“It was a mutual effort.”She smiled.“Jude did most of the hard work.”
“Ivy,” Jude said putting his hand on her back.It was the first time he’d touched her since they arrived at the hospital, but she didn’t want to get her hopes up or read into the small gesture.“These are my friends and their women.This is Iron, a veteran from the Virginia SEAL Team, and his wife Vivienne.”Jude gestured to the woman who’d been holding hands with Iron when they entered the room.Vivienne’s large blue eyes lit up, and she crossed the room, pulling Ivy into a hug.
“So good to meet you.”The woman’s long blonde hair brushed Ivy’s cheek as she moved.Vivienne gave her arms a quick squeeze before stepping back into her husband’s embrace.
“This is Sully and his fiancée, Jane,” Jude said.The dark-haired, dark-eyed beauty sought Ivy’s gaze, and offered a soft smile.“And Red and his fiancée, Thalia.”The woman’s dark hair was swept up and away from her face, highlighting her striking green eyes.“Red and Sully live in Coronado, and Iron and Vivienne just bought a vacation property there.”
“It’s so nice to meet all of you.”She smiled at the newcomers around her, the tension in her muscles loosening, as she looked around at the support Jude had.He might not want to be close to anyone; to care about anyone, but these men and their significant others had rallied around him anyway.Maybe that’s what Jude needed from her, as well.
“We heard about your teammate, Jude,” Sully said.“Cameron gave us a call, and we wanted to be here.”
Jude scrubbed his hands over his face, as though unsure how to accept this show of solidarity.
“Why don’t we go down to the cafeteria and bring back some coffee?”Vivienne bounced up on her toes and kissed Iron’s cheek.“Would that be okay?”She shot a bright smile at Ivy.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Ivy said, wanting to give Jude time to fill in his friends.
Vivienne strode across the carpet and put her arm around Ivy’s shoulder as they walked toward the door.Jane and Thalia followed right behind them.
The women took the elevator to the first floor and walked down the hallway lit by fluorescent lights.They passed the gift shop, now closed and dark, save for the light glowing from a refrigerator packed with glass vases of flowers.
“Was Jude on a SEAL team with your men?”Ivy asked as they followed the signs to the cafeteria.
“Many years ago,” Thalia began.“Red was shot multiple times on a mission.Jude led the SEAL team who got him out of Sudan.”
“Red was transferred to the same military hospital where Iron was recovering after losing his leg,” Vivienne added.“That was the mission that ended his career with the Navy.”
“Sully had been on Iron’s team at the time,” Jane said as they turned into the cafeteria.It was nearly abandoned except for a few nurses on their breaks.“When he went to visit Iron, he also met Red.”
Jane smiled at Ivy.“Sully told me he was shocked when years later he and Red were assigned to a two-man team.They were able to help Jude and another SEAL when their team was ambushed.”
“Oh my God.”Ivy’s words were totally inadequate for the complicated way the men’s lives had intertwined and how their paths continued to cross.
“How did you come to meet Iron, Vivienne?”Ivy asked.
Vivienne stepped up to the counter and quickly ordered eight to-go cups.The other women, including her, tried to pass her cash or credit cards, but Vivienne waved them away.
“Just because you have all that modeling money doesn’t mean you always have to pay,” Thalia said rolling her green eyes toward the ceiling.
Vivienne shrugged.“I do not always pay.About meeting Iron, it’s a long story.”The sunny woman smiled, turning to take the cups from the woman behind the counter.“He agreed to help my sister, Hannah, and her boyfriend, Branch, to get me out of an arranged marriage that I didn’t want.Iron brought me to Virginia.For the first time, I felt free.I grew up with wealth, but it had become a prison at the same time.”
“It sure was,” Thalia said taking two of the empty cardboard to-go cups from Vivienne.“I’d lived at the Day Estate with Vivienne in a forced labor situation and was abducted and taken over the boarder when I tried to help feed Hannah and Branch information about what was going on with the sham marriage.”Thalia placed her two cups under the pre-made coffee carafe, filling each of them.
Ivy’s mouth had gone dry, and she knew it was hanging open, but she couldn’t seem to shut it as the women’s stories became more convoluted than the men’s.
“Vivienne and I were friends, though,” Thalia said.
“Best friends,” Vivienne interjected.
“Yes.”Thalia grinned and gave the other woman a hip bump.“She sent Red and Sully after me.”
“Don’t forget that you already knew Red.”Jane took two of the cups from Vivienne, as well, filled them both, and began adding cream to one of them.“To me, that’s the most unbelievable part of the story.”
“It is very strange how fate threw us together twice.”Thalia mixed sugar from the self-serve station into her cups.“I met Red when his parents were on a concert tour in Colima.Red was just a boy at the time and wandered out of the resort area.He ran into some trouble.”
“And you saved his life,” Vivienne said with a dreamy expression, loading both her cups with flavored cream and copious amounts of sugar.
“And found Tiny,” Jane finished for her.
