“Didn’t want to useboxerand have you thinking thatIthink I have a face like a dog.” He grinned at her. “It’s notthatbad, as far as faces go.”
It certainly wasn’t, but she would never tell him that. Instead, she hid her smile in her glass of wine.
“As far as how we select the teams,” Jim continued, “it’s already been done. Dunk’s gonna come in and read off the assignments. There’s gonna be noise; ignore it if you can—Dunk’ll shut it down. We’ll then meet in groups to assign a TL—a team leader.”
And there came Dunk, into the room followed by Thomas, Rio, and Lucky. Ashley felt her shoulders tense.
“It’s gonna be okay,” Jim murmured.
Ashley turned to him, unable to stop herself from asking, “Should I have quit?”
He laughed. “Only if you thought it would be fun for me to mock you endlessly.”
“Endlessly?” she asked. “I think it would’ve ended when I left in the morning.”
“And I’m pretty sure Dunk has your email address,” Jim said. “I definitely would’ve continued to mock you endlessly from afar.”
“Seriously,” she said. “I know that Dunk would’ve made an exception to his no-refund rule for me. My being herehasto be a challenge for him—and for you and the other instructors, too.”
“There’s not a Navy SEAL alive who doesn’t love a good challenge,” Jim pointed out, leaning closer and lowering his voice as the room fell to an anticipatory hush.
“Good evening,” Dunk said. “Did everyone enjoy Lieutenant Slade’s chicken?”
Ashley turned to see Jim giving a pope-wave and laughed. “Youcooked that dinner?”
“Such incredulity,” he saidsotto voceas Dunk continued to speak, explaining how he was going to announce the teams, who would then break off into groups to get to know one another.
“Not that you cooked it,” Ashley lowered her voice to tell Jim. “It was crazy delicious, by the way—but that you somehow hadtime.”
“A man, a plan, and a roaster with a lid,” he whispered back. “Or in this case, when feeding thirty-ish people, an abundance of roasters with lids, and a team of sous chefs or grunts as we call ’em in the service—the carrot and potato peelers. I drizzled the olive oil and applied the spices and put theexactamount of water in the bottom of the pans. Everything mixed together and… Into the oven for two hours—with that lid, you cannot overcook, you can only make it better. There’s time to shower and even attend a meeting or two. Excuse me.”
Yes, Dunkhadjust requested his SEAL instructors join him at the front of the room for the team announcements.
As Ashley watched Jim Slade walk across the lounge—trying not to limp—she realized that maybe, just maybe, this next week wasn’t going to be as awful as she’d imagined.
She and Jim, along with Clark and Kenneth, might actually have fun and…
Theirs was the first team announced. “Lt. Jim Slade will be instructor for Team One, which includes Ashley DeWitt, Clark DeWitt, Kenneth Price…”
And there it was except, inexplicably, Dunk kept going.
“…Todd Grotto and Dwight “Bull” Edison.”
“What…?” Bull put voice to what they all were thinking, hiswhatgoing up several octaves to High-Soprano-Land. “What thehell!”
Ashley was too stunned to speak. Todd and Bull were part of their team…? She looked over at Jim, but he was not looking at her, and with a sinking heart she realized his admonishment for her not to quit had probablynotbeen entirely honest.
“Settle down there,” Dunk said as the men in the room who were not Bull or Todd murmured their relief. “Moving on to Team Two,” Dunk announced, but whatever he said after that, Ashley had no idea.
All she could think was, shit…shit!
CHAPTER FOUR
Ashley looked shell-shocked.
As Jim watched, she brought her still half-full glass of wine over to the table that he’d decreed as belonging to Team One. She sat down across from him, but the smart, funny woman he’d been talking to at the bar had vanished.
Bull and Todd were in the corner, having a heated but relatively quiet discussion with Dunk.
