Warrior
Copyright © 2015 by Nicole Blanchard
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
Bolero Books LLC
11956 Bernardo Plaza Dr. #510
San Diego, CA 92128
www.buybolerobooks.com
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-941665-85-5
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
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Editing: Vanessa, Prema Romance and Hot Tree Editing
Fomatting: Champagne Formats
Table of Contents
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
SYNOPSIS
QUOTE
PART ONE
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
PART TWO
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
PART THREE
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
EPILOGUE
GLOSSARY
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Synopsis:
I thought it was just one night with my brother’s best friend. The boy I had dreamt about since he gave me my first kiss, under the lights of the Ferris wheel.
I knew he was about to leave for a year – no chance for a future.
But our one night together would create memories for a lifetime.
Our paths crossed again, but I had lied, and he was no longer the man he once was. He was warring against demons. Against the silence that was threatening to swallow him. And I had kept a secret from him, one he would never forgive me for.
But my secret was about to be ripped open. Displayed for the world on national news. And I had only one way to repair the damage.
I had to trust the man I lied to.
The man I never got the chance to make a life with.
The only man who could save what we had created together.
“I’M GLAD YOU were able to take some time to come see your momma before you took off again.”
I wrap her into a bear hug, the kind I used to use to piss her off with as a kid because she’d always been so much smaller than me. “You saw me a few months ago.” I kiss her hair and inhale the scent of her perfume. Something inside me hitches, but I shove it away. “Besides, I remember you yelling at me to get the hell out when I was eighteen. So, really, you’re the reason I joined the Marines in the first place.”
She laughs, but it’s watery. I don’t know what to do other than squeeze her a little tighter. She takes a deep breath and then pushes me away. We both ignore the fact that her eyes are still rimmed with red. “Get out of here. Jack’s been calling all afternoon. I swear it’s like the two of you are sixteen again.”
I kiss her once more. “Save me some of the ribs and rice, woman.”
“I’ll fix you a plate before your father eats it all. Now go.”
The creaky front door slams behind her and I hear her yelling at my dad about anything that will distract her from the fact that I am deploying in just a few days.
Ah, home sweet home.
My shoulders slump and I wipe off the smile I’d slapped on when the plane touched down in Jacksonville. A shrink would have a field day with my mental state, but it’s nothing I haven’t been through before, so I drown out those thoughts with our homegrown country station. The sooner I get to Jack’s, the better. The last thing I need is to be alone in my head right now.
Driving around my hometown is a surreal experience. I clearly remember growing up here, going to school here, but the person I was then and the man I’ve become couldn’t be more different.
I pull up to the lake house and momentarily contemplate passing on his offer to hang out when my eyes fall on movement in the doorway. My breath catches in my throat when I realize it’s Jack’s younger sister, Olivia. Her eyes meet mine and I realize I’m not the only one who’s done some changing over the years I’ve been away. Was she always such a knockout?
My hands clench on the steering wheel until Jack appears in the doorway behind her as a much needed reminder that I should keep my distance. I hop out of the truck and make my way over to them. Olivia stays back with her arms wrapped around her waist as Jack walks over and gives me a one-armed hug.
“Good to see you, man,” he says. “It’s been way too long.”
“Yeah,” I say, my eyes still on Olivia. “It has.”
“Do you mind helping Olivia with the food? I’ll pull out the chairs and shit. Logan should be here soon.”
“Sure, man. Whatever you need.” I make it a point not to look at Olivia until Jack leaves the room.
She bites her lip and smiles. “C’mon, I’m making bacon wrapped shrimp. It’s pretty awesome, I’m not gonna lie.”
I chuckle. “I’m sure it is.” I follow her in and immediately feel at ease. “God, this place hasn’t changed at all.”
Constructed just about entirely of wood, the house is really more of an expanded cabin with floor to ceiling windows that look out over the pristine surface of McCormick Lake. Through them I can see Jack wrestling with the patio furniture. I squint my eyes at the dark figure beside him.
“Holy shit, is Sofie out there, too?”
Olivia turns from the fridge, a package of bacon in her hands. “Yeah, she didn’t want to miss your big homecoming and I managed to convince Jack to be on his best behavior.”
I glance back at them and note their hostile postures. “Yeah, I’m not sure how long that’s going to last.”
She places a bunch of ingredients on the counter and looks out the window only to shrug them off. “Who knows with those two? Here, will you rinse these off for me?”
I move across the kitchen to her side at the sink. The dress she’s wearing brushes my leg and my body warms. She smiles up at me and all I can think is, Oh, shit.
We’re interrupted by the sound of the back door to the patio slamming. “I’m going to strangle that girl, Liv,” Jack says, grabbing a beer from the fridge. He motions toward me and I nod.
“Relax. You can control yourself for a couple hours,” she tells him.
“I doubt it,” he replies crypt
ically. And fuck if I don’t have the same thought.
When Jack leaves again, I should put a careful distance between us, but I don’t. Instead I move to her side and lean against the counter. “So how have you been?” I ask, knocking my shoulder into hers playfully.
“Oh you know, busy as hell. How about you?”
“Same.”
“Well, I’m glad you were able to make it. I don’t think I’ve seen you since before you left for boot camp.” She flicks a glance up at me and the memory of our one and only kiss feels like a physical presence. She blushes and then looks back down.
“My mom was about to kill me for staying away for so long. War I can handle, but that woman is terrifying.”
“Mrs. Hart?” she says. “She makes apple pie for goodness’ sake. She’s like five feet tall. How can she possibly terrify you, someone who is essentially an American Jedi?”
“Has she ever chased you around the kitchen with a barbecue fork because you broke her T.V.?”
Olivia gasps. “She did not do that.”
I hold up my hands. “Swear to God.”
“I’ll have to ask her the next time I see her because I just can’t picture that.”
“You’d be surprised.”
She narrows her eyes at me as if she’s still not fully convinced. “Can you grab some more paper towels for me? They’re just up there in the cabinet.” She indicates the one above her head and holds up her dirty hands.
I stretch over her and my chest brushes against her back. She turns to me and our eyes lock. I find myself leaning toward her when Jack bursts in through the back door again. We spring apart like a couple of guilty teenagers.
It’s going to be a long night.
Her laugh sounds, and even across the distance that separates us, I can feel it in my stomach like a sucker-punch. My gaze lifts from the bottle of beer I had grabbed from the cooler and I find her in the center of the group, her eyes shining and cheeks pink with laughter. I pop the top and chug—both to ease the heat building in my chest and to stop any inclinations I may have about finding out if she still tastes as good as she looks. Bad idea.
The first swallow is smooth, but does little to erase the imprint of her smile. I lean against the deck as I watch the crowd gathered by the gently lapping water. Their voices and the soft crackle of the bonfire creates a soundtrack I commit to memory. Friends, simplicity, home. The simple shit normal people take for granted.
Those are the things I miss the most.
When the constant attacks seem endless, when I haven’t showered or slept in days, it’s nights like these I remember. That I want to come back to, even though I never seem to be a part of them. I’m more of an outsider looking in. But unless there’s a gun in my hand or bullets flying by, I can never quite relax enough to enjoy them.
The irony isn’t lost on me.
I’ll admit, I’m not one to wax poetic about women—in the past, they’d been nothing more than a distraction between assignments—but there had always been something special about Olivia.
Special in an untouchable kind of way.
Her brother Jack nudges me with his shoulder and leans against the deck railing next to me. “Gonna nurse that beer all night, Monica?”
I tear my eyes away from my unabashed appraisal of his sister. “What’s Livvie doing here? Isn’t she supposed to be at school?”
“She finished, man. Starts teaching in August.”
Nodding, I turn my attention back to her. To the summer sundress that’s just a little too low-cut, a little too tight, and a whole helluva lotta tempting. From what I’ve heard from Jack, when his parents adopted her, she gave up the rebellious ways that bounced her from home to home, and tried to tame her wild side. But the little spitfire inside of her often makes an appearance when she’s either pissed off or three sheets to the wind. I have little will to resist the way her eyes snap or the sexy as hell way she cocks her hip when she’s throwing sass. She bites off a comment to her brother and I stifle a groan.
As I think about how much I’m gonna miss her, the firelight catches the red-gold of her hair and turns it into a halo of flames. I can’t help but wonder how it would look spread across my bed with her generous curves steeped in shadows. Her brother chatters on about my upcoming deployment, but I tune him out when Olivia shucks her cardigan and even more of her gorgeous milky skin comes into view.
Silence falls, and I see Jack watching me from the corner of my eye. “I’m sorry, man. What’d you say?”
Jack shakes his head, a knowing look in his eye. “I’m telling you from experience, dude. Love her to death, but you’re about to leave. Not a good idea to go there.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
“Good.” He stares at me intently for a moment before turning away. “She’s got a good thing going at that fancy art school. Got her life together. The both of you have shit timing, I swear.”
“I’m not the only one.” I nod toward Sofie. If Olivia and I had shit timing, Jack and Sofie have it ten times worse. Even now, they could barely stand to talk to each other. They only gave each other cow eyes when they were certain the other wasn’t looking. Otherwise they spent every interaction sparring.
“When do you leave, exactly?”
I clear my throat and shake my head a little to dispel the image. “Ah, next Monday.”
“Well, I’m glad you could make it out here before you had to ship out.”
“Thanks for inviting me.”
Jack slaps me on the shoulder as he heads toward the group. “Keep eyeing my sister like that and I’m going to start regretting it.”
“Fuck you,” I reply.
After dumping my now empty beer in the trash, I grab another and reluctantly follow Jack down to the beach. Night has fallen completely, and the only light comes from the small flickering bonfire and the few rooms still lit up. Memories of hundreds of similar nights gone by wash over me.
Our history is made up of a series of nights like this, and there is a gnawing feeling in my gut that this is going to be the last one. She isn’t a starry-eyed teen anymore, and I’m not some pissant private. Soon, a man would see what I am seeing and take it. And I would have to resist the urge to break his fucking jaw as I could only watch the distance between us become greater.
I chug the beer to soothe the sudden burn in my throat. Pre-deployment leave always makes me nostalgic.
A few more days and I can put Olivia behind me. For another year, at least.
I just have to get through tonight.
Sand shifts beneath my feet as I sit on one of the creaky old lawn chairs we’d drug to form a circle around the fire pit. I nod to Jack and our mutual friend Logan Blackwell. The three of us had gone to boot camp together. Jack and I joined because we couldn’t imagine doing anything else, Logan because of the extended family he had to support. Though we had different jobs, we always seemed to find our way back to hang out on our time off. And it was always nice to touch base with my guys when we had the chance.
Logan had recently separated from the Marines. In addition to serving as my going-away party, we’d also gathered to take his mind off his troubled marriage. On the positive side, he had only just started working as a cop. At least he had that to look forward to.
Yet another reason why it wouldn’t be smart for me to get involved with Olivia. Not that I expected her to cheat or give up on me, but who was I kidding? Most women could barely handle normal separation, let alone that of the military life. Our dangerous lifestyle had a notorious burnout rate—both for the men and their families.
I drown that sorrow with a healthy tug on my rapidly emptying bottle. If I kept up this pace, it would be one of those times where I wound up on the beach the next morning without my clothes…or my dignity, if the guys had anything to do with it.
My mind begins to wander to the possibility of Livvie joining me, and it doesn’t take long for that fantasy to spiral abso-fucking-lutely out of control. Images form of her s
lick skin against mine, her eyes dark with need. I clear my throat, shifting in my suddenly uncomfortable seat, and refocus my attention to the conversation between the others, steadfastly ignoring the intense look Jack is shooting my way.
Livvie sips delicately from her cup, likewise ignoring her best friend Sofie.
“C’mon, Liv. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! If there were any reason to give it a rest and live a little, this is it. It’s not every day the stars align and our favorite band, since we were tweens, is playing a reunion show an hour away.”
Livvie shrugs, smiling guiltily. “I don’t know. You know school starts in a few weeks, and I have so much to do with the classroom and lesson plans. I just don’t want to screw it up my first day and be caught unprepared.”
“If I can handle my crazy-ass roommates 24/7, you can manage one day off from your group of artsy types. Besides, we haven’t gone out in forever. Where did my crazy sidekick go?”
Jack scoffs and rolls his eyes. “Give it a rest, Sofie.”
Sofie cuts a glare toward Jack. “No one asked you.”
“What are you even doing here, anyway? I thought you were living it up at UNF with all the other brainiacs.” He takes a heavy swig from his drink. “You wanted to go so bad, maybe you just should have stayed there.”
Sofie stands and swaggers to Jack’s side as he watches with hooded eyes. Olivia gasps beside me as Sofie upends her drink over Jack’s head.
“Thought you could use something to cool off your hot head,” Sofie quips.
Jack lunges to follow as Sofie prances away, but changes his mind, slumping back into his seat instead. “You gotta stop inviting that fucking girl,” he says.
“She’s my best friend, you asshole. The least you could do is keep from insulting her. This is the first time she’s been able to visit since she started grad school. You keep this shit up and I’ll never get to see her at all.”
Olivia tails after Sofie, leaving me, Jack and Logan staring sullenly at the fire. We’re a sad sight, that’s for sure. Women.
I smirk. “Don’t go there, Jack. Not a good idea.”
He scowls at hearing his own advice to me from a few moments ago, using the tail of his shirt to mop the beer dripping from his hair. “Fucking women. Not worth the fucking trouble.”
Warrior (First to Fight #1) Page 1