A Proposal for the Officer

by Christy Jeffries

  Molly held up her hand. “See? Now that you know, you’re babying me. I don’t want people treating me like I’m going to fall apart if I eat a baked good. I’m going to mess up and get my levels wrong and make mistakes. It’s now obvious that I’m going to need some support, but I also have to figure things out on my own.”

  “Fine. I’ll try not to be supportive without going into overprotective mode and smothering you with my concern.”

  “Good. Because I’ve gotten more than enough of that from Kaleb. He always thinks he knows what’s best.”

  “It’s obvious that he cares about you.”

  “I don’t really want to talk about him,” Molly murmured. She’d already said too much in front of too many people and her emotional well was running dry.

  “Okay.” Her sister paused before switching tactics. “So what’s going to happen to your career?”

  “I really don’t want to talk about that, either.”

  “Then what do you want to talk about?”

  “I don’t want to talk. I just want to go to sleep.”

  “That’s another thing I read when I was researching. That sometimes you’ll get tired for no reason at all. Have you been sleeping okay?”

  The truth was, with Kaleb spending the past three nights, neither one of them had gotten much sleep at all. Instead of replying, she yawned.

  “Fine, then we’ll go to bed,” Maxine said. “We can talk about everything in the morning.”

  But when Molly stood up to walk down the hall, her sister followed. “Don’t you need to get home?”

  “Nope. I told Cooper I was going to stay with you tonight.”

  “You really don’t have to do that.”

  “I know.”

  “When it comes to being overprotective, you might actually be worse than Kaleb,” Molly said as she began to arrange pillows on the bed.

  “So then you do want to talk about him?”

  She shot Maxine an annoyed look, but really, she was glad her sister was here. For the first time in her life, she didn’t want to be alone. They didn’t say another word, and in the morning, Molly was surprised to see her sister sound asleep on top of the covers.

  “What are you still doing here?” she asked when Maxine finally opened her eyes.

  “Sleeping. It’s not like it’s the first time we’ve had to share a bed.”

  Molly rolled her eyes. “But it’s the first time you were almost nine months pregnant and snored the whole night.”

  “I don’t snore.”

  “How sweet that your husband lets you believe that.”

  Maxine swacked her with a pillow. “So what are you going to do about Kaleb?”

  “There’s nothing to do. He’s going back to Seattle today and I don’t know where I’m going. Or what I’m going to do when I get there.”

  “Have you thought about taking his job offer?”

  “Of course I have! It would probably be the next best thing to flying. But I can’t stand the fact that he came up with it as a way to micromanage my life.”

  “Do you think you’re being a little stubborn?” It took a couple of tries for Maxine to heft herself up into a sitting position. “What does it matter whose idea it was? If it’s a good one, you should jump all over it.”

  “But what if I actually had to work with him? I don’t think I could handle that.”

  “Because you love him?”

  Molly squeezed her eyes shut. “Maybe.”

  “Then it’s worth a shot.”

  “You don’t understand. This whole dating thing? It wasn’t even real.” Heck, if she was going to open up with her sister, she might as well tell her everything. “It was all for show to keep people from finding out about my condition.”

  “People or me?”

  She wished she could wipe the injured look from her sister’s face. “Mostly people. Because they would end up telling you. I needed time.”

  “So you guys weren’t really involved romantically?”

  “We were, but...it’s complex.”

  “Then try to simplify it.”

  “We were supposed to only be going on platonic dates.”

  “What in the world is a platonic date?”

  “Like enough of a date to make it look like he wasn’t lying to his family outright, but not so serious that we would develop actual feelings for each other.”

  “It’s nice that someone in the relationship didn’t want to lie to their siblings,” Maxine mumbled.

  “It wasn’t a lie. I said last night that I was just waiting to tell you. Even Cooper knew that.”

  “Wait, my husband found out about this but didn’t tell me?”

  “Not exactly.” Molly cringed. How had she let the web spin so far out of control? “Remember how he and Hunter ran into us at Shadowview after I was getting some blood work done? Well, he kind of guessed that something was up, but didn’t want to be responsible with knowing the details. I promised him that I would tell you after my appointment today. He said that if I didn’t, he would.”

  “Did Hunter know about it, too?”

  “No. At least, I’m pretty sure he didn’t. Although sometimes it surprises me what that kid can find out.”

  “Okay, so back to the platonic dating,” Maxine said. “How platonic are we talking about?”

  Molly’s cheeks burned. “Uh, pretty unplatonic.”

  “Did you guys...” Maxine swirled her fingers in a circle.

  Molly hesitated. She was finally opening up and she wanted to continue sharing, but she was unsure of how much she should say. “Let’s just say that things progressed way past the kissing stage and emotions got involved. At least, they did for me.”

  “But not for him?”

  “Who can tell? He thinks about things down to the last detail. Everything is a game or a strategy for him. It’s like being stuck in a perpetual chess match and I’ve only been given the rules for checkers.”

  “How did he benefit from this so-called game?”

  “I don’t know. He got to avoid his family, I guess.”

  “Oh, come on.” Maxine flung her palm out. “Nobody buys that excuse. You’ve met the Chattersons. Who in their right mind would avoid that hilarious mess? They’re dysfunctionally perfect. And no matter how much he says otherwise, the man adores them. I’ve been friends with Kylie for over ten years and Kaleb’s never missed a family vacation. Four summers ago, he threw his parents a humongous thirtieth anniversary bash on some buddy’s island off the coast of Bora-Bora. Those guys all act like they can’t stand each other, but really, they thrive off each other. So since we can rule that out, why else would he insist on platonically dating you?”

  Molly shrugged. “I guess he did it to keep my secret.”

  “Then you’re just as big of a game player as him.”

  “How am I playing games?” she huffed.

  “You said it yourself. You were trying to keep your diabetes a secret. From you own sister, no less,” Maxine attempted a look of chastisement. “But what did Kaleb gain from this arrangement?”

  “He got to boss me around?” Molly asked.

  Maxine made a loud buzzer sound. “Try again.”

  All Molly could do was shrug.

  “I’ve seen the way he looks at you,” her sister continued. “And a man doesn’t call in a favor to the Pentagon and create brand new flight simulator technology for a woman unless he cares about her.”

  “But Kaleb said he’s not the serious relationship type.”

  “Would you be if you thought most of the women throwing themselves at you were only interested in your money and your famous name?”

  “I guess not. But surely he knows that I don’t care about any of that stuff.”

  “Of course he does.” Maxine shot her a smug grin. “That’
s why he’s doing everything in his power not to let you go.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Kaleb had tossed and turned on his sister’s sofa all night. He finally fell asleep at five o’clock and woke up to the smell of frozen waffles burning in the toaster. The battery on his smartwatch had died, so he sat up and turned to Kylie, who was fanning at the smoke in the kitchen.

  “What time is it?” he asked.

  “It’s time you go find Molly and apologize for being such a dumbass yesterday.”

  “You know, I’m not exactly a fan of these new nicknames everyone’s giving me. Whatever happened to Brainiac?” Kaleb, who’d slept in a pair of sweatpants he’d borrowed from his brother-in-law, pulled on a T-shirt.

  “When you start acting like you have a brain, then maybe we’ll start using it again.” She poured coffee into a travel mug and held it out to him.

  “Your waffles are burning again.”

  “Damn,” she said as he headed to the restroom.

  Ten minutes later, he was in the truck, scrolling through the recent destinations list until he found the address for Shadowview. Molly’s appointment was for eight o’clock and it was now thirty minutes after that. Okay, so maybe he didn’t need the GPS to tell him how to get there when he’d driven to the same place only a couple of days ago. But he was hoping to find a shorter route.

  First his watch battery died and he’d slept through his alarm, and now this digital map on his dashboard was reminding him that there was only one road going in or out of Sugar Falls. Molly’s past comments mocking his dependence on technology were coming back to haunt him.

  Luckily, rush hour traffic through downtown was minimal and he quickly breezed through the city’s four major stoplights. Unfortunately, he got stuck behind a tractor trailer slowly meandering down the highway, hauling one of the parade floats from yesterday. He eased across the yellow stripes, only to swerve back into place when he saw a lumbering RV steaming up the opposing lane, a line of cars trailing behind.

  Molly probably would’ve gunned the engine and gone for it, but Kaleb wasn’t that desperate. Yet. He used the radio controls embedded into the steering wheel to shuffle through his playlist, and when he couldn’t find a song he liked, he switched off the radio. He hooked his Bluetooth headset onto his ear, then realized there was nobody he wanted to talk to but her. His watch, which was plugged into the charger in the center console, was finally at 20 percent so he switched it on to see if he’d missed a text from her.

  He’d only been looking down for a second when one of the lengths of tinsel streamers from the float in front of him ripped off and landed on his windshield. He yanked the steering wheel to the right, applying the brake. However, he didn’t see the object in the road until it was too late. The bounce jarred him as he thumped over it, then there was a loud bang before the rear of the vehicle began to shimmy.

  Rolling down the window, he stuck his head out to watch for oncoming traffic as he hugged the shoulder of the road. Thankfully, there was a turnout ahead and he eased the truck off the highway.

  Kaleb jumped out, yanking the streamer off his windshield and tossing it inside the cab before walking around to the back. A scrap of torn metal was completely embedded in the right rear tire. He lifted his head to the sky wondering if the universe was trying to send him some sort of signal.

  Getting back in the truck, he pulled up his location on the GPS. His initial instinct was to call Angela and ask her to route a roadside assistance company to him. But he knew that all the money in the world wouldn’t guarantee the response time he needed way out here on the mountain.

  He’d already forced himself to wait more than twelve hours to go after Molly. Yet, now that he was finally so close, his patience was being tested again. But this time, he would take his time and he would do things himself—without the help of technology or assistants. Like his father had told him last night, when he wanted something badly enough, he didn’t give up. Kaleb needed to prove it to himself before he could prove it to her.

  * * *

  The white paper liner crackled and ripped as Molly climbed down from the exam table in the endocrinologist’s office. The specialist had just walked out of the room and Molly held the once-dreaded forms in her hand. A copy of her medical board. Nothing had changed.

  She’d already met with the registered dietitian down the hall for an assessment and had discussed setting up a meal plan, but even following the most stringent of diets wouldn’t affect the final recommendation. She would never get to fly again. Molly could try to appeal, but realistically, there was no chance it would be overturned as long as she required insulin. The process would take months and meant she’d be assigned as a “random tasker,” riding a desk or shuffling files or whatever job the Air Force could find for her while she waited for them to ultimately reject her anyway.

  She was done fighting. She was done pretending that she could keep doing what she’d always done. Yet, she wasn’t angry or sad or grieving. In fact, Molly was surprisingly calm. Or, at least, way more calm than she’d expected. The decision had been taken out of her hands and she would be a good airman and follow orders.

  It was time to move on.

  She got dressed and threw the forms in her tote bag. The sun warmed her face the second she stepped into the parking lot. She had her whole future in front of her and suddenly it didn’t look so dark. Sure, she had no idea what she would do or how she would do it. But she also didn’t feel so alone anymore.

  Maxine had wanted to come to the appointment with her, but Molly didn’t want anyone influencing her decision. While it was a relief that everything was now out in the open, she wasn’t totally willing to give up her independence. Knowing that she had her sister’s full support in whatever she decided was reassuring enough.

  Steering onto the highway, Molly determined that the first order of business for her new civilian life would be to get rid of the rental car and invest in something more permanent. And definitely more fast. If she couldn’t be inside a jet, she would need to get her speed from somewhere else.

  Her second order of business would be to find a job. Even if it was only temporary. Maxine had offered to put her to work at the bakery, but while she’d grown attached to the cute little shops and the people of Sugar Falls, Molly was holding out for a position that would utilize her aeronautical engineering degree. Besides, working with cookies all day might not be the best place for her, given that she was still learning the maneuvers of her daily nutritional minefield.

  There were plenty of civilian contractors who designed military-grade planes. Maybe she should interview with one of those firms. For the first time in over a month, Molly finally saw that the world was full of possibilities. If nothing else, she could thank Kaleb for coming up with the idea of staying in the same field.

  She looked up in the sky, wondering if he’d already hopped aboard his corporate jet, eagerly returning to his own life. She’d checked her cell phone several times this morning, hoping he’d call or even send her a text to tell her goodbye. But after the very public fight they’d had yesterday, she couldn’t really blame him for wanting nothing else to do with her. If what Maxine had said about him not wanting to let her go was true, the determined man would’ve reached out by now.

  Okay, enough of that. She zeroed in on the pavement and yellow dotted lines ahead of her. Her third order of business would be to forget about Kaleb and the amazing week they’d spent together.

  Unfortunately, that would’ve been way easier to do if she hadn’t spotted his dad’s truck pulled over alongside the highway, the back axis sitting at an odd angle. Molly slowed down as she approached, then waited until an SUV passed before flipping a U-turn and pulling up behind him.

  He was sitting cross-legged on the asphalt beside the tire he’d just pulled off, black smudges on his fingers and a confused expression on his face.

 
“Car problems?” she asked as she slammed her door shut and walked toward him.

  He startled at her approach, but he was so focused on his task he didn’t stand up. “I hit something in the road and popped my tire. I’m trying to change it.”

  “Have you ever changed one by yourself?” She squatted down next to him.

  “No. But as you can see, I’m more than halfway there.”

  “How long have you been here?”

  “About an hour or so.”

  “And nobody stopped to help you?”

  “Plenty of people did. But I waved them on.”

  She slipped her phone out of her pocket and saw a full signal of bars. So he clearly wasn’t out of cell service. “Why didn’t you just call someone?”

  “Because I can do it myself.”

  “Where’s your tablet?” she asked, scanning the area around him. “Surely you watched a how-to video...”

  “Nope. I’m determined to do it on my own.”

  She nodded, then stood up and put her hands in her back pockets. “Then you might want to go grab that lug nut that rolled under that hedge over there.”

  He muttered an expletive before rising and stomping toward the bushes. “I probably would’ve solved that problem. Eventually.”

  “Yeah, I hear that attitude is going around lately.” Molly picked up the spare and lined the rim up with the lug bolts. “Unless you want to be out here for another hour, pass me the wrench.”

  “Listen. I’m sorry for making you think that I didn’t believe you could handle things on your own.” He passed the lug nuts to her one at a time.

  She sighed. “How could you when I didn’t even believe in myself?”

  “But you were right about me being a micromanager. I saw a problem and I wanted to fix it.”

  “You thought I was a problem that needed fixing?”

  “No. I’m getting this all wrong. Let me try and explain.” He adjusted his glasses, leaving a smear of grease on his nose. “When I was in ninth grade, I was recovering from my second back surgery. We were driving home from my doctor’s appointment and swung by the batting cages to pick up my brothers. At an intersection, this minivan in front of us broke down and was blocking the lane. All of my brothers jumped out to help push the car to safety, but my mom reached over and grabbed ahold of my seat belt buckle, not letting me unclasp it so that I could get out and help, too. The woman in the other car was crying and thanking my brothers and came over to the window to tell my mother that her sons were heroes. I never got to be a hero. Then, when I saw you in the grocery store that day, it was finally my chance.”