Page 15 of Ex-SEAL Bad Boy

“Yeah, I thought about that.” I say. “It’s a possibility, I guess, but I think he’s still kind of under the sway of his parents, and you know how they are. He definitely seems different than he was before he went away.”

“Maybe so,” she replies, her voice wary. “I can’t forgive him for the way he treated my sister, but if I can’t dissuade you, just be careful, that’s all I ask.”

“Thanks, Mel,” I tell her before hanging up.

I go back upstairs and sit on the edge of my bed. I feel a little bit better, but as I turn over the events on the beach in my mind, I keep coming back to one thing.

Right before we made love, there was something about that gleam in his eyes, something that wasn’t quite right. Was it passion – or danger?

7

ETHAN

I suppose it was inevitable. The sit-down with the parents.

They’re still not happy about me skipping out on them last night.

My mom and dad, or Mother and Father, as I’ve always referred to them, are rather formal about everything. I’m expected to be properly dressed for dinner.

No coat and tie or anything silly like that, but at least a nice polo and pants, no swimsuit and tank top, or any of the other things I usually wear around the house.

“So nice of you to join us,” my father says sarcastically. Yeah, it’s going to be that sort of a night.

“Sorry about last night, but you well know I haven’t seen Liam since I got back. I told you I saved his sister, so yeah, felt like I had to be there.”

My father shoots me a withering look. Other people’s lives are immaterial to him. You look up narcissist in the dictionary, and there’s a picture of dear old dad.

My mother might not have been like him in another life, but after 30 years of being married to him, however, she took on the dutiful role of stern, heartless matriarch. Now, they deserve each other.

“Ethan, your mother and I have been discussing your role in the family.”

Here it comes.

“Now we were accommodating when you decided to enlist in the Navy ...”

Accommodating? If you call almost having a coronary accommodating, I guess, I think to myself.

“And we think it’s time for you to get serious about your life. Now, we’ve discussed university before, and I believe I can get you into Yale or Harvard.

In point of fact, your military service might even make you more attractive to them,” he continues. “Not that it matters, considering what we have on the presidents of both of them.”

“Your undergraduate degree can be anything you like; although, naturally something like pre-law or political science would prepare you better for law school, but up to you,” he drones on.

“I suppose it wouldn’t be out of the question for you to get your graduates’ degree in another field like public policy, but the men in our family have always studied law.”

I don’t have a problem with what they’re saying so far. Actually, the thought of having time away again is quite appealing.

“There is one other matter we need to discuss with you,”

Ah, the other shoe. Of course.

“We are currently embarking on an operation that we would like your assistance on. I would normally phrase this as a request, but your mother and I agree that it’s about time you start pulling your weight in this family.”

And there it is.

“Look, I appreciate the effort that you and mother have made to provide me with a good life. But I think it’s more important that I blaze my own path.”

“You know I had something lined up with a security firm, but as I found out from Graham, you put the kibosh on that.”

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