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“Raised in a house of four boys and no mom.” Nikki’s mom had died when she was young, and her father didn’t remarry until she was in high school. “Also, I have a set of balls while the rest of you are missing them. Either way, what are the odds?”
“Nope. I do not want any betting,” Seth said.
“Why not? Alpha does it all the time,” Nikki said.
Inwardly, he groaned. He loved Team Alpha. They were the original Task Force formed a few years ago. Bravo—and soon Charlie—was formed to help with the expanding need for their expertise. Team Alpha had a bad habit of betting on each other’s love lives. Their commander, Martin Delano or Del, had told them to knock it off. Unfortunately, some of that rubbed off on his team during training.
“No,” Ryan said quietly.
“No betting?” Nikki asked.
“No, they aren’t together. Their body language is off for something like that.”
They all looked at the pair. As Autumn and Ian turned, the team found something else to look at. Well, everyone but Seth. It was always difficult to concentrate when Autumn was around. From the moment they’d met, she’d intrigued him. As they returned to their table, Nikki and Kap grabbed chairs. They all scooted around to make room between him and Nikki. When he caught her smile, he knew she had some kind of plan.
“Ian,” she purred, “I heard you have a couple of the Daniels brothers working with Dillon Security.”
He naturally sat down next to her to talk shop, leaving the chair next to him open. Autumn hesitated just a moment, not enough for most people to notice, but enough for him. He was tuned into her on some weird level that left him itchy. He still hadn’t figured it out.
“You work today?” she asked, settling in the chair.
“Yeah. We had to run some drills and help find a tourist at Diamond Head. They overheated and had to be rescued.”
She rolled her eyes. “When will they learn?”
Before he could answer, someone called out her name. She held up her hand, and the man brought her order to the table. The amount of food on the tray made his eyes widen. She shrugged. “I missed my afternoon snack.”
“Maybe you should have had a snack and kept your trap shut,” her companion said.
Her eyes narrowed as she cut a glance towards Ian. “Shut it, Mix.”
“Don’t call me that.”
She smiled. “You know what they call Ian at Dillon Security? Mix. He loves that nickname.”
“They do not, and I do not.”
“Which one is it?” Nikki asked.
Ian opened his mouth, then he snapped it shut and frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Well, either it isn’t your nickname, or it is. Can’t be both.”
Everyone around the table stared at him, the silence stretching out. Ian Smith was starting to discover what it was like to be part of the Task Force Hawaii family, or‘ohanaas the Hawaiians called it. The silence was broken by the waiter who brought over Ian’s food. Then, Seth realized that they ordered separately, meaning there was a good chance this wasn’t a date. Why that made him happy, he didn’t know, or he would rather not think about why it did.
“They do not call me Mix. One annoying office member uses that name, but thankfully, she’s on the mainland right now.”
“Emily isn’t on island?” Autumn asked.
He shook his head. “She needed a break from her brothers, and Dillon needed help with personal security in Miami.”
She turned to Seth. “You should see Emily. She looks like a kindergarten teacher but could take down any of the men around this table. I guess it helps when Mad Dog Daniels is your brother.”
His eyebrows shot up. “The MMA fighter?”
She nodded as she took a bite of her taco. Her humming sound sent a shaft of heat spiraling through his blood. What was it about this woman? She constantly irritated and aroused him. He had never been this interested and repelled by a person.
“I might need to rethink my betting strategy,” Nikki said, cutting into his infatuation. He frowned at her, a look that he knew scared people. Nikki smiled.
