About Esther
http://esthereschmidt.com
Service and Sacrifice
by MariaLisa deMora
“Thank you for your service” is what we’re taught to say to military men and women in gratitude for our freedoms won at their expense. Less often do we thank their families, those left behind to hold down the fort, to manage the day-to-day struggle of keeping everything up in the air until their loved one returns.
When you can’t count on anyone else to save you, there’s only one real choice.
Amanda lost her husband to war. Alex lost part of himself. Through a series of glancing encounters, Amanda and Alex find reasons to continue on. And together, they’ll discover hope and peace can be found in the most unexpected of places.
Chapter One
Amanda
Amanda leaned against the side of the car she’d borrowed from a neighbor, and watched carefully as the numbers ticked up in the pump display. Her palm was slick against the handle as she slowed the dispensing rate, then slowed it again, waiting until it hit the even twenty bucks she had in her wallet. She’d retrieved the money, just returned the nozzle to the holder, and was turning to twist the gas cap into place when she heard it. Or felt it, really.
A throbbing thrum of something tickled the soles of her feet, then the racket grew louder, sending tiny thrills of shivery sensation up her legs and into her belly. It seemed to echo off every building around, the sound folding back in and on itself until there was nothing else except for this primal thunder. The first bikes appeared moments later, and she steadied herself against the car door as she watched the double line of vehicles slow, signal, and swoop into the station. They split into a pattern only they recognized, machines and men pulling up three- and four-deep on every pump.
She looked left and saw a pair of bikes just in front of the car, unsmiling men staring at her. Not a glare, nothing threatening, but more as if she didn’t matter. As if her existence mattered so little, they scarcely noticed her except for the fact she stood beside the only pump blocked by a car. She glanced right and found two more bikes a short distance off, barely giving her enough room to back up and leave. She nodded her thanks, getting one chin lift in response before she clambered into the car.
Then right back out, because she still had the money clutched in her hand. She stared at the two men in front, but they weren’t looking at her, heads turned to talk to each other, pointedly ignoring her polite wave. She looked the other direction and held up her hand, pointed at the money, then at the door of the station. Chin lift guy shook his head and made a shooing motion with one hand while the man next to him laughed, lips splitting in soundless humor at her predicament.
“Park, then pay.”
Amanda shrieked and whirled, one hand coming up to cover her throat in a useless defensive move. One of them had dismounted from his bike and was standing right in front of her. A black bandana was wrapped around his head, and dark sunglasses kept his eyes from view as he leaned in and repeated himself. “Park.” He shoved his hand towards the store, pointer finger extended. “Then pay.”
He smelled of oil and gasoline, and faintly of something she couldn’t define. Wide shoulders and massive arms strained the seams of the jacket he wore, folds creased into the elbows telling of long hours of wear. With a short, untrimmed beard and a tattoo crawling up the side of his neck, he looked every bit the kind of terrifying man she’d avoided all her life.
Amanda Stewart didn’t go for bad boys. She’d never walked on the wild side. Married at eighteen to her high school sweetheart, her life was safe and sane, and predictable. Her family had moved on, parents retiring to warmer states and her brothers scattering to the winds, but she still lived in the same town where they’d all grown up. In fact, other than a rare trip, she’d never traveled outside the state where she’d been born, and was so okay with that even her siblings laughed at her.
She might have tried to carefully craft her life as best she could, but now, everything was in disarray.
Almost five years ago her husband had come home unexpectedly, his travel unscheduled, and all their future plans waylaid by an enemy sniper in the mountains of Afghanistan. Stoically, Amanda had sat on the first pew of the same church where they’d married, and then again in a folding chair beside the raw earth mounded beside a freshly dug hole. She’d dutifully accepted the condolences of their friends and family, his commander, and a few of the men who’d walked so many miles beside him. The sun was past zenith when the startling booms of the salute rang out and had dropped to kiss the horizon before she’d given in to the urging of her brothers and stood to toss in her handful of clay. All day she’d sat with his folded flag in her lap; it wasn’t that she’d refused to leave so much as she just couldn’t imagine leaving Martin alone.
A year later, their house had gone into foreclosure, taken back by the bank, because without the active duty pay, she couldn’t afford it. She’d managed to hold onto his car, scrimping and scraping money together every month for the too-large payment, all while bouncing among her dwindling friends. Moving from couch to guest room, and before she’d gotten a small efficiency apartment—for a short time to the back seat of the car. Not that anyone knew about that last bit, because she’d been determined to not let anyone pity her.
But now even the car was in danger, because the transmission was threatening to give out. The shop owner was an old classmate, and he’d promised to hold the car for another month to give her time to pay for the repairs, even after he’d told her the vehicle wasn’t worth the cost.
It didn’t matter to her, because Martin had picked it out, had loved it, had wanted it. And what Martin wanted, he got, in so many things. Beautiful, faithful wife, check. Ostentatious house, absolutely. Impractical car, you got it. Military career always volunteering for dangerous missions, outstanding choice, sir, there you go.
So here she was at nearly thirty, borrowing a car to drive to her low-wage job at the big-box store one town over. Still pinching pennies because putting more gas in the car meant fewer groceries in her already skimpy pantry. In so many ways she felt like life had passed her by, misplaced in the wake of young love and stability, of service and loss.
And the man standing too close, who looked angry now, was terrifying. “Jesus, lady, you deaf or something? We need that pump.” He reached up and took off the sunglasses, tucking one temple piece into the neck of his shirt, exposed to view because he’d unzipped his jacket at some point. Probably when he teleported over here. His green eyes were flat and cold, filled with the don’t-give-a-shit attitude she was sure he had been born with.
Wordlessly, Amanda held out the money, not certain what she hoped to accomplish with this mute appeal. Maybe to have him back off, or understand, or see how frightened she was, fingers shaking so the bill looked nearly ready to take flight.
“Yeah, I get that you gotta pay, lady. Just—” He gestured behind him again, towards the front of the shop. “Park first.”
She looked to the side. There were bikes everywhere, scattered in groups and wavering lines across the parking lot, and she didn’t see a way to drive past them to the slotted spaces in front of the store. Glancing behind, she saw the other two bikes had rolled closer, and she felt a wave of panic when she realized she was now blocked in. She whirled and shoved the money at him again, muscles clenched tight to hold the trembling at bay.
He frowned at her a moment, crinkles in the corners of his eyes becoming more pronounced, gaze never leaving her face. Then he turned his head to shout over his shoulder, “FNG.” Curls of hair escaped from the back of the bandana, dark blond and thick.
That acronym, that title, was familiar. Martin and his friends had joked about the scrubs in their squad, the newbies, sometimes literally fresh off the farm: Fucking New Guy. Amanda studied the patches on the man’s jacket and saw another thing that felt familiar. A military insignia that matched the one she’d memorized. “Oorah,” she whispered, and he whipped h
is head back to her. “Thank you for your service, Marine.”
This time, instead of lady, she earned, “Ma’am. My duty and honor.” Something Martin had said in response to people at diners, grocery stores—she looked around—or gas stations, when they’d interrupt whatever he and she had been doing to offer their thanks.
Duty and honor. She sniffed, then scrubbed at her nose with the back of her wrist. Amanda absently looked down and ran a thumb over the tattoo on the underside of that wrist. Right over where her pulse was strongest, where the skin was weak and the blood ran hot. Where the blade had missed the intended target.
He reached out and cradled her hand in his and, at the hot touch, she looked to see the top of his head fringed by those curls. Chin angled down, he was studying her tattoo and any question of whether he knew the meaning was gone when he lifted his face to hers. Eyes narrowed, he stared hard at her a minute, and she realized at some point he’d stopped examining her tattoo by touch, moving along her skin so the pad of his thumb was now tracing along the scar.
“Your brother?” The lifting sound at the end told her he was guessing the who, but knew the what and why, and she took a breath because it had been a long time since someone had just known like that.
“Husband.” She swallowed around the words that wanted to escape after, forcing them down before they got free. Lover. Best friend. Soul mate.
“I’m sorry for your loss.” He gave her wrist a squeeze but retained his hold, keeping her in place. Long, hard fingers folded hers around the bill, and told her, “Don’t worry about the gas. It’ll be on me, ma’am. Where was he?”
“Helmand.” If this man had served overseas, he would know that name. From the grimace on his face she knew she was right. “Thank you.”
“How long?” Someone stepped up behind him, and over his shoulder, the man gave a brusque order. “Put her gas on the card, man, my tab.” Then his intense eyes were back on her, and she stared at him as he repeated his question. “How long?”
Amanda closed her eyes. “One thousand, eight hundred, and twenty-five days.”
“Oh, honey.” Strong arms wrapped around her and it was so good, so unbelievably good that Amanda let herself sink into the embrace, uncaring how rough the zipper felt against her cheek, how irresponsible it might be to allow this man cradle her like this, because someone was asking her to give up being strong for one minute. “Tomorrow, huh?”
She nodded.
It took a minute, and when it came, the words were gritted out, voice trembling with something like anger. “Suckass kind of anniversary.”
She nodded again.
Another period of silence filled only with her heartbeat, the murmured conversations and bursts of laughter seeming far away. “What’ll you do to remember him?”
“Visit the cemetery.” Something she did every week without fail. Rain, snow, heat—it didn’t matter. She kept her self-appointed trek where the only certainty was in the arrival alone.
“The one here in town?” His voice rumbled under her ear and she felt pressure against the top of her head. “On the highway east of town?”
“Yes. That’s where he is.” Something his parents hadn’t wanted, but she was glad her requests were honored. They would have preferred somewhere bigger, more deserving of their son’s loss, someplace they could hold up as a proper memorial. But, if he’d been across the country, or even in the military cemetery downstate, it would have made her visits more difficult. She pulled in a breath and caught the scent again, but from closer, it was filled with notes of masculinity she hadn’t noticed before. “Thank you.” Amanda stepped back and let her arms drop, not even having realized when she’d wrapped them around his waist.
He released her, then reached out and trailed fire along her wrist, mapping the scar until he pressed against the semicolon she carried there. “Thank you for your sacrifice.”
She ducked her head and settled into the car, surprised when the bikes were gone from in front of her. There were three parked in front of the store, the rest disappeared sometime during that interlude. The door closed gently, then two taps on the roof to send her on her way, just like Martin had always done.
Amanda watched her mirror as she drove away, seeing the tall man still standing next to the gas pump, like a surprising sentinel.
***
Monk
Alex Waterman watched the old car bounce over the low curb that separated the gas station from the street, and traced the woman’s route with his gaze until she rolled out of sight. He couldn’t remember ever seeing someone carry as much pain and grief while still keeping themselves upright. The look on her face as she’d counted off the days told him how she’d measured the hours of each one. Probably holding out hope the next sunrise would prove nightmares didn’t exist, rising from her lonely bed to wrestle them to heel. Day after day, and at some point, she’d given up on that route, seeking a final solace. Even that had been denied, or she wouldn’t have had that damn tattoo to prove how she’d survived.
“Monk, you ready to roll, brother?” Alex looked up and smiled at his club name, brain changing gears until he was fully back in the moment with his patch brothers in the Borderline Freaks Motorcycle Club. He knew Blade, the one who’d spoken, would also be the one who’d moved Monk’s bike without having to be asked. “We sent the main column on, just us hung back with you.” Unspoken was the question about the woman, who and why probably first on their tongues. The problem was Monk wasn’t sure what had happened, not really.
One moment he’d been annoyed that a good ride on a good day was being disrupted by a bitch who couldn’t be bothered to show the least bit of decency and move her goddamned junker out of the way so they could fuel, and the next he’d been holding her while she breathed through her grief, every swell and collapse of her ribcage pained and rough, like something was killing her slowly from inside.
“Yeah, man. I’m ready.”
The rest of the ride, rolling fast to catch up with the rest of the group, then through two more fuel stops, and finally halting at a diner near the state line everyone liked, Monk couldn’t drag his mind away from the woman. “Husband,” she’d said, and infused that single seven-letter word with so much loss it had stolen his breath away. The expression she’d worn was like, and yet unlike every war widow he’d had to see. And he’d seen far too many—glimpsed during personal notifications if he was stateside, and by God, those were the hardest. Taken unawares, it didn’t matter if they’d looked outside to see who was at the curb, pain and disbelief and fear. Jesus. So much fucking fear. Doors flung wide on a scream of “No,” or opened gently with children in arms and faces already streaked with tears, women took the news as best they could bear it. Men did too, because he’d made more than one notification there, too, that their beloved wife, cherished mother, or favored daughter wouldn’t be coming home again.
What he’d seen in the woman’s face today was grief and acceptance, well past the denial stage, and what he’d offered her in the form of a physical connection wasn’t his gig. Condolences weren’t what he did, unless it was for one of his men, and there’d still been too many of those.
“Monk.” At his name, he looked up from the menu at Neptune, another fellow Marine and patch brother. “Woman needs your order, man.” He blinked, looked around and realized the place had filled up with his brothers.
“Just the coffee.” He knew even that would sour in his stomach, but the idea of eating wasn’t appealing. Not right now. Monk offered her the plastic-coated thing, and she pointed to the napkin holder on the table, where he saw three more just like it. The place he’d undoubtedly retrieved it from originally. Fuck. He tried to smile, nodding as she pulled away. “Thanks.”
“Pretty thang,” came from beside him and he glared at Wolf, another double brother he’d served with overseas. His glare apparently wasn’t enough of a deterrent because the man continued in that vein, exactly as Monk would expect. “Gonna go back and tap that pretty thang? M
onk no more, brother, about time.”
He’d earned the name Monk one night at an epic party where there’d been girls and booze plenty, nerve-soothing pot in ample quantities, and brotherhood of the highest order. Someone had asked him why he wasn’t in line for a girl, and he’d told them all about what it meant to have his version of PTSD. He rolled his eyes at the memory of that version of Monk, at the time still just known as Waterboy, and he wasn’t sure which was worse.
“You wanna know why? You sure? Because I’m fucked in the head.” He pulled a face, tongue wagging, finger cocked at his own temple. “Fucked in the head but can’t fuck with the body.” Jeans unzipped, he dug his soft cock out and shook it. “ED ain’t no joke, man. Little buddy here ain’t interested in anything anymore.” Gyrating his hips, he helicoptered his dick, the men around him falling out of their chairs laughing. “Uncle Sam won’t allow but six little blue pills a month.” He pulled up ramrod straight and saluted. “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. I’ll be happy to get a half a dozen hard-ons every thirty, sir.” Shoving his member back in his jeans, he finished, “Half the time it’s too much work to dick around with.” Laughing, he pounded Blade’s shoulder. “Get it, dick around with?” Collapsing back into his chair, he said, “So that’s why I’m here and not there.” He pointed across the room to where two men were double-teaming a woman, had her squeezed between them as they fucked her ass and pussy hard. “Might as well join a…what’s it called for men? A monkery? I don’t know. I’m just fucked in the head, man, and these days, not fucked in the flesh.”
“No. She’s a widow, brother.” All three men seated with him froze in place. They knew what that word meant and were probably rewriting today’s encounter in their own minds with just that single sentence.
Twisted Tales of Mayhem Page 14
