Meara looked sufficiently shocked, and he thought—and hoped—she wouldn’t pay Bjornolf any attention now that she knew what he did for a living, if that was Bjornolf’s intention. But Finn was beginning to wonder if hiding his real objective was part of Bjornolf’s chameleon persona. Finn noted that Anna appeared just as surprised to learn who “Joe” was, and he thought she wouldn’t see anything good in the man now, either.
Having covertly made eye contact with Finn, Anna looked as though she wanted to talk privately about something. From the way she wouldn’t sequester him in the living area of her suite, he assumed the something was about Meara. He wondered what Meara had done now. Finn had given Anna ample opportunity to speak with him privately, but she didn’t seem to want to alert Meara that she needed to talk to him about her. Hell.
When Anna still didn’t say anything about it, he finally decided to call it a night. Whatever it was couldn’t be too bad, or Anna would have made more of an effort to speak with him secretly.
Feeling smug about Bjornolf not having a chance at seducing the women, he said good night to Anna, knowing Paul would arrive momentarily and watch her back as she did his. The time had come to take Meara back to the safe house. He assumed they’d have a tail, Bjornolf again, only Finn didn’t plan to try and lose him this time. But he damn well wanted to know what was bothering Anna.
Meara was quiet on the drive back. He figured she was frazzled and tired, so he didn’t push the issue of her following Bjornolf to the lounge when he’d instructed her to stay in the lobby.
But when they arrived back at the safe house and Meara went straight to the kitchen to grab a stash of graham crackers, chocolate, and marshmallows, he studied her in surprise.
“What are you doing, Meara?” Finn figured as late as it was and as little sleep as they’d had, she’d want to return to bed. Like he did. He hadn’t planned to do anything more than hold her close, thank the merciful heavens that she and Anna were safe for the time being, and sleep.
He had every intention of questioning Meara about the SEALs’ last mission the next morning after they’d both had sufficient sleep. He wanted to learn how she had become involved and what exactly she’d done that none of them had known of.
“I’m having some more s’mores,” Meara said matter-of-factly and pulled open the door to the deck. “You and Bjornolf and Anna worried me sick. I need some chocolate to help me get back to sleep.” She sounded drained by the experience as she left the house and walked down the wooden stairs to the beach.
Finn stared after her for a moment, then shook his head and followed her. There was no figuring women—especially this woman.
He’d never paid much attention to a woman walking on a beach before, but when he reached the sand and saw the way Meara was trying to navigate through the sifting particles and the way her hips were swaying, he found himself mesmerized. She soon broke the spell when she turned and motioned to the fire pit.
“Why don’t you start the fire? I’ll hold on to the fixings.” She possessively held the packages to her breast, and he noted again how beautiful but tired she looked.
He wasn’t used to a woman giving him orders, and he would have preferred that she tell him to carry her off to bed, rather than start a fire and roast more marshmallows. But he silently did what she’d requested.
His thoughts slipped to what Bjornolf had said concerning how she’d saved their lives, and despite the hour, Finn couldn’t wait for morning to have this discussion. If they’d gone to bed, that would have been another story. He started the fire, then glanced over at Meara as she settled on the bench, quietly observing the ocean, her expression one of peace, tendrils of dark curls tickling her cheeks in the cool breeze.
She looked at home on the beach with the pine trees behind her rising on the hillside and stretching ponderously over the house. When he’d seen her in the redwoods of California, he’d thought she was at home there as well. He realized then that she was the kind of woman who suited the great outdoors, no matter what the environment. Well, maybe not the desert. He couldn’t see her living there.
Unless it was a desert island. And he was shipwrecked on it with her. But there wouldn’t be any s’mores to share with her then. Oysters could work wonders, though.
He sighed. His need to know what had happened during their last mission nagged at him, and he wanted to ask her what she’d done to save Hunter and the rest of the men. Yet for an instant, he didn’t want to spoil the moment. He had to ask her, though.
He cleared his throat, drawing her attention. “Meara, Bjornolf said you saved our lives on our last mission.”
Her eyes widened, and then she smiled a little. “How’d he know I made my special homemade soup for the rest of the guys after Hunter and the others were injured? Did you know that family recipe had been passed down for generations? It works, though. It truly helps to encourage healing.”
Soup?
Finn reached for the bag of marshmallows and skewered a couple. “I thought he meant something more… directly related to the mission.”
“Like what?” She snorted. “I didn’t even know where you were going to be.” She frowned. “What did Bjornolf say I did?”
“He said you saved us. That we would have all been dead if it hadn’t been for you.”
Meara looked back out to sea. “He’s making it up.”
Finn thought he saw a niggling worry line etched across her forehead. Maybe from trying to recall something that might have happened. Had she done something inadvertently and didn’t even realize what she’d done?
“Maybe it seemed insignificant to you at the time, but it was really important. Can you remember anything to do with that last mission?” Finn asked.
“Yeah. I fought with Hunter. I was going out with this guy…”
Finn couldn’t help that he was scowling. What did he care about some guy she was dating?
She frantically waved at the marshmallows. “Hey! You’re burning them!”
“Hell.” He shook them off the stick into the sand, the marshmallows covered in flames and the white quickly turning black. Concentrating on the task at hand, he poked two fresh marshmallows on the stick.
“Hunter didn’t care for the guy,” Meara continued.
Finn didn’t want to hear this. He was certain he wouldn’t have cared for the guy either, no matter who he was. But what did that have to do with their mission? Since she seemed focused on that instead of with his real question, he might as well let her get it out of her system first. “Was he wolf or human?”
“Wolf.”
Finn tried to appear neutral, despite not liking that she was seeing wolves, assuming she wouldn’t want to talk about it with him if he seemed to feel the same way as Hunter.
She concentrated on the marshmallows. “Don’t burn them this time.”
“Why didn’t Hunter like this guy?” Hunter’s instincts had always been good about keeping Meara from making a mistake so Finn trusted Hunter’s judgment over hers. He wondered if she actively sought problem males just to provoke Hunter.
“Here, let me have the marshmallows. Your mind is elsewhere.” She pulled off the melted ones and let him have them. “Next two are mine.” She poked the marshmallows on the stick, her fingers inadvertently sliding down the length, and he thought of how she had wanted to put her hand on him earlier that evening and stroke him like he’d stroked her.
He closed his eyes and shook the notion loose, then looked back at her and prompted, “He didn’t like this guy you wanted to date. Why?”
“He never liked any of the guys I wanted to see, Finn. Period. None of them were good enough for me, so he said.”
“He was right, too, wasn’t he?”
She grunted and sandwiched the chocolate and the gooey marshmallow between the graham crackers. “He wouldn’t like you seeing me in that way either, you know.”
Finn snorted. “We’re not talking about me. Why did Hunter not like this guy in particular?”
“It was right when you were going on your last mission. Hunter was adamant that I not see the man while he was away. He was afraid something might happen between us, and he wouldn’t be able to stop it before it was too late. I wasn’t planning on mating the guy, just dating him.
“It wouldn’t have mattered who he was, at least I don’t believe so. All he had to be was an unmated alpha male and that was it. Hunter…” She sucked the marshmallow and chocolate off her fingers, one after another. “…had an uncanny ability to know when someone wasn’t right for me. Or at least he thought he had. I really think he was wrong about this guy. That’s all.”
Finn stared at the way she sucked her fingers, wanting to be the one licking them, and then at her lips, thinking of how he’d kissed her in the sand and wanting to repeat the performance.
But damn it, he was not a moonstruck teen. And he had to get his raging testosterone under control. “What happened between you and the guy?”
“Nothing. He left. I figured that Hunter must have had words with him, and I never heard from him again.”
All right. Finn could see Hunter doing that. And anyone who wasn’t alpha enough would have backed down, tucked tail, and left. “What happened between you and Bjornolf at Anna’s hotel?”
“What do you mean?”
Her question struck Finn as odd. Why not say nothing had happened? If nothing had occurred between them.
She was watching Finn with an alpha’s challenging gaze, but he swore her armor had slipped when he heard the nearly imperceptible hitch in her voice and observed the way she stood a little straighter, stiffening her back, the way her eyes were wide with feigned innocence, as if she was hiding a guilty conscience.
Hell. “He was seated in a booth in the lounge, drinking a beer and waiting for you. Why?”
Meara looked genuinely surprised. “He said he didn’t drink.”