She al­ways bo­ught ge­ne­ric clot­hes, ef­fi­ci­ency and com­fort be­ing her war­d­ro­be go­als. Ca­ta­log shop­ping sa­ved ti­me sin­ce ever­y­t­hing al­re­ady mat­c­hed, and the clot­hes, ne­ver in-or out of-st­y­le, las­ted for ye­ars.

  This mor­ning she hadn’t be­en ab­le to mo­ve her arm eno­ugh to ho­ok her bra, so she’d left it off. She’d ad­ded the bla­zer over her whi­te blo­use, ho­ping to dis­gu­ise the de­fi­ci­ency.

  Her out­fit wo­uldn’t ha­ve in­ci­ted envy, but it wo­uld ha­ve pas­sed mus­ter as dressy ca­su­al on the cam­pus of UNC-Wil­min­g­ton whe­re she was a juni­or fa­culty mem­ber. It was wrong for the bre­ak­fast.

  Emmie didn’t know what to say. She co­uldn’t tell Gra­ce, of all pe­op­le, the truth: she was lo­oking for Ca­leb. Gra­ce wo­uld want to know why, and she wasn’t a go­od li­ar. To lie well one had to un­der­s­tand a so­ci­ety’s un­w­rit­ten ex­pec­ta­ti­ons.

  Gra­ce wa­ived her he­si­ta­ti­on asi­de. “For­get I as­ked. Do you ha­ve a ri­de back to Mot­her’s ho­use?”

  “Yes.” She wo­uld if she co­uld find Ca­leb, at any ra­te. Em­mie had an ot­her­worldly in­no­cen­ce, pla­in and fresh as warm milk, that ma­de men twi­ce her age, bal­ding de­acons and lo­an of­fi­cers with grown chil­d­ren, hit on her. The go­od thing abo­ut it was that pe­op­le ra­rely qu­es­ti­oned her in­ten­ti­ons.

  “Fi­ne, just re­mem­ber it’s go­ing to ta­ke a long ti­me to dress.” For­tu­na­tely, be­fo­re she co­uld add mo­re ad­mo­nis­h­ments, so­me­one in­ter­rup­ted to ask Gra­ce for an opi­ni­on abo­ut so­me wed­ding de­ta­il. Em­mie ma­de her es­ca­pe with a lit­tle wa­ve.

  She co­uld ha­ve scre­amed with im­pa­ti­en­ce when Pic­kett’s six­t­yish co­usin An­nalynn plan­ted her­self in her path, de­ter­mi­ned to pump Em­mie for news.

  “Pic­kett’s fi­nal­ly get­ting mar­ri­ed! Can you be­li­eve it? And to a re­al hot­tie!” An­nalynn gus­hed. An­nalynn gus­hed abo­ut ever­y­t­hing, but she ne­edn’t so­und as if a mi­rac­le had tran­s­pi­red. In Em­mie’s opi­ni­on, Pic­kett was far too fre­qu­ently re­le­ga­ted to “po­or thing” sta­tus. Her re­la­ti­ves still saw Pic­kett as the baby of the fa­mily, the chubby, fre­qu­en­t­ly-ill te­ena­ger with un­ruly ha­ir and her no­se stuck in a bo­ok.

  Emmie nod­ded but re­fu­sed to reply.

  As col­le­ge fres­h­men Em­mie and Pic­kett we­re nerds to­get­her and so­on best fri­ends. Pic­kett’s he­alth and fi­gu­re had im­p­ro­ved on­ce she le­ar­ned to con­t­rol her di­et. She dis­co­ve­red a ha­ir­cut that ma­de the most of her exu­be­rant gold curls and over­ca­me her ner­dis­h­ness with her warmth and com­pas­si­on. It was no sur­p­ri­se to Em­mie an at­trac­ti­ve man co­uld fall in lo­ve with Pic­kett.

  She was sur­p­ri­sed at Pic­kett’s cho­ice in a gro­om: a SE­AL. Ta­ke ever­y­t­hing bad abo­ut the mi­li­tary, mul­tiply it by ten, and you had a SE­AL. Pic­kett had al­ways sworn up and down she’d ne­ver marry a mi­li­tary man-it was so­met­hing they’d al­ways be­en in per­fect ag­re­ement abo­ut-and yet, Pic­kett had chan­ged her mind. It de­eply, de­eply sca­red Em­mie. Not­hing co­uld ever chan­ge the fact that she lo­ved Pic­kett with all her he­art, but she wasn’t su­re how they wo­uld ma­in­ta­in the­ir fri­en­d­s­hip. On­ce Pic­kett was ab­sor­bed in­to the mi­li­tary-in­dus­t­ri­al com­p­lex, she wo­uld be­co­me part of a cul­tu­re an­tit­he­ti­cal to Em­mie’s most ba­sic be­li­efs.

  Pic­kett wo­uld tell her she was wor­rying abo­ut events that hadn’t hap­pe­ned yet, and that she wo­uld ne­ver al­low an­y­t­hing to thre­aten the­ir fri­en­d­s­hip. No­ne of this was an­y­t­hing Em­mie was go­ing to dis­cuss with An­nalynn.

  Pa­ti­en­ce wasn’t Em­mie’s strong su­it. On­ce she had a go­al in mind, she ten­ded to fix on it to the ex­c­lu­si­on of all el­se. She didn’t ha­ve ti­me to tra­de party chat­ter with Pic­kett’s co­usins, aunts, un­c­les, and as­sor­ted ot­hers who­se deg­ree of kin­s­hip was dis­tant eno­ugh to con­fo­und the most de­ter­mi­ned ge­ne­alo­gist, but who, ne­ver­t­he­less, qu­ali­fi­ed as fa­mily. It se­emed li­ke every one of them had stop­ped her. Em­mie was ut­terly sick of ex­p­la­ining why her arm was in a co­balt blue can­vas sling. On­ce the wed­ding bre­ak­fast bro­ke up, the high-ce­ilin­ged ro­oms of the la­te Vic­to­ri­an ho­use wo­uld empty qu­ickly. If Ca­leb left be­fo­re she tal­ked to him, all her plans we­re ru­ined. The­re was a very small win­dow be­fo­re she had to get rig­ged out in the bri­des­ma­id ge­tup Gra­ce had cho­sen.

  The sling was rub­bing the col­lar of the be­ige bla­zer aga­inst her neck aga­in. Her war­d­ro­be go­al was ef­fi­ci­ency and com­fort, but she’d sac­ri­fi­ced com­fort to­day for clot­hes she co­uld get in­to una­ided. She reg­ret­ted the de­ci­si­on to add the bla­zer, but sin­ce she co­uldn’t ho­ok a bra she didn’t see what el­se she co­uld ha­ve do­ne.

  The worst part abo­ut the bla­zer was that it en­co­ura­ged her ha­ir to work its way un­der the sling. Pa­in­ful tugs ac­com­pa­ni­ed any in­ca­uti­o­us mo­ve­ment of her he­ad. Em­mie adj­us­ted the sling im­pa­ti­ently and scan­ned the thin­ning crowd, whi­le trying at le­ast to ap­pe­ar to lis­ten to An­nalynn. Im­pa­ti­ent as she felt, Em­mie didn’t want to be ru­de. From the first ti­me Pic­kett had bro­ught her ho­me for a col­le­ge ho­li­day, the­se pe­op­le had hug­ged her and te­ased her and ad­mo­nis­hed her as if she be­lon­ged.

  “I gu­ess you’re next.” Fa­iling to get Em­mie to talk abo­ut Pic­kett, An­nalynn tri­ed anot­her su­bj­ect. “When are you go­ing to find yo­ur­self a man?”

  “Actu­al­ly, I’m lo­oking for a man right now. Ha­ve you se­en Jax’s best man?”

  Emmie ca­ught the avid in­te­rest that wi­de­ned An­nalynn’s rat­her wa­tery eyes and ga­ve her­self a men­tal slap. She’d do­ne it aga­in! So­me­ti­mes she got so fo­cu­sed on her go­als she for­got to con­si­der how ot­hers wo­uld in­ter­p­ret her words and ac­ti­ons. The story that she and the best man we­re an item wo­uld ma­ke the ro­unds be­fo­re the ope­ning ta-dums of the wed­ding march.

  “I didn’t me­an it li­ke that,” she pro­tes­ted with a pa­ined la­ugh. “But I re­al­ly am lo­oking for him. I ne­ed to spe­ak to him be­fo­re he le­aves.”

  “I saw him on the front porch tal­king to Lilly Ha­le,” An­nalynn pan­ted, thril­led to be fos­te­ring a ro­man­ce. “Run qu­ick. I think he was ta­king his le­ave.”

  “Aunt Lilly Ha­le, can I bor­row Ca­leb for a mi­nu­te?”

  Do- Lord felt the odd lit­tle in­ter­nal shi­ver, li­ke the su­per­c­har­ged air of a thun­der­s­torm, a half-se­cond be­fo­re the wo­man ap­pe­ared at his el­bow. Wit­ho­ut tur­ning, he knew Eme­li­na Cad­din­g­ton, Pic­kett’s best fri­end and ma­id of ho­nor, sto­od be­si­de him.

  So­met­hing abo­ut her ir­ri­ta­ted him, so­met­hing be­si­des the way she cal­led him Ca­leb in her co­ol, pre­ci­se vo­ice, oddly de­vo­id of so­ut­hern ac­cent. No­body had cal­led him Ca­leb sin­ce he left Ala­ba­ma. He’d jo­ined the Navy the day he tur­ned eig­h­te­en, and sin­ce then he’d be­en Du­la­ude. Do-Lord to his fri­ends.

  She wasn’t at­ten­ti­on-worthy in any way ex­cept for her wi­de blue eyes that ga­ve her the lo­ok of a se­ri­o­us, in­tel­li­gent kit­ten. Ap­pe­aling ima­ge, but it was can­ce­led by her sha­pe­less clot­hes and sen­sib­le sho­es.

  Spin­s­te­rish. The old-fas­hi­oned word fit her and mat­c­hed her na­me, Eme­li­na. Be­si­de Pic­kett’s tall, ele­gant sis­ters, al­most awe-in­s­pi­ring in the­ir co­ol, blon­de be­a­uty, or Pic­kett her­self, the swe­etest, most fe­mi­ni­ne thing he’d ever se­en, Em­mie didn’t ra­te a se­cond glan­ce.

  SE­ALs might lo­ve one anot­her li­ke brot­hers and be wil­ling to die for one anot­her, but that didn’t me­an they li­ked every SE­AL. Any man who ear­ned the Tri­dent, the symbol of brot­her­ho­od with ot­her eli­te war­ri­ors, had le­ar­ned to con­t­rol his re­ac­ti­on to pe­op­le. Abo­ve all, he did not let things get to him. Which ma­de it even mo­re ir­ri­ta­ting that an­y­ti­me she was in the ro­om, he wat­c­hed her.

  “Emmie, dar­ling! It’s so go­od to see you.” The ol­der wo­man le­aned for­ward to ca­re­ful­ly lay her che­ek aga­inst Em­mie’s, avo­iding the bright blue har­ness that held Em­mie’s arm clo­se to her chest. “But yo­ur po­or arm! Are you still go­ing to be Pic­kett’s ma­id of ho­nor? How are you go­ing to ma­na­ge two bo­uqu­ets and Pic­kett’s tra­in and ever­y­t­hing?”

  Emmie fa­vo­red Pic­kett’s gre­at aunt with a stiff smi­le. “That’s what I ne­ed to talk to the best man abo­ut. Ex­cu­se us ple­ase?” Wit­ho­ut wa­iting for a reply Em­mie lo­oped her go­od arm thro­ugh his and tug­ged him back in­to the ho­use.

  It went aga­inst his gra­in to let a stran­ger in­si­de his per­so­nal spa­ce whe­re a kni­fe co­uld be used; or to let an­yo­ne ham­per his right arm pre­ven­ting him from go­ing for his we­apon; or to let him­self be ta­ken an­y­w­he­re he hadn’t de­ci­ded for him­self to go. A tiny bit amu­sed by her pre­sum­p­ti­on in be­li­eving she co­uld, he al­lo­wed her to le­ad him.

  The very no­velty sent a tin­g­le of an­ti­ci­pa­ti­on thro­ugh his bo­re­dom. She se­emed una­wa­re she’d cros­sed li­nes men twi­ce her si­ze wo­uldn’t ha­ve da­red, and she pres­sed his arm so clo­se he co­uld fe­el the soft gi­ve of the si­de of her bre­ast.

  Her full, soft bre­ast that wasn’t con­fi­ned by a bra.

  He wo­uldn’t be a man if he didn’t no­ti­ce.

  The ir­ri­ta­ti­on he al­ways felt aro­und her mor­p­hed in­to a mo­re pri­mal awa­re­ness. He sud­denly no­ti­ced her smell. She wo­re no per­fu­me that he co­uld de­tect. She just smel­led ba­sic. Swe­et. Li­ke a wo­man.

  She in­ten­ded to pull him past the par­lors in­to the wi­de hall that wo­uld ta­ke them de­eper in­to the ho­use. He didn’t think she was co­ming on to him-not af­ter the stiff way she al­ways ac­ted aro­und him-but she was up to so­met­hing. “Whe­re are we go­ing?”

  “To Aunt Lilly Ha­le’s of­fi­ce. So­mep­la­ce we can talk.”

  “Talk?” Do-Lord hal­ted so he co­uld lo­ok in­to her fa­ce. He squ­as­hed an ab­surd blos­som of ho­pe. She was the last wo­man in the world who wo­uld pull him asi­de for a qu­ic­kie. And clo­se to the last wo­man in the world he wo­uld want to pull him asi­de. Ye­ah, sud­denly she in­te­res­ted him, but not that way. Even tho­ugh she re­min­ded him mo­re than ever of a se­ri­o­us, and right this mi­nu­te, very de­ter­mi­ned kit­ten. A Si­ame­se kit­ten with big, blue eyes and sil­very be­ige fur.

  Emmie in­ter­cep­ted the rat­her cal­cu­la­ting lo­ok of mas­cu­li­ne as­ses­sment he ga­ve her, and sud­denly be­ca­me awa­re of the he­at and ste­ely strength of the arm un­der the fi­ne twe­ed of his co­at, and of the fact that she had left off her bra this mor­ning. Co­uld he tell? Su­rely not.

  She wan­ted to grind her te­eth with frus­t­ra­ti­on. It was that go­al-di­rec­ted thing aga­in ma­king her una­wa­re of how she was co­ming ac­ross. Grab­bing his arm had be­en a stu­pid mo­ve, but for a man who sto­od out as he did, he co­uld be ama­zingly elu­si­ve. For thirty mi­nu­tes she’d se­ar­c­hed the crowd for his rus­set he­ad and bro­ad sho­ul­ders, dod­ging jocu­lar ina­ni­ti­es abo­ut when she was go­ing to find her­self a man. The irony hadn’t es­ca­ped her.

  Or im­p­ro­ved her dis­po­si­ti­on, she was af­ra­id. Her sho­ul­der hurt with a de­ep, grin­ding ac­he. All she re­al­ly wan­ted to do was ta­ke her pa­in me­di­ca­ti­on and lie very still un­til it was ti­me for the wed­ding.

  By the ti­me she’d spot­ted him fra­med by the do­ub­le do­ors open to the warm day, she’d be­en clo­se to fran­tic, the se­da­te calm with which she usu­al­ly en­du­red the­se fa­mily af­fa­irs shred­ded. She ne­eded him, and she’d grab­bed him, de­ter­mi­ned not let an­yo­ne in­ter­rupt. But re­al­ly! The­se jocks! He wasn’t a col­le­ge at­h­le­te, he was a mem­ber of a crack mi­li­tary te­am with an ani­mal na­me. Navy SE­ALs, Mi­ami Dol­p­hins, what was the dif­fe­ren­ce? She re­cog­ni­zed the type.

  They crow­ded her Un­der­s­tan­ding Eco­logy class, a Bi­ology elec­ti­ve for non-ma­j­ors, and tho­ught she sho­uld be flat­te­red. They as­su­med ever­y­t­hing with a va­gi­na was in­te­res­ted in them. They only had to cho­ose which one they wan­ted. They wal­ked the earth with a sen­se of en­tit­le­ment, su­re that the­ir pla­ce in the uni­ver­se gu­aran­te­ed the best.

  On cam­pus she ca­re­ful­ly kept her pro­fes­so­ri­al dis­tan­ce and ma­de it cle­ar in any in­te­rac­ti­on, she was in char­ge. Gi­ve them an inch, and they’d ta­ke a mi­le.

  She for­got her in­ten­ti­on to get on his go­od si­de. Kno­wing the ef­fect was pro­bably ru­ined by the he­at sta­ining her che­eks, she aimed him a don’t-mess-with-me gla­re, “I sa­id what I me­ant. You know. The ot­her fo­ur-let­ter word en­ding in k. Talk!”

  Her fa­ced fla­med red­der. What was the mat­ter with her? She ne­ver sa­id things li­ke that!

  His grin wi­de­ned. “Just chec­king.”

  He chan­ged the su­bj­ect. “Why do you call her ‘aunt?’ You’re not kin with this fa­mily are you?”

  Re­li­ef that she hadn’t of­fen­ded him ma­de her ex­pan­si­ve. “We’re not re­la­ted, but they are my adop­ted fa­mily. Pic­kett and I we­re col­le­ge ro­om­ma­tes. Be­ca­use my pa­rents are mis­si­ona­ri­es, go­ing ho­me for ho­li­days was out of the qu­es­ti­on, so I al­ways ca­me ho­me with Pic­kett. I just got in the ha­bit of cal­ling pe­op­le wha­te­ver Pic­kett did.”

  Emmie ope­ned the do­or in­to a sunny but­ler’s pantry Pic­kett’s aunt had con­ver­ted to a ho­me of­fi­ce. “He­re we are.”

  Fo­cu­sed on fin­ding a pri­va­te pla­ce whe­re they co­uld talk, she’d for­got­ten how small the ro­om was. Hun­d­reds of fra­med pho­tog­raphs, tiny and lar­ge, old se­pia-to­ne por­t­ra­its and bright clow­ning snap­s­hots, co­ve­red every bit of wall spa­ce left by the glass-fron­ted ca­bi­nets. The flo­or spa­ce, oc­cu­pi­ed as it was by an an­ti­que es­ta­te desk, left two adults hardly ro­om to stand.

  The unex­pec­ted in­ti­macy rat­tled Em­mie. He was so clo­se she co­uld see the sha­dow cast by his gol­den eye­las­hes. His eyes, a ha­zel mix­tu­re of brown and gold and gre­en, re­min­ded her of peb­bles was­hed by a mo­un­ta­in stre­am. Cold and hard. She for­ced her­self to lo­ok in­to them wit­ho­ut flin­c­hing. Last night she’d no­ti­ced the way he lo­oked at Pic­kett and tho­ught may­be she had an ally. Now she wasn’t so su­re.

  Under­ne­ath the sling she tug­ged the la­pels of her jac­ket to­get­her and to­ok a for­tif­ying bre­ath. At this la­te da­te the­re wasn’t an­yo­ne el­se she co­uld ask.

  “I un­der­s­tand you SE­ALs are pretty lo­yal to one anot­her,” she sa­id, get­ting stra­ight to the po­int. “Do­es yo­ur lo­yalty ex­tend to Pic­kett?”

  “What are you as­king?” In his lazy, li­qu­id drawl the qu­es­ti­on didn’t so­und li­ke a qu­es­ti­on. His vo­ice was de­ep, so­no­ro­us, but dam­ped, as if he saw no ne­ed to bring its full po­wer to this si­tu­ati­on. Yet the po­wer was the­re. His vo­ice felt li­ke fur stro­king down her spi­ne from her na­pe to the small of her back.

  She rut­h­les­sly slam­med the do­or on the tho­ught. Em­mie, child of mis­si­ona­ri­es, had spent her te­ena­ge ye­ars with an el­derly gran­d­mot­her. She wasn’t op­po­sed to who­le­so­me sex, but the tem­p­ta­ti­ons of sen­su­ality we­re sub­t­le and best avo­ided. This was for Pic­kett, but still, his vo­ice, dark as burnt um­ber and a lit­tle gritty, com­pel­led mo­re ho­nesty than she had plan­ned. “I’m as­king, are you wil­ling to do a fa­vor for Pic­kett-no mat­ter what the fal­lo­ut?”

  “Do I ha­ve to kill an­y­body?” He didn’t lo­ok li­ke he was kid­ding.

  “No, but if we’re ca­ught, all hell will bre­ak lo­ose. Pic­kett’s sis­ter Gra­ce might kill you.”

  “And you, I pre­su­me.”

  Emmie dis­mis­sed that. “Pro­bably, but I don’t ca­re. Pic­kett’s the pe­ace­ma­ker.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  Emmie to­ok a de­ep bre­ath and lo­oked him stra­ight in the eye. “We ha­ve to switch wed­ding ca­kes.”

  Chapter 3

  Whoa! Miss Eme­li­na might lo­ok bo­ring in her all-over be­ige clot­hes that mat­c­hed her be­ige ha­ir- tho­ugh bright sun stre­aming in the win­dow bro­ught out its pretty sil­ver she­en-but she’d just pro­ved she co­uld sur­p­ri­se him.

  Do- Lord la­ug­hed alo­ud, the first ho­nest la­ugh he’d had in days. “I’m get­ting a vi­si­on of a ca­ke ex­p­lo­ding li­ke Mt. St. He­lens and spe­wing whi­te fros­ting ever­y­w­he­re.”

  Sud­denly, he so­be­red. “Is this a prac­ti­cal joke?”

 

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