Wings of Gold Series

by Tappan, Tracy

  He offered her a bland shrug. “If the shoe fits.”

  Her face heated to boiling. More tears fell. “Shane Madden, you’re lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon rut.”

  His eyes blackened. “Get out of my way,” he said in an inflexible tone, “or I will move you myself.”

  “If you leave, I…” She swallowed with difficulty. “I won’t be here when you get back.”

  He went absolutely still. He might as well have been encased in ice. “All right, Kitty, you win.” He sneered. “I’ll just call my chief and say, ‘Excuse me, Aloha, I can’t report for duty because my girlfriend needs me to talk about my childhood.’” Shane’s lip curled into a deeper sneer. “Would you like me to give you a mani-pedi, too, while I’m at it?”

  Humiliation washed the feeling out of her cheeks. “You don’t have to be so…so…” She dragged the back of her hand over her dripping nose. “I just want to know you care about me, Shane. Why can’t you give me that?!”

  “I will always protect you.” Shane lifted a clenched fist in front of her, showing her his massive power. “I will always provide for you. That’s how you know I care. You want talk,” he grated, “get it from your girlfriends. I can only give what I can give, and if it’s not enough, then you do need to fuckin’ walk.” He grabbed her by the waist, spun her off the front door into the living room, then stalked outside.

  Kitty picked a piece of lint off her surgical cap while she waited for Max to comment.

  After a moment of silence, Max released a breath. “Wow, that…that sounds really rough, Kitty. I’m so sorry.” She exhaled again. “What happened after Shane left?”

  “I stomped around the apartment, crying and losing my nerve to leave, then—” She glanced up from her cap. “I tore open some mail that had come in earlier in the day and saw I’d been accepted into a nursing program I applied for. It gave me courage.” For the first time in a long time, she hadn’t felt so stupid and incapable when she read We are pleased to inform you that you’ve been accepted… She felt like she deserved better than what Shane was giving her. Too bad her courage never lasted long. She always managed to talk herself out of stuff—like, she never ended up going to nursing school—but at least that night, she’d made it out of the house.

  “So I packed up all my belongings—not much, my clothes and some kitchen stuff—and left. Luckily, a corpsman friend of mine working out of Balboa Naval Hospital was looking for a roommate, so I had a place to go right away.” No living in a shed again, thank you, dear Lord. “Do you want to know the funny thing? Shane never once contacted me after I moved out—not a call, not a text. Nothing. Like all the time we were together ceased to exist…or he erased it from his mind like that.” She snapped her fingers, then let her hand fall loosely back into her lap. A sick feeling pushed into her throat like bile. It hadn’t been so easy for her. In many ways, it still wasn’t. “I guess funny isn’t the right word for it.”

  “No,” Max agreed softly. Her lips pursed. “I think even the best of men need some training going into a relationship. They just aren’t raised with communication skills like we girls are. And a military man…” Max blew out her cheeks. “He probably needs serious remedial work, especially a SEAL.”

  Kitty lifted her shoulders in a defeated shrug. “I tried everything to get through to Shane, but nothing I did ever worked, and finally I just ended up fighting with him all the time.” She felt her mouth flatten into a bitter line. “Which for a certain didn’t work.”

  “No, I imagine it didn’t,” Max agreed in her understanding way. “It might not have been anything you did or didn’t do, Kitty. Maybe Shane just wasn’t ready for a relationship.”

  “Maybe.” Kitty inspected her cap for more lint. “But now…there’s another fella…a good fella…who likes me, and…” She trailed off.

  “And you like him back?” Max guessed correctly.

  “Yeah. But.” There was always a but. “I don’t know if I can trust my feelings about it, considering all that happened with Shane.” Considering my entire track record with men. “Although, truth be told, he’s not like any fella I ever dated.” She shot Max a look from beneath her lashes. “It’s Steve.” When her roommate’s expression remained blank, Kitty clarified, “Lieutenant Whitmore.”

  “Oh…ah!” Max brightened. “How great! Steve’s a very sweet man.”

  Kitty sat up straighter. “You really think so?” Maybe if Max thought Steve was sweet, he really might be this time.

  Max’s mouth lifted a little at the corners. “I don’t know him extremely well, but he seems so.”

  “He’s also an officer,” Kitty warned, “and I’m enlisted. We’re not supposed to fraternize.”

  Max thought for a second. “What does Steve say about it?”

  “That we just shouldn’t tell anyone.”

  Max chuckled. “Well, that’s one way to handle it. And if you become a nurse one day, then you’ll be an officer, too, right?”

  “I suppose.” Kitty chewed on her bottom lip. “So do you think I should go for it?”

  “I can’t answer for you. I do understand why you’re gun-shy about men, but”—Max gave Kitty’s knee a quick squeeze—“at some point you’re going to have to ask yourself if Steve is worth taking another chance.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Max slouched over a half-eaten meal of scrambled eggs and toast, and blearily sipped her coffee. It was the height of the breakfast hour, and the mess tent was in full swing, utensils clattering against trays, a dozen different conversations going on at the other tables, the siss of coffee dripping onto a burner every time the pot was pulled out to—

  A tray slapped down on the table opposite to Max, and Kyle planted his butt on the bench across from her, hard. Probably hard enough to squash a pea through a stack of twenty mattresses.

  She glanced once at his face—his silver-blue eyes were steely shards of ice—then heaved a sigh. I’m too exhausted for this. “Before you start in on whatever Kyle-thing you’re about to do, I should warn you I’ve only had four hours of sleep and I’m still on my first cup of coffee.” She peered into her mug. “Not even one whole cup, actually.”

  “Kyle-thing?” he repeated through closed teeth.

  Oh, boy. He was winding up for a real doozy of a fit. She rubbed the heel of one hand into her temple. “Can we do this later?”

  “We didn’t use a condom last night,” he hissed at her.

  Guess that meant, no, they couldn’t do this later. “True.” She smothered a yawn in the palm of hand.

  He gave her an astounded look for a space of two heartbeats. “True,” he mimicked her again. “You don’t have anything more to say than fucking that?”

  “Correct. That’s all I have.” Maybe more after a second cup. Unless… “Unless you’re here to tell me you gave me a disease.”

  “No,” he grated. “I didn’t. And do you know why?”

  She was going to treat the question as rhetorical. A vein in his forehead appeared to be on the verge of explosion.

  “Because I always use a condom.”

  “Okay. Nice to know you’re Kyle the Careful.” She dragged her finger through a drip of coffee on the side of her mug, then licked it off. “What…? Are you waiting for applause?”

  He growled so deeply she would swear his tray shimmied.

  She grimaced. All right, she should probably start paying better attention here. “Are you afraid I gave you a disease? Because I didn’t, either.”

  “Motherfuck.” Kyle grabbed his fork in a tight fist.

  If he planned to stab her with it, she was too weary to stop him…or care.

  “What if I got you pregnant?”

  Ah. So now they were at the crux of it. She brushed his concern aside with a tired wave of her hand. “Don’t worry, you didn’t. I can tell when I’m ovulating, and I’m not.”

  He tossed down his fork, then rammed both hands into his hair and clutched up fistfuls of it for a moment before c
ontinuing, his tone still low, dark, and incredibly angry. “Just like that, you’re sure?”

  “Yes, Kyle, I’m sure. I know my body, and it functions like clockwork.”

  “Well, me myself?” he bit out. “I’m not sure. Far from it. And if you are pregnant—”

  “I’m not.”

  “If. You. Are.” He leaned forward, his lips tight over set teeth. “You’re not having it. You got that? No. Fucking. Way.”

  She slammed down her coffee cup, a sudden fierce heat rolling over her scalp. It was her turn to be angry—in fact, downright furious. Yes, this was bona fide rage. And, no, this kind of anger wasn’t like her, and, okay, maybe her emotions were getting away from her because she was sleep-deprived and grumpy. Or maybe, just freaking maybe, it was because of the cavalier way Kyle had flung the option of an abortion at her. No, insisted on it.

  She rocketed to her feet. But…

  As soon as she did, she saw Kyle lean forward subtly, the look on his face turning… Expectant? Dear God. He wanted her to rip him a new one, had provoked her directly into this very trap. And all at once the pieces showered over her in a landslide. She got it. She understood who Kyle was, what he was doing, and in the next blink, her anger was gone.

  “May I have a private word with you in your tent?” she asked politely, the edges cleaned from her voice.

  His chin moved slightly to one side and his eyes narrowed. He was clearly suspicious about the sudden change in her…about what she had in store for him now. But he stood, anyway, and accompanied her to tent number eight.

  Steve Whitmore was inside.

  She asked him for a moment alone with Kyle.

  Steve took one look at Kyle’s expression, grabbed his shoes, and bolted.

  She gestured at Kyle’s bed. “Would you mind sitting?”

  Kyle sat on the edge of his bed, spine straight, nostrils white. He was braced for battle.

  Too bad he wasn’t getting one. She stood in front of him, keeping her posture relaxed. “I know what you’re doing, Kyle. I’ve got a bead on you now. It took me a while to figure you out, but I’m finally there.”

  “How nice,” he drawled in a nasty tone. “Do you want some applause?”

  She smiled indulgently. “Here’s the thing: you don’t get to talk for a while.”

  He glared at her with eyes still roiling with turmoil.

  “This is your Kyle the Shithead act,” she informed him. “I’ve seen it before, and now I know when I’ve seen it—anytime anything happens that brings us closer. You get uncomfortable with these feelings, and, bam, out pops your alter ego. And last night we experienced some seriously deep emotions. We both said we love each other and then had incredibly meaningful sex. So now here you are, predictably being a jerk. And do you know why you do this?” She lifted a hand. “Don’t answer. I’m going to tell you. Because you feel the need to sabotage everything good in your life. And do you know why you sabotage everything good in your life?”

  He didn’t answer. Quick learner.

  “Because you don’t deserve anything good.” She leaned over, braced her hands on her knees, and gave him a level stare. “Because you’re worthless.”

  A tic twitched in Kyle’s upper lip.

  She straightened. “Of course, you’re not actually worthless. I can attest to that. But you’re convinced you are. I’m guessing it’s because your dad checked out on you. If you’d been worth a plug nickel, he would’ve stuck around, right?”

  The muscles along Kyle’s throat visibly flexed.

  Max crossed her arms. “I know how you earned the call sign Mikey.”

  The sides of Kyle’s jaw bulged. “That asshat Tarzan,” he said through stiff lips.

  “Yes, he’s the one who told me the story. On a port call during your first long cruise, a group of you pilots and AWs were at a sleazy bar. Several of the guys were in the back, screwing a whore on a table. You were dared to go down on her after they were done, so you stuck your face in her crotch…until someone named LZ pulled you off. From then on, you were known as Mikey, after the Life Cereal kid who would eat anything.”

  Kyle’s cheeks turned dark red. “I was extremely fucking plastered, okay?” he said defensively. “I’ve never been that drunk again.”

  “You were a young officer with your reputation ahead of you—yours for the making—and you did that to yourself? Sabotage.” She let the word crack through the tent before going on. “It also makes sense to me now why you keep a shrew like Sienna in your life. Because her regular shaming and ridiculing remind you, again and again, of who you really are: Kyle the Worthless Shithead.”

  He looked down, a muscle in his jaw still jumping.

  “Now you’re trying to sabotage us. But I’m not going to let you. Do you hear me? Give it your best shot, Kyle, blast me with both barrels, but nothing you do will work. I’m on to you now.”

  He shoved the fingers of one hand into the front of his hair and propped his forehead on the heel of his palm, his elbow braced on his knee.

  She dropped down into a crouch in front of him. “I’m not pregnant, Kyle, but come the day that I am, we’ll make a decision about what to do from the perspective of two people who care for each other.” She placed a hand on his knee. “However I’m telling you right now nothing in this world would prevent me from having your baby.”

  Air huffed out of him. “You…” He broke off. Muscles were jerking throughout his face, and Max sensed his long pause was about composing himself. And, yes, when he lifted his head to look at her, his eyes were wet. “There was one other time I didn’t wear a condom,” he said thickly. “I got Sienna pregnant. It was years ago. She never told me. I was never supposed to know. But the kid got…got sick with cancer, so the adoptive parents needed me to give some of my bone marrow.”

  Max’s heart clenched. Oh, God.

  “Ever since I found out, I’ve wanted to get genetic testing done on myself. Because the thought of having another sick kid scares me cross-eyed, Max. So…so, uh, if you’re pregnant…” His lips went stark white and taut, like it was taking an incredible effort to keep them from quivering. “I’m sorry I said all that shit to you about getting rid of the baby. I didn’t mean it. Jesus”—he covered his face with his hands—“of course I didn’t. I just don’t know if I could forgive myself if I gave you a sick kid.”

  Max’s throat closed around a painful clogging of tears. She swallowed convulsively. Seeing Kyle so torn up was burning a hole straight through the center of her heart. It was worse than watching terrorists hold him down over a table. “Thank you for telling me.” Leaning forward until she came down on her knees, she lifted up, eased his hands away from his face, and kissed his forehead. “But sometimes…” She released a soft breath. “Sometimes kids just get sick, Kyle, and it has nothing to do with a gene either parent passed on. And as far as you and I are concerned, there’s no sense having a difficult conversation about a point that’s moot. So let’s not worry until there’s something to worry about, okay?”

  He nodded, his lips still pale.

  “How is your child doing? Do you know?”

  Kyle pressed a knuckle into the corner of his eye. “Last I heard he was doing better. They think he’s going to be okay.”

  He. “So you have a son?”

  Kyle paused, nostrils quivering. “I have a son.”

  She smiled.

  Kyle’s chin lowered. “I guess not really, though. It’s not like I’m raising him.” He rubbed his palms up and down his pants. “Good thing. I’d suck at it.”

  “Are you kidding? You’re going to be an awesome father someday.” If the way Kyle dealt with his men—firm, fair, fun, all when appropriate—was even a partial indicator about how good he was going to be, then awesome might be too mild a term.

  He stared at her, his eyes more shiny silver than blue right then, and after a moment, a tender expression flickered over his face. “More of that positive attitude I totally eat up. Where do you live, anyway?�
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  His off-topic question brought another smile to her face. “My parents have a vacation home in Lake Arrowhead where I mostly hole up. It’s about halfway between Los Angeles and Camp Pendleton, where my brother is stationed. So it’s convenient for when I need to go into the newsroom or visit Kevin.”

  “But basically you can work from anywhere on your computer?”

  “Yes. Basically.”

  “So…you could work from San Diego, where I live?”

  Her heart came to attention. “Yes.”

  “Because I was thinking…this Pakistan mission is almost over, and I’ll be reporting back to my ship soon to finish my cruise. I was wondering…would you be willing to write to me?”

  “Write to you?” She tilted her chin. “As your pen pal?”

  His laugh rang out. “Well, since I don’t seem to be having any success offloading you with my most expert sabotage skills, I was hoping as my girlfriend.”

  Jumping up and down right now was completely out of the question. It would be too obvious. Besides… “I suppose it depends on which Kyle would be my boyfriend.” The man she knew as Player Kyle wasn’t her favorite persona. She shifted back onto her heels. “When I said there was nothing you could do to sabotage me, I wasn’t being entirely honest. If you ever cheated on me—”

  “I wouldn’t,” he cut in. “I won’t. Look, I realize I’ve been a complete dog for a while now, so your question is fair. But when I make a commitment, Max, I keep it. Another thing I’m scared cross-eyed about is becoming like my deadbeat dad.”

  “Okay.” She pushed a hand through her bangs, shoving them off her forehead. “So you’re saying you want to be in a committed, monogamous relationship with me?” Yes, she needed to hear the words.

  “I am. And you?”

  She nodded. “I’m saying the same.”

  Smiling, he pulled her onto his lap and kissed her, long and sweet.