Encounter with a Commanding Officer

by Charlotte Hawkes

  Ash stood firm. ‘I’m happy,’ he lied. ‘Anyway, what can I do for you, Wilf?’

  ‘You’re here. That’s all I need.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Standing together in companionable silence, Ash forced a polite smile to his lips as each new arrival came up to Wilf. Rosie had a good send-off. He wasn’t surprised. She’d been an incredible woman.

  It felt like an eternity before the two men had to take their own seats. But, just as they were about to move, Wilf placed a hand on Ash’s arm, his grip surprisingly strong and his eyes suddenly sharp.

  ‘Did you bring anything with you?’ he demanded urgently.

  Sheepishly, as if he were fourteen again, Ash reached into his pocket and took out a handful of popcorn kernels.

  The grin split Wilf’s face in two even as a tear tipped over and rolled down his cheek.

  ‘Me too. I already threw mine in,’ he chuckled. ‘We’ll send our Rosie off with the bang she always wanted.’

  * * *

  ‘Ash?’

  When Fliss opened her front door at such an ungodly hour, he was the last person she expected to see.

  Ever since she’d awoken in that hotel room alone, she hadn’t been able to shake the hope that she might see him again. It wasn’t just about the sex, but if that was all he was offering then, so help her, she’d take it.

  He was exhausted and devastated, and looking dishevelled in his service dress. Her heart vaulted around her chest, questions piling in on her. But, before she could ask a single one, he stepped through the door, tugged apart the tie of her dressing gown and scooped her up, encouraging her to wrap her legs around his hips as he pinned her against the hallway wall. Fliss was vaguely aware of the front door slamming behind him.

  ‘Bedroom?’ he ground out hoarsely, abandoning her mouth for a brief moment.

  She was barely able to think straight, let alone speak.

  ‘Left, right, right,’ she managed.

  It never crossed her mind to stop him. But she wanted him too much. Wanted this too much. They’d have to deal with the fallout later.

  He laid her on the bed, stripping her down so that she felt the cool morning air on her body, sending goosebumps skittering over her skin and hardening her nipples. Ash noticed too, studying her whole body reverently before covering each breast with a large hand and taking both brown peaks between a finger and his thumbs so that sparks shot through her body.

  But he wasn’t here at this hour for foreplay. Moments later, they were both naked and he was covering her pliant body with his own solid one, holding himself above her, his eyes locked with hers, not a word more spoken. Neither of them needed words. And then Ash claimed her as his, quickly bringing her to orgasm moments before he exploded inside her.

  It was only when their shudders had subsided that he slipped out of her, still caressing her spine as he would a lover, until finally his breathing slowed and he drifted into the first sleep Fliss suspected he’d had since leaving the hotel the other day.

  When she woke several hours later the bed was cold, like some pathetic déjà-vu. Only this time, she realised, something felt different. Throwing on an old T-shirt and yoga pants, she padded along the corridor, following the scent of coffee and warm bread. He was dressed in gym gear that she imagined he’d retrieved from a gym bag he kept in the boot of his car, just as she did.

  Then her eyes widened in surprise. ‘Homemade bread?’

  ‘Rosie taught me,’ he answered simply.

  She took it for the hedged invitation that it was. Moving gingerly into the room, she slid onto a barstool across the kitchen worktop, as though any sudden moves might startle him.

  He watched her, his gaze unwavering. ‘I’m sorry about this morning. That wasn’t what I intended when I drove here.’

  ‘It wasn’t?’ She attempted to tease him in an effort to conceal her nerves, but she knew it sounded a little stiff, a little awkward.

  The truth was that she didn’t want to hear the words. She didn’t want him to say it had been a mistake.

  Instead, he offered a wry smile. ‘Okay, it was. But not like that. I wanted to talk first.’

  Something pulled in her chest but she schooled her features, scared to give too much away.

  ‘Oh?’

  He raked his hand through his hair, clearly trying to work out where to start. Her heart paused for a beat. The apprehensive gesture was so unlike the man she had come to know.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ He blew out a sharp breath. ‘I seem to be saying that word a lot recently. But I don’t know where to start.’

  She had to be careful here. ‘How did the funeral go?’

  Another pause.

  ‘It was harrowing,’ he confessed at last, then frowned. ‘Yet somehow...soothing.’

  ‘You got some closure,’ she observed.

  He rolled his eyes. ‘Is that the quack term for it?’

  Ah, that flash of macho pride she recognised from too many soldiers, the stigma that still, to some degree, shrouded talking about personal issues.

  ‘Don’t knock it,’ she warned patiently. ‘Or underestimate its significance.’

  ‘Fine. Then I guess I got closure.’ He bunched his shoulders. ‘And I am sorry. I was out of line when I told you to mind your own business in the hotel that night. You were right; I wasn’t mentally prepared for the funeral. I did need to say goodbye and I did need permission to feel those emotions. I’m grateful to you for saying all you did; it made me open my mind up subconsciously so it wasn’t such a shock when I got there.’

  ‘And your foster father?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he admitted. ‘You were right too. Wilf welcomed me straight away. Hugged me. Told me he was glad I was there.’

  ‘Good,’ she offered softly, relieved she had judged it right.

  Nonetheless, it was clear from Ash’s changing expression that there was more to it than he was saying. She could practically hear the cogs clicking over in his head, and as he brooded she could feel something building. At first, she couldn’t put a name to it. She just needed to give him space to find the right words for whatever it was he wanted to tell her.

  ‘I felt I’d let him down. And Rosie.’

  He raked his hand through his hair, short as it was. The helplessness of the gesture tugged at her.

  ‘You’re not the kind of person to let people down,’ she protested. ‘I spoke to your men. Remember?’

  His jaw locked, the tiny pulse flickering. Finally, she could pinpoint the source of the tension building inside him. Guilt and anger.

  ‘It’s not the same,’ he growled.

  ‘Why not?’ she ventured.

  He crossed his arms defensively over his chest, subconsciously pushing her away. She could tell he wished the conversation was over but he felt obliged to answer. She was putting herself in his sights. She didn’t know why she was even doing it. She didn’t have to. They weren’t even a couple.

  He turned his back, busying himself with emptying the now cold cafetière and boiling the kettle for a fresh one. She knew he was buying time. Silently she watched, waiting for him to continue.

  All at once, a realisation detonated in her brain.

  You’re going to get hurt because you’ve let yourself care about him, you stupid girl.

  Before she had a chance to regroup, Ash started speaking and inexorably she was drawn back in.

  ‘I told you how Wilf and Rosie turned my life around? Pretty much saved me?’

  ‘You told me they did, yes. Though not how.’

  ‘Well, when I got busted for stealing the car, no one else was prepared to take me on. Except for them. They were tough, but fair. They told me that they were my last chance saloon. That they could see I had the potential for more but they weren’t prepared t
o take chance after chance on me. That this was my opportunity to lose.’

  ‘They were tough but fair,’ she acknowledged.

  ‘Right. They told me what they were prepared to do for me, and also what they expected from me in return. Not least that every hour of my day was going to be accounted for so that I had no time to pick back up with my so-called mates.’

  ‘Was that hard?’ she asked curiously.

  Even now, the relief in his expression was evident.

  ‘No. It was the excuse I needed to change my life. I knew those guys were no good for me but they were all I had. I never believed Rosie and Wilf would be there for me when it really came down to it, but I was prepared to use them to get out of the cruddy life I had.’

  ‘But they were there for you, right?’

  ‘Yes. They were. It took time, but I finally began to see that the more I gave, the more they gave. Rosie tutored me to get my grades back up—no one had ever given a damn about my grades before. Then, when I succeeded there, Wilf found me a job in his garage as a mechanic to earn a bit of money. My money, which I could spend however I wanted to.’

  ‘Unlike the foster father who beat you when you were late from a paper round because he’d been waiting for his drinking money,’ Fliss recalled.

  The memory of him telling her that still punched a hole in her stomach.

  ‘Right. And I responded to the discipline. I respected them for being honourable and fair. Within the year they’d turned me around and got me into the Army Cadet Force. I never looked back.’

  He was making it sound easier than it clearly had been. She could only imagine the effort Ash must have made too, to turn his life around.

  ‘I managed to get sponsorship for my engineering degree, an Army Undergraduate Bursary, but I still couldn’t afford to go. And then Rosie and Wilf came forward with the money.’

  Fliss gasped. ‘They can’t have afforded to do that for all their foster kids.’

  ‘They couldn’t. I hadn’t even lived with them for a couple of years, but we’d stayed in contact. They’d made sure of it. Everything I’ve achieved—my career, being a colonel—is all down to the opportunity they gave me. I could never have dreamed of this life if not for Rosie and Wilf.’

  His humility was striking. She wanted to point out that they never would have offered him that support if he hadn’t been worthy of it. If he hadn’t been Ash. But he wouldn’t thank her for it; he was still battling demons for some perceived failing and this was a rare glimpse at the vulnerable side of Colonel Asher Stirling. A side no one else ever got to see. As sad as she was for Ash, she couldn’t help feel special that he trusted her in this way.

  Fliss bit her tongue.

  ‘Rosie and Wilf were my guests when I had my passing out parade at Sandhurst. They were the family I brought to any officer balls, or garden parties. They were the people I called first every time I got a promotion. I visited them once or twice a year. More, if I wasn’t on a tour of duty.’

  ‘You stayed close,’ Fliss said softly. ‘There’s nothing wrong in that.’

  In fact it made her wonder, when he had such a support network like them, why he’d become so closed off. So afraid to let other people in.

  ‘And then Rosie started showing the first signs of Alzheimer’s. Small things at first, forgetting people’s names, telling the same story a few times over the course of a weekend, and it was gradual. But, because I was away so much, every time I went back there was something new.’

  Silently, Fliss listened to him.

  ‘She started forgetting medication, eating through a whole box of twenty ice-creams in an hour because she couldn’t remember having had one, running out into the street screaming with fear because Wilf had left her alone for five minutes to go and buy a pint of milk. By the time a few years had gone by it had got to the point where she couldn’t recognise anyone. Sometimes not even Wilf.’

  ‘That must have been hard.’

  The silence hung between them. She held her breath, the urge to touch him, comfort him almost overwhelming, but she didn’t dare to. They were getting to the root of the issue but if she said anything, if she pushed him, he could shut her out entirely. She sat immobile, hardly even breathing, willing him to trust her enough to continue.

  ‘Frankly, I didn’t handle it well,’ Ash stated simply.

  For a man who liked to stay in control as much as Ash did, she could only imagine how painful that was for him to admit.

  ‘I returned from a tour four years ago and she didn’t know who I was at all. When I tried to tell her, she became hysterical, screaming that I was lying and that the real Ash was only a kid. She warned me not to go anywhere near Ash because he was doing well and she didn’t want me pulling him back down the wrong path.’

  ‘She thought she was looking out for the fourteen-year-old Ash again,’ Fliss realised.

  ‘Right. And she had no idea that I was Ash.’ His expression was flat but there was no missing the pain behind those shale-hued eyes. ‘I was away so much with the Army and my sporadic presence was only stressing her out, so Wilf and I agreed that it would be better if I didn’t see her.’

  It must have been like losing his mother all over again, Fliss realised abruptly. Feeling rejected all over again, feeling as if it was him against everyone all over again.

  Of all people, she should know how deep that rejection cut. It would be like losing her uncle, the only person who had believed in her.

  ‘But how did you handle it badly? You did nothing wrong,’ Fliss pointed out carefully. ‘You stayed away because it was the kindest thing to do.’

  ‘I left Wilf to cope all alone. I might not have been able to see Rosie, but I could have pretended to be someone else. I could have been there for Wilf instead of just dumping him in it.’

  ‘Ash, you were off fighting for your country. You’re a colonel. You were a major then. The career path we’ve chosen isn’t like other jobs. There are sacrifices. Wilf and Rosie understood, even before the Alzheimer’s. With the best will in the world, you couldn’t have been there.’

  ‘I should have found a way. I should have taken fewer postings away, fewer tours of duty.’

  ‘But no way would you have ever made colonel. At your level that would have been your career over.’

  ‘I should have made that sacrifice for Rosie. And for Wilf.’

  It was the grief talking, she knew that. His mind grappling with an impossible situation. In time he would see that, but for now all she could do was tell him what she thought he needed to hear.

  ‘I don’t believe she would ever have wanted you to do that. From what you’ve told me about them, I don’t think either of them would have thanked you for it. They didn’t make those sacrifices to send you to Cadets, to fund you through university for you to walk away from it. You could never have gone back.’

  ‘I should have done it anyway. I could have found a job in Civvy Street, moved in next door. Even if I couldn’t have been there to help care for Rosie, I could have been there for Wilf whilst he cared for her.’

  ‘That’s a hell of a thing to ask of anyone.’ Fliss shook her head. ‘I know you like to think of yourself as superhuman, Ash, and I know your men see you as their hero, but guess what? You are only human. You have emotions and you were in pain. I don’t believe Wilf thinks you abandoned him.’

  ‘It’s not about what Wilf thinks. He can tell me there was no other choice all he likes,’ he bit out angrily. But she knew it was anger directed at himself, not at her. ‘It’s about what I know. And I know I could have done more. Should have done more. I should have found a way.’

  A tight hand was squeezing Fliss’s heart inside her chest. His pain was palpable. He’d lost one of the only two people who had cared for him, loved him. And he was alienating himself from the other person becaus
e he couldn’t shake a sense of guilt which he shouldn’t be feeling.

  No wonder he kept with short-term relationships, never opening himself up to more hurt. Just like her. They were two of a kind.

  So maybe they could help each other? The thought stole into Fliss’s brain so softly that she didn’t realise it was there at first. She brushed it away and calmed her fluttering heart.

  It was a ridiculous idea.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said suddenly. ‘For listening. This wasn’t what you bargained for when we agreed to this one-off fling.’

  She managed a nervous laugh. ‘It’s not a problem. Besides, I told you I didn’t usually do one-night stands. Now I can say I definitely have had one. And I’m glad—one night wasn’t enough.’

  She just about succeeded in not clapping her hand over her mouth at her faux-pas, but, rather than distrust, the look Ash shot her was so brooding, so licentious, her body shivered under its intensity.

  ‘One night was most definitely not enough.’

  She couldn’t speak; she could only jerk her head.

  He stood up abruptly, pacing her tiny kitchen as though deciding whether or not to say anything more.

  ‘We have two weeks’ R&R, Fliss. Aside from a one-day course, which is in this neck of the woods anyway, and a rugby match with my former battalion, I’m not expected anywhere.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘Nowhere,’ she confirmed, feeling as though she was trapped in some kind of suspension.

  She was almost afraid to think he was suggesting what she wanted with every fibre of her being. Afraid to say it and be wrong and experience rejection on a level she had never known possible.

  ‘What are you saying, Ash?’ she breathed.

  ‘I’m saying, to hell with it. We have two weeks and no one else with demands on our time. Let’s spend it together.’

  Fliss felt as though she were burning up inside, consumed by the need to say yes, but her brain told her no. If she’d fallen for him this hard after one night, then how far gone would she be after another fourteen nights? And what about the feeling of rejection, of loss at the end of it? Logically, she knew Ash couldn’t reject her if they had agreed the terms to start with. But man, she was going to have to keep reminding herself of that.