by Tawny Weber
She shoved both hands through her hair and tried not to scream at the conflicting thoughts battling it out for top spot in her mind.
Then she heard a noise. Her heart skipped. The scraping sounded again off the room behind the bar. Balanced on the tips of her toes, she shifted to run out the door.
Then she heard voices.
Brody?
Panic fled, leaving a frown as she stepped cautiously toward the bar.
As if her movement triggered a signal, Brody and Leon, the bar owner, stepped out. Leon looked bored, as usual. Brody’s face flashed with surprise, then something that seemed like irritation that went too fast for her to be sure before he gave her a questioning look.
“Genna? Why are you here?”
“I was looking for you,” she said, figuring that should be obvious. Her boots sticking to the floor in places, more proof that the chairs on the tables were a fake-out, she made her way across the room.
With each step, tension drained away, both from discomfort of being alone in such a sleazy setting, and from her worry over where Brody had disappeared to. Leaving plenty of room to wonder about why he’d disappeared to here. She’d think it’d be the last place he’d want to see.
“I got stuff to run to the bank. You cover for me?” Leon mumbled, tucking a grungy sack into the front of his pants, then buttoning his flannel over it.
At Brody’s nod, the older man skirted the bar and left, not glancing once toward Genna.
Even though she was apparently invisible to him, she still waited until the door closed before reaching across the scarred bar to give Brody’s hand a squeeze.
Before she could say anything, he asked again, “Why are you here?”
“I told you, I was looking for you.”
“I’ve got a cell phone.” His words were short, his expression stiff. “Just call. Don’t come looking, especially at a place like this.”
Since she didn’t like seeing him in a place like this, she couldn’t blame him for feeling the same. But still, why was he here? Given the history, that his father spent most of Brody’s life here drinking himself to death, you’d think he’d want to stay clear of it, too. Her frown deepened and she glanced at the small room behind the bar, then at the hand-lettered bartender-wanted sign on the stool.
She’d turned her life upside down and quit her job. She’d faced off with her father and offered her mother a silver platter full of health woe excuses. Thanks to Brody, she’d found the nerve to finally move forward with her life.
Her stomach knotted and bile rose in her throat.
And what? Thanks to her, he’d moved back?
She gazed around the dingy bar, the sense of desolation and despair as real as the dust and dirt. Back to this?
She was pretty sure when Prince Charming had ridden in to save the princess, he hadn’t give up the castle to end up in a hovel.
As much as she hated to mess with what had this morning been a pretty awesome outlook for her life, they had to talk. She had to know, for sure, that he was going to be happy with his decision.
Otherwise, she thought as her heart sank into the toes of her sticky-soled boots, there was no hope for them to be happy together.
* * *
“BRODY, SERIOUSLY. WHAT are you doing here?”
Brody scowled. How the hell had she found him? He suddenly felt dirty. As though every nasty memory he’d had of this place was crawling over him. He figured he’d better get used to it, though.
“Leon had been bugging me to stop by and clear out the old man’s stuff.”
Genna moved closer, standing on tiptoes and making a show of trying to see over the bar.
“His stuff is back there?”
“You heard Leon. He asked me to man the bar for a half hour.”
Her face as distant as he’d ever seen it, Genna took a deep breath, crossed her arms over her chest and gave him a long look. He damn near shuffled his feet, her eyes were so intense. It was as if she was looking inside him. As if she was checking out all his secrets.
He hoped she had plenty of time. He had a helluva lot of them.
“I heard Leon was looking for a new bartender.”
“So?”
“So. Did you take the job?”
Shit.
Brody had spent most of his life answering to nobody. The last ten years answering to the navy. He’d sorta thought this round he’d answer only to himself.
He’d sorta thought wrong. At least, he had if he wanted Genna in his life.
And he did.
More than anything, more than everything, he wanted Genna. Even if it meant trying to justify his decisions. Even the ones he couldn’t quite come to terms with himself.
“I’ve gotta work,” he said, irritated that he sounded so defensive. “Look, this is a good thing.”
Her mouth dropped open and she blinked a couple of times, then shook her head as if clearing a buzz from her ears.
“A good thing? You, quitting the navy. Giving up being a SEAL. To what? Tend bar in the same sleazy dive you grew up over? Why? You missed all the happy memories?”
Damn. She had a smart mouth on her when she wanted. And a wicked way of kicking her point home right where it’d hurt most.
“Well, there’s not a whole lot of jobs in Bedford requiring a sniper.” He shrugged. “I’m trained to fight. To perform covert operations and carry out military strategies. Believe it or not, those skills aren’t big moneymakers in the civilian world.”
“But they are skills you love. Skills you’re proud of.” She lifted both hands in a classic WTF gesture. “So why are you throwing them away to pour drinks for drunks?”
Brody ground his teeth together to keep the cusswords from spewing out. Yeah. She was aces when it came to the well-aimed shot. This one didn’t hit his ego, though. It went straight for the gut.
What a deal. Giving up a life of excitement, adrenaline and power to schlep booze for drunks. Traveling the world to hole up in the town he’d spent most of his life trying to escape. But that was his problem. And he was willing to do it if it meant a life with Genna.
Why was she pushing this? Most women, outside the frog hogs as the guys called the SEAL groupies, wanted a guy who was around. Who was around for Friday night dates, holidays and more days in the month than he was gone.
Maybe she just didn’t get it.
“Look, this is a good thing. You should be happy,” he said, despite the fact that she appeared about as far from that as he’d ever seen her. “This means I’m sticking around. You get that, right? That I’m here, that we can be together. No deployment, no long missions, no part of my life locked up and labeled classified.”
Her eyes softened and some of the tension left her posture. For a second, he thought he had her. But Brody knew better than to relax.
“I want to be with you,” she said, her words soft and sweet to match her smile. She stepped forward, taking his hands in hers and lifting one to her cheek.
Brody wasn’t a mushy kind of guy. But that move, it slayed him. Especially when she was looking up at him as though he was her whole world and she was ready to love every second of it.
Then, with a quick brush of her lips over his knuckles, she released him and shook her head.
“You can’t do it, though. You can’t quit being who you are. You won’t be happy.”
“I’d be with you. That’d make me happy.” Happy enough, he promised himself. The two of them building on what they had. That’d be enough. He’d make it enough.
Her eyes so bright they lit up even the dim dust of the bar, Genna smiled. But there was a line between her brows that got deeper as her smile faded. Slowly, she shook her head.
“I want to be with you. So much. I love you,” she finally said. Her words se
nt a thrill through Brody. Not because they were some he’d rarely heard in his life. But because they came from her. And they meant everything.
“But you can’t put that on me. I can’t be the reason you leave the military. I can’t fill the hole it’s going to leave in your life.”
“I’m not leaving because of you.”
“But you’re not leaving because you want to.”
Brody scrubbed his hands over his face. God, this was stupid. Why the hell was she arguing with him? For a brief second, he missed the navy so much it hurt. For no other reason than in the navy, when someone issued an order or made a decision, everyone shut the hell up and accepted it.
“Look, I’ve made up my mind. I’m through. I can’t be a SEAL anymore. And if I can’t be a SEAL, I won’t serve.” He gestured to the bar. “This is a job. It’s honest work and will pay the bills until I figure out what I want to do.”
Honest work to pay the bills. It took Brody a moment to figure out why the words tasted so bitter. Then he remembered his father yelling them at his mother. Every argument they had over his drinking, his living at the bar, had ended with that statement.
Apparently they sounded just as good to Genna as they did to him.
“So this is it?” The wave of her hand was more a slap at the bar than an encompassing gesture. “Your future? Tending bar, holing up in that dingy apartment filled with ugly memories and despair?”
“Leon already rented out the dingy apartment. I figured I’d live with you.” Clearly not in a joking mood, she just hissed. So he shrugged and amended that to, “Or in the guesthouse behind my grandmother’s.”
Her glare was just as threatening as an AK-47, making it clear she wasn’t interested in smart-ass responses.
Okay, fine. She wanted the truth, she could find a way to deal with it.
“My future was being a navy SEAL. I worked my ass off for that, Genna. I trained for it, I lived it, I breathed it. I was it. And now I’m not.” Brody glared right back, hating that she was forcing him to say the words aloud. “So excuse me if I make the best of the lousy hand I’ve been dealt.”
She gave him a long look, then slowly nodded.
The vicious knots of tension gripping Brody’s gut eased a little. Good. Maybe now she’d let it go.
“You don’t have to take this deal. You have plenty of other options, including returning to duty.”
Why? He wanted to drop his head into his hands and give it a good shake. Why did he ever believe she’d take the easy path? The one that tidily avoided all that emotional crap.
“What in the hell do you know about it?”
“Blake and Alexia came to see me earlier,” she said. “I know your friend said the surgeon cleared you to go back to the navy. That the decision to leave the SEALs was yours.”
If she’d hauled an Uzi from under her skirt and shot him, he couldn’t have been more stunned.
Blake and Alexia had been in Bedford? Specifically to visit Genna, obviously. What the hell? Since when was it the lieutenant’s job to play retention officer? Why did he care? Didn’t he realize the team was better off this way? That any team was better off with a solid group of dependable men?
Brody didn’t let any of that show on his face, though.
Any sign of weakness, of surprise, and she’d never let it go.
“Landon was right. It’s my decision. And I decided to stay here.”
“So... What? You’re just going to spend the rest of your life here at Slims, pouring drinks and hiding from life? You really are taking Brian’s place, aren’t you?”
Her implication was like a slap to the face. He wasn’t his old man. He wasn’t a bitter, angry asshole who loved his booze more than anything else in his life.
He was just a bitter, angry asshole.
“I don’t drink.” Brody almost rolled his eyes at that stupid statement. He was really hitting the bottom of the barrel on pathetic now.
“No? Why not?”
“My body is a military machine. A tool for Uncle Sam. You don’t take care of your tools, they don’t do the job they’re supposed to. Alcohol dulls the senses, it slows reaction times. I’m not messing up hours of intense training for a cheap buzz.”
His words trailed off as he realized he was speaking in the present tense. But his body wasn’t finely tuned anymore. And his mind was jacked-up trash.
That realization crashed down on him along with the full impact of how hard he’d worked, how long he’d striven to be the best, to finally be someone people admired. Gone.
All fucking gone.
Brody didn’t even realize he’d grabbed the whiskey bottle until the scent of Jim Beam hit him.
His eyes cut to Genna’s.
Instead of the appreciation and understanding he’d grown used to seeing in those warm blue depths, this time there was contempt.
His gaze cut away, focusing on the whiskey hitting a dingy glass.
“Well,” she said quietly. “I guess you have made your decision. You’re going to turn your back on a career you apparently loved. One you’re so good at, the president of the United States acknowledged you. One you’ve made such a difference in, the mayor of Bedford is throwing an event in your honor.”
Was she still harping on that? The entire team was up for the Silver Star, not just him. For the good and the bad, it was always the team. He wasn’t a hero. And he wasn’t a part of the team anymore.
“I told you from the beginning, I’m not doing that damned event. I’m not a windup toy sailor to be paraded back and forth for someone else’s ego.”
She threw both hands in the air, giving him an exasperated look.
“This isn’t about ego, Brody. It’s about you accepting your due. It’s about you being treated with the respect you deserve from a town that sucked at giving it to you before.”
Respect?
For what?
If they knew the truth, everyone in town would see that he was the same loser they’d always judged him to be. The only one under any illusions was Genna.
“I’m not a damned hero. I’m just a guy trying to make a life here so we can be together. You don’t want people to know you’re dating a badass, that’s your issue. If you don’t know who I am, if you can’t accept me for what I am, fine. But quit trying to make me into something I’m not to soothe your own ego.”
The look of shocked misery on her face made Brody want to throw himself on an IED. Crap. He shoved both hands through his hair, totally at a loss. He didn’t want to hurt Genna. But neither did he want to defend his decision. Because, as everyone in this room clearly knew, it was a lousy one. But he wasn’t changing his mind. He wasn’t fit to be a SEAL. And if he couldn’t be a SEAL, he wasn’t going to serve.
With that same sass he’d always admired, Genna took a deep breath and shook her head.
“The man I know, the man I’ve had a crush on since I was seventeen, the man I fell in love with? He’s a hero. He’s a badass with a miserable history. A man who overcame adversity, an abusive home and a knife in the gut to make something of himself. Something to be proud of. If that’s not a hero, I don’t know what is.”
She sniffed, took a shaky breath, then shook her head again as if she were trying to figure out where he’d gone wrong. “And now look at you. You’re what? Throwing it all away because you are having identity issues. It’s not because of me, Brody. Don’t you dare pin this on me.”
“Identity issues?” he sneered, wondering just how long she’d spent with Alexia. That shrink talk was apparently contagious.
“That’s what I’d call it,” she shot back. “You’re either the guy who turns his back on his past to be a big bad SEAL, a hero with no ties to anyone or anything. Or you’re the badass bad boy from the wrong side of town, the son of the drunk who lets the pa
st limit his potential and shape his every decision.”
Holy crap. Brody shook his head, wondering if Alexia had dropped off a psych profile to go with her contagious talk.
“You’ve got it all figured out?” he mused, anger wrapped around him so tight he felt that he was suffocating. “And, what? If I’d returned to the SEALs, or even to the navy, you’d have stood by me? Like you’d give up your golden life here as the pampered princess or walked away from your happy new business to live on base. For me? Yeah. Right.”
For just a second, her chin trembled. Then she lifted it high and gave him an arch look.
“I guess we’ll never know, will we? But for the record, yes. I’d have stood by you, whatever your decision. If you talked to me, and were honest about what you wanted, I’d have done anything for you. Stay here, hand out fliers for this lousy bar. Or follow you all over the world, waiting while you defended our country. I’d even built my happy new business around the idea of being portable, of doing it from anywhere. So I could be with you.”
A single tear slid down her cheek, glistening in the dim light like a diamond.
“But then, you never asked. You decided to destroy your life instead.” With that and an ugly look at the glass in his hand, she turned on her heel and sashayed out.
Not stormed or stomped. Nope, not Genna. She knew exactly how to hit him where it hurt, so she took her time, hips swinging and head held high.
Wrapped in bitterness, he watched her go. She shoved the door open, letting a blinding beam of sunshine into the bar before it slammed closed with a bang that ricocheted through the room. Leaving him in the dark.
Brody stared at the door for a long second.
Then, damning his entire life to hell, he tossed back the whiskey in a single gulp.
* * *
YOU’D THINK IF A steady diet of cookies and sex was incredible, bingeing on just cookies to get over not having the sex would at least be okay.
Instead, it was rotten, sucky and miserable.
Genna stared at the pink polka-dotted fuzziness of her socks, one crossed over the other on the coffee table strewn with cookie crumbs, candy wrappers and an empty box of tissues.
