The SEAL's Second Chance: An Alpha Ops Novella by Anne Calhoun Page B

Rose’s shoulders and gave her a quick kiss. Jamie raised an eyebrow.
    “Turkey,” Keenan said succinctly. “I’ll tell you about it later. Take this,” he added, offering Jamie his bottle of beer.
    “Thanks, but keep it. I’ll get one of my own,” Jamie said, scanning the crowd. The average height of females in attendance skewed to the tall side, thanks to the current and former basketball players, but none of them were wearing a standout shade of fuchsia. He turned to scan the far end of the party, stretching through the flower beds and tulle-draped trellises, and saw most of Charlie’s players, but not Charlie.
    “Looking for someone?” Jack asked.
    “Yeah,” he said, then turned back to the entrance again.
    His heart stopped. Charlie stood on the wide-plank patio stretching the length of the building. Her hair, normally a pretty blonde, caught the sun like someone had streaked gold along the strands, and hung in tousled sexy waves around her face. She’d done her makeup, too, a little more mysterious than he’d seen back at the high school, something with her eyes that turned them violet, a barely there shade of pink on her lips.
    Jack was talking, then Keenan, and he knew from the tone whatever they were saying was at his expense, but he was out of fucks to give because a big, powerful fist had reached into his chest and squeezed, heart and lungs and diaphragm and stomach all crammed together, none of them working the way they were supposed to. He loved her so goddamn much. If this month didn’t work, then he’d come at it again, come home every leave he had, even if the travel time left him with twenty-four of a forty-eight with her. He wasn’t quitting until she was his, forever.
    “Who’s that?” Keenan asked.
    “That’s Charlie Stannard. She was a starting point guard on the championship team, and coaches the Lady Knights now,” Jack’s sister, Rose, said.
    “Hm,” Keenan responded politely.
    “Starting power forward,” Jamie corrected absently. “She could clear space under the basket like nobody’s business, and holds the school record for rebounds, boys or girls. She won the NCAA championship her junior and senior year in college, and started on the French team that won the European championship a couple of years ago.”
    “Hm,” Keenan repeated, this time with the respect Charlie deserved.
    Making his rounds of the assembled local dignitaries, retired teachers, administrators, and coaches, Jamie snagged a couple of glasses of champagne from a passing server and found Charlie under a rose trellis, Grace and the tall, silent Lyssa at her side. Grace tugged Lyssa away, leaving Charlie and Jamie alone.
    In place of the kiss he wanted to give her, he handed her a glass of champagne.
    “Thanks,” she said.
    “You look amazing.”
    “I can do makeup and hair,” she replied. “I just don’t usually do it. Have you been catching up with the guys?”
    “Yeah,” he said, distracted by the novelty of looking up into a woman’s face. “I lost touch with most of them after we all graduated.”
    “I stayed in touch,” she said, not meeting his eyes. “It’s easy to keep friendships going with Skype, Facebook, text.”
    “But it’s like the last ten years never happened.”
    “This is true.”
    “Got a second? I want you to meet some friends of mine.”
    “Sure,” she said, and followed him back to the loose cluster of people.
    He introduced her to Keenan and Rose, then to Jack and his date, Erin, and from there to Jack’s grandmother and a whole subset of Lancaster society. He watched her, knowing the strong lift of her chin hid her lifelong awareness of being from the East Side rather than from the Hill. But when he saw her step back and gesture for Lyssa and Grace to join them, then introduce them to Helen, he knew what she was doing. She carried deeply rooted shame that made walking through the Garden Club’s pristine white doors so hard for her, but she never stopped