by Leila Haven
I should remove myself from the investigation. I should walk straight to Major Atoll’s office and report my conflict of interest. If I didn’t, and it was Shaun that was guilty, I wasn’t convinced I would be able to convict him.
I was screwed.
That was all I knew for sure.
It was difficult to keep everything going on inside from showing on the outside. “So, in your opinion, you think it warrants a further investigation on Private Simon?”
“Yes, I do, ma’am.”
“Is there anything further you would like to add?”
“No, ma’am.” He paused and then added, “Except that I’m sorry you have to be here at all. I’m Simon’s superior, it was my responsibility to keep him on track. If he is the traitor, then I should be charged with showing a lack of due care.”
“Thank you, Corporal.”
I switched off the voice recorder when he left and my shoulders sagged. More than anything, I wished someone would walk into my makeshift office and point the finger at someone else.
It couldn’t be Shaun.
He was a good man. I’d seen it in his eyes, in his tender strokes when he brushed the hair from my face and tucked it behind my ear. Surely he couldn’t be working with a force that killed innocent people?
The door suddenly opened and I pushed back all the emotions that were welling up. Major Atoll stepped into the room and closed the door again.
“Officer Ramirez,” he started. “You found the dirty bastard yet?”
“I’m still conducting interviews, sir.”
His lips pursed together until he looked like he was sucking on a lemon. “I need this rat found so I can have him charged. Every day that passes is poison out here. I need my men to be united, they can’t be looking at each other and wondering if it’s them.”
“I’m well aware of the time pressures, sir.”
“We need someone arrested.”
Talk about pressure. “I’m working as fast as I can, sir. I promise you’ll be the first to hear when I have a case against someone.”
“Work faster, officer. We have lives at stake here.” He didn’t say another word before he left.
I had one good suspect.
I could have told that to Major Atoll.
But my heart wouldn’t let me.
I really was screwed. I needed to talk with Shaun, at least gives him the heads up. He deserved that, at least.
Chapter 8:
Private Simon
҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉
My usual scan of the mess hall revealed Jenny in the line. It was a relief to see she was okay, hopefully that meant she’d been on the base all day and not out there getting hurt like yesterday.
I figured I could probably spot her in any crowd, even one of millions. She had this way of attracting my gaze, like she was a magnet and I was pure steel. I liked it, even though I had no right to. After all, we weren’t officially together.
Grabbing a tray, I pushed into the line to be beside her. Nobody called me out on it, nobody dared. Apparently it was known that I was working for the enemy, so people tended to give me space now.
“How was your day, officer?” I said, catching Jenny’s attention.
She startled slightly, her eyes only flicking to me briefly before they returned to the food. “It was quite long, but I’m sure it wasn’t nearly as unpleasant as yours was.”
“I don’t know, being inside all day seems pretty unpleasant to me.” I smiled but she didn’t return it. Something was wrong and it instantly made my insides turn.
“At least I was safe,” she said. Jenny could have been talking to anyone, definitely not the man she’d shared a bed with recently. I could feel her cold shoulder even in the desert.
We shuffled down the line while we grabbed food along the way. All the things I wanted to talk to her about suddenly vanished from my mind. I wasn’t prepared for her icy reception.
Did she think I was the traitor?
What fucking lies had people been telling her all day?
“Is it you?” she asked quietly, in such a small voice that I wasn’t certain she meant to say it out loud. No matter how many times the question was asked, the sting never got easier to handle.
“No,” I replied, the only word I knew how to form.
“Are you sure?”
“Meet me later,” I said. We inched along the line a little more before she finally shook her head.
“I can’t.”
“What?”
“I just can’t.”
What kind of a game was she playing? The last time I saw her she was fine. We were fine.
And now she didn’t even want to meet with me?
“I think we need to talk,” I insisted, it came out unintentionally as a low growl.
“I said I can’t,” she replied.
We reached the end of the counter. Jenny picked up her tray and sat at a table by herself. I couldn’t go and sit with her, it wouldn’t take much for the wrong person to see us together and put the pieces together.
I sat with Rafter, Cooper, Salinger, and Ridley. The conversation at the table ended the moment I sat down, leaving an awkward silence.
“You can continue talking about me if you want,” I said. It was supposed to be a joke but it didn’t sound much like one. I was pissed, not only at Jenny but at everyone.
I was ready to lay down my life for all my brothers in arms and now they couldn’t even talk to me? What kind of treatment was this? They’d never seen me do anything wrong but had decided I was guilty anyway.
It was Jenny’s job to find the traitor.
Maybe she wasn’t looking very far.
My shitty day was only getting worse. I was looking forward to lights out just so I didn’t have to keep being treated like shit by everyone I knew. Tomorrow would probably be the same but at least I would be able to get some reprieve from it.
“We weren’t talking about you,” Rafter said. He scooped some carrots into his mouth and kept talking. “In fact, we were talking about the Superbowl. My money’s on the Broncos winning this year.”
He was probably lying. If I was in a better mood I might have been able to keep up the ruse and play along. Not tonight, not after the fucking awful day I’d had.
I shoveled food into mouth, eating fast enough that I would probably have indigestion later on. As I cleared my plate, I stood. “The Broncos have no chance.”
Silence followed me all the way out of the mess hall.
Apparently staring at me was a thing now. The craze seemed to be rampant in the ranks with everyone doing it as I moved.
Excluding Jenny, who was doing everything she could not to look my way. Apparently that magnetic attraction only went one way.
They could all go to hell.
It was still too early to go to bed and I was riled up enough to get myself in trouble. The rec room was the only part of the base that didn’t seem like it was full of people. Private Kincaid was the only one in there. She wasn’t glued to Rafter’s side, which was a change.
I flopped onto the couch and tried to get lost in the television. Kincaid had some bad reality show on which definitely wasn’t my idea of fun. Still, I could stare at the screen with nobody hassling me.
Or, at least, so I thought.
“What’s gotten you all brooding tonight?” Kincaid asked. She didn’t look at me, keeping her eyes fixed on the television.
“Haven’t you heard? I’m the fucking traitor.”
“Shouldn’t you be up to all kinds of shenanigans then? You don’t have a clandestine meeting with a man dressed all in black tonight?” She smiled and gave me a sideways glance to make sure I knew she was joking.
“Nah. That was last night.” I couldn’t help but smile back. Out of all the hostility and whispers I’d put up with all day, Kincaid was a nice change.
I’d always respected Kincaid. She’d proven herself several times over when we shared a troop. It didn’t matter that she was a woman, she
could definitely hold her own both out in the field and at base.
She was also Rafter’s fiancé, which I couldn’t forget. Anything that I said to her could very well make its way back to him.
“You sure it’s safe to be talking to me?” I started. “My guilt could rub off on you. Wouldn’t want to tarnish that good image of yours.”
“I’m pretty sure I did that when you caught me making out with Rafter,” she replied, still with that lilting grin on her lips.
She was very easy on the eyes, Private Kincaid.
Very easy, indeed.
“I never told Atoll about that, you know. I never told anyone, just like I said I wouldn’t.”
“I know.”
“Really?” It sounded like she was lying, just to make me feel better. I’d been denying everything for weeks now and it seemed nobody was listening. I was surprised to still be invited to Watson’s wedding, I thought he might have taken it back after this whole shitty mess came up.
“Really,” Kincaid said. “Just like I know you’re not the one that internal affairs officer is looking for.”
“How can you be so sure? Unless it’s you she’s searching around for.”
She punched me on the shoulder. Kincaid had a decent right hook. “I know because it’s not something you’re capable of. You’re a good soldier, Simon. You don’t deserve to be tarnished like you are.”
“Well, thank you, Kincaid. You are officially the only sane one in this entire goddamn place.” I meant it too. “Seriously, the only thing that bugs me more about the whole thing is that everybody is too busy pointing their fingers at me that the real bastard is getting away with it.”
She nodded in agreement. “Who do you think it is? Present company excluded, of course.”
“I have no idea. I wish I did, then maybe I could convince them to look at someone else.”
“Have you been interviewed yet? That woman is scary.”
I chuckled, because the idea of Jenny being scary was laughable. Sexy, sultry, gorgeous, intelligent, were all words I would rather use to describe her. Scary was down the list by about a hundred rungs.
“I was interviewed the other day,” I confessed.
“It seems like she’s trying really hard to get to the bottom of the matter.” Kincaid seemed genuine, like she wasn’t just saying things to make me feel better. It was nice to have a sensible conversation with someone. “She might have a whole range of people she’s looking into.”
“I doubt it. Everyone wants to pin it all on me. It would be an easy case if enough people all say the same thing. I’m probably going to lose my career, maybe even go to jail.”
“They need evidence to charge you, Simon.” Kincaid made it seem like it should have been obvious. “They can’t go on word alone. Considering you didn’t do it, they won’t be able to find any proof. They won’t be able to prosecute.”
I wanted to believe her. God, did I want to believe her. But all I kept thinking of was what about if they did find proof?
It was possible.
Crazier things have happened.
No matter how much someone thought they were doing a good job, it was only human to make an error. Given enough time to really look into things, anything could be discovered about a soldier.
Including me.
There were plenty of things I didn’t want Jenny knowing about me. Unfortunately, she had carte blanch to open up the pages of my life and study everything with a magnifying glass.
I stood to leave, no longer wanting to talk to anyone. “Let’s hope they find the bastard so they stop pointing their fingers at me,” I said.
Kincaid gave me a mock-salute as I left. She returned to watching her reality show while I stalked back to my dorm.
After washing away half the Afghanistan desert from my body, I hit the sack. I didn’t really feel tired but my mind was weary. I needed a rest, otherwise I wasn’t going to be able to get up in the morning and do everything I needed to.
I heard all the guys come in and lay down eventually. It was shortly after the dorm was full that I finally drifted off to sleep.
My alarm went off at four a.m. It felt like I’d been asleep for only the same duration as a blink of an eye. There were no such things as days off out here. They worked our asses off and then a bit more.
Nobody else was up yet, which was exactly the point of my early morning rise. I crept around the sleeping quarters and gathered my things, choosing to dress in the bathroom so I didn’t wake anyone.
I needed to see someone.
Any they weren’t going to wait for me.
Chapter 9:
Officer Jennifer Ramirez
҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉
Sleeping in my bed didn’t feel the same without Shaun but I couldn’t invite him back in. We were playing with fire that would surely burn at least one of us.
After all, I felt like an inferno when around him.
Proof enough.
I’d tossed and turned all night, uneasy about the way I had treated Shaun in the mess hall. There were too many people around to explain why I couldn’t meet with him. I didn’t want to give him the brushoff but maybe that was for the best anyway.
My hand was on the door to the meeting room when I was stopped by Corporal Rafter. His face was red and he seemed flustered. “Officer Ramirez, have you seen Private Simon this morning?”
“Why would I know where he was?” My face flushed with heat. Surely he didn’t know what was happening between us? Could he have seen Shaun slipping away from my dorm the other night? Did he notice the stolen glances between us? The panic alarm went off in my head.
He gave me a bemused look before he continued. “I’m asking everyone. Nobody has seen him anywhere and he wasn’t in his bunk this morning. Have you seen him?”
Embarrassment about my reaction made my face flush even more. “No, I haven’t seen him. Maybe check the mess hall, he might just be running late.”
“If you see him, please tell him to report to his station asap.”
“Will do, Corporal.”
He nodded and then hurried down the corridor, stopping everyone he encountered along the way. I hurried into the room and sat down, taking some deep breaths so my face would return to its normal color. I was going to give us both away by acting so crazy.
My ass had only just reached the seat when Major Atoll stormed into the room. He had a way of demanding attention without saying a word. He could make anyone quiver in their boots with just one glance.
“Major, good morning. What can I do for you?” I asked politely.
“You caught the bastard yet?”
Here we go again. “No, sir, there have been no further updates since we spoke yesterday. I have more interviews today. I’m certain I will get to the bottom of it in due course.”
He snorted. “That’s not good enough, officer. I need a result now or this whole base is going to go to hell. Get out in the field today, I’m assigning you to Rafter’s troop so you can observe Simon firsthand.”
“Sir, after the last time—“
“That’s an order, Officer. Get down to the vehicle bays immediately.”
Major Atoll stomped out of the room before I could protest further. You would think almost getting killed the first time would have relieved me of field observations. Apparently my life as an officer of the military wasn’t worth all that much to him.
The idea of going out on a day’s missions with Shaun and his troop made me feel sick but also excited me. My job wasn’t exactly riveting and a part of me always regretted not enlisting for the more physical roles. While I still served my country, sometimes it felt like I was just on a constant rotation of paperwork.
I hurried down to the vehicle bays, searching for Corporal Rafter so I could report in. I had to wait with his troop for twenty minutes before he finally joined us. His face was an even darker shade of red than mine was earlier.
“Simon still hasn’t showed up?” He addressed the question to th
e whole troop. Everyone replied with the negative. “Fucking hell. I’ve been all over this base and I can’t find his ass. We’re going without him. Officer, what are you doing here?”
