SEAL'D In Deep Read online

  She had worn lace earlier that morning, when she thought he might meet her for lunch. She had known, at the time, that it was a horrible idea. That all that would come of it would be making Carter McIntyre feel as though he was an escort or something. But she couldn’t help herself.

  Thankfully, he had been busy and it had given her libido some time to cool down. By the time she arrived home, however, the prospect of seeing him again had her considering a cold shower, if only to rid herself of the flush on her cheeks.

  Ultimately, she decided against that, as well. Liz was a grown woman and she could sit through an hour-long dinner with a man without wanting to jump his bones. Even if that man happened to be as handsome and mysterious and…beautiful as Carter McIntyre.

  Liz ran her hands over her curves and she couldn’t help but imagine Carter doing the same thing. She imagined him stepping up behind her and pushing her against the mirror. Imagined him running his hands up her thighs and slipping his fingers between her legs to feel the dampness there, waiting for his touch. She imagined him unzipping his jeans and pushing aside the crotch of her panties or—better yet—ripping them straight off of her like they were made of tissue paper. She imagined him entering her in one fluid motion, stretching her almost to the point of pain, because she could only imagine that somebody with his confidence, with his body, was quite large. She imagined him taking her from behind, while she met his eyes in the mirror, one of her hands resting over his between her legs as he rubbed her clit, the other laced with his fingers on the mirror, leaving their mark as their hot breath left steam and—

  A knock at the door rocked Liz from her daydreams and she blinked, looking at her reflection in the mirror. She was flushed, her entire face red, all the way down to her chest, which was heaving. There was an insistent throb between her legs that refused to go away even as she rubbed her thighs together. Her eyes were classy and her steps were jilted as she made her way toward her bedroom door, taking a deep breath before straightening her spine and walking, with more confidence than she felt, toward her apartment door. The heels she’d chosen were professional as well, but the heels were a little higher than necessary. She imagined they gave her a bit of an edge.

  She was hoping that Carter would be distracted by them, just a little bit. Also, they made her ass look fantastic.

  Taking a deep breath, Liz tugged on the doorknob and pasted on a sexy grin as the door opened to reveal Carter McIntyre…in Navy fatigues. Her eyes widened at the sight, her panties dampening even further as she realized that he was also shaved, his jaw smooth and square and enticing. He stood ramrod straight, like a true soldier, but there was a tilt to his head as his eyes raked over her form.

  “Nice skirt,” he murmured.

  “Nice uniform,” she retorted.

  Both statements were unambiguously and genuinely honest as both pairs of eyes filled with heat. Liz felt the familiar itch in her fingers to reach out and touch Carter’s jaw, but she resisted. To her surprise, he leaned down and pecked her on the cheek, smiling just slightly as he pulled away.

  “Please,” she said, stepping aside, “come in.”

  “Thank you,” he replied gruffly, stepping over the threshold and into the living room. His eyes seemed to drink everything in as she drank him in. She had not considered the fact that he may have had business with the Navy today. Perhaps there was a reunion of some kind, or he was being called back to serve. An end to his leave would mean that she would be out of a subject.

  And a lover.

  “The food is on the table,” she said, brushing her thoughts away. “Help yourself.”

  “Thanks,” Carter said, making his way to the table. It might have been Liz’s imagination, but his steps were much more rigid than they had been earlier. Or maybe it was just the uniform that made her think that.

  “Was there a convention or something?” she asked, closing the front door and following him into the kitchen. Carter had grabbed one of the plates that she set out and was now piling it with food, keeping them in separate sections on his plate, just barely touching.

  “Excuse me?” he said, turning to look at her, one eyebrow raised.

  “What’s with the uniform?” Liz asked.

  “Oh,” Carter said, looking down at the fatigues. “I was meeting with a few Navy buddies at a bar downtown. They give you free drinks if you’re in uniform.”

  “So that’s where you were when I texted?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you have a good time with your friends? Are they all on leave?”

  “Are you writing an article or something?”

  “What? No…”

  “Then what’s with all the questions?” At Liz’s raised eyebrows and widened eyes, he sighed and shook his head. “Sorry, Morgan,” he said. “I’ve had a long day. I didn’t mean to snap.”

  “Is that a Navy thing?” she deflected. “Addressing people by their last name.”

  “Yeah,” he confirmed. “Sometimes, we come up with nicknames, too, but they’re not always so polite.” Liz chuckled at that. “So, you wanted to talk about something?”

  “Yes,” Liz replied. “But, first, take a seat, please?”

  Carter nodded and pulled out a chair at the table, setting his plate down in front of him as he sat down. Liz made herself a plate and did the same, reaching for a paper napkin and placing it on her lap.

  “Very prim and proper for Thai and beer, don’t you think?” Carter said, reaching for one of the half warm beers in the middle of the table and cracking it open with his bare hand. Liz watched with wide eyes, obviously impressed.

  “I was raised wealthy, remember?” Liz tried to joke. Carter grinned. She cleared her throat. “So what I wanted to talk to you about,” she went on, grabbing her own beer and reaching for the bottle opener. Before she could snatch it, however, Carter had already plucked the bottle from her hand and opened it. He handed it back to the wide-eyed (and damp-centered) Liz and she thanked him, before starting in on her food.

  “You were saying?” Carter prompted, reminding Liz that she had been saying something, but the intensity of those green eyes staring at her and the way he looked in his Navy fatigues had distracted her and caused her mouth to go dry.

  She took a long sip of beer before answering.

  “How would you feel,” she started, “if I asked to take your photo?”

  Carter’s fork paused and his eyes widened as he stared at her for a heart-stopping moment, before a cocky smile spread his lips and he straightened up, tilting his head. “Why, I thought you’d never ask.”

  Liz let out a breath and a nervous little laugh. “You were really expecting this?”

  “Why wouldn’t I?” Carter asked. “I think I’m pretty good-looking, don’t you?” It was clear by his tone that he was only half-joking. Either way, Liz had to agree.

  “Definitely,” she said, feeling her cheeks flush. “So, you’ll do it?”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, it’s a bit time-consuming.”

  “Taking a photo?” Carter asked. “Isn’t it just click, click, done?”

  “I don’t just want a photo of you, Carter,” Liz explained. “I would like to do a whole series of them.”

  “Really…”

  “Yes,” Liz said. “You’d be handsomely compensated for your time, obviously, but I feel that you would be perfect for what I have in mind.”

  “But, why do you want to take my photo? I thought you only photographed famous tourist attractions.”

  “Landmarks,” Liz corrected.

  “Whatever.”

  “I take photographs of people, too.”

  “The tourists?”

  “No,” Liz snorted. “Like, actual subjects. I haven’t had one in a few years. Not since I left Europe.”

  “Do you even realize how much you sound like a spoiled rich girl?” He was completely joking this time; Liz couldn’t help but laugh.

  “You’re saying that you wouldn’t have take
n the opportunity to travel if you’d gotten an inheritance?” she challenged.

  “I traveled with the Navy. That’s enough, I think. Though, it is rather impressive what you’ve been able to do with what you’ve been given.”

  “Have you…do you know my work?”

  “I know your father’s work,” Carter explained. “My commanding officer had a few of his photographs hung up in our tent. It was supposed to inspire us to want to go home more quickly; to fight harder.”

  “That’s…really nice of him.”

  “Not so much nice as an incentive,” Carter said. “And I guess I accomplished what he wanted. I’m here.” There was a hint of sadness behind it, but Carter hid it well.

  “What was it like out there?” Liz asked.

  “Way different than it is here,” Carter retorted. “For one thing, you’ve always had enough to eat.”

  “But without an inheritance, I wouldn’t have,” Liz said. “When I was first starting out, I used to panic about the day my inheritance would run out. What would I do if I didn’t start to really sell my work. I went to school for photography—it was my whole life. I didn’t know how to do anything else. Working in an office would have been like giving up for me and I refused to give up.”

  “You could have joined the Navy,” Carter said, pointing his fork at her. “Fight for your country and whatnot.”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Liz said, her voice quiet.

  Carter tilted his head, looking a bit insulted. “Why? You a pacifist or something?

  “No,” Liz replied, her voice quiet, still, her eyes on her plate.

  “Then why wouldn’t you join?”

  “Because my brother died out there,” Liz admitted. “He was stationed in Afghanistan when a suicide bomber ran through his camp. He was one of the men trying to negotiate with the man who did it; trying to get him help. But the man insisted that what he was doing was right and what they were doing was wrong. My brother was the closest person to the impact.” She looked down at her plate. “There wasn’t even enough of him sent back to bury. We got an empty casket.”

  Silence filled the space between them for a long moment as she pushed her food around her plate.

  “How old was he?” Carter asked, after some time had passed.

  “Twenty,” Liz informed him. “I was seventeen, just starting to look into college. He always joked that I should join up and have the government pay for my education. He used to send me these horribly lit pictures of the desert and write that, if I was there, I could do so much better. I actually considered it for a while.”

  “Until he died.”

  “No,” Liz sighed. “Even after that, I thought about joining. It was my father that stopped me. He told me that my mother couldn’t bear to lose another one of her children. There were only five of us left after Brent died.”

  “Your brother’s name was Brent? Brent Morgan?”

  “Yeah,” Liz said, glancing up. “Did you know him?”

  “Not personally, no. He was military. But I heard about him; the kid that put himself between a bomber and the rest of his platoon without any armor whatsoever. He’s a legend. He got a few medals for that, didn’t he?”

  Liz nodded. “Our eldest brother, Zach, has them. They were really close. Zach always felt like he needed to protect us. Especially me and Brent, since we were the youngest.”

  “What about your other siblings?” Carter asked. “Any of them ever go into the military?”

  Liz shook her head. “Brent was the only one. He wanted to be like our grandfather, who died in battle when my dad was thirteen. My dad didn’t like it, but he couldn’t exactly stop him.” She smiled to herself and shook her head. “Nobody could stop Brent Morgan from going after what he wanted.” She took a deep breath and another sip of her beer. “My other brothers went into construction and business. I’m the only girl and the only one that followed in our father’s footsteps.”

  “Only girl with five brothers. That must have been a rough childhood.”

  “I can hold my own,” Liz huffed, but she grinned. “I was a little bit of a tomboy growing up, a little rough around the edges, but I grew up well. My mom taught me all about makeup and dressing right and showing off ‘what the lord gave me’,” she put on a fake Southern accent for that, then laughed. “My brothers taught me how to fight and stand my ground. So, all in all, I’d say I turned out just fine.”

  “More than fine,” Carter husked and Liz felt her face flush. She reached for her beer and took another long sip.

  “So,” she said, taking a deep breath as she set down the now empty bottle, “about this photography subject thing. You’d be compensated, of course.”

  “Compensated how?” Carter asked. There was heat in his eyes as they raked her body.

  “In cash,” Liz replied, trying and failing to keep her voice firm and unaffected by the way he was scorching her without even touching her body. “For every photo taken, you’ll get a fair sum, and for every one sold, you will get a percentage of the profits.”

  “How big of a percentage?” Carter asked.

  “Twenty percent.”

  “How about thirty.”

  “Twenty-five.”

  “Thirty.”

  They locked eyes across the table, waiting for the other to blink.

  “Fine,” Liz said, at last. “Thirty percent, but you do everything I say. Understood?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Carter said, with a self-satisfied smirk. He reached for two more beers and cracked them open, handing one over to Liz. They tapped the necks together in a toast. “Deal.”

  “Nice doing business with you, Mr. McIntyre.”

  “It’s Lieutenant McIntyre, actually,” Carter said, pointing to his own nameplate on his left breast pocket.

  “Lieutenant, then,” Liz echoed with a flirty smile. “I always did love a man in uniform.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Mhmm,” she purred, rubbing his leg underneath the table, even as the voice inside her head reminded her to act professionally.

  “Well, that’s really too bad then, isn’t it?” Carter said, grabbing her ankle and pushing her wandering appendage away from his groin, where it had started to wander. “Because I don’t sleep with the people I work with.” He downed the rest of his beer and stood up, giving her an honest-to-god salute—which only made Liz’s libido that much worse. “Ma’am. Thank you for the meal, but I feel it’s time to retire.” His voice was deep and authoritative and all she wanted to do right now was push him back toward her bedroom and have her way with him.

  Instead, he was already walking toward the front door, his hand reaching for the doorknob.

  “Wait!” Liz called out, brushing the napkin off her lap as she got up to follow him. Carter paused, his hand clutching the knob. He turned back to her, waiting. “Nine AM,” Liz said. “Tomorrow. Wear a bathing suit.”

  “Why?” Carter asked, furrowing his brow.

  “Because,” Liz retorted, “our first photoshoot is at the beach.”

  Chapter Four

  The sand was white and hot beneath their feet, burning their soles, but neither of them bothered to move as they watched the waves lap against the shore, every now and then licking at their ankles.

  When she was a little girl, Liz had loved the ocean. She and her brothers would spend all day running along the shore, chasing the waves and riding their boogie boards in the shallows. Their father took photos of their smiling, toothless faces and sun-freckled skin and placed them all over the house. He always kept his favorites in his wallet so that he could show people when he went away for business.

  “There are my kids,” she imagined he’d say. “My boys; Zach, Kevin, Marty, Louis, and Brent. And my ginger girl, Lizzie. She’s a photographer, you know. Just like her old man.” He always brought back a picture especially for her, to tape to her bedroom wall. She loved the beach scenes most. Especially the ones with people.

  “So what do I do?” Carter a
sked, startling her from her memories. “Just stand here and let you photograph me?”

  “Essentially; I’m just taking a few test photos for right now,” Liz replied with a shrug. “Just act natural. You can do whatever you want. Go for a swim or sit down in the sand…just stay close enough for me to capture you. I’ll let you know when I get an idea.”

  “Fine,” Carter said, wading out into the water, shin-deep. He stretched his arms up over his head and Liz watched as his muscles rippled beneath his skin. The scars on his back stretched and she wondered if they ever ached when it rained or when it was cold outside. Maybe he had broken bones or had shrapnel embedded there at some point and there was still some inside the jagged lines of his back. There was always a story to be told with injuries like that.

  Especially the burns that lined his forearms.

  But she wasn’t going to ask. That wasn’t her job. All she had to do was take his picture and let the camera tell a story that her clients would pay handsomely for once they were pinned up in galleries all across California. Her personal curiosity was not important.

  Even so, she itched to ask him questions, to run her fingers over each line, to kiss each burn and listen to him tell her the story of how each of them had come to find their home on his body. She wanted him to hold her in his strong arms and whisper the secrets of his past in her ear as his own hands mapped the curves and folds of her body.

  She shook off the longing thoughts and snapped more pictures of Carter as he plopped down in the water, stretching his legs out under the surf as white foam washed over his lap. The water glittered under the late morning sun, making his skin glisten and his blonde hair shine. Liz found herself walking toward him, trying to get a better angle of his profile.

  “Turn your head,” she called out to him, and he did, one green eye looking toward her, a glint of electricity flowing down her spine as she met his gaze through the lens of her camera. She shivered and pressed down on the shutter. “Good,” she said, her voice catching slightly in her throat. “Now look up at the sky.” He did, sunlight catching in his eyelashes. She snapped another photo of his face. “Lay down,” she ordered next.