Page 16 of The SEALs' Single Mom Baby Surprise

It doesn’t keep them from griping, but she handles them well enough that I don’t feel the need to step in. I can only imagine how she’d turn on me if I did.

I lean closer to the guys as they continue with her inspection of older inventory and tell them what else I found while I did research on our pretty little asset.

Wow, even in my head, that sounds dirty.

I can’t help it. She’s growing on me.

“What do you mean, you didn’t look into her ex?” Hastings half laughs. “Suddenly grow a conscience about snooping? Need a new line of work?”

I grin. “Mostly, I have a feeling I’ll go nuclear if I do. It can wait. I’d rather we earn her trust and have her tell us what happened there.”

“Because the basics are a bit obvious?” He peers between Cole and me to watch her for a few long seconds.

Suddenly, that broken heart of his doesn’t seem so broken.

“She’s getting bursts of texts that make her jittery every eighty minutes. Like the person sending them has a set schedule.”

My heart sinks as the possibilities click together. “Like a lecturing professor? I used to have those seventy-five-minute classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays in college, the entire semester I attended before I joined the SEALs.”

Cole smiles and nods. “She was pregnant already when she went to college.”

“Yeah,” I confirmed.

Cold anger flares through me. This is why I didn’t look into it. I knew my hands would ball into fists like they are now with the want to bust Fitzwilliam’s face into a pulp.

It’s better that I don’t know where to find him.

Cole slaps a hand on my shoulder. “So far, she seems to think it’s safe to ignore him. We’ll do the same unless he gives us a reason.”

“I won’t have to look far for one.”

Boss nods behind me to Boone, and the man nods back, arms crossed over a barrel chest that screams old power from a foundation of fighting. The stories hold true.

And his protective behavior is making more sense.

“Did he tell you what happened?” I asked.

“No. He didn’t need to.” His wheels are turning, putting together a plan to protect her tonight. But with her knowing or without her knowing?

I leave it to him and turn back to Sloane.

Part of me wants to offer help as she checks and double-checks serial numbers and weights, and maybe that’s why I end up in the center of it all before I register my action, cataloging every movement, every item being brought in, every inch of Sloane as she leans over, crouches, inspects.

It’s difficult looking away from her.

She must feel my gaze because she spares a second to peer back at me over her shoulder, a small narrowing of her eyes as she meets mine, but her attention is pulled away a second later.

Her voice grows stern as she snaps her fingers at one of the recruits with a hand-powered forklift. “Hey. Did you open those up?”

The guy shakes his head.

“And what about my having everything else opened up makes you think that it’s okay to run off with that before we check inside?”

“I—uh—we usually?—”

“We’re doing it differently today.” Sloane waves her hand behind her at me, Cole, and Hastings. “We’re being audited, or something like it, so hold your horses and open those up to confirm everything in there is what’s supposed to be in there.”

Biting back my laugh, I enjoy how she sets him straight and has him rooting around those boxes in seconds. She even admonishes him for not having a box-cutter handy before offering her own.

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