Too Hot to Hold by Stephanie Tyler Read Free Book Online

track. Got a nice little list. Between you and Saint and that goddamned brother of yours—”
    “Which one?”
    “You know which one,” Max snorted, and yeah, he was talking about Jake. Jake, who was seriously missing Izzy, as she was back working a short stint for Doctors Without Borders. At least work was keeping him busy.
    Both Jake and Chris had gone straight to base from their night out—as previously planned—for an earlier-than-0-dark-hundred flight for Coronado with the team’s senior chief, Mark Kendall, to participate in cross-training exercises. Nick and Saint and other teammates would remain in Virginia, as Nick was finishing up training of his own, training he’d had to put aside hurriedly when his team had gotten called away months earlier.
    Now Nick waited until Max stopped grumbling under his breath and finally told him, “All right, give me a few days and I’ll see what I can do.”
    “I don’t have a few days.”
    “Holy fuck, Devane, crawl out from my ass!” Max roared. But Nick stayed in his seat, remained unimpressed. “I don’t know where the hell you got your balls, kid.”
    “This guy was Kaylee Smith’s husband,” Nick said quietly as he slid the piece of paper with Aaron’s name on it, and the request for Nick’s old SITREP, toward Max.
    “Why didn’t you just say so to begin with?”
    “I never did like doing things the easy way.”
    “I thought you were shutting her down,” Max grumbled.
    “I was. I am.” Nick stood. “Can you get me Kaylee’s address as long as you’re searching? Maybe run her plate number for me now.”
    Max gave him a long stare, and then began to type the license plate number into the computer as he spoke. “You’re playing with fire on this one. You know that, right? Because you’re supposed to get this woman off your tail, not get involved in her life.”
    “I’m not getting involved in her life,” Nick insisted, even as his mind flashed back to last night, the way she’d have easily wrapped herself around him if he’d pushed.
    It felt like it had happened ten minutes ago, as if no time had passed, and the sensation of hard needles of cold water hitting his skin in the shower earlier had made him bare his teeth and hiss—it had done little for his hard-on, only served to make him think of the woman who had gotten him this aroused.
    He needed something to fill up the silence. He wanted the loud, pounding sounds of music, of combat—of sex. Tonight, none of that would do, at least not with a stranger, not that he hadn’t considered that possibility.
    Finding out that Deidre had died via a news report had thrown him. But losing himself in grief for a mother who’d never wanted him wouldn’t do shit for him anyway. Losing himself in Kaylee … that was a much different story.
    He left Max’s lair and headed to his own office, was down the hall moving toward his cubicle in the quiet area the SEALs often used to strategize, when he suddenly knew someone was on his six and far too close for comfort.
    He turned before the man could lay a hand on him, had his own palm poised to strike directly at the throat of whoever was stupid enough to attempt to sneak up on a military man just home from combat. Christ, they were all jumpy as hell when they got back, but with his aversion to being touched, he was the worst one of all.
    He just hid that last part better than most.
    It was his CO. Saint had his own palm raised and he was smiling. “Making sure you’re on your toes,” he drawled as he sauntered past Nick toward his own office.
    Nick flipped him the internal middle finger. “I put in for three days of leave, starting tomorrow,” he called after him.
    “Everything all right?”
    “Just something I need to take care of. No big deal.”
    “Take a week.”
    “I don’t need a week.”
    “Don’t fuck with me when I’m feeling generous,” Saint admonished. “You come back here with any part of your body in a cast and I’ll kill