mean he tried to kiss you into coming back?”

She shrugged uncomfortably. “He just kissed me for a long time, waiting for me to respond. It was very strange. It was as if he had to make me see how good he was. I didn’t respond other than yelling at him. I used his real name, I think that shocked him. He left after that.”

Gabe ran his thumb over her knuckles and a surge of need swept through her. Just having him here, whispering, talking, was amazing to her. Yes, if Butter hadn’t taken his life, she wouldn’t have had a reason to come back to find him.

Now that he was right there with her, she wondered if there was any chance she could bring Gabe back into her life.

JULIE WAS LOOKING a little heavy lidded. When he glanced at the clock he realized it was past one a.m. They’d been talking and reminiscing for hours. “Do you have a place to stay tonight?”

Julie’s eyes widened when she looked at the clock as well. “Oh, no. I was going to go down and get a hotel room along the coast somewhere. I just wanted to be here for you if you needed something.”

Gabe looked at her with fresh respect. Yes, he’d expected to see her at Butter’s funeral, but she didn’t have to stay any longer than that. That she would stay here for him, just to make sure he was okay with everything going on made him feel…loved. And not so alone.

“Thank you, Julie. I really appreciate that. If you have time, maybe you can go over to his apartment with me tomorrow?”

She nodded and stood to gather up her things.

Gabe felt panic tighten his chest. “You know, it’s stupid to get in a car this late and try to find a bed. Just stay here. You can take my bedroom and I’ll sleep on the couch or in the recliner.”

She hesitated but common sense won out. “I am pretty tired. Are you sure that won’t put you out?”

“Of course not. I’d love to have you here.”

Truer words had never been spoken. Just having her in his apartment again fulfilled him in ways he hadn’t felt for a long time. “Give me your keys, I’ll go get your bag.”

She handed them over without comment and he did as promised, carrying her small overnight bag in and handing it to her. All of the pizza clutter was disposed of and she was zipping the few remaining pieces into a Ziploc bag. Gabe probably would have just left the pizza out in the box to chew on the next morning, but Julie wouldn’t do that.

Having her in his life had been enlightening. She’d given him a taste of what it might be like to be married, and he’d enjoyed every second of it. Honestly, he wanted it again.

With an appreciative smile she took her bag from him. “I think I’m too tired to shower even. I might just go to bed.” She stood there a little awkwardly as if debating whether or not to kiss him. Gabe took the decision out of her hands by leaning down to press his lips to hers. For a brief second she hesitated then she warmed to him, leaning in to press against the length of his body. Gabe groaned, wondering how he could go from the saddest of days to being shown a glimpse of heaven.

They had been perfect together. When he’d met her in that bar, it had been easy to see that it wasn’t her usual hangout, she’d just gone to meet up with a friend. She’d nursed the beer she’d had for a long time, just chatting, before he’d sent her a fresh one. And though she’d smiled at him and nodded, she hadn’t drunk that one either. But she’d said yes when he’d offered to dance.

Dancing could tell you a lot about a person and they had moved together as if they’d been doing it forever. A few weeks later, after they’d been on a few dates, he’d asked her back to his apartment and they had loved all through the night. The next morning it had shaken him how easy it had been to be with her. He knew then that his heart was in serious trouble.

And as his body responded to her just like it always did, hard and fast, he knew he was in trouble again. Before he could do something they would both regret he pulled away.

“I’ll, uh, see you in the morning.”

She nodded, eyes dilated, lips swollen, and turned away. “Good night, Gabe.”

He watched her narrow back disappear through his bedroom doorway and the door close behind her. He took a minute to use the bathroom and brush his teeth then wandered back out to the living room, not exactly sleepy but feeling worn out. His eyes were gritty from emotion and he needed to shave but he could do that stuff in the morning. Grabbing a blanket from the end of the couch he settled into his leather recliner and flipped the feet up. Then he had to take a minute to lift the blanket to his nose. It smelled faintly of Butter’s cologne that he wore when they went out. Gabe’s throat tightened with tears again but he forced them away. As much as he’d loved him like a brother, he was done crying for his buddy.

*     *     *

JULIE CRAWLED INTO Gabe’s bed as she had many times before, just not alone like tonight. The alone part seemed very strange to her.

Was there a right or wrong way to handle this situation? Their best friend had died three days ago. The wedge that had come between them was gone. When she felt the passion in Gabe’s hold and the need in his kiss, it was hard to remember that almost two empty years had gone by. He felt the same and tasted the same and stirred every single emotion the same as he’d always done.

Was it wrong to want to reclaim his love?

She fell asleep still trying to puzzle it out.

GABE DIDN’T NEED the alarm clock to wake him up the next morning. He’d woken several times through the night and as always seemed to happen, he woke a half hour before his alarm was supposed to go off. Crossing to his utility closet he drew a pair of shorts and a T-shirt from the dryer. Grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge he scribbled Julie a note that he needed to run and took off.

When he returned an hour later, energized and with some of his anxiety demons exorcised, he opened the door to the smell of cooking food. Gabe stepped into the kitchen and stopped.

Julie stood scrambling eggs, her freshly washed hair curling over her shoulders to leave damp marks on the light fabric. For a minute Gabe had a serious flashback to her doing the very same thing many times when they’d been together. Then, when she heard him enter, she turned and smiled, and totally wrecked his heart. He mumbled something about taking a shower and disappeared.

Fuck! Everything she did made his heart ache with want. They’d been damn good together and letting her go had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. It had been the right thing to do at the time. But now, it was a completely different matter.

Today was his last day of leave so he needed to make it count. Dressing in jeans and his favorite Lucky t-shirt he headed out to join her for breakfast.

Julie sat at the little glass top table in the dining room. Two places had been set. The third, Butter’s, had been left empty. As he sat down she gave him a sad smile. “It’s very strange him not being here.”

Yes, it was.

The eggs tasted surprisingly good and were exactly the protein he needed. “Thank you for breakfast.”

She shrugged. “I was hungry, too and I figured you would need the energy after your run.” She poured him a juice and a glass of water. “What time to you want to go to his apartment?”

Gabe frowned. “I told Gwen I would be there by nine.”

They had plenty of time to finish breakfast and clean up. By eight thirty they were in his truck and headed across the peninsula to the apartment complex Butter had lived in. The beach had drawn him here, even though it was almost forty minutes away from base. Times when he’d known that he needed to be at the base quickly, he’d stayed at Gabe’s place. As they drove south along the coastal highway Gabe could understand the appeal. Something about Virginia Beach felt different from Little Creek, maybe it seemed more laid back to him.

Gwen had sent him a text message saying that the truck she’d rented to for the things they were going to keep was due to arrive at eleven. That gave them two hours to pack up anything they needed to.

Gabe had hired a crime scene cleaning company out of Norfolk to come in after the body had been removed. Actually, when he’d mumbled something to the coroner about cleaning up the place before Butter’s genteel southern mother got there, the man had fished a business card from his wallet. “Call this guy. They do impeccable work.”

As he walked into the apartment he took a short breath, afraid of what he might smell. But nothing assaulted his nose and he dared to walk in. Butter’s apartment looked the same as it always did—cluttered and in need of a good cleaning. Heart thudding with dread, he walked across the room and peered into the bathroom. Nothing. For a moment it didn’t jive with what he remembered and he blinked, trying to realign his reality. A soft hand rested on his back and he jumped, but it was just Julie. “Are you okay, honey?”

Gabe nodded, his heart warming a little at the endearment, his gaze drifting back to the tile in the bathroom. Lord knows he’d seen blood before, but never like what he’d seen that night. The cleanup crew had done an amazing job and earned every bit of their expensive fee.

“I’ll get the stuff in here if you want to work in his bedroom,” she offered.

Gabe knew she was doing it to help with his sanity but he didn’t like taking the easy way out. “No, I’ll get it.”

She pulled a cardboard box from the hallway and gave it to him with a smile. “If you want me to take over, just let me know.”

Gabe looked down at the box in his hand and was a little disoriented. It seemed very strange going through his buddy’s things like this. He opened the medicine cabinet and stilled, his eyes ranging over the rows of prescription pill bottles. There had to be twenty or twenty-five different bottles. What the hell…

Reaching out he drew one from the shelf. The name of the drug was one he recognized but he wasn’t sure what it was used for.

“Hey, Julie, can you come here a minute?”

She was there within seconds, whistling softly at what he had discovered. “Oh, dear,” she sighed, taking the bottle from his hand. Then she reached for a couple of others, sometimes holding the transparent bottle to the light to judge the amount of pills inside.

“What are these?”

She gave him a long, considering look. “They are antipsychotic drugs used to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. The prescription is fairly recent but it’s curious because there are hardly any used out of the bottle. That was why I was looking. These are only thirty day prescriptions.”

She continued to look through the bottles, arranging them in a couple of different groups.

“Antipsychotics, mood elevators, mood suppressors. There’s a whole range in here. Did you know he was having issues?”

Gabe felt like he’d been slammed in the face by a two-by-four. “No, not at all.”

Julie seemed to accept that with a nod. “If a person has had mental health issues long-term, they become adept at hiding it from other people.”

She looked at the counter cluttered with pill bottles. “This seems pretty severe to have hidden, though.” She picked a bottle to look at more closely, then pointed to the label with a finger. “These are recent but look at the bottle. That’s not Butter’s name.”

No, it wasn’t. Obviously he’d set himself up an alias to use for treatment. Gabe didn’t want to think about the time and care it took to set up a false identity. Although, if anybody could do it, it would be a SEAL.

“I’m just… what the hell was going on here?”

Julie turned her compassionate gaze to his. “If I had to guess, I would say that he didn’t want the Navy to know about his medical issues.”

Gabe froze, his mind going blank then racing to put all the pieces together.

Though the average returning veteran was getting more care and PTSD issues were less of a stigma, among Navy SEALs the word wasn’t even mentioned. They didn’t talk about mental issues at all. SEALs were trained to be more badass than the rest because of their repetitive conditioning. They had to be solid.

“If they knew he had mental issues, he would lose his security clearance,” Gabe murmured.

Julie turned to him, mouth ajar. “What?”

He rattled a pill bottle. “If a SEAL’s mental health is compromised, he is a risk to the team and the mission. They would yank his clearance for classified missions.”

“Why don’t they help him? If they’ve invested that much time and money why wouldn’t they take the time to rehabilitate him?”

“I’ve wondered that myself,” he murmured. “But it’s kind of a shoot first and ask questions later, hair trigger reaction. The government can’t risk the security of their missions. I’ve talked to guys that I’ve wondered about, that maybe shouldn’t have been in the field, but they can’t get the help they need.”

“So, if Butter was having issues and went to your command, what would they do?”

Gabe shook his head. There was no good answer. “Honestly, they’d probably throw him in a mental hospital. Then he’d be screwed, because once that’s on your record it doesn’t come off. No more Navy SEAL. It’s no wonder he created an alias.”

His heart ached for what Butter had to have gone through. Feeling isolated and alone, unable to even talk to his best friend because of the issues between them…which had probably been caused by his mental health issues. It was a vicious Catch-22.

“He hadn’t taken very many of these, but there’s a long history here, going back years it looks like.” She pawed through the medicine cabinet, then knelt down to go through his cupboard beneath the sink. There she found a basket with even more pill bottles. “These are from a long time ago. There’s a gap. Looks like he was good for a few years. When did you guys graduate BUD/S?”

“Oh eight.”

She nodded as if he’d merely confirmed what she already knew. “There’s a gap in these prescriptions from oh seven to twenty thirteen. Unless the bottles are somewhere else.”

He doubted it. Butter had managed to keep his shit together for a few years but the pressure of the continuous deployments had begun to grind on all of them. Gabe knew every one of the guys in his Team had been stressed. They worked hard and they played hard, but every once in a while one of the links broke. It didn’t happen very often in the SEALs, but Gabe wondered how many guys actually had true, legitimate issues they needed help with, but refused to seek it because of the stigma.

Julie began to pile the bottles into the box he still held in his hand. When he carried it out, Butter’s mother looked at it in dismay. Her soft blue eyes filled with tears and her mouth pursed. Though normally a well put together lady today she seemed disheveled and out of sorts. She looked at Gabe. “He didn’t want you to know. He worried that you would feel obligated to do something.”

“You knew he was having issues?”

She crossed slowly to the tan couch and lowered herself to the cushion. “I had a feeling. There was nothing he said in particular but when you all had that falling out, he turned very quiet. I would have to prod him for the slightest details. But he never did tell me what all the drama was about.”

Julie looked at Gabe, but he could only shrug. She sighed. “As much as I loved Butter as a friend, I think he thought there was more to it than that.”

Gwen nodded her head sadly. “I wondered if it wasn’t something like that. Even when he was a child, the things he wanted most were the things he couldn’t have. I’m sorry he did that.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Julie lowered herself to sit next to Gwen. “Butter was a grown man. He knew what he was doing. He made sure the facade he presented to everyone was shiny and perfect.”

A tear slipped down Gwen’s cheek. “But a mother should know these things about her child.”

Gabe knelt down in front of her. “There were times when I was with him, literally, twenty-four seven. I never noticed what was happening either. I think we can’t fall into the trap of blaming ourselves.”

Gwen nodded but he didn’t think she would let it go so easily. He wouldn’t either.

Eventually they got back to work, each absorbed in their own tasks. The furniture was sorted and Gabe kept a few things he wanted; pictures of them together in BUD/S and one of them doing a skydive, Butter acting the fool in spite of the danger they were in.

Gwen pulled him aside at one point. When he saw the box he knew what she had found, Butter’s Trident pin. “I want you to keep this. You understand more than anyone what it meant to him to be a SEAL. He loved you like a brother and I know he didn’t mean to cause you pain. And I know he didn’t mean to come between you and Julie. If he was the reason you two were apart, you need to reconsider that now.”

There was too much emotion tightening his throat for him to speak right then, but he nodded, taking the case with care. He cleared his throat with a cough. “Thank you, Gwen. I’ll think about it.”

She nodded and left the bedroom.

Gabe looked down at the pin. Butter had been meticulous about this item in particular; they all were. Anything else he would toss on a counter or in a box, but he always kept his pin safe. It had taken monumental effort to get it and he had been proud of it.

When they were just about done, he started to do a final walkthrough. Julie sat Indian-style on the floor at the door of the closet in the bedroom. There was a Nike Air shoebox open in front of her and several pictures were stacked outside on the carpet. As he walked closer, he thought they were pictures of the three of them and they were, or they had been, he realized when he saw what was wrong with them. He had been cut out of every single picture.

Julie looked up at him in consternation. Now, all of the pictures looked like she and Butter had been a couple. Gabe was gratified to see his arm in almost every pic because it had been around Julie’s shoulders. “What was he thinking?” she whispered.

Gabe knelt down beside her. “I think Gwen hit the nail on the head. He wanted what he couldn’t have.”

Then, Julie pulled out an envelope with her name on it.

“I’m afraid to open it,” she whispered.

Gabe was too, but he forced himself to move; he pulled the single sheet of white paper out and unfolded it. Then he leaned down so that they could read it together.

Julie,

I know you don’t feel for me what I feel for you, but I had to tell you somehow. My therapist suggested I write a note, so this will have to do.

Gabe is my best friend in the world and I’m really trying to stay strong when it comes to you, but I know I could love you better than he does. It was only chance that he bought you that drink first and caught your eye. If I had seen you just a few seconds earlier things might have been different in both our lives.