“I would say that the military has provided you with a good life, a good and honorable living, and you feel it is your duty to continue to give back.” She looked at him from under her lashes. “Does that meet your approval?”
He nodded, not trusting his voice.
“Good.” She stood, picking up her purse from the dresser where she’d left it. “I’ll leave you for now. Have a good evening.”
Before he could stand up, she was gone. He raced to look for his shoes, slipped them on without socks and raced after her.
He found her, standing still, on the sidewalk outside the building. “I forgot . . . I rode with you.” She turned, facing him with a blank expression. “You have to take me back.”
The five-minute car ride back was quiet. He struggled for something to say, but nothing quite worked out. When he parked at the gym, he sighed in relief to see her car was still alone, unharmed. With the vandalism happening, he shouldn’t have left her car there. Next time he’d be more careful. But before he could say anything, she slipped from his car and headed toward hers.
He barely caught up with her before she opened her car door. Damn, the lady could move with those long legs when she wanted to.
“Dinner,” he blurted out, then felt like an idiot.
“Dinner,” she said slowly. “We just ate dinner.”
“Tomorrow. Your place.” Sentences, Higgs, use real sentences.
She closed off at that. “No, thank you.”
“Fine, back at my place then.” He could make that work.
She shook her head. “Thank you, but no.”
“Then at Sweeney’s place. I’ll kick him out. He won’t care.”
She hesitated, then asked, “He wouldn’t mind?”
He might, but Greg wasn’t about to tell her that. “Nah, he’s good with it. Said we should make ourselves at home.” Probably hadn’t meant that for when he wouldn’t be home, but Greg wasn’t about to let the man take it back now. “Seriously, it’s fine.”
She hesitated, and in that hesitation he could see her true desire.
“Reagan.”
Her eyes slanted to his. She nibbled on her bottom lip a moment, and he slid in for a kiss. With her heels on, and him in just his running shoes, he was actually reaching up an inch to make it work but that was fine. When she sighed and pressed into him, he knew he’d won over her resistance.
Breathing hard, he pulled away and pressed his forehead to hers. “Have dinner with me tomorrow. Let me cook you a real meal, let me sit with you on the couch and watch a movie. Let me cop a feel during the scary parts and whisper cheesy lines in your ear during the romantic stuff. Let’s do the normal couple things that people do when they’re dating that are hard for us here.”
She laughed and let her head drop to his shoulder. “Okay. Fine, you convinced me. But only if Graham is okay with it.”
“He will be,” Greg promised as he shuffled her into her car and watched her pull away. He will be or else Greg would murder him on the spot and move into his house.
As soon as Reagan’s car—God, that was a death trap on wheels—pulled out of the parking lot, he dug his cell phone out of his pocket and flipped through his contacts.
“Sweeney? Yeah, I need a favor . . .”
CHAPTER
12
“The article reads well.” Marianne settled in her chair, Kara and Reagan in their by-now assigned positions on two of the training tables in the AT room. “I’m sorry about the protestors, though.”
Reagan played with the homemade breakfast sandwich Kara had brought over. Zach, her son, was playing imaginary basketball in the gym while they talked in relative privacy.
Early that morning, Reagan had passed the small but determined group of protestors on her trek through the main gates. They couldn’t step on base, but they huddled together just outside on the main road that led to the main gate, where a majority of the Marines would drive through. Holding up hastily created signs that ranged from generic military hatred—“Damn those who hide behind the uniform”—to ones that were more specific to the current kerfuffle—“Violent sports + violent men = more violence.”
That one, she had thought with a private snicker, had been a truly moronic one. If you were going to take the time and energy to make a sign, at least create one that was original.
The smile died as she remembered children, no older than Zach, standing with their parents in the weak morning sun with their parents, holding hateful signs.
“I knew it would happen eventually. I just didn’t think it would be so soon, and after just one article.” Reagan let her sandwich fall back to the paper plate. Her appetite had taken a nosedive.
“It was a doozy of an article.” Kara reached over and stroked a soft hand once down Reagan’s arm. “They’ll move on shortly. We’ve seen this dozens of times, right, Marianne?”
“She’s right. It’s not uncommon around here. We’ve seen it all.”
“And when they’re tired, or just bored, they’ll move—” Kara paused, then yelled, “Zachary, get in here!” in a voice so fierce, Reagan jumped a little. That was, without a doubt, the Mom Voice.
Zach peeked his sweet face in the doorway. “Yeah, Mom?”
“Were you on the other side of the gym?”
He flushed, and even Reagan squirmed a little being witness to the Mom Stare. Kara had all the weapons of motherhood in her arsenal, and she was loaded for bear this morning.
The sweet woman with the elfin face and soft voice crossed her arms over her chest and glared. “And remind me, one more time, why you aren’t allowed to cross the halfway mark of the gym?”
Zach sighed, the heavy sigh of the beleaguered. “Because the coach’s office is on that side of the gym.” When Kara only waited, he added, “And I’m not supposed to bother him, even if his door is closed.”
“That’s right. So you stay on this side, or I’ll make you sit in here and listen to us gossip.”
The horrified look on Zach’s face had Reagan covering a snicker with a cough. “Fine, Mom.” He sprinted away, and they could hear his sneakers echoing in the hollow, empty gym as he darted around invisible defenders on his way to make the game-winning basket.
“Stinker,” Kara muttered, but she was fighting off a smile.
“He’s awesome,” Reagan said. “Reminds me of my brothers. They all turned out decent, for the most part.”
“For the most part?” Marianne leaned in. “Which one didn’t?”
“The ax murderer,” Reagan said easily, appetite returning enough to pop another bite of sandwich in her mouth and chew before she added, “Kidding.”
Kara and Marianne’s twin frozen faces of terror made her snort.
“You guys are too easy. He’s just a good kid, that’s all I mean. Listens to his mom, pushes boundaries a little—but what kid doesn’t?—and respects you enough to not argue when you rein him back in.”
“He is pretty awesome, isn’t he?” Kara’s smile grew a little misty, and Reagan wanted very much to avoid waterworks.
“Yup. If only he weren’t so ugly . . .”
“Reagan!” Marianne threw her napkin at her while simultaneously laughing.
The sound of men’s voices drifted to their room, and all three women sat up a little straighter. Marianne checked the clock. “Must be an early group wanting to get some exercise in before practice.”
“Zach!” Kara hopped off the table and rushed to the door of the training room. “Zach, come back in here now.”
Zach rushed back, red-faced. The unmistakable sound of a basketball bouncing caught Reagan’s ear. “Mom! Mom, they said I could play with them. They’ve got a basketball with them and they said they were going to get a game in before practice. Can I play? Pleeeeeeeeeeeease?”
The amount of pathos a child could pack into a single word was unbelievable.