Going Overboard

by L. A. Witt

  I just laughed. Diego was a pistol, no two ways about it, but whoever finally won this man’s heart really would be lucky. If my circumstances were different, maybe it could’ve been me.

  Maybe it still could if the Navy ends up kicking me out.

  My heart sank at the thought. As much as I adored Diego, I didn’t want him as a consolation prize when I lost my career and my . . .

  And Chris.

  My best friend. My boyfriend. The only man I’ve ever felt like this for.

  I still had my career for now, but Chris had never felt farther out of my reach. The thought hit me hard, and my throat tightened around my breath. If I hadn’t had Diego to lean on right then, God knew how I’d have held on to any of my sanity. Maybe we couldn’t make it work as a couple, but damn if I wasn’t grateful to have him as a friend.

  Diego wrapped an arm around me and pulled me in close. He pressed a kiss to my temple and whispered, “I’m serious about Chris. Don’t fucking give up on him.”

  Closing my eyes, I sighed but said nothing.

  I didn’t want to give up on Chris. Just thinking about it hurt like hell.

  But what could I do? Chief Lasby had us by the balls. The Navy had us cornered by a whole stack of regulations. How I felt about Chris didn’t matter when there was shit in black-and-white that said we couldn’t have each other.

  I don’t know how to fix this.

  I don’t know if it can be fixed.

  On my next duty day, I headed to work, but I didn’t go see Chief Jackson or Senior Chief Curtis. A million times over, I’d talked myself into approaching the chain of command, and a million and one times, I’d talked myself out of it. I could still hear Diego’s voice in my head, but my own voice kept shooting him down.

  Chiefs look out for chiefs.

  So I chickened out. Feeling guilty and ashamed and pissed off that I was letting Lasby win, I walked right past the hall that would lead to Jackson’s or Curtis’s offices and went to admin to take care of some paperwork. When that was done, I passed the hall again. Still didn’t stop. Still didn’t talk to them. Still didn’t have a fucking spine.

  No, that wasn’t it. I had a spine. I just knew all too well how easily and how badly this could blow up in my face. In Chris’s face.

  Lasby had won. We were fucked. Now I didn’t have Chris, and I had one shot at keeping my career. Might as well not torpedo that shot and—

  “MA2.” Lasby’s voice stopped me dead. When I turned, he nodded sharply to the left. “My office.”

  Ice formed along the length of my spine. Without a word, I followed him into his office. The click of the door behind us echoed through my bones.

  As he often did, he let the silence linger until the air in the room was thrumming uncomfortably.

  Finally, he spoke. “Things are going to change in Harbor, MA2. I’m down two coxswains right now. Not only is MA1 Anderson still stuck in admin, but MA1 Ingram is going to be working as the LPO from here on out, so he won’t be driving as often. I can’t spare him to come out there and fill in for you as a coxswain.” He stepped closer, lifting his chin as if that might make him an inch or two taller than me. “You want a shot at making MA1 before you hit high-year tenure, I would suggest you pull it together, get back out on that boat, and be the coxswain the Navy invested in.”

  I gritted my teeth. “What if the shrinks say I’m—”

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, MA2.” He closed some more of the space between us, and I swore cold air radiated off him. “But if it turns out your head’s too fucked up to do your job? Well, you better start making room in your schedule for TAPS.”

  My heart sped up. The implication wasn’t even subtle—TAPS was a class for Sailors getting ready to transition to the civilian world.

  “So,” he growled, “are you going to be driving the boat today or not, MA2?”

  Teeth clenched against rising bile, I nodded. “Yes, Chief.”

  “Good. And another thing to keep in mind . . .” His eyes narrowed. “Thanks to the investigation into your incident, the Navy is watching our harbor unit like a hawk, and if they don’t think we’re running a tight ship here, people are going to get fired. Not just me, but the LPO. So I would suggest you and your fellow MAs get your shit together. Unless you’d like to see the Navy make an example out of your new LPO.”

  Acid burned the back of my throat. One MA1 had already fucked up. If another one did, he would fall even harder. Captain’s Mast. Stripped of rank. When the Navy wanted to make an example of someone, they didn’t fuck around. Any incident, anyone stepping out of line, and Lasby would make sure the hellfire and brimstone landed right smack on Chris.

  I had to give the man credit—he knew exactly how to get my balls into a vise.

  “Do I make myself clear?” he asked in a low growl.

  I nodded. “Yes, Chief.”

  “Dismissed, MA2,” he hissed, practically in my ear.

  I didn’t wait around. I spun on my heel, swung open the door, and walked out of his office, fighting the urge to run.

  When I was around a corner and safely out of sight, I paused to grab a few breaths and pull myself together. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I didn’t know which burn was stronger—the threat of vomit or the threat of tears. Did it really matter? Because I was pretty sure once I gave in to one of them, the other would follow.

  I needed air. I needed to be somewhere other than here. I needed to go now before I lost my cool completely.

  The door. Just get to the door. Walk fast. Faster. Get to the door.

  I strode down the hall, gaze fixed on the exit like a sniper fixated on a target. Nothing else existed or mattered. Get to the door and get out. Everything else could be dealt with afterward.

  I made it, and I put my hand on the push bar, ready to step outside, catch my breath, get in my car, and drive down to the harbor building to start my shift.

  But one word slammed into my consciousness and stopped me in my tracks:

  Enough.

  Still gripping the push bar, I clenched my teeth. Fear coursed through my veins like cold water, but the sudden wave of determination was stronger. Chief Lasby had fucked with us enough. He’d threatened us, cornered us, gaslit us, and forced us apart. Now he was using my devotion to Chris to keep me in line. It wouldn’t have surprised me if he’d used me to keep Chris in check too. Which would explain why Chris had abruptly cut me loose.

  My chest tightened with barely contained rage. I had no proof and no reason to believe anyone above Lasby was an ally, but I wasn’t rolling over and taking this quietly anymore. If I torpedoed my own career . . . fine. I was one advancement cycle away from getting booted out anyway. I might never drive a boat again. I had PTSD and TBI. I’d lost my boyfriend and the ability to spend time with my best friend.

  I swallowed the acid and stepped back from the door. If there was one thing Chief Lasby had underestimated, it was how little I had left to lose at this point.

  Full of determination and scared out of my mind, I turned around and headed back down the hall.

  Chief Jackson’s door was open, and I wasn’t surprised to see Senior Chief Curtis kicked back in one of the guest chairs. They were friends, and everybody knew they sometimes shot the shit in here. And besides, Curtis was leaving for his next command soon, so he wasn’t doing a whole lot besides showing up. Curtis just sort of hung around in case he was needed while the new senior chief settled into his old office.

  Seeing him there almost made me backtrack again, though. I could face Chief Jackson. Both of them? Shit . . .

  Jackson tilted his head. “You need something, MA2?”

  “Yeah, I . . .” I cleared my throat. “Can I talk to you, Chief?” I glanced at Curtis. “Actually, both of you?”

  They exchanged uneasy glances and both sat up.

  “Come in and sit down,” Jackson said. “What’s going on?”

  I came in and shut the door. I started to stand at attention, but he motioned
toward the empty seat next to Curtis.

  “I said sit down, MA2.” It wasn’t an order. More like an invitation. A nonnegotiable one.

  I took it, but I couldn’t relax. “I, um . . .” My courage was flagging hard now. I tried to find some comfort in the wedding bands both men wore and the framed photo of a gorgeous redheaded man on Jackson’s desk. I knew there was no reason to be scared of any homophobia from either of them.

  But there was more to this than Lasby’s disgust at my relationship with Chris. There were politics and bullshit involved that, if taken seriously, could do serious, irreversible damage to Chief Lasby’s career. I didn’t know either of these men well enough to be sure they’d back me up when it meant potentially taking down another member of the chiefs’ mess.

  Senior Chief Curtis leaned forward, elbows on his knees. He’d always had a pretty mellow tone, but he was so soft-spoken now he almost broke me. “What’s going on, MA2?”

  I was scared to death. I was about to make everything exponentially worse, I just knew it, and my stomach was sicker than it had been the day after the incident. My mind and stomach roiled with guilt and shame over . . . fuck, I didn’t even know.

  But with both chiefs watching me intently, I took a deep breath, and everything came tumbling out. The night I went into the water. The pressure and gaslighting. Chief Lasby shutting down the joking about me and Chris together. The threats to MA3 Rhodes.

  By the time I was done, I was sweating. If I could’ve loosened my death grip on the chair’s plastic armrests, my hands probably would’ve been shaking. My voice sure was.

  Jackson and Curtis glanced at each other, but they didn’t say anything.

  I pushed out a ragged breath. “I get that MA1 Ingram and I can’t date if he’s my supervisor. That’s why he requested we be put on different shifts.”

  “Why was the request denied?” Jackson’s tone was neutral, offering no indication of whether he was on my side.

  I swallowed. “Because with Chris—with Ingram moving up to the LPO position and MA1 Anderson still working in admin, I’m the only Level II coxswain in our section who isn’t committed to other things.”

  Both men were silent for a long, uncomfortable moment.

  Jackson tilted his chair back as he absently stroked his chin. “Chief Lasby thought you two were dating even before MA1 Ingram was promoted. Is that correct?”

  I nodded. “I mean . . . we were dating. He didn’t like it, and I think he was trying to keep us apart without saying he was trying to keep us apart.”

  Curtis and Jackson both stared at me.

  “Can you give us an example?” Curtis asked.

  “The day I made my appointment to go to Bremerton for a psych eval,” I said, “I mentioned to Lasby that I’d take care of getting there. I didn’t tell him I was going to ask Chris to give me a lift, but Chris and I go pretty much everywhere together. He stayed with me after the accident. It’s kind of a no-brainer that he’d be the first person I’d ask. And when I did ask, Lasby had just talked to him about doing a duty swap to fill in for someone else.”

  Both men shifted, their chairs creaking.

  “Were you able to get a ride?” Curtis asked.

  I nodded. “MA3 Rhodes said she’ll take me.”

  “Good,” he said with a nod. He turned to Jackson, but neither of them said anything.

  Squirming uncomfortably, I blurted out, “You want to know why I did so fucking horribly on the advancement exam?”

  Both men looked at me, eyebrows up.

  I pushed out a ragged breath and dropped my gaze to the gray linoleum. “Part of it was the concussion. I was . . .” I shook my head as I looked at Jackson. “I was still definitely fucked up from that. But when I was on the way in to take the exam, Lasby stopped me in the hallway. He pulled me aside and told me I needed to be in his office after the exam because the investigator wanted to interview me about the incident. He kept telling me to only tell the investigator what I was absolutely sure I remembered. Leave out anything that was hazy because he didn’t want Anderson’s career getting fucked over something I thought I remembered.” I ran a shaky hand through my short hair. “And that was it. I couldn’t focus.”

  “Did he tell you anything else?” Curtis’s voice was tight.

  I gnawed the inside of my cheek and focused on my boots. “He reminded me that MA1 Anderson was a solid coxswain, that his intent had been to save civilians.” I looked across the desk at Jackson. “And that the boat only foundered because I didn’t see the net before we hit it.”

  Jackson rolled his eyes, breaking military decorum for the first time since I’d known him. “Even if you’d seen the net, there’s no way you could have relayed that to the coxswain and had him maneuver in time. Not at that speed.”

  Something loosened inside my chest. “Yes. Yes, exactly.” I gulped. “Plus we were getting thrown around so bad, I could barely stand up. I was looking for shit to hold on to, not nets in the water. And I mean, those nets are almost invisible even in calm seas.”

  They both nodded with expressions that said Yeah, no shit, everybody knows that.

  “So he’s blaming you because you didn’t see the nets,” Curtis said, tone flat.

  “Yeah.”

  “He also gaslit you and tried to sway your testimony to an independent investigator,” Curtis growled. “And he did it right before the advancement exam when he knew it would throw you off your game. Not to mention threatening MA3 Rhodes over that rifle?” He shook his head.

  “Downgrading her award too,” I said quietly.

  Both men stiffened.

  “Come again?” Curtis asked.

  I moistened my lips. “He told her she might get a NAM, and that’s only if she doesn’t go to Mast for the gun and breaking protocol. But she was just doing her job, so she doesn’t deserve anything higher.” My voice wavered a little as I added, “He seriously thinks she didn’t go above and beyond? Or that it matters that she broke protocol? I almost died. I fucking would have if she hadn’t done what she did.”

  Some color was rising in Curtis’s face. Jackson’s jaw worked. When they locked eyes, something passed between them. Something telepathic. Maybe it was a chief thing, or maybe they’d just been friends long enough to read each other. I couldn’t tell.

  Then Jackson picked up his phone and dialed an extension. “Hello, MA3. It’s Chief Jackson. Would you send MA1 Ingram to my office, please?”

  My gut clenched. I turned to Curtis. “What? You guys are—”

  “Relax, MA2.” He patted the air. “We’re on your side.”

  I didn’t relax, though. I couldn’t.

  Please, don’t be lying . . .

  On the way into Chief Jackson’s office, I had no idea what to expect when I got there. He was barely even in my chain of command since HPU was separate from the rest of security. On paper, he and Senior Chief Curtis were in our chain, but in practice, HPU mostly did its own thing.

  So God only knew why he wanted to talk to me. With everything that had been happening this year, all I could think was, Now what?

  The door was open, so I went in. Senior Chief Curtis was there. And . . . Dalton? My stomach knotted. What was going on?

  Senior Chief Curtis stood and motioned for me to take the chair. While I sat, Curtis closed the door and leaned against the wall beside it, arms folded loosely across his chest. Dalton shifted like he was uncomfortable. I could relate.

  “You want to tell us what’s been going on with Chief Lasby?” Jackson’s tone was even. Not baited. Not hostile.

  I glanced at Dalton. Then Curtis. Then Jackson. “Which part?”

  “How about starting with the night MA2 Taylor got hurt.”

  I chewed the inside of my cheek, then took a deep breath and told him everything I could remember, all the way up to the part where Lasby threatened me if I continued seeing Dalton. By the time I was done, I thought I was going to be sick.

  Jackson looked past me. I could practicall
y feel him and Curtis locking eyes. The tension in the room needled at the back of my neck, and now I was the one shifting uncomfortably.

  After a long moment, Jackson picked up the phone on his desk. When he spoke, my blood turned cold: “I need you to come by my office.”

  He didn’t mention any names or ranks, but I knew. Deep down, I just knew.

  The chief and senior chief asked me a few questions about what happened the night Dalton was hurt and about what Lasby and I had talked about recently, but I didn’t get the impression I was telling them anything they didn’t already know. A few minutes later, there was a knock at the door, and when Curtis opened it, in walked Chief Lasby.

  Lasby glanced around the room. His eyes narrowed when he reached Dalton and me. I wondered if Dalton was struggling as hard as I was not to squirm. Lasby glared at Jackson. “Yeah?”

  Jackson’s eyebrow flicked up, probably at his peer’s lack of military bearing. He didn’t comment on that, though. Instead, he folded his hands on his belt buckle and looked up at him. “I understand these gentlemen asked to be put on separate shifts. There a reason we can’t accommodate them?”

  Every muscle in Chief Lasby’s body seemed to turn rigid. “I don’t have a Level II coxswain to spare, or—”

  “What about switching LPOs?”

  Lasby glared at him. “I don’t think I need to explain my duty sections to you.”

  “Then you can explain them to me, Chief.” Curtis’s tone was even, but something in his eyes gave me a chill. Like he was closing in fast on the end of his patience.

  Lasby shifted his glare to Curtis. Neither moved. Neither spoke. No one in the room even breathed.

  Then, without moving his eyes, Curtis growled, “MA1. MA2. You’re dismissed.” After a second, his gaze flicked toward us. “No one else comes in here. Understood?”

  “Yes, Senior,” we both said. We got up and squeezed between him and Lasby. I didn’t think I’d ever been so relieved to get out of a room.

  To my surprise, Chief Jackson followed, shutting the door behind us.

  In silence, the three of us headed down the hall. We weren’t twenty feet away when a door-muffled shout stopped us all in our tracks, and we turned back toward Jackson’s office. I couldn’t understand what was being said, but it was Senior Chief Curtis’s voice, and he was pissed.