Fitz slapped his friend on the back as Jack flagged down a cab outside the airport. “Can I at least have a beer first?”
“Man, you can have all the beer you want as soon as we get to the island. Just hear me out.”
They hopped into a cab, and the bustle of Freeport swallowed the vehicle whole as the driver navigated around an ancient bus, between a limo and an honest-to-God mounted police officer on a chestnut horse that flicked his tail in the direction of the car.
“It must be a big favor since you’re dragging it out.” Fitz craned his neck to enjoy the sights as the cab turned down a street full of stores, and yes, Virginia, Santa Claus must exist, because as far as the eye could see, scantily clad woman lined the shops or sat at open-air bars with umbrella drinks. One of each happened to be exactly what was on his Christmas list.
“Nah, it’s nothing. Just a small change of plans,” Jack said brightly. “You know how I told you the Galloway Games are going on this week and you’d have to sleep on my couch since the resort is booked?”
“Sure.” Which of course had required a little Internet recon on whatever the hell the Galloway Games were since he’d never heard of them. “It’s like a scavenger hunt or something. With a race against the clock thrown in.”
“Yeah, and the prize is fifty grand. I need the cash, bro. So I signed us up,” Jack said in a rush, likely because he knew what Fitz was going to say. “And I already paid the entry fee. Nonrefundable.”
“You… did what?” The naked women dancing in his head vanished in a flash as he envisioned sweating his way through a foot race. With Jack. “Are you insane? This is a vacation, not Hell Week Part Two. Which it most certainly would be as I chase your fifty grand around the Bahamas instead of lounging on the beach like I came here for.”
With a classic Hyland shrug, Jack blew off all of Fitz’s concerns. “Look, man, it’ll be a piece of cake. Tailor-made for two guys who earned the trident every day. Name one thing we’ve ever done together that we did not dominate.”
True. But it was telling how easily Jack fell into past tense when talking about his time as a SEAL. They’d never be teammates again, not the way it counted, and it sat funny in his chest.
“I’m still bleeding on a regular basis for my trident,” he countered quietly. “Kind of hoped for an uneventful vacation, you know?”
How would he get back his mojo if he was off looking for the GPS coordinates printed on the backside of a seashell? With Jack, no less. The guy probably didn’t break too many mirrors when he looked at himself, but he definitely had too much dude in him for Fitz’s taste.
“Yeah, okay.” Jack managed to look disappointed and casual about it at the same time. “I hear you. Oh, by the way. I forgot to mention that Thora’s doing it with us. And she brought a friend. Who’s hot.”
Thora? As in Jack’s gorgeous bestie whom he’d grown up with and sworn a thousand oaths to never think of as anything else but a friend because he was missing the majority of his brain cells? Fitz had lost count of the number of times the guys had harassed Jack for his laissez-faire policy when it came to the woman jazzing up all the pictures on his phone. The same woman who was apparently here in the Bahamas. With a friend.
Might be a lot of mojo recouping that could go on under those circumstances.
“Back up,” Fitz said as the cab stopped near the walkway to a large marina. “Maybe you could’ve led with that, genius. For a smart guy, you need some help in the persuasion department. How hot?”
Jack grinned and mimed zipping his lips with a smart-ass little twist of his fingers. “No, you said you didn’t want to do it. I’m just gonna tell Thora we’re too busy lying around like bumps on a log to team up.”
“Geez, man.”
This scavenger hunt slash race had gotten simultaneously more intriguing and more of a pain in the ass. He was going to have to do it if for no other reason than he suddenly wanted to see the fabled Thora of the Great Friendship for himself. And okay, he’d still lay down his life for a teammate, even though Jack had bailed on him.
A quarter of fifty grand wasn’t anything to sneeze at, but he’d rather have half. Probably. He’d reserve judgment until he got to evaluate the hotness level of the friend for himself.
Lilah was going to kill Thora if the stomach flu didn’t do the job for her.
For the third time, Thora ran off to the bathroom of their hotel room at the Duchess Island resort, and for the third time, the horrific retching sounds echoed off the tile walls until Lilah thought she might have to join her. Sympathy vomiting was not high on her list of things she’d wanted to do on her vacation.