1

      “HASTA LA VISTA, BABY.”

      Sweat dripping into his eyes, Zane Bennett narrowed them enough to glare at the guy shimmying past him on the rope. He couldn’t tell from behind who it was, but it didn’t matter. The other man was breaking away, getting ahead.

      Losing was one thing that Zane personally detested but had learned to accept when competing with fellow SEALs. After all, they were the best.

      But losing to a sore winner?

      Damned if that was okay.

      Zane dug deep for more power. Ignoring his screaming muscles, he kicked it up from high gear to the unsustainable but kick-ass superhigh gear. Palms burning, biceps quivering, shoulders rippling, he yanked himself up his rope in three quick pulls. Rather than vaulting the wall at the top, he flipped over it, landing on the other side, double-timing it through the rest of the obstacle course to take the lead. He kept it through the three-mile run back to base, where he crossed the unofficial finish line and dropped into the sand to huff for air.

      Even at eight in the morning, he was glad for the cap that shaded his eyes from the Southern California sun as it poured its hot rays over his already sweating body.

      “Nice job.” The congratulations were accompanied by a slap to the back that would have felled a lesser man.

      “Hey, Lansky,” he greeted without bothering to look back at his senior officer. “How’s it going?”

      Lieutenant Jared Lansky was a SEAL and member of Poseidon, a twelve-man team deemed the elite even among the SEAL Brotherhood. A team Zane would have been breaking his ass to join if not for the fact that it was exclusive to men who’d graduated BUD/S together, all of them focused on building their reps since they’d left Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training with their SEAL tridents.

      “Dude, why are you doing PT?” Shaking his head as if Zane had dropped a screw or two on the run, Lansky gave Zane his patented WTF look. “I thought you were on leave.”

      Leave.

      Yeah. Two weeks without training. Two weeks without heart-pounding, muscle-building, ligament-tearing workouts. No competition, no shooting range, no testing his skills.

      “My plane doesn’t leave until noon.” His arms resting on bended knees, Zane flicked the sand off his boots. “I figured I’d get in one last sweaty round before heading for Colorado.”

      “You don’t sound thrilled. Problems at home?”

      “Problems?” Zane laughed. His mother wouldn’t allow problems. “Nah. Home is good. Really good. Two weeks of sleeping as late as I want, not shaving, eating mom’s cooking? Good times, man. Time with my family, hanging out with the twin, chilling with my buds. All good.”

      “That’s three goods. In my experience, three goods equals bad.” Jared threw up a hand before Zane could reply. “We’ll get back to that. First, the twin?”

      “My brother, Xander.” Actually, thinking about seeing Xander again made the prospect of home a lot more interesting. Seeing any of his family was okay, but everything was always better when Xander was around.

      “Identical?”

      “Fraternal.” He considered for a second, then shrugged. “But we look enough alike to pass for brothers.”

      “Do you have that twin mystique?” At Zane’s questioning look, Jared explained, “You know, you do things alike. Think alike. Finish each other’s sentences. Twin things.”

      “I wouldn’t say that,” Zane objected. Others said it a lot, but he really didn’t see it himself. He doubted his brother did, either. They were themselves, not two halves of one person.

      “What’s your brother do?”

      “He’s an engineer. In the Navy.” Zane slid a sidelong look and smiled. “And a SEAL.”

      “No shit?” Laughing in delight, Jared gave him a swift slap on the shoulder. “That’s awesome. Twin SEALs. Where’s he stationed?”

      “Virginia.”

      “The two of you ever serve together?”

      “Nope. I enlisted the day after we turned eighteen. He went the Annapolis route after graduating high school. My focus was explosive ordinance, his was engineering.”

      “Is he the reason you blew through OTC like there was a tiger on your ass?”

      “Nope.” He had gotten his bachelor’s degree and went through officer training in the shortest amount of time possible, but it had nothing to do with keeping up with Xander. “I simply wanted to beat Cole Hanes. I pretty much forgot about the guy after we went our separate ways when I kicked his butt in BUD/s. Word got back to me that he was talking smack about me. That once he made officer, he’d prove once and for all who was the better SEAL.”

      “So rather than accepting that nothing could take away from graduating top of your BUD/s class, you busted ass, tripled your workload to get your degree then plowed through OTC in record time all because some idiot was trying to make himself look good?” Lansky slanted him that WTF expression again. “Why?”

      “He challenged me.” Zane shrugged. “A challenge is just a fancy-ass dare, isn’t it? And only a wimp walks away from a dare.”

      “True that,”