course, he planted his paws so that she ended up dragging him.
She glanced at Jack, expecting to see disapproval, but the only thing in his eyes was amusement. “Here.” She unlocked her phone and handed it to him. “You’ll definitely be hearing from me if you can teach him some manners.”
“I can.”
When he handed her phone back, their fingers brushed against each other, and there was that tingling again.
“Take care, Nichole.” He squatted in front of Rambo. “I know you have a lot of energy, buddy, but try to behave for your mistress.” Rambo tossed himself onto his back, his tail scraping across the floor.
“I don’t think behave is in his vocabulary.”
Jack glanced up at her as he gave her dog a belly rub. “Part of teaching him that word will be to teach you how to master him.”
There was something in the way he said that, in the flash of heat in his eyes, that had her almost fanning her face. “Um, master him, right.” Jeez, Nichole, get your mind out of the gutter.
That was easier said than done with this man, and when the heat returned to his eyes and one side of his mouth curved up, she knew he knew right where her mind had gone. Again.
She glanced at the couple, who were still browsing. The woman picked up a mug. “I love how you embedded a maple leaf in these. I’ll take the set.”
“I’ll be right with you.” She glanced at Jack. “Gotta go.” Before something else came out of her mouth... Like my bed is only a few minutes from here. Want to go play?
He rose in a slow unfolding of his body that had her eyes tracking every movement and flex of his muscles. Oh, yeah. Sex. On. A. Freakin’. Stick. She’d been burned so badly by her last boyfriend that she’d gone through an I-hate-men stage. That phase might have just ended.
“Hope to hear from you, Nichole,” he said before picking up his coffee.
“I think you will,” she murmured as she watched him walk away. “And real nice butt, Whiskey,” she added.
Her morning had started off as one of the crappiest ever. She’d woken up tired and out of sorts after drinking enough wine to get up the nerve to call Trevor the Bastard Allen at three in the morning and tell him what she thought of him for sabotaging her commission. She’d figured that if she was up at that time of night, stewing over what he’d done, that it was only right for his sleep to be disturbed. The jerk had pretended not to know who she was.
Rambo hadn’t helped her mood when she’d found her favorite running shoes chewed up. Her fault for leaving them out, but weren’t all the toys she’d showered him with enough? Considering everything the world had rained down on her recently, she deserved a hot SEAL to play with, right? But she refused to appear too eager—because, really, the man probably had eager-to-get-into-his-pants women at his beck and call—so she’d wait a bit to contact him.
Chapter Two
There were two seasons in Afghanistan: freeze-your-ass-off cold and heatstroke fucking hot. At the moment Jack was positive he’d sweated off a good fifteen pounds under his uniform, flak jacket, and gear. He spit the dust out of his mouth and swiped his sleeve across his forehead. If he took off his helmet, a gallon of perspiration would probably fall down his face. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine that the warm water he was chugging was a beer so cold that it had turned into an icy slush. Didn’t work.
After giving Dakota some water, he nodded at his team. Time to move out. They were doing a reconnaissance run, looking for an Afghan official who’d been kidnapped. Intel had come in that the man was being held in the small village two klicks ahead. Since the information had come from an unreliable source, their orders were to find a place where they could observe. If they could confirm the official’s presence, they’d mount a rescue.
He was point with Dakota, and he made a useless wish that they could find a location to set up that had a damn shade tree. Useless because there wasn’t a single tree between him and the horizon. Dakota was a few steps ahead, her tongue flopping out the side of her mouth as she panted in an attempt to cool down. She was his third dog, and a good one.