“You’re killing me, Tate.”

“That’s the idea, Caldwell.” Yes, indeed. That was the idea. She sensed that any show of weakness from her would bring out the predator in him, resulting in her being eaten alive. And not in a good way.

When her shoulder ached from recoils and her toes were cramping from dehydration, Kettering called an end to the morning’s shooting. They went back after lunch, and Sherri didn’t think they were ever going to leave the firing range by the time they were finally released.

Anna and Lily headed straight for the showers, but Sherri made her way to the gym, where foam rollers were stored. She wanted to roll out some of the kinks in her shoulder before calling it a day. Assuming the sadists training them didn’t have some dastardly night evolution up their sleeves.

The hard foam rolled across the kinks in her upper back, and it hurt so good. She groaned in pain and relief as the knots worked out.

“You gotta quit making noises like that around us guys,” a voice said from just behind her. Griffin.

She lurched and slid off the roller, her rear end thumping unceremoniously on the concrete floor. “You startled me,” she mumbled.

“A SEAL should never be startled. You should scan your surroundings continuously, know where everyone in the room is at all times. You should spot every entrance and possible egress point, identify where an attacker would ambush you, and know what your first couple of moves will be in response to any attack.”

She pulled a face. “You’re singing to the choir.”

“How’s that?”

“I’m a woman. Worse, I’m a decent-looking woman working in a largely male world. I already do most of what you described in self-defense.”

Griffin grabbed a roller and lay down beside her, rolling his hamstrings across the foam cylinder. “I thought sexual harassment has been addressed pretty aggressively in the military.”

“It has. But too many men seem to think I’m an exception to the rules.”

“Is that why you want to be a SEAL? So you can kick their asses?”

She shrugged as she shifted the roller to her other deltoid muscle. “It wouldn’t suck as a side benefit.”

“Speaking of which, I apologize for kissing you. That was out of line.”

“No worries. The way I remember it, there were two voluntary participants.” Besides, it had been more of a mutual collision than a boy-kissed-the-girl moment.

He nodded and turned on his side to roll out his right quad.

“Tell me something, Griffin. What hangs you up so badly about the idea of women as SEALs?”

“It’ll change the team dynamics, that’s for sure.”

“You mean like sex and attraction and flirting?”

He shrugged, declining to answer. But clearly she’d hit the nail on the head.