by A. J. Adams
So by the time this bloke realised he had nothing Kyle’s fist was in his stomach. At the same time, Kyle’s right foot had come up and was swinging round, kicking the other uniform in the chest. It was like one of those Jackie Chan films. Except there you know that it’s make-believe and everyone’s going to go home in one piece. When Kyle punched this man in the gut, he instantly fell to the ground and threw up. The other one, the one who got the boot in the chest, went paper white. There was this cracking sound, I’m sure it was his ribs going, and he just smashed against the wall before collapsing into a little heap. Blood started pouring from his mouth.
By now the dry humper on top of me knew something was up but as he tried to look round Kyle’s boot got him right in the family jewels. I felt the impact. It was pretty solid. Also, I had a perfect view of seeing dry humper’s eyes go round as the pain hit him. The one who’d been holding my arms, stood up, yelled something and kicked out, his foot sailing high in the air. He’d had some martial arts training.
I scrambled out from underneath dry humper who was now making gargling sounds, and plastered myself to the back wall. The martial arts wannabe was dancing about, making ‘whoo-hoo’ sounds. Kyle just looked at him, leaned back and then his foot arched into the air, hitting the wannabe in the solar plexis. He slammed across the room and thumped into the wall. Then Kyle leaned down and picked up the dry heaver. I knew the fat bastard weighed a tonne, but Kyle picked him up like he was feather light. He punched him in the belly a few times, half rolled him round, got him in the kidneys, and then punched his face, breaking his jaw and nose. I thought Kyle was going to kill him but then he dropped him.
It had taken him less than two minutes to take out the four uniforms and Kyle wasn’t even breathing hard. I was going to throw my arms around him but I took one look at his eyes and changed my mind.
Kyle’s got dark colouring, right? Black hair and tanned skin but his eyes are grey. When we first met I thought he had cold eyes but that isn’t really true. It’s just the contrast between all that black and that light silvery colour. I’d learned pretty quickly that when Kyle’s amused that those little lines by his eyes crinkle slightly. He’s also got that little twitch by the side of his mouth that means he’s laughing inside.
This time though, his eyes were like ice and there was no crinkling or mouth twitching at all. He was frowning, his lips were thin and tight, and he was pale with fury. He looked like a fiend.
I stepped back, thoroughly frightened. It was just as well because that’s when two other blokes appeared in the doorway. Unlike their pals who’d stowed their gear before embarking on their multiplayer party game, these were armed.
For a moment I thought they’d shoot Kyle but I needn’t have been afraid. He looked back and then flipped into the air, kicking up with both legs. It looked like he was floating but when the kicks landed, hitting the man in the door dead centre, I heard bones shatter. The force of the strike threw him backwards and into the corridor beyond. I heard him hit the bars of the cell with a tremendous smash. Kyle had kicked him so hard that the force of it spun the other man off balance too. As this bloke was staggering about, he got a shot off. I screamed and ducked but Kyle just went for them. He moved straight past the gun, grabbed him by the neck and balls and ran him headfirst into the doorframe a couple of times before punching him in the guts. By the time he dropped him, the man was unconscious.
There were six men lying shattered on the floor, bleeding and spewing and moaning, and Kyle’s not even sweating or breathing hard. He made straight for me.
“Are you hurt?”
I just couldn’t speak.
“Chloe! Are you hurt?”
Then he was touching me, testing my arms and my body, checking me for broken bones.
“I’m ok. They didn’t get me. You came just in time.” And then I was weeping again. Stupid cow that I am.
He held me against him for a moment. Just the feel of him, those solid muscles like rocks, made me feel all safe. He smelled funny though. Of spiced smoke, perfume and earth. I didn’t care. I was clinging on to him like a baby and weeping like a bloody river.
“Enough!” Kyle shook me a little bit. “Get dressed. We’re leaving.”
He handed me my jeans and I tugged them on quickly, my whole body still shivering with fright. My T-shirt was just a mess of ribbons. Kyle looked at it, dropped it on the mattress, took off his shirt and wrapped me in it. I won’t tell you how I felt but you should know it started me sniffling again.
“Shut up and follow me.”
His clipped voice told me that Kyle was still furious. He took me by the hand and marched me out of that horrible room, past the lockup with all the hookers and winos and drug addicts, all staring wide-eyed at the two uniforms that were lying about in the corridor. By the looks of them, they knew the four lying in the room were just as fucked over. When Kyle walked past them, they all surged away, wide eyed with fear. They probably thought he was the devil too. I didn’t care. I was getting out of there.
When we got to the front office, it was empty except for the senior man. He got up and moved towards the door. I could see he wasn’t happy.
“You can’t do this.”
Kyle wasn’t stopping. “Watch me.”
“I will not allow this.”
Kyle stopped, just half a step away from him. Then he pushed me behind him, looked at the man and said quietly, “Want to try stop me?”
There was this dead silence. It was just like a Dirty Harry film. Then the senior man stood aside.
Kyle said nothing. He just grabbed my hand again and pulled me outside.
There was a man standing by Kyle’s bike. He was all thin and twitchy, clearly an addict. He looked a bit scared but he didn’t back away.
Quique was leaning up against a silver Merc, holding Kyle’s leather jacket and smoking a cigarette. He handed the jacket to Kyle, looked at me and mumbled something. When Kyle shook his head, Quique got into his car and buzzed off.
Kyle dug in his pocket, handed a wad of cash to the twitcher and said something quietly. The twitcher shook his head, tucked the money somewhere inside his shirt, and then ran for it.
“Get on the bike.”
By the snap in his voice, Kyle was still hopping mad. I didn’t care. I jumped on the back, and a second later we were roaring out of there. I clung to him all the way and for once I wasn’t scared by the speed we were going at. I just wanted to go home.
Home. Yeah, I know.
When we got back, it was getting dark. We stopped behind the trees like always, and when Kyle’d checked everything was ok, he looked back at me and snapped, “Get your butt into the house.”
Fuck. He really was angry.
I scooted inside and waited in the kitchen. Raoul was there, purring happily. I fed him, kissed him and prayed like mad that Kyle would have cooled down by the time he’d dealt with his bike. When he walked in, I could see he hadn’t. He looked me up and down with a cold, nasty look that sent a shiver down my spine.
“Kyle,” I said shakily. “I’m sorry.”
He interrupted me, his voice like ice. “Shut up.”
I shut right up. The look on his face was so cold that it was arctic. I could see he was abso-bloody-lutely fucking furious. I knew he wasn’t going to hit me. If he wanted to, he would have done that by now. He’d also come to get me. Maybe, a little voice inside me said, maybe that means you fucked up. Maybe Kyle does like you. Or did.
Oh hell. Did. At that point I knew I’d really fucked up. I wanted to explain, to apologise, to crawl but I didn’t know how. I just stood there, frozen.
Kyle finally focused on me. He’d come to a decision. “Go get cleaned up,” he said slowly. “And wait for me in the bedroom.” Then he added, slowly, deliberately, “Slut.”
Chapter 13 Kyle
She was kneeling by the bed, naked, head down, knees apart, wrists propped gracefully on her thighs. One look and I was solid. I was so turned on that I wanted to
jump her, but I was still mad as hell so I decided to let her sweat it out. Yeah, I know. Sometimes I wish someone would kick the crap out of me like I deserve.
I went into the kitchen, found a bottle of tequila, and took my time drinking a shot. Then I had another one. When I came back into the bedroom and sat down on the bed, I had it all worked out. I was planning to have myself the best party ever, and I was going to treat her like a whore. Jesus, maybe somebody should shoot me again.
Copying the dream book, I snapped my fingers. “Up!”
She leaned back on her heels, and rose in a swift, elegant motion, all the time looking at her feet. I’ve never been into this submissive crap, but she makes anything look good. I looked at her body, and then all those little scars came into sharp focus. I felt a jolt go through me, it hurt, a silvery sharp pain, just like that time in Ar Ramadi when I got knifed in the gut. I ignored it. She’d humiliated me by taking off like that, and I wanted to send a message.
I wanted to tell her that she only had herself to blame for what would follow, so I put a finger under her chin, and raised it until I could see her eyes. That’s when I freaked. They were empty. This wasn’t the bonus, eager to please. It wasn’t even the fuckbot, frightened and shivering. There was nobody there at all. Chloe had vanished.
I panicked. I grabbed her and hugged her close. “Chloe! Jesus, Chloe, I’m sorry!” No answer. “Chloe!” I looked at her again. Nothing. In desperation, I shook her. “Chloe! Come back!”
“Kyle.” Her voice was tiny, like she was a million miles away. Shock does that to people sometimes.
“Chloe, I’m sorry.” And then I was babbling, apologising, telling her I hadn’t meant it, begging her to forgive me.
“Kyle.” She put her arms around me, and, incredibly, kissed my neck.
“Chloe, I’m a fucking asshole. I’m sorry. Forgive me. Please.” I was desperate to be forgiven. I’m never like that. Never. I was like a kid; dead scared she’d hate me forever.
She was hugging me, talking softly. “It’s OK, Kyle. It’s OK.”
For a moment I thought I was hearing things. “I didn’t mean it.”
“Hey, that’s my line.”
“I’m sorry. Please, Chloe. I’m sorry.”
“Kyle, don’t be such a big girl’s blouse.”
That was my Chloe. When she put her arms around me, and kissed me again, that sharp pain in my chest twisted and went. It was replaced by a dull throb in my shoulder. After being shot the day before, my body was working overtime to heal itself, and having been in a fight and have Chloe hug me tight too didn’t help. It hurt but I didn’t care. I deserved it.
“Chloe...” I didn’t know where to start. I looked at her, thumbing away a lock of hair that had fallen across her cheekbone. There was a bruise forming just underneath her hairline. By tomorrow it would spread to the edge of her cheekbone. “I’m going to kill those fuckers.”
“You bashed them already.”
Chloe hugged me again and then she stopped, pulled back, and looked at me closely. “You’re hurt!”
“It’s nothing.”
But Chloe was lifting my shirt and examining my body. She sucked in her breath when she saw the bruises. “These aren’t from today. These are two days old.”
My girl’s an expert in bruises. “Hmm.”
Then she spotted the bandage. “What happened here?”
“I got shot.”
“During the fight?”
“No. It’s been a busy week.”
She stared at me. “You big, stupid bastard!” she said slowly. “You wassock!”
It wasn’t what I’d been expecting her to say.
“Kyle, when you kept disappearing and then coming back and refusing to touch me, I thought you’d gone off me.”
As I said, I’m a selfish bastard. Suddenly I saw the last ten days through her eyes and I understood that it was all my fault. I had driven her away, and then I’d punished her for leaving.
“Kyle, do you like me?”
She sounded shy, nervous almost. She wasn’t looking at me. I finally realised how insecure she was.
I kissed her. “No,” I replied. “I don’t like you. I’m nuts about you.”
She didn’t move, and I realised I didn’t know how she felt about me. I had a cold, cold feeling that maybe I’d fucked up. Maybe this last week had been too much. Maybe Chloe wanted to call it quits. I was scared to ask. Yeah: me, scared.
Chloe looked up at me. “That’s good.”
I just sat there, praying she didn’t hate me. “I’ll do anything you want,” I said eventually. “If you don’t want to be here, I’ll set you up in any business you like. Or you can go to school. Anything. Just name it.”
She looked at me considering. “I thought you were nuts about me.”
“I am. I love you too much to ask you to do anything that makes you unhappy.”
We sat there, with me dying a thousand deaths. Then Chloe smiled. “Well,” she said slowly. “I might consider staying.”
Then I knew she loved me too. She’d been making me suffer on purpose. “Chloe, you little bitch.”
“Payback, Kyle.” Then she was laughing and crying and hanging around my neck. “You eejit! I’ve been wanting to tell you for weeks that I love you but I was scared to say anything.”
After that, we talked. Neither of us have a lot of practice at sharing our feelings, and we had the additional problem of not having much experience of relationships. I could count mine on the fingers of one hand, and Chloe had only read about them. But we’re both practical people, so we just said what we felt. It’s probably the wrong way to go about it but it worked for us.
Then Chloe wanted to know how I’d found her. “I was sure nobody had seen me,” she said.
At this point we’d moved to the deck, sitting together in my big lounger, watching the Milky Way above us. Chloe was lying on top of me, all curled up in the crook of my good arm.
“You were spotted going into the station.”
“The Cartel has eyes everywhere?”
“Yes.” Thank God. I had that cold feeling again. It had been very close; too close. “We call the watchers halcones: falcons,” I explained. “They are everywhere. On street corners, at bus stations, busy shops. There’s always someone watching the police station. When you went in, a report was automatically sent through the system. You’d given a false name so by the time someone realised you were my girl, a few hours had gone by.” I squeezed her tight, scared at what might have been.
Chloe kissed me. “But you got there in time.”
“I almost didn’t, pitufa. They had trouble contacting me because I was at a funeral.”
“Oh.” Chloe was quiet. Then she sighed. “I wondered what that smell was. Incense and earth.”
“Hmm.”
“Was it a friend of yours?”
“Not exactly. Just an associate.”
Chloe was silent for a while. “Will those plods from Reynosa come looking for you? For revenge?”
“No.”
Chloe was looking at me. “Really? No comeback at all?”
“None. They don’t want to start a fight. We’d wipe them out in a heartbeat and they know it.”
Chloe was figuring something out. I love it when she does that. I could see her mind working full speed.
“They didn’t know I was your girl,” she concluded. “They knew I was lying, but when they didn’t find any product on me, and I didn’t tell them I had a connection, they thought I was trying to run a lone game.”
“Right. There are plenty of kids that come over the border, hoping for a quick score. Most look for a buy but get robbed instead. They lose their money and their passports.”
“And the girls get to play trains before they’re sent home?”
“If they make it back. Most just disappear into the desert.”
Chloe snuggled into me. “I’m glad you came on time. I don’t think I could have handled being raped again.”
>
What can you say to that? I just held her, glad she was in one piece.
“Kyle?”
I knew what Chloe was thinking. I’d been thinking it too. She wanted to know if I’d raped anyone. How can you tell someone that violating someone is part of your training? That you learned the power of it while working for your country?
I’d never laid a finger on a woman in Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan or any of the places the Corps sent me. I’d probably killed a few; when you’re in a war, and there’s gunfire everywhere, you don’t always look before you lob a grenade or send a blooper someone’s way. And women fight too. There are plenty of them fighting alongside us as well as them. But in all that time, I took prisoners but I didn’t abuse anyone.
Although the Corps stuck to the rules of combat, my problem started when they sent me to Afghanistan. That was a fucking mess because politicians ran the war. You wouldn’t ask a baker to build a submarine so why would you expect a professional windbag to manage a war? Combat is always a difficult, dangerous, dirty business and Afghanistan was no exception but it was made worse by the idiots from Capitol Hill interfering. I managed to get my team in and out of situations by way of strategic thinking (I ignored stupid orders) but one day we were sent into a so-called green zone to meet up with some so-called friendlies – but what we were faced with were Taliban.
So my team of six (undermanned, thanks to budget cuts, for fuck’s sake!) were surrounded by twelve of their best. I got shot straight off, plugged in the shoulder, in-and-out, so no biggie. But we were sitting in the middle of a pile of rocks, surrounded by the enemy, and it was looking pretty grim.
I took a look at the situation and saw there was a small gap in the enemy line. It was facing home too; south-by-southeast. It was a trap of course, set to lure us out and into the open.
It was perfect. I told my team to give me a count of ten and then to get the fuck out of there, heading north-by-northwest, and to circle back to base. Then I lobbed a smoke grenade that gave us all a bit of cover, and with a lot of yelling lured the fuckers into chasing me. They converged on me like a pack of coyotes, howling with glee, before they realised there was just me, and that my team were blasting off in the other direction.