Christmas with a SEAL

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“Whoa.” The other man grimaced, holding up one hand in protest. “Is this the type of confession you really want to share? I’m not judging, man, but you’ve never been the bare-it-all kind of guy before. I hate to see you say something you’ll regret more than...” Lane coughed uncomfortably. “Well, more than whatever you did here already.”

“What?” His head in his hands, Phillip pressed his fingers against the sledgehammer pounding in his temples. Lane’s words finally filtered through the pain and remnants of the vile cocktail his system had made of scotch and champagne. He groaned. “No.”

“Beg pardon?”

Phillip risked spilling the contents of his stomach and lifted his head. “Frankie is a woman.”

“Yeah? Cool, I guess.” Lane shoved his hands in the front pocket of his jeans, looking as if he’d rather be anywhere but there. In perfect accord, Phillip shifted his gaze to the bedside clock.

How long had she been gone? How had he missed her leaving? He was a military specialist, highly trained in covert ops. And he’d slept through his one-night stand’s walk of shame.

“Sir, are you okay?”

Lane’s calling him “sir” wasn’t a form of respect, or in deference to Phillip’s rank. Nope, he frowned. That was his call sign. He’d always been a little amused by it in the past. He didn’t mind being thought of as uptight and by the book. He was ambitious enough to want to—to plan to—climb to the rank of admiral, so just generally thought of it as his due. He’d been raised to command and expect power.

But today, when he felt so far from commanding or powerful, the name grated.

“You are whiter than those sheets,” Lane noted. The guy didn’t sound panicked or worried. He didn’t move from his position by the door. But Phillip knew he was on full alert.

“Headache,” Phillip muttered, dismissing the gut-clenching migraine. He needed meds fast, or this sucker was going to put him down.

“I’ll meet you in the lobby in ten,” he said, dismissing the petty officer without a glance. Partially because the guy was standing directly in a pool of sunshine and Phillip was pretty sure looking directly at the bright light would make his eyeballs explode. But mostly because he needed all of his focus, his entire concentration, to put one foot in front of the other.

He made it to the bathroom, grabbed a bottle of aspirin out of his toiletry bag, and dry-swallowed two pills. A steaming shower, a hundred push-ups and three bottles of water from the minifridge later and he felt like he’d live.

He glanced at the bed and winced.

He didn’t do one-night stands.

He didn’t have sex with strange women.

And he certainly didn’t fall in love after seven hours. Hell, he didn’t even believe in love, so falling was pure impossibility.

Wasn’t it?

Phillip felt as though he was losing control. Everything was spinning out of bounds, even his own thoughts.

He wanted to know what the hell was wrong with him.

But he wasn’t going to figure it out now.

He’d told Lane ten minutes, and he was never late.

Well, almost never. There was the notable exception of when he’d been captured by a sadistic drug kingpin with an unhealthy interest in infiltrating the Navy SEALs through torture and intimidation.

Shoving the memories aside along with the nagging pain still pounding at his head, Phillip grabbed his few belongings, tossed them in his bag and headed for the door.

His hand on the knob, he glanced at the bed again.

The image of Frankie’s body spread beneath him filled his mind. The memory of her touch, of how it had felt to lose himself in her bombarded him.

He shook his head, hoping the pain would dislodge the thoughts. The sooner he put Las Vegas and last night behind him, the better. He wasn’t worried about the memories. He’d just shove them in that same locked part of his mind where he kept all thoughts of his days as Valdero’s guest.

* * *

FRANKIE SAT IN her studio, as she’d dubbed the third bedroom in her grandmother’s cute little house, and tried not to scream. In her fist, she clenched the hideously lumpy mangled silver that had started out as a necklace.

What had happened?

Where were all the colors, the brilliant images and all that amazing creative juju?

She’d been sure she had it when she’d tiptoed out of Phillip’s room. She’d had trouble sitting still on the plane ride home, she was so excited to get her hands on her tools. All it would take were a few pieces, maybe a dozen, to reestablish herself. A month or so to build up an inventory, maybe prep for a show.

By the time she’d unpacked her suitcase, she’d been able to see it all clearly. Her rise from the ashes, a celebrated return to glory. She’d have a stylish new condo by spring, be traveling around the country from gallery showings to high-end buyer meetings. Her pieces would be featured on television, in Vogue, maybe even in a movie or two.

And then she’d walked into her studio, smiling so big her cheeks hurt, and started to create.

Crap.

Frankie opened her fist to glare at the dull, unevenly linked spheres.

Every other thing she made was pure crap.

She knew she should be grateful that it wasn’t every single thing. She was doing fine with simple pieces, reproductions of her earlier works.

But she was an artist. Not an assembly line.

And an artist created new pieces, dammit.

Ready to scream, she threw the failed necklace on the table, the force sending the silver bouncing to the floor. Frankie got to her feet, tossing aside her apron since its weight only slowed down her pacing.

What was she going to do?

She glanced at the ornaments ready for packaging, each exactly the same except for the name and date etched and echoed in gemstones.

Christmas was in a little more than a month.

What was she going to do after that? Make Valentine’s ornaments? Fancy hangings to commemorate weddings and babies?

Frankie shoved her fingers into her hair, tugging to relieve the pressure.

How could any of that be considered creative? It couldn’t. It just couldn’t.

What had gone wrong?

After that night with Phillip, she’d felt the creative energy.

She’d seen so many pieces in her head, uniquely beautiful, each one in her signature quirky style.

After months of seeing nothing, it had been amazing. Like her birthday, five Christmases, graduation and incredible sex all rolled into one.

Incredible sex...

Heat washed over her, images flashing through her mind. Memories of Phillip, gloriously naked and poised over her body. Memories of that night, the orgasms—oh, the orgasms. So mind-blowing, so delicious.

She took a deep breath, her thighs trembling. She closed her eyes as heat coiled inside her, low and tight. Colors, images, designs flashed. So close. So, so close.

Maybe she could draw them. If she could get the images from her imagination onto paper, maybe—

“Frankie, the mail is here.”

Frankie bit back the curses that wanted to tumble off her lips. She’d been so close. It was like being caught reading a naughty magazine just when you got to the good part.

But a girl didn’t snap at her grandma, no matter how delicious that good part might have been. Instead, Frankie plastered on her brightest smile and turned to the door.

“Thanks, Nana,” she said, walking over to take the stack of envelopes. “I thought you were going to be at the seniors’ center this morning.”

Looking a good ten years younger than her sixty-five, Josephine O’Brian stood a foot taller and a half foot wider than the granddaughter she’d raised since Frankie’s fourteenth birthday when a car accident had taken both Josephine’s daughter and son-in-law.

“I was at the seniors’ center for a while. But with Millicent and Olivia both on another cruise, it wasn’t much fun.”

“What about Deidre?” Frankie asked, referring to the fourth woman in her grandmother’s close-knit group of friends.

“Off to her sister’s for a couple of weeks.”

Nana frowned and started to tidy the studio. Frankie had given up asking her not to. Apparently, the housekeeping urge was too deeply ingrained to ignore.

That, or she was bored. Nana was the only one of her friends not yet retired. While the others traveled and visited, she stayed faithful to her post at the Bankses’ house. Since the elder Bankses had died almost three years back, she’d started taking short trips, long weekends. A year ago, Frankie had tried to convince her to actually retire, but Nana refused, saying the estate still needed her.

It was that loyalty, her devotion and her forty-plus years of service that had netted Josephine O’Brian a place in the Bankses’ will. As long as a Banks owned the estate and Mrs. O’Brian was the housekeeper, she could live rent-free in the housekeeper’s quarters at the back of the estate.

Sometimes Frankie wondered if part of the reason Nana wouldn’t retire was because she had to look out for her flaky granddaughter.

Guilt, misery and frustration settled in Frankie’s gut. Despite the failure of her business, Nana insisted that her granddaughter continue designing. Five months ago, Frankie had started looking for a real job, something that would provide a regular income. Her grandmother had pitched a fit to end all fits, giving Frankie a solid understanding of where she’d gotten her temper.