A Soldier for Suzie: A Military Romantic Comedy (Love will OUT Book 3)

by D. E. Haggerty

  “I’m not afraid you’re going to betray me. I trust you.”

  I’m not just spouting words. I do trust him. I trust him more than I ever trusted Toby. And therein lies the rub. How can I possibly trust someone I’ve known for less than a year more than the man I loved for years?

  Adult Suzie tuts at me. You didn’t love Toby. You thought you loved Toby. You were wrong.

  Have I mentioned how much I hate Adult Suzie? She’s a total pain in my ass. She’s also right, and she doesn’t hesitate to rub it in. Bitch.

  “Then what are you afraid of?” Grayson asks and my attention returns to the man staring down at me with love clearly reflected in his eyes.

  “It’s all happening too quick. I’ve known you less time than the time it took me to fall in love with Toby.”

  Grayson grunts. “Are you seriously going to keep lying to me about loving Toby? You and I both know you never loved the man.”

  “What? I did love him!” Can you go to hell for lying? Because I am a big fat lying mess.

  Grayson doesn’t argue or get mad. No, he grins at me and releases my hair to cradle my face with his hands. “Let’s forget about Toby. Let’s stick to the people in this room on this bed right now. They’re the only people who matter. You with me?”

  I swallow the lump forming in my throat and nod.

  “I love you, Suzie Langley.” My heart flutters as my entire body heats and goosebumps erupt across my skin. “And I know you love me.”

  I roll my eyes. “You had to ruin it, didn’t you?”

  He ignores my disruption. “I’ve given you two months to hem and haw and overthink things. Are you about done now?”

  Um, no. Hello! Have you met me? I have tons of more problems and obstacles to throw at him. “What about when you move back to Merrill?”

  His thumbs rubbing circles into my skin pause. “When I move back to Merrill? When am I moving back to Merrill? Why am I moving back to Merrill?”

  “Since you and Liz made up and all, I thought you’d want to move back to your hometown. Wally said you didn’t move back here after you got out of the Army because of the situation with Liz and Bill’s death.”

  “Ah, I see.” His eyes move to a spot behind me as he formulates his answer. Shit. I was right. He does want to move back here. I panic and verbal diarrhea spews forth from my mouth.

  “I can’t move here. My whole life is in Milwaukee. My friends, my business, my brewery. I mean, I guess I could move the brewery, but all my contacts are there. And I don’t think I could manage living in a small town. Everyone in the diner knew Liz and her story. I couldn’t handle walking into a room and knowing everyone knew everything about me. I like my privacy.”

  “Are you done ranting now?” I wasn’t ranting. But I don’t bother with an explanation. He’s a man. He wouldn’t understand.

  “Whatever.”

  “I never planned to move back to Merrill. There aren’t a whole lot of job opportunities here. And moving here after …” He pauses to clear his throat. “… everything I’ve seen and done seems like moving backwards.”

  “Oh.” I fiddle with a button on his shirt. “Are you planning to stay in Milwaukee then?”

  He grasps my chin and forces me to look at him. “I’m not leaving Milwaukee unless you are. I love you, Precious. I’m not going anywhere.”

  I close my eyes and let the feeling of belonging wash over me. I didn’t realize how much I was worried about him moving back to Merrill until we visited today. But he’s not moving back. He wants to stay with me.

  “Now, is there something you want to say to me? Something about love maybe?”

  I slap his chest. “Don’t push me.”

  “Munchkin, if I don’t push you, you won’t tell me you love me until we’re old and gray sitting on our rocking chairs on your porch at your house.”

  “Please. Like I’m ever going to go gray.”

  Grayson wraps his arms around me and hauls me close until my body is flush with his. “I need to hear the words, Precious.”

  “Fine! I love you. Are you happy now?”

  “Ecstatic,” he whispers before he molds his lips to mine. I immediately open my mouth and his tongue invades to duel with mine.

  I end the kiss before I completely lose my mind in a Grayson fog. We have other things we need to clear up before I forget my name.

  “You’re not going to propose, are you?” I tilt my head back so I can look him in the eyes. “I’m not ready for an engagement.” I’m not sure I ever will be if I’m being perfectly honest with myself. Adult Suzie laughs and laughs and laughs. Liar. You want to be married to this man more than you want your next breath.

  “No.” Grayson chuckles. “I’m not going to propose this minute.”

  “You need to know I may never be ready to get married.” It’s important to be honest about these things.

  “Not a problem. Wisconsin is a common law state.”

  I narrow my eyes on him. “What do you know about common law?”

  “You’re the one who’s always bringing it up every time Sid claims he’s only been married four times.”

  “He has been married five times,” I insist. “Common law marriage is still marriage.”

  Grayson rolls us and I find myself on my back with him hovering over me. Sparks erupt when I feel his hardness pressing into my belly. Yes.

  “Finally, we get to the ravishing portion of our evening. Time to rip my clothes off, bad boy.”

  “I am not going to fuck you.”

  My bottom lip juts out in the biggest pout ever.

  “No, silly girl, I’m going to make sweet love to the woman I love who finally admitted she loves me, too.”

  I am totally down with his plan. Totally!

  Chapter 37

  The past, present, and future walk into a bar. It was tense.

  “Where are you going?” I ask Grayson when he misses the exit for the highway the next morning.

  “To my parent’s house.”

  “To your parent’s house?” I screech and my hands go flailing about. “You want me to meet your parents?”

  I am not prepared for this! I need time with my girls to discuss strategy, maybe even a shopping trip with Phoebe to pick out the perfect outfit. And now you know how serious meeting the parents is. I would brave a shopping trip with Phoebe to prepare.

  Grayson catches my hand and kisses my knuckles. “They’re going to love you.”

  I am not touching his comment with a ten-foot pool. “I can’t believe you want me to meet your parents.”

  “Do you love me?”

  I roll my eyes. The guy needs to stop asking me that question. Last night he made me say I love you before he’d let me come. I’m pretty sure his actions constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

  “Yes,” I grit out.

  “Is this relationship serious?”

  Oh great. Are we going to have another one of our talks? I could do without. “Yes.”

  “Then, you’re meeting my parents.”

  I release the breath I was holding thinking this is the end of the conversation. What am I thinking? Of course, it’s not.

  “And I want to meet your parents when they visit at the end of July.”

  “We’re living together. My parents will be staying with us. I wasn’t planning on hiding you in the closet.” Don’t get me wrong. I’m tempted, but my mom would ferret out Grayson living in the house in a minute flat. The woman is part bloodhound I tell you.

  “They’re staying with us? Can’t we get them a hotel?”

  I throw my hands in the air. “Can we talk about this later? Right now, I need to spend my time panicking about meeting your parents.”

  “Too late,” he says and parks the truck on the side of the road. “We’re here.”

  My heart starts to beat at a frantic pace and my hands tremble. Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit. Grayson jumps out of the truck and comes to my side to open my door. I debate taking off in his truck, but
the uncles never taught me how to hotwire a car. Gross oversight on their part.

  “All you have to do is be yourself. They’ll love you. They’ll probably spend the entire time telling embarrassing stories about me.”

  My ears perk up. Embarrassing stories? Maybe meeting the parents won’t be too bad after all.

  Grayson helps me out of the truck, and we walk hand in hand to the front door. Before we reach the porch, the door flies open and an elderly man who looks a whole lot like an older Grayson steps out.

  “Grayson? We weren’t expecting you.”

  A woman pushes the man out of the way. “What a way to greet your son, you cretin. Grayson!” Her eyes widen when she notices me. “And a girl!” She claps. “Grayson brought a girl home!”

  Grayson chuckles as he steps forward. “Mom, Dad, this is Suzie. Suzie, this is Norman and Armela, my parents.”

  I reach out my hand. “Mr. and Mrs. Neill, it’s lovely to meet you.”

  His mom swats my hand away. “None of this Mr. and Mrs. Stuff. You’ll call me Armela,” she says before wrapping her arms around me.

  Grayson separates us. “Mom, don’t scare her away.”

  His dad chortles. “Scare her away! This is the woman who slays demons for my son. She isn’t scared of a little old hug.” He yanks me away from Grayson and pulls me into a bear hug, which lifts me off my feet. To my relief, he lets me down and motions us into the house before he can squash me.

  I start to walk inside, but my foot catches on the door sill and I go flying. Grayson wraps an arm around my waist to stop me from falling flat on my face. In my defense, the door sill is elevated way higher than normal.

  “Would you look at that? The demon slayer is a klutz.” Norman chuckles.

  “Dad.”

  “It’s fine.” I smooth my hand down Grayson’s arm. “He’s not wrong.”

  “And we both know you’re not as klutzy as you pretend to be.” I ignore him. Now is not the time to discuss my inability to walk with two left feet.

  “Come in. Come in.” Armela ushers us into the kitchen where we take seats around the table. Before I can blink, there’s a coffee cake in front of me and I can smell the coffee brewing.

  “When did you get into town?” Armela asks as she serves us cake.

  “Yesterday.”

  “Of course, Bill’s birthday.” She sniffles but blinks away her tears before they have a chance to fall. Of course, Grayson’s parents practically raised Bill. They must be feeling his loss too.

  “Where did you stay last night?” Norman asks.

  “At a hotel.”

  “Why didn’t you stay here last night?” I blush as memories of all the things Grayson and I did last night flitter through my mind. I wasn’t exactly quiet.

  Norman looks at my face and winks. “We wouldn’t have minded. I’m half deaf anyway.”

  Armela slaps him. “Stop embarrassing them.” Lucky for me, she deliberately changes the subject. “I’ll bring out Grayson’s baby album as soon as you finish your cake.”

  I bite my tongue to stop myself from cheering in excitement. Grayson groans.

  Armela points at him. “Don’t you dare say a word, young man. I have waited a long time for you to bring a woman home.”

  My eyes widen as I glance over at Grayson. “Have you never brought a girl home before?”

  He shrugs. A shrug is not an answer.

  Armela pats my hand. “He was waiting for the right woman.”

  “Mom, stop scaring her.”

  “What? I’m not scaring her.”

  She totally is, but I’m not admitting my fear to his parents on the first meeting. What I am going to do is kill Grayson as soon as we leave. How dare he ambush me like this! And could he have warned me his parents are crazy? Yes, yes, he could have.

  I shovel my cake in my maw. I want those embarrassing Grayson stories. The shoveling is not due to my desperate need for an excuse to not talk. Nope. This coffee cake rocks.

  An hour later I find myself sitting in Grayson’s childhood living room laughing my ass off. “He didn’t!” I exclaim.

  “Oh, he did.” Norman frowns at his son. “Nearly got expelled for it too.”

  “What were they thinking bringing a live animal into a school full of teenagers?” Grayson grumps as I continue to giggle. “It was entirely too much temptation.”

  “Then it wasn’t your fault you set the donkey free?”

  “How was I supposed to know the donkey was going to find its way into the cafeteria and steal all the bananas off students’ trays?” Notice he didn’t deny freeing the animal.

  While I wipe tears of mirth from my eyes, Grayson stands. “We need to get going. Suzie has work in the morning, and I have a class.”

  “You don’t get a break for summer?” his mom asks.

  He shakes his head. “Summer school.”

  Armela envelopes me in a hug. “Thank you for bringing Grayson home.”

  “I didn’t—”

  She places a finger over my mouth. “Shush. I don’t want to hear it.”

  Her arms have scarcely left me before Norman’s grabbing me and giving me another one of his bear hugs. I barely stop myself from squealing as I’m lifted from the ground and twirled around. “You’re all right, demon slayer. You’re all right.”

  “Dad,” Grayson grumps before freeing me from his dad’s hold.

  “You’ll come up for our July 4th picnic.” Armela more or less orders as we walk toward Grayson’s truck.

  Grayson raises his eyebrow at me. Smart man. He’s leaving the answer up to me.

  I grin. “Sounds like fun.” And I’m not lying. After I got over my nerves, the day ended up being fun. And meeting his parents wasn’t too bad. They speak my language – crazy. Looking at Grayson’s diaper-clad bottom didn’t hurt either.

  Besides, wherever Grayson goes I go. I will put up with crazy parents and fireworks for the man. Hell, I’ll put up with nearly anything for the man. I’m not quite sure how it happened but I love him more than I could have ever imagined. I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him. Maybe we’ll even get married.

  Adult Suzie gives me a thumbs-up. Uh oh. I must be talking crazy if she’s agreeing with me.

  Chapter 38

  Beer! Because no great story ever started with someone eating a salad.

  I open the door to my house – our house, Adult Suzie reminds me – and nearly run smack dab into Grayson.

  “Hey, what are you doing here?”

  “Is that any way to greet your man?”

  I roll my eyes before lifting up on my tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “There. Happy now?”

  “Yes.” He smiles and his dimples come out to play.

  What was I thinking? Why did I only kiss his cheek? I lift up on my tiptoes again, but Grayson places a finger over my mouth before I can reach him. I drop down with a big pout on my face.

  “What’s going on? I thought you were working.”

  Since there’s a the month-long break between the end of summer school and the start of the fall semester, Grayson took a job with a protective services company. Apparently, there are private companies that provide patrol services to towns. Who knew?

  Anyway, it turns out Grayson has some super-duper mega top-secret clearance from his time in the Army. The company couldn’t hire him quick enough. Unfortunately, he works all hours – nights, weekends, you name it. It’s Labor Day weekend and he’s scheduled to work the entire three days. I planned to spend the entire weekend in my brew shack.

  “No. I have the weekend off.”

  “What? Since when?”

  Grayson looks at his watch. “No time to explain. Come on,” he says and picks up two bags. He places his free hand on my back and steers me out the door and toward his truck. “I’ll explain on the way.”

  Except he doesn’t explain on his way. He’s being all mysterious. Gosh. I hope he’s not taking lessons from super-spy, Wally. I’m not sure I can live with a mysteri
ous man. I don’t like surprises and I’m nosy as hell.

  Maybe he’s taking us on a romantic getaway. Little Susan fans herself with both hands. Shut it, I tell her.

  He pulls into the parking lot of the airport. We are going on a romantic getaway! Little Susan is jumping up and down now. There’s no controlling her when she gets like this.

  Grayson shuts the car off and turns to me. “Is there any chance I can get you to wear a blindfold and earplugs?”

  A blindfold? Earplugs? Little Susan is practically melting. Tell him yes and ask if he brought handcuffs!

  I look around. “We’re at an airport. If you bring me in there blindfolded, Homeland Security will have you arrested so fast it will make your head spin.”

  Trust me on this. I once made a teensy-weensy, minuscule really, joke about Osama Bin Laden while I was checking in for a flight to Florida for spring break during college. I won’t go into details, but someone did not make it to Florida for spring break that year. That no-fly list stuff is no joke.

  “Will you at least agree to the earbuds?” He holds out a pair of brand-spanking-new Beats headphones in bright red.

  “Dude, those are not earbuds.”

  I don’t mention the price. Grayson loses his mind whenever we talk about money. Maybe because I refuse to let him help pay the mortgage or other bills for the house. Adult Suzie shakes her head. When are you going to stop being stubborn and grow up? I don’t answer her, but the answer is never.

  “Please. For me?” He gives me puppy dogs eyes. And with those whiskey-colored eyes of his, I’m helpless to say no. Don’t judge. You couldn’t tell the man no either.

  And thus begins the weirdest adventure at an airport ever. I wear the headphones and listen to my brewers' podcast the entire time. The only time I’m allowed to take them off is when the security personnel insist. Then, we’re off speed walking to a gate. Grayson wasn’t kidding when he said we need to rush. The plane is nearly done boarding when we rush on.

  “Can I take my headphones off now?” I ask when we take our seats. Grayson cringes. “Am I talking really loud?”