Page 1 of Life, Love and the Pursuit of Happiness

Prologue

The bigger they are, the harder they fall . . .

The first time he saw her, she was wearing a tool belt.

The second time he saw her, she was wearing leather and riding a Harley, her ice-blonde hair blowing in the wind.

The third time he saw her, she wore nothing at all.

Hoo-yah!

Merrill “Geek” Good didn’t stand a chance. He was in love. Or lust. Or both.

Didn’t matter that the ex–Navy SEAL, soon-to-be treasure hunter had been around the world a dozen times, seen amazing things, done amazing things, been wounded five times, almost died once, screwed so many women he should be called DeWalt, could bench-press two hundred and thirty pounds easy-peasy, measured 150-plus on the I.Q. meter, and had a million or two in stocks due to an erotic invention he sold on the Internet. Don’t ask!

Nothing in his colorful life had prepared him for this woman. Love at first sight didn’t begin to describe the wallop she packed.

Unfortunately, Delilah Jones didn’t reciprocate his feelings.

Prison makes good women horny . . .

The first time she saw him, she was blasting the rust off an old metal diner with a power tool—and was so disconcerted she almost bored a hole straight through. Holy-frickin’-moly!

His light brown hair was cut short, military style.

He wore a uniform of some kind, probably Navy.

Whiskey-colored eyes smoldered as he watched her work.

The second time, he was standing on a street corner in a ratty Metallica T-shirt, cargo shorts, and flip-flops as she passed by on Uncle Clyde’s motorcycle.

He lowered his sunglasses halfway down his nose and peered over them to watch her almost hit the car in front of her.

The third time she saw him, it was by moonlight. She’d been skinny-dipping in Bell Sound, the bay behind her property, and he was standing on the rocky shore, which she’d thought was private.

It was a devilish situation. She was new in town and needed to make friends, not enemies, for business and other reasons.

Even so, that’s when Delilah decided to put on the brakes, slam the door, raise the wall, amp up her usual snark factor a notch or two, do everything in her power to keep the man away. Merrill Good might be sizzling, bone-melting, pure temptation on his size twelve hoof to most women, but that was the one thing a female ex-con couldn’t afford now that she was finally free.

Still . . .

Chapter 1

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and he chose . . . the bay . . .

“No regrets?” Navy SEALs Lt. Commander Jacob Alvarez Mendozo, aka JAM, asked Merrill as they sat with their buddies at a round table in the ballroom of a mansion called Chimes in Bell Cove, a small town on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. The room was festooned with Fourth of July decorations. They were inhaling beers and raising an occasional champagne toast to the newly married couple, Christmas tree farmer Ethan Rutledge and ex–female SEAL Wendy Patterson. A lethal combination! The alcohol mix, not the happy couple or the overabundance of odd-for-a-wedding red, white, and blue paraphernalia.

“Not so far,” Merrill answered, knowing that JAM referred to the abrupt turning point he was taking in his life, leaving the exciting life of the teams a month ago and moving here to Bell Cove. He would soon be starting a shipwreck salvaging and treasure hunting company, a different kind of exciting, he hoped. Even so, he admitted, “I am feeling a little disoriented, though. It’ll pass, eventually, but for the moment, I’m not sure who I am, or where I fit in, neither fish nor fowl, if you know what I mean. Hell, I’m like a dickhead addict going cold turkey after my fifteen-year fix in Special Forces.”

Merrill was surprised at himself, that he could put that many words together, considering the state of his inebriation.

“Same as me. Sixteen damn years! Which is like a hundred in frog years,” JAM quipped, “not to be confused with dog years.”

They grinned at each other. SEALs had been known as frogmen from way back when most of their work had been done on boats or in the water. Ribbitting was a joke among the guys when someone called them animals.

Yeah, sometimes the only thing that would do was a good ribbit. It was as popular as the traditional “Hoo-yah!” in some instances. Or if you asked a SEAL who’d been out on a mission too long if he was feeling “froggie,” as in lascivious, the answer would be a loud and bodacious ribbit.

“I still say you should join me in treasure hunting,” Merrill said. “The first meeting of my crew will be held on Monday. You could stick around an extra day or two and see what we’re about. I could use you, man.”