Hot SEALs: SEAL's Ultimate Challenge (6 page)

When he broke the kiss, his nostrils flaring, he brushed his thumb across her mouth. “Get me a new therapist.” Then he climbed out of the Jeep, poking his head back in the door. “I mean it. Call me when you get to your apartment.”

His voice, low and gravelly, melted her all the way to her core. She nodded, unable to form a single coherent word or thought. Out of rote memory, she shifted into drive and pulled away from the curb. When she glanced in her rearview mirror, she spotted Reaper standing where she’d left him.

Every last bit of her self-control was needed to keep driving when all she wanted to do was turn around, beg him to get in and come back to her apartment, and make crazy, sweet love with her through the night. Yeah. She would fail the cardinal rule of a fulltime physical therapist.
Don’t fall for your patient.

AFTER LEIGHA DISAPPEARED out of sight, Reaper hurried to his room, booted up his computer, and searched the internet for GAPS, the Guardian Angel Protective Services, a fairly new organization established by an old friend from BUD/s training, Jon Rudnick. He might have connections who could do some digging.

An answering machine picked up on the second ring.

“This is the Guardian Angel Protective Services. Leave a message, and we’ll get back to you during regular office hours. If this is an emergency, dial…”

Reaper committed the emergency number to memory, ended the call, and dialed it.

“Jon speaking.”

“Jon, Cory Nipton, you might remember me from BUD/s.”

“Reaper! I sure as hell do. Good to hear from you. Where are you these days?”

Reaper filled him in on all that had happened in succinct, emotionless sentences including the attack that evening.

Jon listened without commenting until Reaper was done. “I’m sorry to hear about your loss. What is it you want me to do? I currently have all my guys out on assignment. I could be there myself in three hours, though. I have to be in Alexandria tomorrow, anyway.”

“No. Like Leigha said, this could have been a random attack. Leigha was a cop in D.C. Do you have any connections who could dig into her arrest and sentencing record and find out if any of her jailbirds are up for or have been paroled who might have a bone to pick?”

Jon paused. “I’ll get my computer guy on it. Is this number a good one to reach you at?”

“It is.”

“Good. When I’m done with my meeting in Alexandria, I’d like to swing your way. If I have any news, I can pass it on then. Otherwise, I’d enjoy catching up on old times.”

“You’re on. Call me when you’re near. I’m not going anywhere.” Reaper ended the call, realizing how true his parting comment was. Once he was through therapy, then what? He supposed he would find a job. Doing what, he hadn’t a clue. His entire life had been focused on a career in the navy. Suddenly thrust into the civilian world, he didn’t know here to start.

Well, he’d just have to, what was it Leigha had told him? Man up.

A smile tugged his lips at the image of Leigha after he’d kissed her. Her blue eyes had been wide, her lips slightly swollen, and her blond hair curling around her chin. In some ways, she reminded him of O’Connell—her strength, determination, and ability to stand up to men twice her size.

In other ways, she was completely different. The kiss had spark. An entire electrical current that zipped throughout his body, culminating in his groin. Even now his jeans were tight, making it difficult to walk without adjusting.

When he’d kissed O’Connell before she left, he hadn’t felt that spark. He’d brushed it off as a first kiss that would get better in subsequent kisses.

O’Connell.

To be fair to her, he should contact her and confess what he’d done.

Guilt overwhelmed him. He was engaged to O’Connell, and he’d kissed another woman. After all the time she’d spent with him through his surgeries and recovery, he repaid her by cheating. He tapped his keyboard, bringing up the video chat application he and O’Connell used to communicate. The time would be early morning in Afghanistan. Hopefully she’d be awake, getting ready to go for a run.

After several rings, her image appeared, her sandy blond hair rumpled like she’d just gotten out of the rack. “Reaper?”

“Hey. Did I wake you?”

She rubbed her eyes and yawned. “Yeah. But I needed to get up anyway. How are you feeling? Are you getting along with your new therapist?”

“Sure.” That twinge of guilt almost tied his tongue. “I have a question for you.”

She pushed her hair out of her face and blinked several times before saying, “Shoot.”

“When we kissed goodbye…”

Her eyes flared and her face tightened. “What about it?”

“How did it make you feel?”

She looked away from the screen. “You video chat me at six in the morning to ask how I felt about a kiss?” Her eyes narrowed, and she stared at the screen. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine. Never better and thinking more clearly than I have in a long time.” He sighed. “Did you feel a spark?”

“A spark?” She shook her head. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You know, like chemistry when our lips met.” He waved his hand, struggling for the right words and not finding them. “I sound like a fucking idiot.” He stared back at her and blurted, “O’Connell, let’s cut to the chase. Did you
feel
anything when we kissed?”

She stared at him for a long moment without moving.

Reaper thought the video feed had frozen and reached to hit the refresh key.

But then O’Connell bit her lip, her face tensed, and she said, “Of course, I did.”

He looked into the face of one of the best friends he’d ever had and forced a smile. “Okay then.”

“Is that why you called me?” she asked.

“That, and I was thinking about you and wanted to see your face.” He wasn’t lying. No matter how confused he might be, he would always love O’Connell.

But he couldn’t make himself tell her that he’d kissed another woman. Not while she was deployed. He didn’t want to guess how that would impact her ability to concentrate when she flew missions. She needed all her focus to be on the job she performed. He would be selfish if he confessed his infidelity when what she needed was to know everything was okay back home. Time enough for him to share what he’d done. In the meantime, he wouldn’t repeat his transgression with the pretty little therapist.

He owed it to O’Connell, his fiancée to be true. When she got back…then maybe he’d tell her…until then, he would behave himself. No more kissing the therapist.

As he lay in his bed, sleep refused to come right away. An image of Leigha’s face plagued him. Her freshly kissed lips, almost begging for another.
Fuck
. What kind of new hell was this?

Chapter Five

LEIGHA SPENT THAT night with her H&K .40 caliber pistol beneath her pillow, loaded, with the safety locked. By morning, she was kicking herself for letting talk of paroled offenders scare her into a sleepless night of tossing and turning.

She rose before her alarm, dressed, and made a large cup of coffee to jolt her brain into gear. Any sleep she’d actually gotten had been plagued with dreams of kissing Reaper. Not only kissing him, but lying naked in bed beside him, running her hands over his tattooed chest, down his ripped abs, and over his…

Leigha slammed her coffee mug on the table, hot liquid spilling over the edge onto her hand. “Damn it.” This was not happening. Her first real therapy case on her own, and she was falling for her patient. If only he hadn’t crossed the line and kissed her, she might have resisted her attraction, pushing it to the back of her mind while she worked with him in her sessions. But now…Holy hell, she’d tasted the forbidden fruit and there was no wiping it from her mind.

As she left her apartment, she patted her purse with her pistol tucked inside and made a thorough perusal of the parking lot before she walked to her Jeep. One circle around her poor, damaged Jeep reassured her nothing had been tampered with since the incident the night before. By the time she slid behind the wheel and locked the doors, she was convinced she was overreacting to a random act of thuggery.

Morning rush hour was particularly insane on her way to work, with people pulling out in front of her vehicle and nearly sideswiping her. She reached the rehab center with no incident, but her nerves were frayed and her lack of sleep topped with a heavy dose of caffeine weren’t helping.

“You look like hell,” Eric greeted her in the break room.

“Thanks,” she snarled. “I love you, too.”

“What’s got your scrubs in a twist?”

“Nothing.”
Everything. One SEAL in particular.

Eric checked the schedule. “You have a pretty full day, but one of your guys cancelled. Mind if I give you one of mine?”

“I don’t mind. Who cancelled?”

“Nipton.”

Her heart skipped several beats and then raced on. “Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah. Called first thing this morning and said he had an appointment he couldn’t miss at the same time this afternoon.”

Perhaps he’d had an attack of guilt. After all, he had a fiancée deployed to Afghanistan.

“About Nipton—”

“Did you hear, Pendley handed in his resignation? He’s taken a job in Richmond as head of a small physical therapy clinic. That’s going to leave us really shorthanded until we can hire in a couple more therapists.” Eric glanced up. “What about Nipton?”

“Nothing.” She checked her schedule and headed out onto the floor in search of her first patient. She couldn’t pass Reaper to anyone else when the staff were already shorthanded. Besides, what excuse would she give?
I kissed a patient and want to go to bed with him. Is there a problem?

Her career as a therapist would be over practically before it got started. She would have failed at two careers, and she hadn’t even hit thirty. No. She had to get a grip on her feelings, squelch her desire, and keep marching. Changing careers now wasn’t an option, and her stint here was too short to job hop to another clinic. She didn’t have enough experience on her resume to attract any other offers.

As she worked through the day, she wondered what
appointment
Reaper had that was so important he couldn’t complete his session. Or if there really was an appointment. At lunch, she got on the phone with Caitlynn Tate, the prosecuting attorney she’d dealt with during her stint as an officer of the DCPD.

Her secretary patched the call through.

“Officer Fields, what can I do for you?” Caitlynn answered.

“First off, I’m not an officer anymore.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. I was really hoping you’d recover sufficiently to go back to work for the department.”

“It wasn’t to be. But I’m okay and working with disabled vets in Bethesda.”

“I bet the work’s a lot more rewarding than street cleaning in the capital.”

“It is.” Leigha realized for the first time that it really was. Her colleagues weren’t badgering her about being the smallest cop on the force, and the patients were, for the most part, grateful for her assistance, not trying to shoot at her. For a woman who, at one time, could only see herself as a cop, she’d not only reimagined her life, she was living it and that made her feel pretty damn good. And the fact someone had tried to take away her newfound confidence by ramming into the back of her Jeep pissed her off. “I have a favor to ask.”

“Anything,” Caitlynn responded.

“Is it possible to find out if any of the criminals I’ve arrested, who were subsequently sentenced to prison, have come up for parole?”

“We have a database that collects that information. I’ll have my secretary run a query.”

“I’d appreciate anything you can give me.” If the attack the night before was deliberate, she’d find the bastard.

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m curious.”

“Casual curiosity, or something happened to you that makes you think you might be targeted for retribution?”

Leigha had always been impressed with Caitlynn’s ability to see through the bullshit and get down to the nitty-gritty. “I was rear-ended last night.”

“Fender bender?”

“Three times by the same vehicle.”

“I see.” Caitlynn paused. “I’ll have my secretary get right on the task. In the meantime, you might want to stay with a friend or family.”

Reaper had suggested the same, even volunteering to stay with her. Having the SEAL spend the night in her apartment would have been a complete disaster. “Thanks, Caitlynn. Anything you have will help.”

“Be vigilant.” The P.A. rang off, and Leigha stared at her cell phone for a long moment. Two people had given her the advice of staying with someone else. Maybe she was being too casual about the incident.

Her lunch hour over, she went back to work and kept busy for the rest of the day, working with warriors who had a lot more to deal with than she did. She focused on them and resigned everything else to the back of her mind for after she left work at the end of the day. Reaper’s replacement showed up for his appointment slot, and Leigha couldn’t help the twinge of disappointment, but she moved on, giving her new patient all the care and attention he deserved.

Perhaps Reaper would request a different therapist and save her the trouble of doing it herself. That would be just fine. She didn’t need to be involved with him. He was far too dangerous to her mind and body.

REAPER SAT ACROSS the table from Jon Rudnick at a bistro not far from the rehab facility.

Jon stared at Reaper’s stump, shaking his head. “It’s a shame you lost an arm, but I’m glad you’re alive.” He glanced up and smiled across the table.

Reaper fought the urge to wince, wondering how much time had to pass before he didn’t feel a stab of pain over the loss of his arm. “Have you found anything yet?”

“My computer guy is still working on the search. Hopefully he’ll have something by the end of the day.”

“I appreciate the effort. Let me know what I owe you.”

Jon waved a hand. “You don’t owe me anything.”

His hand fisted. “I don’t need your charity.”

“It’s not charity. Consider it a brother helping a brother.”