by Anne Marsh
“Girl,” I bite out.
Finn grins like the asshole he is. “And is she or is she not your friend?”
This is where shit gets trickier. There’s no actual rulebook that says men and women can’t be friends. It’s just that by the ripe old age of twenty-six, I’ve learned firsthand that friendship is exponentially harder when one friend is the proud possessor of a vagina while the other is stuck lugging a penis around. It’s like we speak two different versions of English, see the world from different sides of the mountain. Kind of like that book that claims we’re from two different planets with about a million miles of empty, cold space between us. Maybe a meteor belt or two as well.
Finn makes a give it up gesture. “Waiting for an answer,” he says.
Fuck. Him.
I go on the offensive. “Are you friends with Vali?”
Finn doesn’t hesitate. “Fucking A we are.”
Huh. Not the answer I expected, but probably one that’s gonna earn him the gold star with Vali. I think he means it, too. I glance down at the laptop. I’m supposed to be updating our website, but the random keystrokes I’ve inflicted on the keyboard have transformed our home page into a mess of gibberish. That’s not a great way to build business, you say? Yeah. Right there with you.
Marlee stops in front of our office and something audibly falls off her bike. She hops off with a squeal of dismay and crouches down, fiddling with the chain. I make a mental note to take a look at the damage. Surprisingly, I like seeing her. She’s on the short list of people I don’t want to murder after ten minutes—a list that normally includes Ro and Finn, although I’m considering booting Finn off. I shove upright and bound over to the door like the best-trained dog.
“Girlfriend,” Finn croons behind me, cementing his fall from grace. Maybe he’s right. Or maybe Marlee and I can just be friends without having sex. Or thinking about sex. Hell. Even talking about sex right now might kill me. I head out to meet her and leave the girlfriend comment alone.
Marlee beams up at me. This has the wonderfully unfortunate position of putting her mouth way too close to my dick, and my jeans are nowhere near barrier enough.
Unaware of my looming erection issue, Marlee launches into speech. “Can I buy you lunch?”
My brain short-circuits, not because her question is so unexpected (which it is, but a guy has to eat, so I should be saying yes). Nope. I stop thinking critically because all the blood that should be pumping through my brain rushes south to my dick. I blame it on the dress, although I suspect it’s the woman in the dress. Marlee is downright gorgeous. She dresses the same way she talks—exuberantly, loudly, and yet so colorfully and curvy that the inner caveman I didn’t know I possessed demands I toss her over my shoulder and carry her off. Her dress is a hot pink color with thin straps, a tit-hugging top and six wet dream-inspired buttons that march down her front to her waist. The top two buttons are undone, revealing several inches of mouthwatering cleavage and the edge of a pink-and-white bra. Since I’m standing over her, looking down, I have an awesome view of the lace that edges the cups, forming a landing strip for my tongue. She folds her arms and her tits threaten to escape altogether.
I should be so lucky.
She points to a basket tied onto the back of her bike. “I thought we could picnic?”
She wants to eat. With me. Usually, I avoid most invitations the way other people shirk the dentist or the IRS. I’m about to offer her my standard story—paperwork, incoming dog, too much to do blah fucking blah—but she reaches up and pokes me in the stomach.
And barely misses my dick. Not sure if I should be disappointed or grateful. Robin Hood didn’t fuck Azeem, and she thinks I’m too young.
“Don’t say no,” she orders.
Nothing more awkward than an anti-social former SEAL with no manners trying to fill that silence. She doesn’t rush to fill it, either—just outwaits me like a genius field commander. We both know I have two choices—cave or lie my ass off.
I crouch down, slide the chain back on the bike, and nod.
Thirty seconds later, I’m sticking my head back inside the office. “Going to lunch.”
Finn laughs and flips me off. Fuck. I’m gonna hear about this for weeks. Possibly months. I’m usually the guy with a dozen different excuses for not going out—and here I am, having a lunch date.
Since it doesn’t really matter, I bring my truck around. Check Marlee out some more as I load her bike in the back. The dress stops a few crucial inches north of her knees. Her legs are bare and she’s wearing a pair of chunky wooden sandals with pink straps. She definitely passes this SEAL’s inspection, although biking in that outfit seems nothing short of miraculous.
“You got a spot in mind?” she asks as soon as we’re on our way.
“Nope,” I tell her with all honesty. “You’re the commander-in-chief of picnic land. You choose.”
I’m curious where we’ll end up. After we leave Search and SEALs, she directs me straight back to Angel Cay. Marlee owns a shop on Angel Cay’s main—and only—street. It’s got to be the pinkest, sparkliest place I have ever seen. The name Papelier is painted over the door in curly gold letters. I’m not even sure that’s a real word, but I’m not stupid enough to say that out loud. When I asked, Marlee claimed it was French. Whatever. It’s definitely one of those places that caters to women—she sells about four hundred million different kinds of papers, ribbons, and bows. Balls practically shrivel and fall off when they cross that threshold.
Just when I think we’re doomed to lunch in Paper Hell, however, she orders me to take a right. We end up at the dock in front of her place. Better yet, she sends me in via a small side lane, so we skip Angel Cay’s main street. Not too many better ways to become a sideshow star than parading your usually date-less and morose self down the busiest street in town. I swear the neighbors all have webcams, just waiting for something juicy to happen.
The wooden dock is nice and quiet, though. It stretches away from the strip of sand in front of her house. Must be a hundred yards, although the only occupants I spot are sea gulls. There’s not a boat—or a tie up—in sight. There’s a little gazebo thing at the end with a rather dilapidated roof that needs re-shingling and a wood table. Marlee bounces out there, adroitly sidestepping more than a few missing boards, and unfolds a bright pink-and-blue checked blanket. Guess we’re getting ambiance with our picnic. While she gets lunch out of the cooler, I take a look around. She needs a handyman. Possibly a half-dozen handymen. The sea wall’s not in great shape and her dock needs immediate redecking.
I’m seriously considering grabbing the tools from the back of my truck, when she pats the seat next to her. “Sit.”
Since Finn’s not around to give me (more) shit, I sit. If nothing else, Marlee’s amusing.
“We have plans to make,” she informs me. “Sieges to lay. Mountains to climb.”
“Sounds exhausting, and I’m retired from superhero duty.”
“I’m fixing you up,” she declares more sternly than a nun at Catholic school.
“Is this part of the Robin Hood plan?”
“Absolutely. So tell me what kind of woman you find attractive.”
You.
“I can find my own girls,” I tell her.
“Which is why you’re alone every Friday night,” she says pointedly.
Interesting that she’s been watching me.
“I’m alone by choice,” I counter. “People suck more often than not.”
She hands me a sandwich in a plastic baggie. Peanut butter and jelly. She’s definitely no Vali, but a free lunch is a free lunch. Not like I’d do better. She’s also packed chips, apples, and a six-pack of diet soda.
“Well eat up, lone soldier,” she says.
“Yes, ma’am.” I flick her a two-fingered salute and dig in. Eating with Marlee is strangely companionable. The ocean hits the dock with a rhythmic thwap-thwap-thwap, the occasional seagull squalls overhead, and I don’t feel pressured to make
conversation. We sit. We eat. Nothing more.
See? That right there is my fatal mistake. Marlee’s hot. She’s sexy. She’s also gonna be a pain-in-the-ass.
A wiser man than I would steer clear.
After our lunch date, I fall into the habit of running past Marlee’s place. Obviously, I have to run somewhere, and unless doing four million laps around the training center appeals, there are really only two choices. I can run north to the mainland or I can run south along the Overseas Highway. In theory, that gives me almost a hundred miles of asphalt, but naturally my favorite five miles takes me past Marlee’s.
In fact, that’s where I stop and stretch with more regularity than a factory worker punching the time clock. When I hit the third mile, I can see her porch from the road. Set back a good thirty feet from the road in a yard with more flowers than a greenhouse, Marlee’s porch is just a pit stop. I promise. It’s convenient, and I know she possesses no killer dogs and won’t have me cited for trespassing.
The yard is as exuberant as its owner. Search and SEALs is surrounded by palms and sand—there’s not too much variety in our neck of the woods. Marlee, however, has overloaded on color. She’s got a gazillion pink hibiscus and avocado trees. Thick strands of passion vine tangle with everything, the purple and white flowers poking their heads out of every branch. Coconut palms jut up behind the house and strands of fiery orange honeysuckle wrap around the porch railings. She should really cut the vines back, but I know she won’t. She likes the crazy, mixed up, colorful flowers.
I unlatch the little gate and lope toward the front porch. One of the hardest things to get used to after I came home was running out in the open. The Florida Keys offer plenty of sand and sun, but we’re low on hostiles. No one will shoot at me as I rack up my miles. No one will plant an explosive device by the side of the road, waiting for me to pass. I still scan the road, though, as I run—old habits die hard.
My bottle of water is waiting for me on the porch. It’s still ice-cold, tiny droplets dripping down the side. I’m indulging myself and I know it. I could carry a water bottle. I could run somewhere else.
But I don’t.
Instead, I stop and stretch, assessing the outside of the house and the yard for my next projects. I’ve already replaced the obvious missing boards in her dock, fixed two broken windows, scraped and painted her shed, and evicted multiple baby palm trees that were squatting in her front yard. Today’s project is painting the white picket fence that marches around her front yard. Pretty sure the last time a paintbrush touched those boards was sometime in the last century.
I grab two cans of white paint, a screwdriver, and a brush from the storage shed. Marlee’s a minimalist when it comes to tools. The first time I checked out her stuff, she owned exactly two screwdrivers. One flat head. One Phillips. For her, that got the job done. Me? I prefer some variety—you can’t have too many tools. You need a back up and then another spare in case bad shit happens to the first two or some jackass breaks in and clears out your stash.
I head out to the fence, pop the lid on the first can, and get busy. Painting’s not a bad job. I’m not ready to go all Mr. Miyagi and declare it some kind of spiritual experience, but it’s got a nice rhythm. Not my all-time favorite—that honor goes to sex—but I’m on my back getting the pain-in-the-ass bits underneath and in the zone when Marlee wanders out to grab the mail. Since she’s wearing a pair of denim shorts that hug her ass and flash her cheeks with each step, I take a paint break to stare. We’re friends, but I’m not blind. The camisole tank top thing she’s wearing floats up with each step she takes, so I get a bonus look at her stomach and back as well. Her waist has this sweet curve and I’ll bet my hand fits there perfectly. You know. If we weren’t just friends. Or Robin Hood and Azeem, who don’t lust after each other in the mainstream versions of the story.
I jam the brush into the can, loading it up good. Paint’s so much safer than shorts. Or waists, tits, and ass. Way too soon, Marlee comes back, flipping through a stack of flyers and envelopes. She hums as she flip-flops her way toward me, humming something that goes note note note uh-huh note hmmm… She stops walking right about when she hits my section of the fence. I stare up at her and up her shirt. It’s got one of those built-in bra things, but she’s got a freckle on her ribs and sweet curves that make a certain part of me start humming an uh-huh uh-huh of my own.
“Oh,” she says. “Look at this.”
I’m looking all right.
She drops down beside me and shoves one of those glossy picture postcards in front of my face. I almost paint the damned thing white, but pull back at the last second. The brush slaps her arm. Looks like the world’s biggest sea gull shat on her, but she doesn’t seem to care. She’s too busy staring at the grinning baby on the postcard.
“Don’t you think he’s just gorgeous?” she demands.
I rest the brush on the can, squint at the picture, and stretch my legs, getting comfortable. “Not my type.”
“Look at him.” The baby undulates in front of me again and I look as directed. Nope. Still not doing it for me. He’s a cheerful, fat, no-part-of-my-universe blob on a page. I’m not sure why she’s getting so excited, so I take a guess.
“Are you related?”
That seems like a safe question, right? I mean who walks around admiring random pictures of babies? But her eyes tear up.
“No,” she says. Her voice wobbles, and she’s gonna get the baby wet.
I snag the card from her. He’s still just a baby, but he matters in the Marlee-verse. I sit up cautiously, turn the card over (not that it’s any of my business), and read it. Two random people somewhere in South Dakota are thrilled to announce the birth of blah blah blah. There’s no mention of deadly diseases, unfortunate accidents, or kidnapping. So… what the fuck? I eye Marlee warily.
She sniffs. “I used to babysit her. She should be three going on four—and she has a baby.”
This is way above my pay grade. I paint fences. I fix broken cars, broken appliances, and broken windows. Whatever’s got Marlee so upset? I don’t have a fucking clue. But her fence is only half-painted and she’s staring at me with puppy dog eyes—and I can’t leave. There’s probably a repair manual somewhere for situations like this, and I make a mental note to do some Googling.
In the meantime, however, I’m reduced to more guessing. “You don’t like babies?”
“I love babies,” she sobs and then her head comes flying at my chest. I catch her reflexively, slamming back against the freshly painted fence. I’m gonna have to fix that later, but right now I wrap my arms around Marlee and hope to God none of her neighbors can see over the hibiscus bushes in her front yard.
“So this is good news.” Work with me here.
“For her,” Marlee wails.
I pat her on the back awkwardly. I know how to love her good. Know how to give her an orgasm or three. This hugging shit? Virgin territory for me. Still, how hard can it be? I run my hand up and down her back, trying not to snag the filmy stuff that’s her shirt.
She lifts her head and stares at me. “Do you want babies?”
I shrug. “Never really thought about it.”
“I do.” She swallows, making a loud gulping sound.
I give her another pat on the back. “So what’s stopping you?”
The stare morphs into a glare, as if it’s my fucking fault she doesn’t have a dozen kids trailing after her to the mailbox and back. Clearly, I’ve just said the wrong thing.
“It takes two,” she hisses. “Do you see a man in my house, Vann? People don’t do asexual reproduction—I need a partner.”
“You were married,” I blurt out unwisely. Vali has mentioned—usually with a great deal of cursing—that Marlee’s ex-husband is a piece of work. A douchebag. A grade-A dick. Take your pick. Marlee’s own comments seem to underscore this, and in our one previous conversation about dicks and reproduction, she made it sound like the ex was the one who couldn’t reproduce. Although I c
ertainly don’t think sharing his DNA with future generations is prudent, another, more horrible thought occurs to me.
“Can you have kids?”
Marlee smacks my chest. Hard. “You think I’m the problem?”
Honestly? No. But that’s because I don’t understand what we’re talking about.
“Tell me how to fix this.” I think I sound a little desperate.
Marlee sighs and pats me on the cheek like I’m fucking six. “You’re a sweet guy, Vann.”
Then she gets off my lap, saunters back inside, and I’m left with a fence to repaint and no clue what just happened.
Two days after I paint the fence (and a day after I give up on the T-shirt that landed in the paint), we have a client come by Search and SEALs to pick up a dog we’ve been training for the last ten months. That tends to make Finn mournful—he treats our trainees like they’re his own flesh-and-blood. I miss all of our dogs when they move on, but it’s important to let them get out there and do what we’ve trained them to do, because they’re amazing and there are way too many bastards hell-bent on blowing up the world.
Our dogs will curtail their terrorist fun.
So when Finn waves his phone in my direction and announces that “Vali has a table for six at the bar,” there’s only one acceptable answer and that’s When? Even I, king of the anti-social misfits, know that. I do, however, swing by my place, shower, and pull on a slightly less used pair of jeans and a T-shirt. This is because I’m eternally optimistic—and possibly also because where Vali goes on a Friday night, Marlee usually follows.
When I come outside, as dressed up as I get, Finn’s waiting for me. “We taking your truck?” he asks.
I take a quick look around Search and SEALs, but Ro’s clearly already gone ahead. And since I’ve never been a big drinker, I’m the natural choice for tonight’s designated driver.
“In,” I say, snapping my fingers like he’s one of our four-legged recruits. He flashes me a salute and then vaults lightly into the truck bed. This is the perfect opportunity to razz him about his non-law-abiding ways and the possibilities for death-by-ejection, but we’ve ridden Humvees, tanks, and a dozen other vehicles as SEALs. Because I’m working on maturity, I pass. Plus? If he survived that, I don’t think he’s dying on the way to the bar.
