by L. A. Witt
“Make everyone suffer because we had to suffer?” Rhodes asked.
“Exactly,” he said with a nod. Slowly, his expression softened, and the growing smile was made of pride. “I’m pretty sure I know which side all three of you will land on.” Some of the seriousness came back. “I just want you to remember how something like this can affect you. Don’t forget this happened to you, and don’t forget that you can be the reason it does or doesn’t happen to someone else.”
As one, we all said, “Yes, Chief.”
“Good.” He gave us a sharp nod. “Turn this into something positive to pass on to your junior Sailors.”
“What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, right, Chief?” Chris asked.
Jackson laughed. “Yeah. Exactly.” He clapped Chris’s arm. “All right. You guys enjoy your cake. Congratulations on the medals and the promotions. They’re all well deserved.”
After Jackson walked away, Chris turned and hugged me again. “You made it!”
“I did.” I blinked, still shocked by the news. As reality sank in, the relief would’ve knocked me off my feet if Chris hadn’t been holding me up. My career really was secure. Now that I’d made MA1, I could stay in until twenty years and retire. Or I could make chief and stay in longer. But I’d cross that bridge when I got to it. For now, I was just relieved to know I wasn’t going to lose everything I’d worked for since I was eighteen.
“Now we definitely deserve cake.” Chris herded me toward the table where a gigantic sheet cake had been reduced to about eight remaining slices. As usual, it wasn’t great. The more-butter-than-sugar frosting was half-frozen and someone had used ground-up cardboard instead of flour, but it was all right. It was something to celebrate a huge stressful chapter in our lives being over. Justice and medals had been handed to those who deserved them, and promotions had saved our careers without a lot of time to spare. The cake might’ve tasted a bit weird and required more chewing than it should’ve, but I didn’t care because, for the first time since February, I could breathe again.
After he’d eaten about two-thirds of his piece of cake, Chris set his plate down and cleared his throat. “So, I’ll be negotiating orders in a few months.”
I chewed my lip. “Yeah, I guess I will be too.” I hadn’t let myself give it that much thought because I’d been convinced my career was over. Of course I’d known Chris would be up for orders, and he’d be transferring out of NAS Adams in the next year. In the back of my mind, I’d just accepted that wherever he went, I would move with him and find a job there. Or if he went overseas . . . well, we’d figure something out. Long-distance relationship, most likely.
But now we were both going to be negotiating orders.
I set my own plate down and met his eyes. “We can take our chances and try to negotiate orders for the same base or the same ship. But the odds of two MA1 billets being open in the same place . . .”
He nodded. “I don’t think I like those odds.” He slipped his hand into mine. “I really do want us to be stationed together, though.”
“Me too. And . . . you know there’s only one way they’ll do that, right?”
We locked eyes.
Chris started to smile.
Then I did.
His fingers tightened around mine. “Think we should go talk to the chaplain?”
“You don’t think we should finish our cake first?”
He snorted and drew me in closer. “No. I don’t. And I’m putting my foot down right now that we are not having the commissary make our wedding cake.”
I laughed as I wrapped my arms around him. “Deal.”
And then, not caring that we were in uniform . . .
Not caring who saw us or who knew or who gave a damn . . .
I pressed a kiss to my fiancé’s lips.
I’d never know for sure if we would have found our way to each other without the accident and our chief’s bullshit. I’d never know how things would have played out if things had gone differently that day in February. All I knew was that somewhere in the chaos, I’d fallen in love with my best friend.
And nothing else mattered.
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Anchor Point series
Just Drive
Afraid to Fly
Chief’s Mess
Rank & File
Bad Behavior series, with Cari Z
Risky Behavior
Suspicious Behavior
Reckless Behavior
Romantic Behavior
Get a Grip (a Bluewater Bay story)
New Hand (a Bluewater Bay story)
Kinky Sprinkles
Rain Shadow (a Bluewater Bay story)
Starstruck (a Bluewater Bay story)
Running with Scissors
Roped In, with Marie Sexton
Finding Master Right
Static
Covet Thy Neighbor
Where Nerves End
Writing as Lauren Gallagher
Stuck Landing (a Bluewater Bay story)
Razor Wire
Writing as Ann Gallagher
Lead Me Not
All the Wrong Places (a Bluewater Bay story)
Writing as Lori A. Witt
The Tide of War
See L.A. Witt’s full booklist at: gallagherwitt.com
L.A. Witt is an abnormal M/M romance writer who has finally been released from the purgatorial corn maze of Omaha, Nebraska, and now spends her time on the southwestern coast of Spain. In between wondering how she didn't lose her mind in Omaha, she explores the country with her husband, several clairvoyant hamsters, and an ever-growing herd of rabid plot bunnies. She also has substantially more time on her hands these days, as she has recruited a small army of mercenaries to search South America for her nemesis, romance author Lauren Gallagher, but don't tell Lauren. And definitely don't tell Lori A. Witt or Ann Gallagher. Neither of those twits can keep their mouths shut...
Website: gallagherwitt.com
E-mail: [email protected]
Twitter: @GallagherWitt
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