The SEAL's Christmas Dilemma
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Julianna Morris
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The healing power of hope… And family! A trip home to Montana in December is just the vacation international relief doctor Noelle Bannerman needs to get past a heartbreaking time. What she didn't expect was wounded Navy SEAL Dakota Maxwell to be part of her family's holiday plans. His resistance to Christmas fun becomes her challenge. And as she remains festive in the face of everything she's lost, will Dakota offer her new possibilities?
PROLOGUE
“COMMANDER, CAN YOU hear me?”
The insistent voice filtered into Dakota’s fuzzy brain and he opened his eyes to see a woman in uniform standing over him. An officer.
Standing?
He tried to banish the pain muddling his head, but didn’t quite succeed. A glance around told him he was in a ship’s medical bay.
Memory of a bomb blast returned. Aside from that, the last thing he could recall was telling a dumb joke, then grinning at his SEAL team and giving the signal to move.
“What about my men?” he croaked through a dry throat. “And the mission?”
“Don’t worry about that now.”
“Is my team all right?”
The Navy doctor sighed. “Your mission is classified and above my pay grade, so to speak. All I can say is that you arrived by helicopter two days ago. I’ve operated twice. You’re lucky to be alive.”
Dakota slowly realized there were bandages on his face and leg. Actually, he was bandaged all the way down the right side of his body. He painfully wiggled his fingers and toes. They seemed to work. Something in the doctor’s face suggested there was more to his injuries than she was revealing, but he doubted she would provide any details at the moment.
“The ship has been on radio silence,” the doctor said, “but we’ll be able to notify your emergency contacts later today, and they can speak with the rest of your family. The names I have are Jordan and Wyatt Maxwell. Is that right?”
Dakota didn’t want to explain that his brothers were the majority of the family he had left. His grandfather didn’t count, his mom had passed away when he was just a kid and his father had been missing for so long, he was presumed dead.
“Yes, but I’ll talk to them myself,” he said. “When I’m able.”
His brothers were going to be concerned and Jordan’s new wife would worry, something she didn’t need during her pregnancy. The thought of his eldest brother’s unexpected marital contentment was curiously soothing and Dakota let his eyelids drift downward.
At least one of the Maxwell brothers was happy.
