Getting Hotter

Dylan barked out an incredulous laugh. “You have to report to the CO in like four hours.”

“Which is why there’s no point in even going to bed. I’ll wait for Miranda to get off, just in case those ass**les decide to come back here and cause trouble for her.”

“Suit yourself. You’ll be the one dead-ass tired in the water tomorrow.” Dylan pulled out his cell phone and scrolled through the contacts, but his vision kept going in and out of focus. “Shit, I know I have a cab number in here, but everything’s starting to spin.”

“Forget the cab. I’ll take you home,” Aidan offered.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, it’s not a problem.”

Dylan’s foggy brain registered a thought. “Aw shit, I can’t go home. I don’t want the kids to see me drunk.”

Aidan’s brows shot up. “You’ve got kids at your place? Since when?”

“Miranda and her children are staying with us,” Seth explained. “Their apartment flooded.”

“Ah. I see.”

“And the rugrats are asleep by now,” Seth pointed out.

Dylan stubbornly shook his head. “Don’t care. What if they wake up in the middle of the night and find me puking in the bathroom? I refuse to corrupt children.”

He’d barely finished his sentence when the world started to rotate again. He wobbled on his feet, nausea climbing up his throat.

Aidan shot Seth a perplexed look. “How is he able to speak in full, articulate sentences when he’s this loaded?”

“No f**king idea, man.”

“How about this? Why don’t you crash at my place tonight?” Aidan suggested. “I live three blocks from here, and I can drop you home tomorrow before I head to the base.”

“That sounds good,” he said, blinking rapidly in the hopes that it would help his eyes focus. Then he gave Seth the finger and added, “I’m keeping that twenty, by the way. Reparation for getting in a fight and cock-blocking me. Asshole.”

Next to him, Aidan gave a soft chuckle. “Shit. You SEALs really are on constant testosterone overload, aren’t you? Fucking or fighting—it’s always one or the other, huh?”

Dylan released a breath. “Tell me about it.”

Miranda was dead on her feet by the time two a.m. rolled around. By midnight, the club had emptied to less than half capacity, so her manager Wendy had sent her to the beer cooler to do inventory, leaving Alex to tend bar alone. Miranda’s arms now ached from lifting all those beer cases, she was shivering from being in a freezer for the past two hours, and to top off an already shitty shift, she’d gotten yelled at by Wendy for no good reason. She’d found out later that Wendy’s foul mood was the result of a fistfight that had broken out on the patio, but that didn’t make her feel any better about being wrongfully screamed at.

All she wanted to do was go home and take a hot bath before collapsing in bed, but that wasn’t exactly an option. Her twins could sleep through a tornado, but she didn’t want to risk waking Seth or Dylan by rummaging around their bathroom and making noise.

“’Night, Miranda,” one of the bouncers called as she left the club through the front doors.

“’Night, Nico.”

She rounded the building and made her way to the tiny lot in the rear alley. There were only four parking spaces back there—one was Wendy’s, the other three were for employees but on a first-come, first-served basis. Miranda had lucked out and snagged a space tonight, which meant she didn’t have to walk to the next block where she normally parked.

“Boo.”

The raspy voice came out of nowhere and made her jump two feet in the air. Heart pounding, she spotted Seth sitting on the trunk of her sedan, smoking a cigarette.

“Jesus, Seth! You scared me to death.” Her heartbeat steadied, then accelerated once more when she noticed the dried blood caked on his nostrils. “Oh brother. Why am I not surprised?”

He tossed his cigarette butt on the pavement and snuffed it out with the toe of his black boot. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’re the one who started that fistfight my manager was bitching about.” She unlocked her car and marched over to the driver’s side. “Ever the troublemaker, aren’t you?”

His taunting laugh floated toward her. “Why are you so convinced I started the fight?”

She stared at him. “Didn’t you?”

After a beat, he broke out in a rueful grin. “Yeah, I did. But you should know that I was defending your honor.”

Now she was the one laughing. “Oh really?”

“Really.”

Miranda watched as he scraped a hand over his scruffy goatee. Well, if you could even call it that. She actually had no idea how to classify Seth’s facial hair. Kind of a beard, kind of a mustache, mostly a whole lot of scruff that made him appear lethal as hell.

“Remember that meathead who was hitting on you earlier?” he prompted.

She nodded.

“I overheard him saying some very unpleasant things about you. One thing led to another and…” Seth shrugged.

She couldn’t help but smile. “I can’t decide if that was sweet of you, or incredibly stupid. I’m leaning toward stupid. And whatever that guy said? I’m sure I‘ve been called worse.”

“Maybe, but that doesn’t make a f**k of a difference to me. If someone disrespects you, I’ll damn well step in and make sure it doesn’t happen again.”