Finding Carly (SEAL Team Hawaii #5)(47)

The annoying sound of a buzzer in the distance made his brows furrow as he finally managed to peel his lips off Carly’s.

“The lasagna,” she said in a shaky voice.

Jag felt as off-kilter as she sounded. He brought a hand up and smoothed her hair off her forehead. Her lips were now slightly swollen and a deeper pink than they’d been before. Glancing down, he saw her tight nipples even through her bra and the material of her T-shirt. Some men might be turned off by the oversized top she was wearing, but not Jag. He knew it was one of his shirts—which made her even sexier to him.

“You good?” he couldn’t help but ask. “Not too much?”

“Not too much,” she breathed, eyeing him. “You can definitely do that whenever you want. I won’t ever complain about being kissed stupid.”

“I’ve never been that into kissing,” Jag admitted.

“No?” she asked. “But you’re so good at it.”

“Only with you,” he said.

“Flatterer,” she teased.

He was being serious, but if she thought he was giving her a line, he wasn’t going to correct her. He wasn’t hungry in the least, would prefer to lie on his couch and make out with Carly all night, but she needed to eat. He couldn’t help but remember how bare her own cabinets had been back at her apartment, how she’d been eating ramen because it was cheap and she was too scared to go to the store.

He sat up and pulled her into a sitting position next to him. “Come on, let’s rescue dinner. You worked hard on it and it smells delicious.”

“It wasn’t that hard,” she protested, but blushed a little at the same time.

Damn, Jag loved the effect when he complimented her. He pulled her to her feet and kept hold of her hand as they headed for the kitchen. He was still wearing his uniform, but didn’t want to let go of her long enough to change. He’d put on a pair of sweats or something after they ate.

She grabbed some plates and he dished up a huge slice of the ooey-gooey pasta dish on each. She poured them glasses of lemonade and they headed to the table to eat.

“Carly?” Jag said after they’d sat down.

“Yeah?”

“I’m so proud of you.”

“Thanks,” she said. “I’m proud of myself.”

And that right there was one of the many reasons Jag loved her.

Wait, shit…did he love her?

He thought about it for two-point-two seconds…then admitted that yes, what he felt for her was definitely love. She’d changed his life, and in return, he’d do everything in his power to give her back the confidence Shawn Keyes had stolen from her.

What was the saying, if you loved someone, set them free? If it was meant to be, they’ll come back to you? That was how he felt. That was how he knew this was love. Whatever Carly needed, he’d give to her. Even if it broke his own heart.

“There you go thinking again,” Carly teased.

“All good things, promise,” Jag told her. He’d taken the seat next to hers, instead of sitting across the table, and he was very glad for that now, as he leaned in and kissed her hard and fast on the lips. “Eat,” he ordered, nodding to her plate.

“Yes, sir,” she quipped. “And I have to admit,” she added under her breath, “I’m loving the kissing thing.”

Smirking, Jag said, “Me too, angel, me too. You can probably expect a lot more of that, now that I know you’re okay with it.”

The smile she aimed at him made Jag’s heart beat faster. He loved her like this. Happy and joking around with him. It was something he wasn’t sure he’d see from her for a long while, and he was thrilled with how quickly it had happened.

He knew he had a goofy smile on his own face as he ate, but didn’t even care. Around Carly, he wasn’t the quiet but deadly Navy SEAL, he was simply Jag. And he liked that. A lot.





CHAPTER THIRTEEN





It had been a week since the shift in their relationship, since Carly had seen Luke at the grocery store. Jag’s guess had been right; it seemed as if she saw people related to her old life with Shawn all the time now. He was proud that, each time she did, it affected her less and less.

Gideon Sparks, Shawn’s other best friend, the guy who worked at the Honolulu Zoo, had seen her and Kenna in an ABC Store near Duke’s, when they’d gone there to grab a snack on one of their breaks. Carly had wanted some Maui Onion potato chips—she was addicted to the things—and Gideon had walked in just as they were checking out. According to Carly, he’d merely muttered hello and walked past them, but it had still weirded her out a little bit.

She hadn’t seen Luke again, thank goodness, but Wes, Shawn’s landlord, had somehow found her phone number and called. He’d left a message telling Carly that when Luke had cleaned out his dad’s apartment, he’d left some of her things to be carted off with the trash. Wes had wanted to know if Carly had any interest in claiming her belongings.

She’d also seen Beau at the grocery store again—and Jag had put his foot down and told her that she had to find a new place to shop.

But he’d still been proud that none of the encounters seemed to faze her. At least not for long. He was torn though; he wasn’t sure if her getting used to seeing her ex’s friends was a good thing or not. If one of them had plotted with Shawn, Jag didn’t want them anywhere near Carly. In the end, he decided that he would rather her not have a panic attack anytime she went outside and definitely didn’t want her to be paranoid to go anywhere.