Officer and the Secret (Semper Fidelis. Always Faithful.)

by Murray, Jeanette

  The microwave beeped and he grabbed the hot burrito, passing it back and forth between his hands as he walked through the open offices toward his own door. Tossing the nuked breakfast on a paper towel on his desk, he sat down and started his morning routine of checking email.

  “What in the good grace are you so fucking happy about?”

  “Morning, Jeremy.” He clicked another email open, not bothering to look up from his computer screen.

  His friend flopped down in the chair across from his desk with dramatic flair. Though he didn’t look, Dwayne could easily imagine the sullen look on his face. Jeremy carried the “tortured artist” look off with ease. He sighed, deleted the email, and opened another.

  “You were whistling.”

  “Was I?” Delete. Open next. “How rude of me, quietly making a cheerful sound in the relative privacy of my own office.”

  “Agreed. So really, what’s got you in such a good mood?”

  He wasn’t about to tell him he finally made it with Veronica. No stranger to swapping vague conquests in the past, this time it seemed beyond wrong. Not only because Jeremy would know who he was talking about, but because… it was Veronica. Just different.

  Everything seemed different with her.

  “You got some ass. Didn’t you?”

  The comment was meant to raise his hackles, and it did, no question. But Dwayne just punched the mouse with a little more force than necessary to open a reply window and started typing.

  “I knew it.”

  Dwayne gave him the middle finger between sentences.

  Finally, Jeremy gave up being an ass for attention and leaned forward. “Seriously, man. You’re hung up, aren’t you?”

  Dwayne sighed again, finished the email, and hit send before leaning back in his char to face Jeremy. He looked well rested, though Dwayne wasn’t stupid enough to think he’d gotten a full night’s sleep if he was spending it with Madison. But now that he was in relationship bliss, suddenly he had to be all Nosy Nelly into everyone else’s business.

  “Hung up is a little juvenile of a term for it. But yeah. I like her. I care about her. And I want to see how things keep going.”

  Jeremy leaned back at that and looked thoughtful. For all his annoying tendencies, the guy was a thinker and definitely didn’t jump to conclusions easily.

  Except with Madison.

  “She’s not your usual. Not flashy or loud or your female counterpart.”

  “Female counterpart?”

  The corner of his mouth tipped up. “You know… country to the bone.”

  He couldn’t deny that.

  Tilting his head, Jeremy studied him with an intensity that made Dwayne itch. “She seems like she fits though.”

  Dwayne raised a brow at that. “You know, you were so against Skye when she and Tim first got together. I’m a little surprised you aren’t in here giving me shit too.”

  “That was different. Different situation, different people. And you know I love Skye like a sister now. So it’s all water under the bridge.”

  Dwayne chuckled at the ease with which he dismissed his concerns from a year ago. True, showing up on Tim’s doorstep and announcing she was Tim’s forgotten wife was not the best introduction to Skye McDermott. But she’d quickly won them over. All of them, including her runaway husband.

  “You’re just different with her. Like your soul relaxes.”

  Dwayne squinted at that. “My soul relaxes? What the hell kind of mumbo jumbo is that?” Other than the truth, of course. But guys didn’t say shit like that out loud. “You writing a book with all these witty remarks there, Dr. Phil? You should stick to the mystery and suspense genres.”

  Jeremy rolled his shoulders and peered out the tiny office window. “Never mind. Just trying to say that I like her and you together. That’s all.”

  “Well, good. ’Cause it’s gonna stay her and me together for the foreseeable future.” Which sounded like more of a commitment than he’d mentally admitted before. But it was just the plain truth, so why bother sugarcoating it? He wanted her. Now, tomorrow, and he didn’t see that changing anytime soon.

  And there was nothing wrong with that at all.

  ***

  Veronica propped herself up on her elbows. Her feet were by Dwayne’s chest, next to the headboard, where he rubbed her calves and ankles. Exhausted after a long shift at work, he’d come to pick her up and bring her back to his place, promising a foot rub in the bargain.

  She would have said yes anyway. But a foot rub, well, that just sealed the deal.

  With a sigh, she let her head plop back to the mattress. “This is probably what heaven is like.” Hot man, a foot rub, hopefully making love a little later, and a warm bed to snuggle in after.

  Her parents, of course, were currently praying for her immortal soul somewhere in Africa, and didn’t even know why. She giggled a little, just thinking about their faces if they knew how their only daughter was spending her time in America.

  “Glad you’re enjoying yourself. And glad you agreed to come over.”

  “I was so tired, I never could have made the drive myself.” Plus, with Madison and Jeremy holing up in their apartment, she didn’t mind the added privacy of Dwayne’s apartment with no roommates. But the sweet way he’d offered to come pick her up echoed in her mind. He knew how to take care of a woman he wanted.

  A woman he wanted. That was her. What a comforting thought.

  What a completely abstract, daunting thought. That she would be worthy of a man like Dwayne’s affections. That a man like him would want a woman like her…

  No. That was not positive thinking. That was her mother’s voice creeping in again, uninvited. She shook away the pessimism and doubt and focused on him.

  “So how is school going?”

  The question jarred her from the little happy bubble she was rebuilding in her mind. “School?”

  “Yeah, you’ve mentioned you were in school. I meant to ask, what are you studying?”

  “Oh, you know. This and that.” Her first instinct—to lie—made her stomach ache. She smoothed the bedspread to hide the shake of her hand. So soon, so fragile the thread of their relationship. She didn’t want to take a chance of snapping it. Not just yet.

  “Well, have you picked a major?”

  “Teaching.” It was out of her mouth before she could call it back. Eventually, yes, she would love to go to college for her teaching license. Out of all the tasks she was assigned in the missionary camps, working with the children and teaching them English—as best could be managed, thanks to the language barrier—was her favorite.

  “Nice. Good, solid career choice. Lots of the guys’ wives at the battalion are teachers. Seems like a pretty mobile career.”

  “Hmm.” Her discomfort shifted a little at hearing him mention wives. A mobile career. Mobile, because Marines moved around often. And so would their families. But why was he mentioning it?

  Because you are flying off the deep end, as Madison would say. Stop reading into things.

  “I assume you’re still in your core classes then, huh?” When she didn’t answer—because she had no clue what core classes were—he added, “If you ever need help, let me know. I can’t proof an English paper, as my professors would have told you. I tend to want to add a few y’alls in there every so often, just for spice.” She giggled at that. “But I can rock calculus and I’m pretty good with sciences.”

  “Thanks.” She wanted to cry. This was so not how she hoped the night would go. And now she’d accidentally misled him into thinking she was already in the process of earning a teaching license. Time to deflect. “Thank you for coming to get me.”

  He shrugged one shoulder, as if it was no big deal. “I wanted to see you, and you were too whipped to make it. I wasn’t. Problem solved.” He gave her a head-to-toe inspection, then q
uickly yanked on her leg so that she flew at him, laughing the whole way. Settling her more comfortably over his chest, he pushed her hair back. “I can think of another subject I could always tutor you in.”

  “Oh?”

  His grin was wicked, and sent chills of anticipation running down her spine.

  “I always wanted to have a study buddy for sex ed.”

  ***

  “It’s too easy.”

  Dwayne paced the floor of the chaplain’s office, hands fisting by his side, then crossed over his chest, then back down by his side again.

  The chaplain, by comparison, lounged back in his chair with ease, as if the world wasn’t tipping on its axis, as if things weren’t starting to go ass-backwards.

  “You’ll need to elaborate, Robertson.” With a wry grin, he pointed to the couch with one finger. “And sit down before you wear a hole in my carpet.”

  He sat, letting his boots thud gracelessly out in front of him on the floor. Stared intently on the dog tag laced in next to the tongue of one boot. If he focused on one spot, then he didn’t feel so off balance. Like those teacup things at the Disney park. Keep your eyes focused and maintain a semblance of balance.

  “Start over. What’s too easy?”

  “Life. Things.” He tossed his hands up in the air. “Her.”

  “Ah.” Like a wise man who just discovered the secret to life, he gave a secret smile and walked around from behind his desk to the armchair across from the couch. “So it’s the woman.”

  “Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.” Dwayne squeezed the back of his neck to relieve the tension. “I keep expecting more episodes. I’m on guard for them. But nothing’s happening. The nightmares are slowing down, only mild when they even happen. I haven’t spazzed recently or scared the shit out of anyone.”

  “And this is a bad thing?”

  “Yes!” He jumped up only to sit back down again when he got the stink eye. “It’s exhausting, always being on guard. Always waiting. Staying vigilant.”

  The chaplain nodded, but stayed silent.

  “Okay yeah, and it’s her too. Veronica.” Just saying her name brought a sense of calm to his heart rate. It slowed, coming closer to a more normal beat. “It’s just… smooth sailing. Nothing wrong. She’s easygoing, she’s sweet. She just sort of slipped into my life at the right time, giving me exactly what I need. Helping me…”

  No, that was stupid.

  “Helping you what?”

  Well, confidentiality and all that. “Helping me heal,” he mumbled.

  “Sounds pretty well like a good deal to me. What’s the problem?”

  Dwayne stared at the man. Had he been talking to air the last ten minutes? “It’s too good.”

  The chaplain tossed the pen he’d been holding onto his desk and stretched his back. “The whole ‘too good to be true’ theory at work, am I right?”

  “There’s truth to the theory.”

  “So who burned you before?”

  Dwayne’s mood, so light from just thinking of Veronica, darkened. “Doesn’t matter.”

  “Sure it does. Clearly. Otherwise, the baggage wouldn’t be sniffing around for a fault in the relationship like a bloodhound on the trail. Something has told you in the past that good is never right. Who.”

  It wasn’t a question. Dwayne could kiss lunch good-bye. He wouldn’t be going anywhere. Settling down in the couch cushions, he got comfortable. “Blair. Her name was Blair.”

  Silence.

  “She and I dated while I was stationed in North Carolina. She hung out at the same sports bar I did.”

  Glancing up to see if he was about to get off the hook, he wasn’t surprised when the chaplain sat with stoic patience, waiting for him to continue. With a sigh, he did.

  “We dated, we got serious. I was getting closer to a PCS, and I didn’t know how the relationship would hold up over long distance. I didn’t know where I was headed yet, but I knew I’d be moving out of the area, likely to California.” He spread his hands in a and here I am gesture. “But I wasn’t anywhere near ready to ask her to move with me across the country. Not when her entire family lived on the east coast. And so I started to resign myself to losing a good relationship, mostly due to timing.”

  “But?”

  Damn the perceptive man. Wait, was that some extra sin, damning a man of God? He’d look it up later. “Then she found out she was pregnant.”

  Chapter 18

  He scoffed. “A baby has a way of tightening things up pretty damn fast. Went out and got a ring the next day.”

  “It didn’t occur to you to wait? People have children out of wedlock often these days.”

  Dwayne looked up, surprised to hear the chaplain’s thoughts. He smiled and spread his hands. “It might not be God’s favorite thing, but it doesn’t make it less than the truth. I might be a man of the Word… doesn’t make me blind to the way things work.”

  Nice. A chaplain with an understanding. Nevertheless, Dwayne shook his head. “Not for me. My mom raised me alone, no dad in sight. I couldn’t tell you his last name. Never even listed on the birth certificate.”

  “You don’t have to be married to claim responsibility.”

  “I was going to. We were serious, and at the time the only thing stopping us from continuing on was the distance. Once I would be transferred to a new base—”

  “Inevitable,” the chaplain put in.

  “It is. And then I could be across the country from her. But with a baby on the way, marriage was the right thing to do. I wanted to be with that kid. Every night that I could.” He stared hard at the chaplain. “We’re gone enough as it is in this business. When my boots are on U.S. soil, I want to tuck my kids in at night.”

  “Commendable.” He waved a hand as a sort of white flag. “Continue.”

  “We were both happy. Excited even. Her mom started planning a small wedding for the next month. And I knew I could easily spend the rest of my life with her, our baby, any other kids that came along. Setting up a good life. Then I surprised her one day, took the day off work to bring her to the doctor for one of those monthly checkups.”

  He shook his head and stared at the purple-gray carpet between his boots. “Take her to the doctor,” he said more softly, scoffing. “She didn’t have an appointment that day. Or any other day. She wasn’t pregnant. Never had been. Oh, first she tried to play it off, layering lie after lie, trying to make me think she’d lost the baby and was scared to tell me and she didn’t want to ruin the wedding with the news. When that didn’t hold water, she tried that she’d only been confused, truly thought she was pregnant, but she was wrong. And how sad that made her, that she wanted to try again for a baby, soon as we were married.”

  “Did you believe her?”

  “I wanted to. Christ, I wanted to.” He gripped his temples with his thumb and forefinger, squeezed his eyes shut. “But slow country boy that I am, even I knew that nothing added up. She finally gave up, got tired keeping track of the lie, admitted it all.”

  Nothing but the quiet hum of the ceiling fan greeted him.

  “She saw the writing on the wall. Knew I’d leave and we’d drift apart and that’d be the end. Coming from less than nothing, from a trailer park in the middle of nowhere with barely a high school diploma to her name, I was a catch. I was security. Wanted to shore up a nice guy with a steady paycheck and good health insurance. I’m guessing the fact that I’d regularly be out of the country for seven months of the year was pretty attractive too. I could have been any dumbass in cammies. Didn’t matter who I was. I was just the lucky SOB that she ran into first.”

  “That’s a little harsh on yourself, don’t you think?”

  “No, I don’t. I should have seen it coming. It was right there in my face the whole time, and I was blind to it. The only good thing that happened was there was never a kid involve
d. She could have gone all the way and actually gotten pregnant, though I’m not sure how. I’m just glad it was a hoax rather than the real deal.”

  The chaplain said nothing, and Dwayne felt too empty to go on. There was nothing left. He’d spilled it all out, laid it at the other man’s feet. The embarrassment, the shame, the absolute terror of not being sure he could trust his own judgment again.

  “And so, because of this Blair, you think Veronica is the same?”

  “Veronica is nothing like her.” The words were too fierce, even he knew it from some impartial part of his own brain. More calmly, he added, “It’s not her. It’s me. I just need to figure out why my brain can’t let go. Can’t accept that things aren’t always just waiting to fall apart. That the other boot isn’t always hovering, waiting to drop.”

  “What would happen?”

  He stared at the man, eyes gritty now from squeezing them too tight.

  The chaplain stood and started back around his desk to sit. “What would happen if the other shoe does drop? Maybe you relapse and have another panic episode. Or Veronica turns out to be not the right woman for you, for any number of reasons. Then what?”

  Dwayne flopped back once more and stared at the ceiling. “Then, I dunno. I deal with it.”

  “Can you? Are you able to handle that load?”

  “Yeah.” He said it with confidence, even arrogance, before he could think. But it was true. He wasn’t some pissant weakling who waited around for things to go ass up. If shit hit the fan, he’d weather it and push through as hard and as fast as he could. It’s what he would do in his job, and it’s what he would do in life.

  The chaplain smiled at him, almost like a proud teacher to the star pupil. Proud as can be. “I thought so.” And with that, he picked up his pen and started writing, as if Dwayne wasn’t still sitting on his couch, having an internal crisis.

  But there was no crisis. It was all a reaction to the situation that he needed to get a grip on. The chaplain was right. No matter what, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.