Stolen September: A Military Romance

by M. C. Cerny

  Dad is the only one home right now, and while I’m sure he’s ready to go to battle, he’s been sitting in his recliner most of the day reading the paper, drinking coffee, and eating leftovers while patting his gently rounded belly. He reminds me of a chonky cat waiting to pounce. It’s rare he takes a day off. I’m guessing he’s enjoying the quiet of a mostly empty estrogen-filled house and I can’t blame him. The aunts pretty much made themselves a pair of foam fingers, chanting “Team Tank,” among other obscene things, until my mother dragged them out to the outlet stores for Black Friday shopping.

  I’m standing in the hallway as the knock sounds, freezing me in place. I glance into the living room and watch Dad turn to look at me. His kind eyes say more than words.

  “You going to get that, Sweet Bea?” He prepares to get up and send Tank away if I ask.

  I wave my hand for him to sit back down. Dad will always be my protector, no matter how old I am and grown up I try to be.

  I stand in front of the door and hear Tank’s second knock. It’s more hesitant this time, like he’s wondering if I’ll open the door. It’s not that I don’t want to formally introduce Tank to my parents, but I feel like we need to hash a few things out before I upend my life emotionally all over again. I wasn’t the easiest to live with the past few weeks, and my parents aren’t exactly thrilled that I refunded my fall tuition in place of a job here in town with no real explanation other than needing to find myself before I invested thousands of dollars in a degree that would make me miserable. I had no idea what made me happy or sad, except for Tank’s sudden exit from my life.

  I open the door and stare at Tank for a second before leaning back to say, “Yeah, Daddy. I got it.”

  “I know you do.” He nods, resuming his reading as I quickly open the door and slip out. He’s mastered the art of letting me fight my own battles, but I’ll always be Daddy’s little girl. I’ve already left my mom a note on the fridge, letting her know I’ll be out late and to not wait up. I’m too old for a curfew, but never too old for her to care.

  “Bea.” Tank takes my hand, leading me down to the car with a hurried step. He opens the door, fingers tapping while I get in. He leans in to pull the seat belt over me, clicking it in place. Our eyes lock on one another and the intensity of his blues unnerves me. Minty breath puffs from his lips dangerously close to my own, teasing me. He’s protective, a little pushy, but oh so gentlemanly. His momma must have taught him well. He pushes back with a smile and gets in the car on his side.

  “So, dinner.” Feeling awkward, I fiddle with the strap of my purse. We shared plenty of meals before, so this shouldn’t feel strange. The car is permeated with his fresh cologne after a shower, and the close proximity of the car has me thinking of other things, wetter things. Dinner is clearly the last thing on the list.

  “Relax, Honeybee. I don’t want to start with dessert. I want to savor your company.”

  I chuckle. “Smooth words. They teach you that at boot camp?”

  “Oh, ye of little faith, my beauty.” His head inclines toward me, a smile creases his sculpted cheekbones, and my damn heart goes all fluttery in response. I’m hopeless against his wiles.

  Tank drives across town to a cute little bistro that’s made up to look like an Italian garden. Soft white lights frame the outdoor garden, with tall heater lamps keeping away the chill. It feels like we stepped into a completely different country, and despite it being winter, we take off our jackets in the enclosed garden restaurant.

  A waiter takes our order and Tank requests a nice red wine to go with our dinner. It has a fancy name I don’t recognize, considering my usual was cheap Boone’s or a beer on tap at the pool hall. A plate of fresh bruschetta comes, followed by a colorful antipasto served family style. Chicken parmesan follows, along with a bowl of pasta. We’ll never eat all of it and Tank doesn’t care. He’s too busy watching me eat each bite and making me blush.

  “If I had to do it all over again…” he starts.

  I put my hand on his. “Don’t. Let’s just enjoy this.” A silent agreement passes between us and we finish dinner, letting the staff box up the rest to take home. Doing this once was enough; I’m not built for emotional upheaval like this. I’m falling for him fast all over again, and I don’t want to get lost.

  “I can’t stop looking at you.” He cups my face in his hands.

  “Take a picture, it’ll last longer when you leave,” I softly sass back earning me a laugh from Tank that shakes his whole body.

  “You’re right.” He takes out his phone and calls a waiter over to take a photo of us. Tank doesn’t even wait for him to leave before making it his background screen.

  “Really?” I tease him. He knows I’m asking about him coming or going and what that means to me, to him, to us.

  “Yes. You want dessert?”

  I coyly glance from under my eyelashes and shake my head no. From the moment he returned, this sexual tension has brewed between us nearly unchecked. I’m full from dinner and a little tipsy from wine, feeling braver than I did when he showed up on my doorstep yesterday.

  “You want to catch a movie? They have a double at the drive-in. Since this is a proper date and all.” Tank scoots closer to me, no longer safe on the other side of the table.

  Falling, falling, falling. I have no chance to catch myself with his determined charm—try as I might.

  His hand makes contact with my knee, drawing circles on the smooth skin. I chose to wear a cute skirt with my brown knee-high boots, and now I wonder if I made this too easy for Tank. The heat between us is enough to melt our clothes off, leaving me panting and in need of ice-cold water in winter. I was supposed to be spurning his advances in exchange for explanations, but all I really want is him.

  “We could play twenty questions, but I’d rather hear what you want to do.” Away from prying eyes, Tank’s fingers drag up my leg in a lazy caress that makes my heart leap.

  I lean over and whisper in his ear, my lips touching the bottom shell of his lobe, my breath warm against his neck. “I want you to take me home.” My voice shakes on the last word and Tank topples over in his chair, standing up. He’s like a bull in a china shop trying to get to me, even though I’m less than a foot away.

  “All right then.” He seems about as composed as I am, and we giggle gathering up our leftover boxes and getting into the car. He drives a little faster than before, and instead of driving to my house, he takes a detour through town, driving me to his—specifically, his room that’s over the garage.

  You would have thought that both of us living at our parents’ homes would have impeded hanky-panky time for the two of us. If anything, it meant that we needed to be more creative, and that’s when Tank introduced me to the loft in his parents’ garage. Back then the place had been a dusty shell of wood beams, old exercise equipment, and cardboard boxes. During the summer he’d been busy converting it into his place. He told me he wanted more privacy, but his parents encouraged him to save his money instead of getting an apartment in town. The garage was a family compromise, but I didn’t know then that he’d enlisted either. The few times I’d been here we had drunk beers and dragged boxes to the curb filled with years of junk while his parents were at work and his little brother played rec football in the park. It looks completely different now—almost like it had a feminine touch, which I assumed is the handiwork of his mom.

  White eyelet curtains cover the windows and a queen metal bedframe sits in the middle of the room, with minimal other furniture that looks like it was collected with care. The old sofa with the tear in the cushion from a night of roughhousing is gone. A tiny fridge sits in the corner next to a table with two chairs under the window.

  “Been busy?” I tease.

  “Been thinking of you. I might have recruited a little help.” Tank shrugs and he backs me up to the bed, nudging me on top.

  I flop back, edging over the mattress, and rest on my elbows. I watch this man walk around the loft lighting candles
in strategic nooks around the room. It bathes us in a warm glow, but I shiver in anticipation.

  Tank follows me down on the bed, his jean-clad knee between my legs rucking up my skirt. His warm hand cups my knee from behind and finds its way under my skirt, resting on my butt and pulling me in closer. Missing him doesn’t compare to the ache that overwhelms my chest and puts a knot of words in my throat. I rub against him and he groans, letting his head hang down over my heaving torso.

  “Tank, what are we doing?” I ask, but he doesn’t answer. Instead he shows me by pulling at the tie on the top of my white peasant top, letting it open slowly, exposing my breasts filling the lace cups of my bra. His gaze studies me and I shift, nervous, uncertain.

  His hand covers my breast and fondles me, slowly rubbing a thumb over my lace-clad nipple. His voice is low and thoughtful, matching his torturously slow movements.

  “I know you won’t believe me right now, but the one thing I missed the most was watching you sleep. I wanted more of those nights and I regretted leaving the way I did that very next morning.” His face is contrite. I believe him. If anything, Tank isn’t a liar, although what he did hurt.

  “No calls? No texts?” I question.

  Tanks shakes his head; his fingers trace the line of my collarbone and between my breasts, all the way to my belly button. “No phones at training camp. I suppose I’d forgotten that part in all my excitement.”

  We stare intently at the path his fingers take with gentleness across my skin. He peels the rest of my clothing away and I shift underneath him to sit up and help him divest his own. Leisurely I pull his shirt up and off. He slides his pants off, kicking them away from the bed. My hands run over his chest—beyond more muscular than before. My short nails find every groove and hollow, touching and memorizing the sensory input. I don’t know for certain how long I have Tank for, if at all. If this is the only moment available to us, well then, I’d better make the most of it.

  “I know this doesn’t change what I did or how I went about it, but for what it’s worth, I’ve never regretted anything more.” His arms close around me like he’s trying to shelter me from the emotional bombs only he can detonate.

  “It’s about trust, Tank.” I sigh, turning my head from him to stare at the window. Lights from outside twinkle, and I focus on the changing tempo following a holiday song that can only be heard by tuning into a radio from the cars lining up and driving past outside.

  Tank turns my head to look at him. “Honeybee, give me a chance to win that trust back. The love is there and I don’t want to lose you.”

  “What are you asking me? You’re going to go back to training, and at some point you’ll get deployed, and where will that leave me?”

  His head burrows in my chest, breathing deep for a moment before he raises it, looking me in the eye. “If you’re my wife, you go where I go.”

  A minute passes, maybe more, where I’m stunned silent. Is he proposing? Was that a proposal? Thinking turns off when Tank reaches for my hip, pulling me under him fully. The heat of his rigid, swollen length is pressed against me. I lift up to feel as much of his heat as I can. Winding my hands around his neck, I pull him down to kiss me. Lips fuse together and I open up to Tank as he presses inside me. I whimper at the feel of him gliding inside with some resistance.

  “Honeybee.” His guttural sound ignites the spark within and I relax, taking him fully inside me. I move my hips to feel more of the passionate zings between us. Tank is relentless, setting the pace far too casual. I need him. I want him. I’m clutching onto him so tightly, forcing my orgasm with each undulation of my body until I cry out, spent. He covers my mouth with his so I don’t wake the neighborhood.

  “That’s my greedy girl,” he grunts, finally giving me the hard fucking I crave so badly. The bed rocks in a steady rhythm, but it doesn’t make a sound like I expect it.

  “Tank.” I demand an explanation between the panting breaths and canting hips of a second orgasm on the brink.

  He bites my shoulder before responding. “A little WD-40 goes a long way.”

  My eyes roll in equal measure of ecstasy and sarcasm. Of course, the bright engineer in him had to find a way to make a quiet bed because he knows I make too much sound. I can’t help but laugh. Tank can’t help but move faster, forcing me to keep up.

  He rolls us over to cover us with the blanket and keep me warm in his arms. I snuggle deeper, expecting to sleep, but Tank rolls again, putting me on top.

  “What’s up, big guy?” My hands find his shoulders and his hands hold my hips, keeping us connected.

  “I was serious before,” he grunts.

  “So I get a shitty goodbye followed by a shitty proposal.” I make a move to get up, but he’s clamped his fingers tight into my flesh, making me hiss.

  “Bea, look at me. Talk to me.”

  “What do you want me to say? You’ve made all the big decisions and expect me to meekly go along because it seems like a good idea.”

  His chest expands and exhales.

  He flips us over again, trapping me.

  “Beatrice Nicole Brennan, will you marry me? Be my wife. My partner. My everything.”

  “Tank.” I pause, wiggling to get out from under him.

  Elbows cage me in. A knee slips between mine but he keeps his arousal off me, mostly. He can’t help the way it bobs and rubs against my tummy like it wants back in. Lust. This is lust, I tell myself, unwilling to say it might be love, though I suspect it is.

  “I know I love you. I had to lose you once to realize it. Anything I do isn’t the same without you.”

  My brain is a swirling mess of details—some that correspond, some that contradict—while my heart, that useless organ, is beating hard and heavy saying do it, do it. I don’t believe in angels and devils dictating choices; no, I have a body full of organs that can’t make up their damn mind beyond biological necessity.

  And still, I open the door to possibility.

  “I’m gonna need you prove it to me. Make it all happen—the wedding, the details, all of it.”

  “And?” Tank leans in close, his massively beautiful cock rubbing against me, this time definitely not accidental.

  “I’ll marry you, Henry Edward Andrews,” I sigh.

  He bites his lip to keep from smiling. “Because?”

  “I love you too.”

  4

  Tank

  My hand shakes a little as I knock on the door to Mr. and Mrs. Brennan’s house. I know Bea isn’t home, and this isn’t how I’d planned on meeting with her parents. There isn’t an ideal damn thing about this situation, but I’ll do anything to get what I want, and what I want is my Honeybee. I watched her leave for work an hour earlier from when I dropped her off. Like a stalker, I sat in my car in the freezing cold morning watching her walk down the sidewalk and into her house, closing the door. With barely restrained patience, I waited until she showered and left again, giving me a wink and a saucy wave as she walked down the sidewalk to the coffee shop where she works. She wouldn’t let me drive her to work, and while I know it’s only a few blocks away, it gutted me letting her go off on her own to a job she’s had all summer.

  There wasn’t much that unnerved me in basic training—not muggy weather, mosquitoes larger than my hand, or lobbing grenades for target practice. Sitting outside her house though, that scares me shitless.

  Bea wasn’t kidding when she said I had to plan everything down to the last detail with zero guarantees that she would show up. Some would say I’m crazy to do this, insane to let Bea have this kind of hold over me, but she’s the light in my life I didn’t realize I was missing until it was gone. I’d do anything for her. Case in point, I have standing appointments for the cake baker, florist, and pastor. Her family is my first stop and I don’t know exactly what she’s explained to them.

  “You gonna come inside, boy, or hang out like a weirdo in the street?” one of the aunts calls from the upstairs window, and I nod my head to her.

&
nbsp; “I’m sorry if this all seems strange,” I add when she winks at me like I’m dessert.

  The door opens and the blue-haired one—Doris, I think—ushers me inside. “What’s strange is that you waited so long. I had my sister put on a fresh pot of coffee, we waited so long for you to git your ass in here.” She chuffs, looping her arm in mine and pulling me along into the kitchen.

  I’m greeted by Bea’s entire family: the aunts, her mother (who keeps scrubbing the countertop), and her father, who seems the least keen on meeting me like this.

  “Mr. Brennan.” I reach for his hand.

  He tentatively shakes it, eyeing me up like I expect him to. “When my daughter came home this morning with the first smile on her face in weeks, I was suspicious. Now I’m downright curious what the Sam hill is going on. Especially when it’s not quite happening under my roof.” Mr. Brennan’s glare penetrates deep. He’s angry—but in that protective way because he can’t figure out what, if anything, I’ve actually done wrong. He’s partially right. I never meant to hurt Bea, but I did. This is me taking accountability, but also promising her family that I’ll never do it again by loving her forever. Heavy things to weigh before 9 a.m.

  My face burns with a blush I haven’t experienced since grade school. Mr. Brennan isn’t pulling any punches with me, and backed up by all the females in the family I know this is it. Forget about convincing Beatrice. If I don’t convince her family I’m done for, a broken heart or not.

  I steel myself, standing straight and addressing them in the eye. “When I met your daughter at the beginning of the summer, I knew she was special. When I left at the end of the summer, I was so focused on my career goals that sadly I didn’t understand where Beatrice fell in that hierarchy.”