I am the meanest motherfucker in the valley. Those words had been his guideposts. His touchstones for determining what the right thing to do was. Train his men for war. Teach them how to maneuver, how to suppress enemy fire. How to come home from the godawfulness that was war.
There were no guideposts now. No way through this the way things stood right now.
Baggins was going home. And Sal was going to send him there.
Part of him was relieved that Baggins wouldn’t have to go downrange again. Wouldn’t have to face the fire of war once more.
But part of him felt like he was betraying the soldier who’d shuttled ammo back and forth when they’d gotten pinned down back on that first tour.
Rationally, he knew this was the thing that needed to happen. But shit, man, Baggins?
“Are you okay?” Emily’s voice penetrated the fog.
He looked up. “Sure. No big deal, right? Soldiers do this kind of stupid shit every day.”
She pressed her lips into a flat line. “It’s okay to be upset by this,” she said quietly.
He stood, dropping the lighter into his pocket. “So I’ll get the file from you and move forward from there?”
“You aren’t going to talk to him?”
Sal sucked in a deep, hard breath. “What am I supposed to say? Sorry you fell in love with the wrong woman, got high and almost jumped off the roof?”
“You could let him know that the chain of command is worried about him.”
Sal closed his eyes for a moment. “I don’t think I can do that,” he said.
There was something cold inside him. Something empty. He tried to summon a memory of Baggins before the war. A memory of the smart-ass kid who refused to keep his damn head down.
But instead, he kept seeing the crying mother at the end of the hall. Hearing the screams of her baby.
He looked down at Emily. “Look, e-mail me when he’s ready to come home. I’ll send someone to check on him and pick him up.”
The small captain didn’t say anything as he left her office.
Sal was halfway down the hall when he saw him.
Baggins stood in the doorway of his room. He wore the shitty gown they gave to kids who didn’t have their own stuff yet. His hair stood out on his head in all directions. The identification bracelet was stark white against the pasty paleness of his skin.
His eyes were red and bloodshot but when he saw Sal, he grinned.
And just like that Sal was transported back. To before he’d stopped sleeping. To before Baggins looked like the shadow of the man standing in front of him.
“You come to spring me out of jail?”
Sal clenched his fists by his sides. A thousand lines ran through his brain as possible responses.
Instead he said nothing.
And walked out the door.
* * *
So long as she stayed busy, Holly was reasonably certain she could keep her shit together. It was generally her plan for dealing with life. She had no idea what would happen when she finally had to take her boots off and pretend to work at a normal job that didn’t involve soldiers and their issues.
And the day was certainly cooperating.
Sergeant Freeman stood at parade rest in her office, her hands at the small of her back, her expression a mixture of blank and belligerent all at once.
Holly had just informed her of the medical board and Sergeant Freeman wasn’t exactly happy with the information. She’d requested to speak with Holly alone.
“What exactly do you want to tell me, Sergeant? And do I need to read you your rights first?”
“First Sergeant, I’m waiving my right to silence.”
Holly lifted both brows and pulled a form out of her files, sliding it across her desk. “If that’s really the case, then you need to fill this out and sign and date. And I need a witness that you’re waiving your rights. Ma’am!”
Captain Reheres stuck her head in the doorway. “Yeah, Top?”
“Need you to witness this. Sarn’t Freeman is about to confess and I need you to witness that she waived her rights without any coercion.” Holly handed the young sergeant a form.
“What are we confessing?” Holly asked after Freeman signed and handed the form back.
“Jason isn’t a druggie.”
“Sorry, but the medics seem to think otherwise. Most normal people don’t dance naked on the roof in their underwear and roll around in broken glass.”
“He got up on the roof to draw attention away from me,” Freeman whispered.
Holly leaned back in the chair and waited.
“I’m in trouble, first sergeant,” Freeman said.
Holly barely managed to refrain from saying no shit.
“I started seeing Sarn’t Pizarro when we were downrange.” She swallowed. “I fell hard for him. He said he was divorced, that he loved me.” A deep, shuddering breath. “When we got home, he wanted to get married right away. I didn’t. When he pressured me, I broke things off with him. And that’s the first time he hit me.”
Holly yanked her patience back. Hard. “I’m sure this is all fascinating but what does this have to do with Balboa?”
“The first time Rafael hit me, I went to Jason.” Holly blinked, then remembered Jason was Balboa/Baggins. “We were friends. He tried to convince me to leave Rafael. But I couldn’t.” She hesitated. “Rafael was threatening to bring the drug dogs though the barracks. When the Corps sergeant major came through, I panicked. Balboa said he’d take care of it for me.” Her bottom lip quivered. “He took care of it.”
“What was ‘it’?”
“Purple Haze. Bath salts.” Freeman swallowed. “I was self-medicating when the medication the clinic gave me ran out. I didn’t want to go to the docs here and have them find out. I had no idea he was going to swallow all of it to keep the dogs from finding it.”
Holly felt a slow kernel of rage building toward the woman in front of her. Rage that she was a crappy friend to a guy who clearly was willing to do anything for her.
Her anger was misdirected. It should have been leveled squarely at the sergeant first class who’d hit her. Who’d driven her to self-medicate.
And it was. At least partially. But there was a kid in the hospital right now because the NCO in front of her had put her own needs above the needs of a good friend.
Holly pulled it back. Remained calm. Slid the sworn statement form across her desk. “Please write down everything that you just told me, Sarn’t Freeman.”
When she was finished, Holly had the commander issue the oath, testifying that the statement was true to the best of her knowledge. Then she walked out of the office and to the headquarters and tried to focus on work. Tried to ignore the twisting painful knowledge in her guts that she’d been wrong about Freeman even as she’d been right.
She picked up the monthly reports and saw she had a copy of Diablo’s monthly flag report.
She skimmed the names, then stopped and read it again.
Flags were administrative actions designed to keep soldiers from getting awards. They also were used when people were under pending investigations by the unit or CID.
Like Sarn’t Pizarro supposedly was.
Except that his name wasn’t on the report.
Sal’s signature was on the bottom.
He’d signed it, knowing damn good and well that Pizarro wasn’t on the report.
He’d lied to her.
The realization that he’d played her for a goddamned fool cut her, deeply. It didn’t make any damn sense. She’d been there the day he’d called the cops on Pizarro. There had to be mistake.
But all she could see was his signature on the bottom of the form.
27
Holly walked into his office and carefully set a piece of paper on his desk.
Sal looked up, momentarily taken aback by the carefully blank look on her face. “Holly?”
“I think you might need to check this,” she advised. “Either you signed it and di
dn’t read it or…”
Sal glanced down and zeroed in on Balboa’s name and…he paused and read it again. “Pizarro’s not on here.”
He looked up at her, in time to see relief skitter across her face. She visibly sagged with it. And then the mask was back. “And he got it in one, ladies and gentlemen,” she spoke softly.
“Holly, I signed that flag. He was on it when I signed this.”
“Then Delgado or someone else is protecting him.”
"You’re absolutely right, First Sergeant.”
Holly spun as Delgado walked into his office. He looked belligerent and ready to fight.
She took a step backward and hated herself for it.
“Pizarro might not be an upright and outstanding citizen according to your moral compass, but he’s the guy I want guarding my six in a firefight,” Delgado said. “This guy” —he jerked a thumb toward Sal— “seems to have forgotten that. We need men who are good at that. Not bleeding hearts who are going to come down with PTSD when they come home because they feel bad about blowing up bad guys.”
Sal came around his desk before Delgado could take another step closer. “You’re out of line, First Sergeant.” Sal stepped between Delgado and Holly.
“No, sir, you are. You’re supposed to prepare these men for war. Instead you’re worried about goddamned medical appointments. You wouldn’t even go see Balboa in the hospital. You’re a disgrace. What kind of shitbag commander abandons his men like that?”
It took everything Sal had not to take another step forward and knock the other man’s teeth out of his head.
He slipped his hand into his pocket. The lighter wasn’t there. He felt a sudden, violent sense of loss. He moved then, stepping fully into Delgado’s space. “You want to say that shit to me, let’s take it outside.”
Delgado lunged before Sal could react. They crashed into his desk, knocking his computer to the floor. He was faintly aware of Holly sidestepping the violence. Barely.
Then strong hands were pulling him off, yanking him backward. Sal hauled off, ready to nail whoever had just stopped the fight. Delgado needed his ass whipped.
But then he looked into a broad, grinning, all too familiar face. “Holy shit, Sarn’t Major.”
He forgot about Delgado and between one second and the next, Sal was flat on his back. He was pretty sure his eyes were open but he couldn’t see.
“Don’t move.”
He almost smiled but his head was killing him. It was Holly. “What happened?”
“You got knocked out.” Holly’s voice sounded good. Too damn good. “Took a crusty old sergeant major to save your sorry butt.”
He blinked, trying to clear his vision. Holly came into view first. She looked worried but there was a distance now. A space between them.
A space that terrified him.
“Where’s Delgado?”
“Outside, getting his ass handed to him by Sarn’t Major Cox in more ways than one,” Holly said quietly.
Sal sat up slowly. His head was pounding and he could feel his pulse where his head had hit…whatever it had hit. “Fuck.”
Holly held out an ice pack. “Might need this. Oh, and I think you need to see a doctor.”
He grinned then and it hurt like hell. “I’m not going to comment on the irony of you telling me to go to the hospital.” He reached up and cupped her face. “It’s nice to have you worry about me.”
She eased away and held the lighter out to him. “You dropped this.”
It was cold when she dropped it into his hand. He looked down at it. At the words that felt hollow and empty.
“I carried these words with me my whole life,” he said. He looked up at her. “But I never understood them until now.”
She waited. Said nothing. Part of his heart tightened in fear that he might never hear her crack another joke again.
“I’m supposed to be a leader of men. My men. Not everyone’s men. Mine.” He paused. “And I forgot that. I let Delgado take care of things with the soldiers because I was so focused on keeping the colonel off our back so we could train.” He swallowed. “I never knew what was going on with Freeman and Pizarro and Baggins because I never bothered to look.” He gazed up at her then. “You taught me how to see. That this, this stuff I hate, this drama and all this family stuff? It’s important, too. We lost four deployable soldiers today because I wasn’t paying attention to the right stuff.” He reached up then, cupping her cheek. “Thank you, Holly.”
“For what?”
“Helping me be a better man.”
28
The first marathon meeting following their tour at the National Training Center set a new record at six hours. Holly’s back hurt from sitting so long and all she wanted to do was go for a long run to work out the kinks.
It had been weeks since she’d gotten to be alone with Sal. There were some kinks she wanted to work out there, too. Kinks that involved both of them naked for the next weekend.
Instead, she fell into step next to Sal as she waited for her commander to get out of a sidebar with the battalion training officer. It wasn’t the alone time she needed with him but it was enough. For now.
“I heard Baggins was back off convalescent leave today,” she said quietly. “How’s he doing?”
“He’s good, I guess. He went home while he was recovering. Started seeing a counselor. I guess seeing some old friends from high school kind of helped.”
Holly smiled. “That’s good.”
“Pizarro finaled out of the unit this morning,” Sal said after a moment.
“Where did the Army move him to?”
“The house. He’s no longer serving. Sorren fast tracked his separation packet.”
She looked up at him sharply. “You okay with that? You’re short a platoon sergeant and a first sergeant.”
He shrugged. “I have to be. Supposedly, I’ve got a first sergeant inbound from Korea since they moved Delgado over to First Brigade.”
She’d thought seriously about arguing with Cox’s decision to move the other first sergeant without any adverse action. He was basically being protected the same way he’d tried to protect Pizarro. But Cox’s logic wasn’t far off. He couldn’t court-martial everyone who ever got into a fight and while Delgado’s actions weren’t in keeping with the way Cox wanted to run a unit, he couldn’t fire everyone.
“How’s Freeman?” he asked after a moment.
“In counseling. Several times a week.” Holly paused. “I still haven’t figured her out. I don’t know what parts of what she told me was the truth and what were lies.”
He shrugged. “I don’t think you have to figure that out. You just have to figure out if someone can soldier or not.”
“Fair enough,” she said after a moment. “What are you doing after work?” she asked suddenly.
His eyes darkened and the look warmed her blood. Made her ache. Sometimes, she’d catch him watching her in meetings while they’d been in the box. She’d drift away for a moment, remembering how he’d touched her the night before they’d left. Or how it felt to fall asleep in his arms.
Things she’d told herself she hadn’t missed out on before now.
Things she’d rapidly started needing. And had missed when they’d been at NTC.
“Hopefully something that involves you. Maybe some wrestling.”
She grinned. “There’s a restaurant in Temple I wanted to try out. Maybe we could actually escape from Killeen for a few hours.”
He rubbed his hand over his heart. “I’m not sure if I even have any civilian clothes.”
She smiled up at him and it hurt her heart how much he’d come to mean to her in such a short span of time. “Are you making jokes now?”
“Maybe you’re rubbing off on me.”
She shook her head and turned to go. “I’ll rub something all right.”
He choked on a laugh as she left the conference room.
And Holly tried to think about what to wear to dinner.
Sal stood on the front step of Holly’s house and simply stared. He couldn’t quite get used to looking at her. Her light brown hair was down, brushing over her shoulders, and she’d put on a little more makeup than he was used to.
He loved how she looked in uniform, but out of it? She was stunning.
“You clean up pretty good,” he said when he was reasonably certain he wouldn’t embarrass himself.
“Not so shabby yourself.” She motioned to the pale blue button-down shirt and khaki pants.
“I had to go buy new pants,” he admitted.
She laughed out loud then stepped a little closer. “Hmmm, you smell good.”
He couldn’t keep his hands out of her hair. He stroked his palm over her hair, her shoulders, then gave in to temptation and pulled her against him. She was soft, fully soft against him, her body not shielded by the normal stiffness of her uniform.
“I don’t even know how to react to you like this,” he whispered.
“Like what?”
“All girly and soft.”
“Well, hopefully it’s got you thinking about getting naked,” she said dryly.
He backed her slowly against the wall and kicked the front door closed. “I thought we had reservations?”
She wrapped her arms around his neck. “I might have made them a little later than what I told you.” She brushed her nose against his. “I wanted to distract you a little bit.”
“Distraction accomplished,” he whispered against her mouth.
“That’s not the distraction.”
He looked at her then, her eyes dark and heavy. She licked her bottom lip and threaded her fingers with his, urging his hands lower, down over the curves of her breasts. Lower, down the length of her thigh, then slowly, so slowly, guided him back up.
To a tiny thread of fabric.
He made a rough noise in his throat. “That’s not really functional,” he whispered.
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