“Goddammit, Kavanagh,” Fly shot back, half-laughing.
Shamrock chuckled, then jabbed a finger at Than. “Man, if this SEAL thing doesn’t work out, you could make a living with that voice.”
Than ducked his head, embarrassed and proud at once. “Maybe, Sham. But as long as I’m breathing, this is what I’m doing.”
Shamrock pushed off the fender and grinned. “So, aye, we’re all crazy bastards. Cheers.”
Bear shook hands all around, the kind of easy, wordless farewell that lived between men who’d been through something deeper than a meal together.
Bear headed back toward Bailee’s street, headlights carving through the dark.
He kept seeing her face during the song, the way the word Wolakota had gone through her like breath. Whatever had stirred her out there had stirred him, too. The song had lit something in him, a need for voice, for his to matter inside that same harmony.
He wanted to hear her speak it again, to know what she’d felt. He wanted her, the woman who’d slipped so deep under his skin that the craving for her felt like thirst, and only she could quench it.
When he opened the door, the house was dim, shadows pooling along the hallway.
He followed the quiet to the bedroom.
She stood by the window in something light and lacy, her skin a dark contrast against the pale fabric, smooth and touchable in the faint glow. He crossed the room, and she accepted the weight of him against her back without a word.
“Tell me what happened out there in the living room,” he murmured.
She leaned back into him. “I was called home,” she whispered. “I answered.”
The words poured out of her then, low and even. “I come from a long line of medicine women, centuries back. It was supposed to be my calling, but I never heard the ancestors.”
His arms tightened around her, and he said nothing, waiting.
“The longer the silence, the harder it got,” she continued, voice unsteady. “The disappointment grew in my grandmother, in my people, in myself. I was a Lakota promise, a savage daughter, but I was never called. So I left. I left everything and everyone, and I’ve never been back.”
“This was your fear? Telling me this?” he asked, his voice low, careful.
She nodded, then turned in his arms, so their faces were inches apart. “Yes. I was scared you’d judge me.” Her hand found his chest, fingers small and sure. “But, Dakota, I was so wrong about you. So wrong. I’m falling for you, and that used to terrify me more than anything. This…this requires honesty, trust. I’m still a mess. I’m still trying to find my way. Going home terrifies me, even as it thrums in my bones.” Her breath hitched. “Just hold me for a while. I need you.”
He released a hard breath, his chest tight with something sharp and tender. Her words echoed her voice, Ayla’s, soft, uncertain, so many years ago. She’d said nearly the same thing before she was taken. That she wanted more than the reservation could give her, that she was scared to leave, that she needed him to hold her, to promise not to judge.
“Judgment comes easy, Bailee,” he said quietly. “Compassion doesn’t. Not everyone who judges us offers mercy with it. But I’m not here to judge you. Holding you? I can’t think of another thing I would rather do.”
She smiled, a small, stunned thing, and buried her face against his shoulder. He held her like he could stitch the breaks together, not because he could fix everything, but because he would stand in the breach with her. He lifted her carefully, set her on the bed, then stripped down and crawled in beside her, their bodies warm and familiar in the dim room.
She curled against him, and he felt the steady press of her head against his chest. He let the silence say what words couldn’t. His thumbs traced the line of her wrist brace, then the slope of her shoulder. His heart tightened for what had been taken from others he loved—Ayla’s missing laugh, the hollow that never quite filled—and it turned fierce at the thought of losing Bailee.
Bailee’s breathing evened against his chest, and he toyed with her hair as his body relaxed into the rhythm of her breathing.
His heart ached for her and for Ayla, for the sister the world had stolen, for the woman who might still be out there somewhere, alive, suffering, waiting. A torment that never faded. He wished he could see her again, talk to her, and have the chance to hold her against all that she had endured. But the world had swallowed her.
He was going to make sure that didn't happen to Bailee.
14
Three weeks later, BUD/S O-Course, Phil E. Bucklew Naval Special Warfare Center, Coronado, California
The wind off the Pacific came sharp and clean, carrying the scent of salt, diesel, and sun-baked rope. Coronado shimmered in the distance, the training grounds a blur of sand, steel, and noise. The BUD/S obstacle course stretched across the beach like a living challenge, ropes swaying, walls gleaming with sweat, sand trenches waiting to swallow anyone careless enough to hesitate.
Bear stood beside Joker at the end of the course, arms folded, Flint at his heel, the K9’s tongue lolling as he tracked movement. The team had gathered, Professor, Blitz, Buck, D-Day, Zorro, and Gator, each one sprawled or leaning in his own brand of lazy alertness, dressed for PT, watching the two figures hammering through the course.
Next to swimming, the obstacle course was the most technically demanding test for trainees. Fifteen obstacles stood between the start and the finish, fifteen chances to prove coordination, endurance, and will. The course wasn’t built for confidence. It was built to break a guy down and rebuild him sharper.
