All for You

by Jessica Scott

“Tell me you’re joking?”

  His smile was grim against the dark of his skin and he glanced at her slick right sleeve that sported no combat patch. “You should worry when I’m not making jokes,” he said, leaning back to check the door.

  He pulled a vibrating phone from his left shoulder pocket and peered out the front door. “Yeah?”

  Emily stood back, unsure of what to do. She’d never been in combat and she hadn’t really paid attention in officer school when they’d done the combat training. Reza pushed the door open a little.

  “Yeah, I see the truck. MPs are en route. Got it.” He scowled and slipped the phone back into his pocket and pushed through the door. Over Reza’s shoulder, she could see an ancient white Bronco yank into the parking lot. A minute later, the door opened and Sloban tumbled out, at least halfway to wasted, gun in hand.

  He was tweaking on something. His movements were jerky and quick.

  “Wait.” Reza stopped and turned back at her movement. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to go talk to him. What’s it look like?”

  “You realize that is massively stupid, don’t you?” She took a step forward. “Last time I checked, I was the doctor here.” Her skin tightened over her bones and she fought the fear that crawled up her spine to wrap around her throat. She was afraid. She should be better than that by now. She expected him to look at her with disdain but instead, something softened in his eyes.

  “It’s okay, Emily,” he said softly. “He’s one of mine. I’ve got this.”

  He stepped into the bright Fort Hood afternoon.

  What kind of a man walked toward the threat of violence instead of away? Everyone else she knew would have smartly left and let someone with a heck of a lot more skill handle the situation. But the big sergeant she’d made love to less than an hour ago headed out to face down a soldier on the edge.

  She blamed the little flip in her belly on nerves as she crept toward the door. She couldn’t very well hide in the corner while Iaconelli did this on his own. She was a doctor. This was what she did. It took her thirty seconds to find her courage. Then she followed him into the light.

  * * *

  Sloban walked slowly toward the front of the clinic. He was using. Reza could tell instantly by the way his hands were in constant motion, especially the one holding the nine mil. Sloban’s eyes were sunken and hollow and rimmed with red.

  He felt her presence behind him as he stepped from beneath the shade tree overhanging the front door. Emily had been white as a sheet only seconds ago when he’d told her he was going out to talk to Sloban. He’d figured her natural fear would keep her inside and out of his way.

  Apparently, self-preservation was not on her list of strong points. Second only to domestic violence situations, dealing with a strung-out druggie was the worst type of situation to go into. Well, except for house-borne IEDs. Those were always fun, too.

  “Dude, this isn’t the way you want to go out,” Reza said quietly to Sloban. He wanted to turn around and shout at the dumbass captain behind him. Why the hell hadn’t she stayed inside and let him handle this? Did she think this was some kind of friggin’ game? The kid in front of him, who had once been a decorated combat veteran, was twitchy and strung-out. His face was pockmarked with sores—some scabbed over, others still fresh and raw. Reza’s soul ached at the emptiness that looked back at him. Sloban had been part of Reza’s platoon once upon a time. He’d been a fucking warrior on the streets of Baghdad and had gone house to house with him in Sadr City.

  But one too many nightmare scenarios had twisted something inside the shadow of the man looking back at him now. One too many explosions that had left him covered in his buddies’ blood. One too many sleepless nights in the bunker as the world blew up around them.

  Reza knew full well what it felt like to want to numb the pain. But he’d never resorted to meth. That was just stupid. Here Sloban was, destroying himself, all because he was trying to get away from the assault from his own brain.

  “Sarn’t Ike, the army fucked me. Totally fucked me.” Sloban gripped the nine mil in his hand like an old-school mobster, waving it for emphasis as he spoke. “She fucked me. Her and all these goddamned doctors who think they know what we do.” He jabbed the gun over Reza’s shoulder in Emily’s direction.

  Reza stepped to the side, blocking Sloban’s view of Captain Lindberg and moving directly into the path of his weapon. “You don’t want to do this, Neal. This isn’t the way to get them to listen to your case.”

  “They’re not going to listen to me!” Sloban raked his hand through his stringy hair. “They said I’m an addict. I won’t get shit from the VA now. I can’t get the fucking memories out of my head. They broke me, Sarn’t Ike. I begged not to go on this last deployment. You know what Captain Marshall said? Suck it up, pussy.” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “I am not a fucking pussy.” His eyes filled. “I did everything the army asked me to do,” he whispered. “Everything.”

  “I know, buddy.” Reza took a single step forward. “I know. And we’ll get it figured out. I’ll help you write to your congressman. I’ll take you to see the Corps commander. We can figure this out, okay? But this isn’t the way to do it.”

  Sloban shook his head, his dirty hair falling across his empty eyes. “There’s nothing else to do, man. They don’t want to pay for what they did to me. They don’t want to talk about how fucked up this war is. They just want people like me to go away.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “We can fix this.” Emily’s voice was soft though filled with terror. She was directly behind Reza. Fear pitched in his guts. “I’ll go back and re-look at your file.”

  “I am not a file!” Sloban screamed, raising the gun at the woman now standing at Reza’s side. “I am a person. A fucking person! I’m not a number. I’m not a file. I’m not something the army can just throw away!”

  The world slowed down and ground to a halt.

  Sloban flicked the safety off.

  Reza dove.

  The echo of the nine mil shattered the afternoon.

  Chapter Twelve

  The lights from the ambulance bounced off the buildings around them. Some jackass really needed to turn off the sirens. It wasn’t like they were in a hurry to get anywhere.

  Sloban had been dead before he hit the ground.

  Reza stood near his truck, holding a coffee cup and sipping it slowly.

  He’d finally opened the flask. He didn’t think anyone would give him shit about having a drink right about now.

  Hell, he needed something a whole lot stronger than a few shots of vodka to get the smell of charred skin and smoking blood out of his nose. The laced coffee was helping, but not nearly enough.

  He watched the chaos play out before him, feeling detached from the world around him. His heart rate had long ago slowed back to normal. He was lucky that he wouldn’t have a strong crash response after the adrenaline stopped pumping through his system, otherwise he’d probably be ready to take a nap. Other than needing a clean uniform, he still had to go back to work. He was sure that Captain Marshall was going to need a full report, PowerPoint slideshow, and executive summary with note cards before Reza could go home for the day. Douche bag.

  The paramedics covered the body and lifted Sloban’s remains into the back of the ambulance. It was only after they moved that he saw Emily standing beneath an old oak tree with Colonel Zavisca. She didn’t really appear to be listening to whatever the colonel was saying. She had her arms wrapped tightly around herself. One hand was repetitively rubbing her shoulder and her face was still pale and drawn. Colonel Zavisca patted her back awkwardly and walked back toward the waiting MPs.

  Sighing and knowing full well he should be going in the other direction, he started across the small yard. She didn’t acknowledge him until he was practically on top of her.

  “Here.” He thrust the coffee cup toward her. It was like a curtain lifted from her vision as she looke
d first at the coffee cup and then up at him.

  “I don’t drink coffee,” she whispered. “But thank you.”

  Reza offered a grin he wasn’t really feeling. “Make an exception. It’ll help get you through the rest of this.”

  She glanced skeptically down at the Styrofoam cup. “What’s in it.”

  “Bug juice. Just drink before you friggin’ collapse.”

  Her hands trembled as she took the cup, then with a deep sigh she tossed back a solid gulp.

  And promptly choked. Her eyes watered as she coughed. Reza took back the cup before she spilled. “What was in that?” she asked when she could speak.

  He smiled and felt some of the detachment he’d felt snap inside him, letting him feel the warmth of the sun beating on his neck. “Special brew.”

  She swiped at her eyes. “I thought you gave up drinking.”

  He wasn’t going to answer that one honestly. “Today’s an exception,” he said quietly.

  “That was a dirty trick.”

  Reza lifted one shoulder, watching a hint of color came back into her cheeks. “You look better now.”

  “How can you be so calm?” she asked, tipping her head to peer up at him. A single ray of sunlight glinted across her cheek.

  Calm? That wasn’t how he would describe the lack inside him. It wasn’t how he’d explain the total emptiness he felt as the adrenaline wore off. “Guess I’m used to stuff like this.”

  “That is a really sad commentary on your life,” she whispered. Already she looked steadier on her feet, more solid, instead of as if a stiff breeze would knock her over.

  “It is.” He shifted and turned toward the departing ambulance. “I knew Sloban before…” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat roughly. “Before he got hooked on the bad stuff. He was a good kid. Lots of potential. Something broke him.” Reza looked down at her, noting how close she stood. Color had come back into her lips. “Eventually, war breaks everyone.”

  She studied him quietly and for the first time in Reza’s life he wanted to simply sit. Not move. Not drink himself into oblivion or fuck until he passed out. Just sit in a stillness that didn’t echo with the taunts of the dead. It was a strange sensation and not completely unwelcome, but a little unnerving.

  “Why do you still stay in, then? Why not get out of the army before it breaks you, too?”

  He smiled wryly. “Who says it hasn’t broken me already?” He rubbed his hand over his face and took another drink, then offered her the cup, surprised when she took another, if smaller, sip. “This is the first time you’ve been around something like this, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Not a whole lot of death at home.”

  “Where’s home?”

  “Outside of Boston. You?”

  “New York.”

  She handed him back the cup. “You don’t sound like you’re from New York. You don’t sound like you’re from anywhere in particular.”

  “I’ve been in the army long enough to bleed any accent out of me.” He kept the rest of his comments to himself. He wanted to make sure she was good to go before he headed back to face Marshall.

  His phone vibrated in his pocket. “Speak of the devil,” he mumbled. “Yes, sir?”

  “Haven’t you seen my phone calls?”

  “Been a little busy here,” Reza said, taking a long pull off the coffee cup. It was pretty sad that he needed strong alcohol more to deal with his company commander than he needed to deal with a kid killing himself right in front of him. Shit, he was a disaster.

  “I needed a situation report for the battalion commander an hour ago. I’m pulling into the parking lot now, damn it, since you haven’t answered the phone.”

  Reza glanced up in time to see Marshall’s big black Toyota Tundra whip into the tiny R&R Center parking lot like it was a sports car on a closed track. Reza slid the phone into his pocket then handed the cup to Lindberg. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. Here, you look like you need a little more.”

  She smiled and the way her eyes warmed did something to his insides. “From the sound of that conversation, you may need it more than me.”

  He grinned. “Yeah, but I’m used to dealing with douche bag officers. Part of the duty description of an NCO.”

  He stalked toward Marshall, praying for the gods of patience to smile down on him. It would not do well for him to punch his commander. Sergeant majors tended to frown on things like NCOs assaulting their officers.

  * * *

  Emily wrapped her hands around the warm cup and sat down on the ring of paving stones circling the tree behind her. Reza was right: Whatever was in that cup was helping keep her upright. All she’d wanted to do was go home, take a shower and curl up in the dark safety of her room. She wanted someone to wake her up and to be able to start the entire day over again.

  The nightmare of Sloban putting the gun beneath his chin and pulling the trigger was enough to make her soul bleed. Every time she shut her eyes, she saw him do it again, over and over in slow motion.

  She opened her eyes, refusing to descend into the morass of the memories, and watched Reza walk toward one very angry captain. The other captain was almost as tall as Sergeant Iaconelli but much thinner. Where Iaconelli was big and wide and looked built for strength, the captain was wiry.

  Other than their uniforms, they looked like they came from two different worlds. The captain was tense and angry, the ends of his dusty brown hair fading into the angry purple of his face. Reza shook his head and jerked his hand in her direction.

  Why would they be arguing about her?

  Sucking in a deep breath, she stood and crossed the small yard, the dead leaves and dried grass that she’d learned marked the Fort Hood summer crunching beneath her combat boots. The other captain’s voice held barely restrained fury. Reza was calm and unruffled, as stoic as he’d been throughout the morning’s ordeal.

  “I don’t really give a shit if the Corps commander was here, Iaconelli. I needed to update the brigade commander and I missed a critical window on the reporting requirements.”

  Reza stuffed his hands in his pockets. “One of your soldiers is dead and you’re worried about a report.” He didn’t raise his voice but Captain Marshall’s face went white. Emily couldn’t tell if it was from fury or shame.

  Marshall jabbed his finger in Reza’s chest. “You’re out of line, Sarn’t Ike. Completely and totally out of line.”

  “What are you going to do, tell the sergeant major I was too busy dealing with a dead body to answer the phone? Go ahead, sir. Knock yourself out. And while you’re at it, add in the part where you revoked Sloban’s pass privileges and ordered him not to do any more drugs. It’ll make you look like a real fucking hero.”

  Reza had almost gone to jail that day. Marshall had done everything he could to punish Sloban for his addiction. Reza had gone over his head to get the kid sent to rehab.

  Was it just too hard to comprehend that you couldn’t give a soldier a direct order not to use? Not when they were addicted to the hard stuff.

  “I told that soldier not to do drugs!”

  Reza’s temper finally snapped and he took a step toward his commander. He stopped short of actually striking the man. “He was a fucking addict, you asshole. You can order him not to do a lot of things but you can’t order an addict not to use. I’m done with this shit. Do you have your precious fucking report?”

  Marshall took a deep breath, his hands clenched by his sides. “I’m going to let your flagrant disrespect slide because of what happened here today. But watch yourself, Sergeant. One day, all the awards on your chest aren’t going to fucking save you.”

  Marshall stalked off, slamming into his big truck and tearing out of the parking lot. Reza turned and almost plowed into Emily. She held up the cup. “You can definitely use this more than me,” she said.

  He seemed to visibly relax as he took the cup. He didn’t seem to feel the alcohol at all. “You doing better?” he asked.

  “I’m
fine. But do you have to deal with that guy on a daily basis?”

  “He’s my esteemed company commander. We suspect he was potty trained at gun point.”

  He took the cup from her and lifted the lid off, peering into the now empty cup. It had numbed something sharp and stabbing inside her. Missing though, was the comfortable fuzz in her head, like there normally was when she’d had a glass of wine. “You haven’t answered the question, Ma’am.”

  She smiled up at him, seeing a crack in the deep mocha steel of his skin. “I thought I was Emily,” she said softly, wishing she could take back the words that had stung him earlier.

  “Only if you still want to be,” he said, his mouth curling in a faint smile. There was something about his smile, the way it eased the hard lines around his mouth. Like he didn’t spend nearly enough time smiling.

  She tipped her chin. “It just dawned on me that your name is Reza Iaconelli. What kind of a name is that?” She needed the distraction.

  “Italian and Iranian.”

  “It seems like there’s a joke in there somewhere,” she said quietly.

  “It probably has something to do with too much body hair.”

  Emily laughed out loud, then covered her mouth as several bystanders shot her looks. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. Sobering, she folded her arms over her chest. “I feel so guilty for laughing right now.”

  Reza stood a little too close, close enough that she could see a shaving nick at the corner of his mouth. Close enough that people would start talking if she didn’t step back.

  But right then, she didn’t care if the whole world started talking about their relationship. She needed him. More than anything.

  At that moment, she couldn’t walk away. Couldn’t tear herself away from him and the solid support he provided by simply offering a cup of liquor to help get her through the terrible afternoon.

  “You shouldn’t feel guilty for laughing,” he said, his voice rough. “We all have different coping mechanisms.”

  “What are yours? Other than drinking, I mean.”

  Something shuttered down on his expression and it hardened. The warmth that had been there a moment ago was now gone, severing the connection that had been growing between them.