Page 1 of SEAL’S Baby Surprise (Lanes #2)

AUSTIN

My name is Austin Ezekiel Moore, and I’m the guy mothers warn their daughters to stay away from.

No, not that guy. I mean, I’m not going to like... destroy worlds and shred reputations. I’m not a danger to anyone but myself.

Well. Danger being a somewhat relative term, I suppose.

In terms of like physical danger, yeah, anyone’s daughter is going to be fine with me. Hell, I’ll probably protect them with my life if I can.

However.

Emotionally, I guess there’s some merit to the warning. I’m not exactly a safe bet, in terms of feelings.

I’m not trying to be a jerk. It’s just that I’m not built for relationships. I’m the guy with itchy feet, who doesn’t want to stay anywhere for long.

Even with my daughter (who luckily inherited the itchy foot gene from me) I don’t necessarily have a permanent home. We live in a modified camper van for now, and it’s as good a home as any.

Speaking of the sweetest devil in the world... I hear rustling, a sure sign that my child is emerging. Sure enough, Julia sticks her tousled head out of the van and asks, “Daddy?”

“Hey baby. I’m here,” I call to her.

“Okay,” she says sleepily.

“Let me let Ark out, and then I’ll come for cuddles,” I call to her.

“Okay Daddy,” she says. I hear the van shift, and know she’s gone back to bed for a minute.

I let my dog, Ark-Ark, named for the prolific sound of his voice, out of my van to do his business, and then I step out behind him. I watch as Ark promptly marks all four wheels of the van, before making a deposit in the sand.

“Good boy, Ark,” I say. “That’s my good dog. Oh, yeah, you’re a super-dooper good boy!”

He very much is. Dog ownership is about as consistent as I’m going to get. Well, that was the extent of my consistent tendencies, anyway. Before I got full custody of Julia.

I climb back into the camper van. I pull Julia close, breathing in her little kid smell.

“I love you Daddy,” she whispers.

“Love you too. Morning, baby,” I respond.

She blinks, looking up at me, and her eyes widen with shock for just a second.

She’s done that every morning since I’ve gotten custody of her, like she can’t believe that I’m real. Every time, it kills me.

I can’t blame her for that disbelief. While I had been busy rescuing people, guarding diplomats, clearing out insurgents, and generally trying to make the world a safer place for civilians, my estranged wife had died.

You see, my wife’s quack doctor had loaded her up with so many pills, a couple of them interacted and had put her into cardiac arrest.

After almost a year of wrangling with authorities to prove that I was stable enough to take care of my kid, I finally have full and final custody.

She is the one shining moment in my life. I love her more than Ark, and that’s saying a lot because that dog is my best buddy.

Fortunately, he’s my designated ESA, and he’s adopted Julia as his pup. We’re a tight unit, the three of us.

It’s a better unit than I ever could have asked for back in the military.

“Dad?”

Her voice shakes me from my thoughts. “Hey, Judy-rudy,” I say, holding her close and giving her a kiss on the head. “What would you like for breakfast?”

“Ice cream,” she says promptly. Her eyes glitter, mischief clear in her intentions.

“Ice cream!” I open my eyes wide, sitting up in the van’s little bed, opting to take a tactical approach to this battle. “Would you consent to maybe some waffles under that ice cream?”

“Maybe,” she grins at me, with a gap-toothed smile. Julia is six and had recently shed her top two teeth. It gives her a whimsical smile, but she knows how to work it.

“With, perhaps, a side of orange juice, bacon, and a couple of eggs?” I tease.

She pouts. “But then I won’t have room for ice cream, and I really want some. Please, Daddy?”

“One egg, and orange juice,” I bargain, knowing that she doesn’t care all that much for bacon — a mystery I have a hard time fathoming. “One waffle with a scoop of ice cream on top. And you have to shower and get dressed first.”

“Okay,” she says.

I start the shower for her. The van has a tiny one, with an oversized tank, since two people showering requires a lot of water. That gives me time to fire up the gas grill, start some bacon and eggs — I like bacon, even if my kid doesn’t — and start the waffle iron heating up.

By the time Julia emerges, dressed in jean shorts and a crop-top t-shirt with the logo “Daddy’s favorite girl” across the front of it, I have a plate with one egg, one waffle, and a scoop of her favorite Very Berry ice cream on top of the waffle.

She eats the ice cream first, of course. But she also eats the waffle, the egg, and drinks the juice. It is a small victory because my little princess has been well on her way to some real eating disorders.

I finish my breakfast while she is eating and start on cleanup. While I am doing that, Betty and Bobby, twins who live two vans over come by. “We’re going to Mother Hubbard’s,” Betty says. “Can Julia walk with us?”

The twins are ten, and very responsible. I feel safe letting them walk with Julia. “I’ll watch from here,” I say.

The three youngsters spin, bob, and tumble their way to Mother Hubbard’s Homeschool. As far as I know, it doesn’t have any official standing, but since it is summer, I don’t have to worry about accreditation.

Come fall, that will be another problem entirely.

Today, however, it’s not important. What matters is that going there, playing with the other kids, participating in the summer reading program, tumbling, and racing along the sand makes Julia happy.

I’d give anything to see her smile, especially after all she’s been through.

It also has the added bonus of giving me three or four hours to exercise and get my work done.

Mrs. Hubbard waves to me, to show that she has the kids, and I turn and start to jog down to the edge of the water. At this early hour, the lifeguard stand is empty.

Time to get a nice run in.

I’m about ten feet down the beach when I notice a lump in the water.

Ahead of me, and right on cue, Ark begins his trademark barking — the activity that had given him his name and flunked him out of K-9 training.

“Ark! Ark! Ark!” he barks.

As I draw nearer, I can see he is dancing around something on the edge of the surf, down where the sand is wet, and where strands of seaweed and driftwood wash up with the incoming tide.

Only what Ark has found this time isn’t a bunch of seaweed or even a sea creature. It is a woman wearing the remnants of some kind of fancy dress.

She is curled up in a knot, her knees drawn up to her chest, and she is trying to bury her head in between them. For a surreal moment, I look for a mermaid tail or fairy wings, because her long hair is a bright, impossible pink.

At first, I think she might be dead. Then she sits up, stretches her arms out to the ocean and wails, “Bad Sea! Oh, bad, bad sea! You didn’t take me with you.”

Uhhh.

Okay.

Little wavelets curl and splash about her, pulling grains of sand from under her. But the tide here in the cove is gentle. Unless we have a big storm, it isn’t likely to move anything as heavy as a human.

Ark continues to bounce around the woman, making sharp puppy barks, and doing “come play with me” bow downs.

Belatedly, I realize that I should probably interfere, in case she doesn’t like dogs. I’m not sure what she’s been through, exactly, but I know it can’t be good.

Women don’t exactly appear in the surf for fun.

“Ark! Sit!” I say, crouching down beside the woman so I don’t loom over her. Just because I don’t like face-to-face interaction with adult humans doesn’t mean I don’t know how to do it. “Hey, there,” I say slowly, hopeful that I won’t scare her. “What happened? Why are you out here?”

“Because I couldn’t,” she says with a very soft sigh. “I just couldn’t. I came out here and lay down on the sand. I thought the ocean would sweep me away, and I’d be done with everything.”

Her voice is musical. It’s nice. Sad, definitely, but nice.

“Fortunately,” I say, “You are just at the edge of the high tide mark. So, you probably aren’t going anywhere.”

“I’m not?” She looks up at me with huge blue eyes the color of the sky above the ocean on a clear, sunny day. Her makeup has run, giving a clown-like appearance to her little round face.

She has a sweet rosebud of a mouth, an up-tilted nose, and a cute little chin, kind of like a cherub painted by one of the old masters, or one of those big-eyed religious dolls from that place out in the Midwest.

It’s unconventional, but on her, it works.

“Not under waterpower,” I say with a smile. “And if you stay out here in that get-up, you are going to get one heck of a sunburn.”

“I am?” the words come out of her mouth, as if she’s never heard of sunburn. Then, “Oh, I guess I might. But I don’t know what to do now.”

I stand up and hold my hand out. “Come on,” I say. “You can shower at my place and borrow some clothes. I’ll make breakfast for you, and then we can figure out what comes next

Cautiously, she takes my hand.

“Okay,” she says in that same tone.

I pull her up, and take her back.

My day, which had started so normally, has taken a hell of a turn.

However, I can’t deny that it’s exciting.

I can’t wait to hear more about this strange woman that I found in the surf.” ?