The Navy's Ghost (Bad Boys of Beta Squad) by Siobhan Muir

said anything? No.”
    “You really love her?”
    “More than life, man.”
    “Yeah, me too.” Jim grimaced as if his coffee had soured.
    “How long?”
    “Since SERE. The damn Kookaburra song sucked me right in.”
    Todd chuckled and sipped his coffee, thinking back to their time at SERE training. “Yeah, that was damn funny. I sang the song in my head for weeks after.”
    Retro snorted, a little more humor in his expression, but he sobered quickly. “The thing is I’ve never met anyone like Chris. The only women I went for were soft, feminine, cuddly. You know, like a kitten or a puppy.” He scraped a blunt nail on the tabletop. “But Chris blew it right out of the water. She’s kick-ass and strong and so damn beautiful, I get hard just thinking of her taking down the enemy, slamming the butt of her rifle in their faces, and still managing to extract the targets.” He met Todd’s gaze. “She kept up with us in training. Hell, she led us through a lot of it. I figured she’d slow us down, make us worry over her welfare and abilities. Boy, did she kick the shit out of that idea.”
    Jim’s hands encircled his coffee cup, but he didn’t pick it up. He seemed to be picking his words instead. “She won me over at SERE and only backed up my respect and admiration over the years we’ve worked with her. It just about killed me when she went down in that miserable dump . If you hadn’t been there…” He swallowed hard.
    “God, she looked so small and so beaten then. It was all I could do to keep from beating the contact into a bloody pulp. I just labeled it as further training in torture and made sure we got out safe. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”
    He paused and turned his gaze to the window. “Until now.”
    Todd ag reed. Chris had terrified him when he’d clamped her femoral artery closed, grateful to whichever God watching out for her he’d been able to grab it before she bled out. He’d definitely earned his nickname. But she’d survived and he renewed his gratitude every day. As for her confession of loving both him and their classmate Retro, it didn’t frighten Todd so much as shock him. A whole new set of parameters had risen up for him to consider.
    He could hear Chris’ s voice egging him on. Are you man enough to take it, boys?
    “You’re freaked out?” Todd focused in keeping his voice carefully bland.
    “Well, yeah. I mean, aren’t you?” Jim’s jaw tightened. “Happily-ever-after always meant the guy gets the girl of his dreams and they hook up. Done. I never heard it included another guy , much less one of his best friends. And I’m straight, man. Straighter than a flagpole. I have no interest in ‘entering at rear’.” He shuddered dramatically.
    “Not even anal sex with a woman? You’ve never even thought about it?”
    Jim shut up and stared at Todd, his eyes suspicious.
    “Are you really considering what she proposed?”
    “Was it a proposal? I figure she just told us what she felt.”
    Retro growled. “Same difference . Are you really okay with the idea of sharing her?”
    Magic dropped his head and rubbed his fingers across the surface of the table, brushing away crumbs left from a previous customer. Am I okay with sharing the woman I love with Jim?
    The thing was he loved Retro, too, loved him as a brother and a friend. But he wasn’t gay. Like Retro, he held no interest in sucking cock or getting rammed by a guy’s rod. But making love to Chris with Jim there, sharing in their love and the physical expression of it—Hell yeah, it turned Todd on more than just fucking Chris alone. They’d always been stronger as a team, including their private, intimate lives. Todd had never considered sharing before, but now the idea of fucking Chris with Jim intrigued him.
    “Yeah, I am.”
    Jim’s face solidified into white marble.
    Todd hastened to explain. “I love Chris. I have ever since she told me to get the fuck in gear and start haulin’ my weight in