Page 26 of SEAL's Sky
Chapter 10
Two weeks later, Jen had read every book in the apartment, watched every movie, twice, and was about to lose her mind. It was like being kept in a cage. She was cranky, bored, and needed to escape. Even a walk around the block was forbidden for now. Her mother had gone back to work after the first weekend. She needed to be at the bar to work whether or not her daughter was missing. At first, reporters tried to interview her, but she’d refused. Soon, they stopped coming around. Murph and Tex told her that the less information she gave out the better. Until they could find something to nail Kurt it was just too risky.
Murph arranged for the other SEAL’s girlfriends to visit. Jen liked the women a lot and it helped ease her cabin fever. Miranda was the quietest of the three. Chrissy and Meghan were lifelong friends and it showed since the two of them played off of each other better than some comedians she’d seen. The stories about their girls' nights were hysterical and they invited her to their next one. It would be wonderful to go, but Jen knew it wouldn’t happen until the Kurt situation was taken care of.
Jen was surprised when she found out Miranda was Senator Richard Stanhope’s daughter. She’d remembered hearing about her kidnapping, and it turned out Meghan’s brother was part of the same missionary group and had been kidnapped too. It’s how they’d met the SEALs, and Chrissy worked for the FBI. Their stories were scary and amazing with endings like something out of a romance novel. In a way, it wasn’t very different from how she’d met Murph. Except they weren’t dating.
The more time she spent around him the more she wanted to. She enjoyed listening to his stories and he told the best jokes. Some evenings he’d come by himself and keep her company while her mom was at work. The best was the night Rafe came with him and was explaining how Murph had more expressions than anyone for having sex. When she didn’t believe it, Rafe dared him to say as many as he could in one minute. There’s been over fifty and some of them were so bad, she was thankful her mom wasn’t there.
“Is that what you do with your free time? Just sit around and come up with expressions for sex?” Jen asked when he was done.
“Not hardly. I’ve just accumulated them over the years.”
“I bet,” she answered.
Rafe howled with laughter and almost choked on his beer.
“It took a while, but I remembered you from when I was in college. You were such a horndog. Big bad SEAL with a different girl every night.”
“Horndog. Maybe we should change your nickname,” Rafe said, still laughing.
“Fuck you. I’m not like that anymore,” Murph replied.
“The hell you’re not,” Rafe objected.
Jen was surprised at the look Murph shot Rafe and wondered what had pissed him off. It didn’t bother her. It was pretty common that the guys would come in to blow off steam especially after a deployment. When you grew up around the military it was a different life.
“I’m just giving you a hard time, don’t blow a gasket, bro,” Rafe said.
But even with Rafe’s semi-apology, the lighthearted mood evaporated like smoke, and they left a bit later. That had been a week ago. Since then Murph was the only one who visited.
* * *
The four walls were closing in on Jen and if she didn’t get out of there she didn’t know what she’d do. Even the morning pool games with her mom weren’t doing it anymore. She needed fresh air for more than the ten seconds it took to go out one door and into the other.
Murph texted earlier to let her know something came up at work and he was running late. Her roots were growing out and she needed to get more hair color. The drug store was just down the street. Her mom kept the keys with her, so she couldn't take the car, but it was close enough that she could get there and back before anyone realized she was gone. It had been over a month since she’d escaped from the loft. Was Kurt the assclown even still looking for her? The news hadn’t mentioned it, but it didn’t mean people weren’t looking for her.
“Screw it,” she yelled in frustration. Grabbing her purse from the bedroom, she shoved her phone in the pocket of her jeans and grabbed the house keys. She’d buy the hair color and come right back.
Stepping outside into the back alley, she took a deep breath of fresh air. Okay, back alley air wasn’t so fresh, but that small taste of freedom made her giddy. Locking the door behind her, she walked to the drugstore enjoying every single minute of her stolen freedom. Unless it was busy inside, she should be back in fifteen minutes tops and no one would know.
Her little excursion went well until she was about ten feet from the back entrance to the bar. She was enjoying the fresh air and congratulating herself on pulling off her jailbreak when someone yelled her name. Not Sky Russell, but Jennifer Turner. Without thinking she turned toward the person.
Shit. It wasn’t anyone she knew, but a tall man in a business suit. When he said her name again, she started running for the bar. She didn’t care who else saw her as long as she could get inside. If she threw enough of a fit any of the guys inside would keep him from hurting her if that’s what he intended.
Except she didn’t get that far. Turning to see how far away he was, she ran straight into Murph. If he hadn’t grasped her arms, she would have fallen.
“Can I help you?” he asked the man in the suit at the same time pushing her behind him, keeping a hold of her arm.
“I just want to talk to her.”
“Who?”
Jen was surprised at how his drawl thickened now that he was pissed off.
“Jennifer Turner.”
“I think you’re mistaken. This is my girlfriend Sky.” Murph squeezed her arm to reassure her. Murph had this, he wouldn’t let anything happen to her.
