Mary Had a Little Problem

by Blaine, Destiny

  There was something about the way Brock stared at her then that gave her courage, somehow inspired her to press forward. Rather than give up, Mary stalked Tom again, in spite of her earlier decision to leave him alone. “Lieutenant! Don’t you turn your back on me!”

  He kept walking. His pace and the way he carried himself reminded her of a deliberate military march.

  “Lieutenant, I’m talking to you!” Mary cried out. “Damn it to hell! How would you feel?”

  He faced her. Stark determination washed across his face. “I don’t know how you feel, Mrs. Worthington. I never pretended to understand a loss of this magnitude. I’ve offered you counseling, supplied you with information—”

  “Don’t you dare hide behind your training to pacify me. I don’t care about the resources for widows and bereaved families. I don’t want your apologies and your excuses. I need to know what happened to my husband! If you were in my shoes, wouldn’t you want to know what happened to your loved one?”

  “Your husband was a decorated Navy SEAL, Mrs. Worthington. You should be proud of the way he served his country.”

  Mary clenched her fists, her nails digging into her palms. She was getting nowhere, fast. “Have you ever loved someone?”

  “Of course I have,” he spat, his restraint coming apart.

  “Then can’t you try and understand why I’m so distraught?” When he didn’t answer, she continued, “Luke was my rock, my inner strength, and now he’s become my greatest weakness,” soft cries interrupted her as she spoke. She became more aware of the way his death impacted her life as she talked about his demise. “He was the man I loved and would’ve been the father of my children. Can’t you see? You took everything from me!”

  “Mrs. Worthington—Mary—please go home. Take a moment to go through the materials provided to you upon your husband’s death. Seek professional help. The answers you need are unavailable to you, and that’s just the way it is. Whatever it is you think I can supply will never be provided. You will never access your husband’s closed file. Are we clear?”

  Mary gulped, trying to regain her senses. She shook her head, sniffed, and then wiped her cheeks. She was a t-total mess, but then something hit her square in the face. She thought of Tom’s most recent words and somehow managed to pull herself together. “What did you just say?”

  “Too much,” Tom Tolsen snapped, narrowing his cold liquid silver gaze. “Good day, Mrs. Worthington.”

  “Tom! Wait! Just give me another moment. Can’t you see what kind of pain I’m in? Can’t you give me something else?” she wailed, yanking his sleeve as she pleaded with him. “You know what happened to my husband! Damn it, Tom! You look at me!” She practically ran alongside him, trying to keep his pace. “Maybe you weren’t there when he died. I’m sure you weren’t…but you’ve read his files. You’ve seen what it is the military doesn’t want me to know!”

  “On behalf of the—”

  “Don’t you start with the same damn spiel you gave me the day you stepped into my home and tore my world apart!”

  “Mary! That’s enough!” Anna yelled from behind her.

  The clickety-click of high heels beat against the sidewalk as Anna hurriedly tried to catch up with them. Mary wasn’t stopping now. Tom had said too much, supplied something—hope, some measure of reassurance, perhaps—but it was much more than what he’d given her in the past.

  He continued rambling as he walked, quietly reciting the same speech he must’ve repeated over and over again as he met one widow after another. Approaching his vehicle, he finished with a firm, “I’m sorry for your loss, Mrs. Worthington.”

  “You’re sorry,” Mary said, slapping her hand over his wrist before he opened the car door and disappeared out of reach. “You’re sorry? Lieutenant Tolsen, I’ve had enough apologies to carry me through this sorry life, and I’m here to tell you those words will never comfort me at night.

  “Regrets don’t ease my pain. I don’t know for certain that the husband I loved and married really isn’t out there somewhere. You didn’t even bring me his body! You just showed up on my doorstep and told me he was dead. Then, you directed me to some fiasco where you assured me I’d find support, reminding me that my husband gave his life up for a damn good cause!”

  “Mary! Dear God, that’s enough!” Anna screamed.

  Fury spun through Mary’s veins. Any compassion she wanted to feel for Tom was long gone. Yes, he was only doing his job. True, he’d been kind and compassionate, more so than most of the other Casualty Assistance Calls Officers, but that didn’t matter now. Tom knew something more, and he wasn’t telling her. What kind of man kept another man from his wife? What kind of monster was this Tom Tolsen character, and what kind of country had her husband served?

  She shook off that thought. She was a proud American. She just didn’t agree with the military policies concerning bereavement issues.

  Tom took a deep breath. “Mary, your husband is not coming back. The man you loved and married is gone. You have to accept that.”

  “Then why didn’t I see a body?” she asked, shoving him. “Why didn’t you tell me where or how he died? What kind of people do you represent if you can’t look a soldier’s wife in the eyes and tell her some measure of truth when she loses the only man she’s ever loved!”

  “Please, Mary! Stop this!” Anna intervened right as Mary drew her fists tightly together. She might have struck Tom if it hadn’t been for Anna stepping between them.

  She’d had time to think about the way Tom delivered the news that most definitely changed her life, and she wanted to grab his attention. Unfortunately, Anna did a better job there. Tom couldn’t take his eyes off her sister, and it was the first time Mary could recall seeing Anna blush. Funny how she noticed that in the midst of her anger.

  “Tom, this has been a tough time,” Anna explained. “You’ll have to overlook Mary. She hasn’t come to terms with Luke’s death.”

  “Don’t you apologize for me!”

  “No need to explain. I understand,” Tom said, talking around her.

  “Do you think any of this is fair, Lieutenant? I mean, I had nothing returned to me, nothing at all. Is that the thanks my husband received for serving his country?”

  Tom kept a blank expression, and Mary saw right then, she’d hit another brick wall. Tom couldn’t give her what she needed most.

  “I had the world at my feet, a man who loved me with everything he had to give, and now what do I have? Nothing, and that’s all. Don’t you see? I just want peace. Is that too much to ask? I need closure!”

  Tom kept a stiff upper lip, said his farewells, saluted a soldier in passing, and disappeared inside his Humvee. Mary watched Tom’s taillights until the military vehicle rounded an old mercantile building, driving out of sight.

  Mary took a deep breath. The tears staining her cheeks had long since dried. Anna’s lips thinned, and she stormed back inside. Apparently, her sister knew better than to pick a fight.

  The noisy bar was alive with activity now. The last thing Mary wanted to do was return to her barstool and act as if she were enjoying herself. Pretending she was having the time of her life would be like faking an orgasm. What was the point? She wouldn’t get anything out of it.

  Mary stared down the street. She wanted simple answers, and Tom Tolsen had what she needed most in the world, but the questions were too difficult for Tom to acknowledge.

  Tom knew the harrowing truth. He had sealed documents, the kind of information a widow needed in order to move forward. Without the military’s closed files, Mary wasn’t able to leave the past behind.

  “It’s his job, Mary. He’s only doing what he’s been instructed to do,” Brock said gently.

  “What do you know about what he does?” she asked without looking at the man behind her.

  Brock placed his hands on her shoulders and forced her to face him, and the gesture alone sent her reeling. A stranger wasn’t allowed to touch her. Before she cursed him alou
d, he said, “I know the military couldn’t pay me enough to do what that man does. Tom deals with death, Mary. He’s only permitted to share limited information.

  “You see him as the devil, the bearer of bad news. And you’re right. Tom Tolsen takes lives. He rips away dreams and destroys families. He’s death walking. When a woman or man sees Tom coming their way, they shout, they scream, they cry, and some of them fight, refusing to believe death—Tom—has finally knocked on their door.

  “No, I wouldn’t have his job, Mary. See, I’m not sure I could’ve walked in your house, given you the short details of your husband’s death, watched you mourn as you tried to grasp the magnitude of your loss, and then left you behind. I wouldn’t be able to do what Tom does.”

  That difficult lump in Mary’s throat returned. The lodging sensation threatened to choke her as she looked into the dark eyes before her. “Shall we?” he asked, extending his arm toward the pub.

  She shook her head, coming to terms with the public fit she’d thrown. “No, I uh…I should go.”

  “That’s your choice, of course,” Brock said. “But I’d like to buy you and your sister dinner and drinks. I’d like to see you smile, maybe listen to your story, and get to know you. If now isn’t a good time, I’ll be around. Anna knows how to get in touch with me.”

  Brock walked backed to the pub entrance and held open the door, propping his wide back against the center beveled glass. Mary stared at him for a moment then softly said, “I need to go.”

  “No you don’t. That’s what you don’t quite get. You don’t have to do anything anymore. You don’t have to move where the military sends you. You don’t have to act a certain way because you’re a soldier’s wife. You don’t have to do a damn thing you don’t want to do. And if you don’t want to go back inside, you don’t have to do that either, but you don’t need to go home alone, Mary.

  “If you do, that’s your choice, but it’s because you choose to sit in that house by yourself, and you reach the decision that you prefer to be alone. Unfortunately, if that’s the path you take, life is passing you by, and those you shut out are missing a great opportunity to spend time with a lovely young woman.”

  Mary studied the brute in front of her. He was the type of man she imagined most men feared, and for good reason. Brock was exactly the kind of man her husband had once been—rough stock. He was a bear of a man. Most fellows were too smart to shake or rattle someone like Brock for fear they’d be unable to contain the beast they might awaken, the special ops enforcer few men, or women, challenged.

  Oh sure, Brock was handsome, sexy, and probably a true rebel, too. Still, Mary knew this type well. She’d married someone like him. She and Luke had countless friends that fit Brock’s MO. They all carried themselves a certain way. They possessed cold eyes, an assassin’s demeanor, and a passion for their careers unlike any other.

  Men like Brock took what they wanted. They didn’t use the power of persuasion. It was a waste of time, and in the end, those they encountered understood they were up against an unshakeable force when they came face to face with a man of this stature.

  Brock was, without a doubt, the best of special ops, a soldier who had a bite far worse than his bark, one of those smooth operators who snuck up on the unsuspecting in the dead of night.

  He was a killer. That much she knew. He hunted the enemy, preyed on the unsuspecting, and got in bed with US adversaries so when they turned their back to him, he could assassinate the men or women he was hired to eliminate.

  Yes, Mary knew plenty about Brock. Her Luke was just like him.

  The military coveted men like Brock, trained them for jobs no one else wanted. Then, they turned them out to sea. They left them to fend for themselves if they had the misfortune to end up on a tour that went south with a final destination no one knew about, no one except those on the same classified mission. And those fellows were unapproachable, too.

  “You’re a SEAL, aren’t you?” she asked, realizing she zoned out as she stared at this stranger.

  “No,” he answered her, taking a step inside.

  Mary glared at his broad back as she eased inside the pub. She refused to follow the man who tempted her, the first person who’d turned her head for longer than a second since her husband’s death. Her curiosity made her feel like a traitor then.

  Brock joined Anna at the bar, and they started talking, acting as if she wasn’t standing there behind them. He glanced up and held her in his focus, checking her out in one of the mirrored shelves housing bottles of alcohol behind the bar.

  He wasn’t a SEAL? That left the Marine Force’s Recon, also known as the bad asses of the military.

  Brock fit the bill.

  He didn’t smile. He didn’t wink. He just looked at her, watched her as if he understood her heartache and believed he alone could somehow wash all the agony away.

  A soldier came in and spoke to her in passing. Brock flinched. The tight line of a set jaw was visible before he slid away from his chair. “Mary? We’re waiting to order.”

  Assumptive—that’s what he was, and all assholes had that in common. She’d learned to cope with the male ego long ago. She also knew better than to cross ties with men like Brock. Presumptuous men were guys to avoid.

  Brock’s tongue held at the corner of his mouth when he took his seat again. He owned this attitude, this cocksure way of looking her up and down and making her feel alive again.

  With outstretched legs, he rubbed his palms across his jeans, drawing her attention to those hard muscles the faded denim had the good fortune to cover. The bulge in between his splayed thighs was hard to dismiss, and when she made the mistake of glancing down, the smirk on his face told quite a story.

  He wanted her to look. He liked seeing her get lost in that sinful body of his.

  Mary started a head to toe appraisal, but stopped herself before she went too far. That’s what he expected. Men like Brock were all the same. She didn’t need or want a man—much less this one. But still, there Brock sat, practically guiding her with those tortured eyes.

  Oh hell and damnation! She’d married one of those heroes, and one was enough to last eight lifetimes.

  Hurriedly, she went to the bar, grabbed her keys, and said her goodbyes. She charged the door, never bothering to look back. Unwilling to check and see if that haunted gaze darted across the room with her.

  She didn’t care. Oh sure, Brock was handsome and sexy. He was interested in her. She was certain of that. He was probably irresistible, too—the last thing she needed—and he represented pure trouble.

  She’d already been there and done that.

  Mary wasn’t going back for more. Oh hell no. Mary wed the military once. She’d be damned if she’d ever court one of its obedient soldiers again.

  Chapter Two

  “That went well,” Brock said, nursing his beer while considering how he might have stopped Mary from leaving.

  “I told you when you asked me about her to take things slow. You didn’t listen,” Anna said. “Mary isn’t like your other arm ornaments, Brock. She’s always been special.”

  “Kind of like her sister?” he asked, arching a brow.

  “No,” Anna retorted, resting her back against the chair. “Mary is nothing like me, and that’s why I asked you to be careful around her. You were like a bull charging her. You acted like you couldn’t wait to wrap your horns around her and drag her off somewhere quiet for a good breeding.”

  Brock grunted. “I tried to show her some compassion. Screw me for being a gentleman, and by the way, since when do you think I’m anything except an egotistical ass?”

  “Since I’ve decided you’re exactly what my sister needs.”

  “Mary doesn’t need me. Tom was right. She needs a lot of counseling, if you ask me.”

  “I didn’t ask you,” Anna fired right back. “Besides, it’s obvious you’re interested.”

  “I won’t be her shrink,” Brock said tightly, realizing he didn’t soun
d too convincing.

  “Well, I can promise you this, if you have anything else in mind outside of being her friend, she’ll shoot you down every single time you’re within firing range.”

  “Is that a fact?” Brock asked, eager to test Anna’s theory.

  “Yes sir, it is.”

  “The military ought to hire you. They need to create a position and let you handle matchmaking. Sometimes, I wonder how I ever went on a first date without you around to coach me.”

  “Uh-huh, that’s exactly what I’ve been thinking, too. If the fellows here acted like you, the military wouldn’t have to worry about couple housing.” A beat later, she said, “I like your idea, though. With this real estate market like it is, I’d love to have a fun and easy job.”

  “Business off?”

  “Market is flat,” she complained, flashing a smile at another man in uniform. “Lord have mercy, the guys around here could make a nun stray from the convent.”

  Brock shook his head. “You’re a dead-level tease.”

  She shrugged, twirled the straw in her drink, and leaned over to take a sip, never looking away from the man who’d just entered the bar. “I try to keep my options open. One day, I’ll find my soul mate, but I plan on kissing a lot of pirates before I let a mercenary steal away with my heart.” A small group of officers walked through the door, forcing Anna to lose interest in her latest prey. “The selection process may take longer than expected if I frequent this place.”

  Brock snickered as he studied Anna and the men who were immediately aware of the attention they received. “You’re a flirt, Anna.”

  “Yes, I am,” she admitted, tilting her head and shoulder toward the fellows.

  Anna was a ball of energy, a real firecracker. She couldn’t sit still. Her height kept her feet from touching the floor, so she continually shifted in her bar chair, grabbing hold of the wooden ledge so she wouldn’t fall to the floor, a place she might find herself if she kept slurping down those margaritas. “Damn shame I like legs.”