Free Revealing Her SEAL (ASSIGNMENT: Caribbean Nights Book 4) by Kat Cantrell Page A

the main strip that lay a short walk from the marina.
    It had been a while since Evan had made the trip to Abaco. Mostly because of the liquor store. The sign for Zippos sat in his peripheral vision, silent and huge, as he guided Rachel toward the lone store that sold fresh food. With her by his side, it wasn’t so difficult to train his mind toward the task at hand. Though every fiber of his being strained to obey the slightest command to change direction.
    “This is the best date you’ve ever taken me on.” Rachel hooked a hand at the crook of his elbow, presumably so they weren’t separated in the crowd.
    He let her. It was a physical anchor that he would never admit he appreciated. His constant hyperawareness of her had only increased after the heavily laced encounter on the boat that hadn’t amounted to more than a woman unused to a sea vessel nearly tripping. He’d steadied her. That was the extent of it. Except it wasn’t, and they both knew it.
    Even her flirting had taken on a different flavor. Or maybe he saw it for what it was—a distraction from her real feelings, which he had yet to uncover. But wanted to, more than he should.
    Rachel smiled at the woman behind the fish counter, discussed the merits of the fresh catch of the day, and finally settled on the grouper she’d come for. After picking out a few more items—no asparagus apparently, but she seemed to be happy with the potatoes—she paid, and before long they were back on the boat.
    He’d have bet money that shopping would have taken hours. Carrie had never been able to make up her mind about anything, dragging Evan to store after store after store, especially when she’d been pregnant. He’d been home from Iraq, with a very short two weeks’ leave, and she’d wanted to spend it dithering over whether to buy the white crib or the brown one.
    She’d never once asked him to just spend time with her. To hang out and reconnect after a brutal deployment. It was almost as if she’d been gearing up for separating even then. They hadn’t had sex once during that whole two weeks. Too tired she’d claimed. Too pregnant, too used to sleeping by herself, too something other than interested in Evan’s paws on her.
    That should have been enough of an indicator that something was up. But stupidly he’d taken her at her word, because what the hell did he know about pregnant women?
    So he’d spent his leave blitzed and frustrated. Which wasn’t so different than how he spent all his days, especially after coming home to realize that in the end, white crib or brown, Carrie hadn’t planned to keep it in the little house on base where she’d lived with Evan.
    Because she wanted a divorce not an alcoholic husband. He didn’t blame her. He didn’t want her to have an alcoholic husband either.
    When they got back to the bungalow, Evan started to head for the shower he’d never gotten to take when Rachel stopped him with a hand on his arm. Pointedly he glanced down at the place where their flesh connected and then back up at her.
    He waited for the familiar annoyance with her to surface, but somewhere along the way, she’d lost the edge that had always crawled across his last nerve. Or it had never been there and he’d manufactured it because Rachel made him feel things he didn’t know what to do with, so he pretended that she irritated him.
    “I know.” She shot him a small smile, full of a different kind of awareness that made him feel as if she’d clued in on his very thoughts. “You just want to be alone for a while. Give me a second, and then you can take a shower. You didn’t want to take me to the market. I appreciate it.”
    Genuine Rachel tripped him up even worse than Flirty Rachel. He stared at her, conscious of her earlier comments about how much she liked his voice. Which yesterday he’d have said was a thinly veiled mechanism to get him to do something outside of his comfort zone.
    Today he could take it at face value. “No