“We’re gonna be fucking Navy SEALs, Wolfie,” Aleki crowed at him, jumping to his feet. “Navy-freaking-SEALs!”
“Don’t call me Wolfie,” Wolfe told him calmly without looking up from his phone. “And we’re not SEALs yet. We have to get through training.”
“You don’t think we can make it?” Caleb asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Of course we can,” Wolfe replied. “Just saying that we can’t get ahead of ourselves.”
Aleki rolled his eyes. Wolfe was a glass half empty kind of guy.
“Come on, Wolfie. You can be happy about it. Smile,” Aleki wheedled.
“No.” Wolfe glared at him.
“Come on, smile.”
Caleb looked between them but didn’t say a word as Aleki took a running leap and landed on Wolfe who was sitting on the sofa.
“Get off me, you asshole!” Wolfe roared as they fell off the sofa, wrestling across the floor.
Aleki leaped off Wolfe and ducked around Caleb’s chair as though he thought the other man might protect him.
Wolfe stood, his obsidian eyes cold and unyielding. Most people steered clear when he looked like this.
Not Aleki, though. Wolfe was his brother. His friend. Plus, Aleki was the only one who did laundry around here. So he was useful.
“Just remember, you kill me and you’ll have to wash your own tightie-whities,” Aleki warned.
Wolfe growled.
“Will you two quit it? We only just replaced the furniture you broke last time,” Caleb commented without glancing up from his phone.
Wolfe gave Aleki a dark look but returned to sitting on the sofa. “What do you plan to do with Genevieve?”
Aleki stiffened, slightly confused by the question. “Do with her? I wasn’t going to do anything with her.”
The three of them had nearly completed degrees from the University of California, but Vivi still had another year to go. Aleki probably wouldn’t have gotten through his degree without the other two helping him. Sitting still wasn’t his forte.
Becoming a Navy SEAL had always been his dream.
“She’s your girlfriend,” Wolfe stated as though that explained everything.
“I know that, man.” Aleki looked over at Caleb, but the other man appeared as confused as he did.
“She can’t come with us. We’ll be living in the barracks. What will you do with her?”
“Dude, she’s not a dog he needs to find a home for,” Caleb told him.
Wolfe scowled. “I’m well aware of that.”
“Vivi knows that we applied for BUD/s training,” Aleki told him. “She’s totally supportive of this move. She’s not going anywhere. I get that you don’t believe in love. But what we have is real. Okay? So don’t worry about us. We’re solid.”
1
Eight years later
“In breaking news, we’ve just learned that Lieutenant Governor William Davidson was found dead in a hotel room in Sacramento. The police have said . . .”
Panic flooded her, making it hard to think. The noise coming from the TV faded away.