He smirked again, and this time there was definite snark. “Good thinking, flower child.” He slid a phone from his pocket and punched a button. A few seconds after he lifted it to his ear, I heard a voice on the other end. Max spoke briefly and to the point, in that infuriating way that men seem to have, giving only the barest of facts about ‘a lady just off post whose car is broken down.’ He sounded so casual and unaffected, as though saving random women were an every-day occurrence for him.
“And what if it is?” I muttered to myself, stalking away to stand on the other side of my car. “What do I care? He’s just some misogynist military pig who toes the line and saysyes sirevery time they tell him to jump—”
“You know I can hear you, right?”
I startled. Max was leaning on the trunk of my car, watching me with an expression in his eyes that I couldn’t quite read.
“Can you? Hmmm.” I shrugged and turned my back, feeling all the more like a petulant child.
“I’m not a misogynist pig. Military, yeah, you got me there. I do toe the line, because that’s part of my job. And I sayyes sirto anyone who outranks me. I don’t think any of them have ever told me to jump though.” He cocked his head. “Oh, wait, that’s not true. In airborne school, they told us to jump out of a perfectly good airplane, but that was a sergeant, not an officer, so it doesn’t count.”
I didn’t turn around. Maybe he was trying to be nice by trying to be funny, but it wasn’t going to work. He’d insulted a set of principles and ideas that were important to me, and I didn’t forgive very easily.
“But I’m not a woman-hater. On the contrary, I love women. Always have. Love their pretty hair, the way they smell ... girls smell so much better than boys, you know? That’s not me being sexist, it’s just a fact of life. I always wondered how that happens. And I like the way women think, and how they can be both practical and dreamers at the same time.”
His voice had gone soft, and I could feel myself melting. Still, I was too stubborn to face him when I replied.
“If the world were run by women, things would be different. Better, some might say.” Yeah, I was being snippy. No, I didn’t care.
“Some might say.” I was pretty sure there was laughter in his tone, and I wanted to turn around stick out my tongue. I refrained. Barely.
“I’m not some flighty moron, you know. I don’t pick up a sign and march whenever the mood hits me. I believe in certain causes, and I’m not going to sit around whining about injustice. I get involved. I write to my congressmen and congresswomen, and I send editorials to the newspapers, and yes, I protest. Maybe our protests don’t change everything, but they let people know that they can’t get away with lying or hiding their actions, and they remind people who’re weak that they’re not alone.”
Silence stretched between us so long that I wondered if Max had walked away. So it was when he spoke this time, much closer to me than I expected, my heart jumped again.
“I don’t know you. Maybe I jumped to conclusions, and if I offended you, I apologize. But looking at it from my point of view ... my men lay their lives on the line for this country. For its people. Foryou. We make the best decisions we can under circumstances that aren’t always ideal. When people assume that any time something goes down that involves soldiers is automatically our fault, or that we’re going to bury it ... yeah, it gets our backs up.”
“Unchecked power is dangerous power.” I almost whispered the words I’d been hearing all my life.
“I agree. We’re not unchecked. We have to operate under the rules the government hands down, and that’s not as easy as it sounds. We also have to co-exist as part of society, and yet not. We live among civilians, but we are not them. In the towns outside our posts, we’re resented and feared and mistrusted. And what we ask of our military families ... can you imagine it? Think of relocating every two or three years, with little to no say as to where you’ll live next. Add to that the idea that if you’re a dependent, the soldier you love is going to deploy several times a year, even during peace. Oh, and then there’re the unaccompanied tours—the places where families can’t go with the soldier. This life is challenging.”
I pivoted slowly until I was facing him. “But you chose that life. It’s not forced on you or any soldier.”
Max’s mouth twisted. “It might look that way from your perspective. And sometimes that’s true.”
“Even if someone feels trapped, it’s no excuse to attack someone else. The man who beat ...”Shit, I couldn’t remember the victim’s name.“... uh, the guy in the bar, he had skills that he learned in the Army. He had an unfair advantage. It was like unleashing a killing machine.”
Max snorted, and I raised one eyebrow.
“Sorry, I’m just ... I have a hard time seeing Reardon as a killing machine. He’s just a kid. A stupid kid who acted without thinking.”
My mouth dropped open. “You know him? The soldier I’m talking about?”
Immediately, Max’s face shuttered again. “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s not information that—shit. Look.” He laid his hand on my shoulder again, this time lightly. “Do me a favor, please? Don’t repeat what I just said. I know that you think we’re trying to cover stuff up, but the truth is, right now we’re only trying to figure out what really happened. And if you go to the newspaper or the TV news and tell them what I said, it’s only going to complicate things more than they already are.”
“I won’t.” I made the promise without thought or consideration, but it was an easy yes. Telling anyone what Max had accidentally let slip to me wasn’t going to accomplish anything. “But is the Army going to even consider doing the right thing here? Or can we expect the whole thing to be swept under the proverbial rug?”
“That’s information above my paygrade.” He put his arms behind his back in an at-ease stance, and I wondered if that was part of his training: saying the right words and standing the right way, all the while hiding the truth from the world.
“Yo, Remington.”
Neither of us had noticed the truck pulling up behind Max’s car, but now we both turned as a tall man in jeans and a tight short-sleeved T-shirt loped across the grass. Max stepped away from me.
“Hey, Kade.” The two men slapped each other on the backs in that typical guy way. “Thanks for coming over. Here’s your customer.” He pointed to me. “Samantha ... uh, Crewe, was it? This is Kade Braggs. He’s going to tow your car to Specialist Evans’ house.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Kade grinned at me, frank appreciation in his gaze. And the feeling was mutual: he was easy on the eyes, with blond hair, green eyes and an adorable dimple on his left cheek. He wasn’t quite as built as Max was, and I had to admit that I didn’t feel the same pull toward him that I did to the other man, even if Kade did seem more interested in me than Max had.
“I really appreciate it.” I glanced at the pick-up truck dubiously. “No offense, because I’m sure you know your stuff, but how exactly are you going to tow my car?” I didn’t see any of the attachments I was accustomed to seeing on wreckers.
