The question exploded across her brain like a heat-seeking missile.

Stunned, she searched her heart for an answer, but found none as they raced ashore like bats out of hell.

Cal ran the dinghy right up onto the beach, executing a nifty maneuver to lift the propeller out of the water at the last second before it ran aground, and Sherri had no more time to think.

Griffin, Trevor, Axel, and the three women leaped out of the skidding vessel in a coordinated egress, using the vessel’s momentum to help them drag the dinghy all the way up the sandy beach to the weeds at the edge of the dunes a hundred feet back from the beach.

In combat conditions, they would hide the dinghy with a camo net and vegetation. They’d practiced doing that many times already, however, and today were allowed to skip that step.

Still seated in the rubber inflatable, Cal announced, “Take me to the Jeeps.”

Sherri groaned as the women and instructors hoisted the dinghy over their heads with Cal seated in it like a conquering hero. They jogged through the dunes, slogging through ankle-deep sand. Today, the vehicles were parked a quarter mile back from the beach.

It might not seem far, but carrying a boat, motor, man, and whatever water had accumulated in the dinghy in the course of their training evolution, over their heads no less, made that quarter mile suck rocks.

Anna muttered, “Cripes. What does Cal weigh, anyway?”

Axel replied, “I don’t know what you’re complaining for. Us guys already did our time in BUD/S hauling Zodiacs around over our heads. And here we are, having to do it again, like a bunch of raw recruits.”

Griffin retorted, “Aww, you know you love having all these pretty girls see how big and strong and manly you are, Axe. Or should I say Teddy Bear.”

Sherri took her cue along with the other women and commenced oohing and aahing.

Axel scowled. “If I didn’t think Cal would kick my butt for dropping him, I’d come over there right now and go homicidal teddy bear on your ass.”

Trevor commented wistfully, “Where’s Kenny when you need him? Surely a song about homicidal teddy bears would be a number one hit.”

Sherri hated to even think about the kind of lyrics Kenny would have come up with about that topic.

Everyone was laughing by the time they got to the parking lot and lowered Cal and the boat to the gravel so the boss could climb out.

Today, Sherri was in the back seat for the ride back to base. How Griffin managed to end up beside her without it looking contrived, she wasn’t quite sure. But again, she found herself plastered up against him. The now intimately familiar contours of his body pressed against her side, and she imagined how they looked backlit by firelight against the night.