On Broken Wings

by Chanel Cleeton

  Fuck Merlin and his stupid wingman needs. I shouldn’t have abandoned her. It made sense that tonight would be hard for her, that she’d be missing Joker, surrounded by the Wild Aces, and I should have stood by her to help her get through tonight.

  Dani shook her head, still not meeting my gaze.

  “Do you want to go? I can take you home if you’re getting tired.”

  “No. I’m fine.” This time she did look up at me, more force behind her words, and the smile that greeted me was Dani, but not Dani, some version of her that seemed stilted and fake, so different from what she usually gave me. “You don’t have to hang with us. I’m sure you want to get back.”

  I followed her gaze to the group of girls, trying to read the emotion in her voice. She sounded like she wanted to get rid of me, almost as though the thrust of her words could propel me away.

  “Are you sure? I don’t mind. I want to spend time with you tonight.”

  I hadn’t meant to leave her for as long as I had, but I’d kept an eye on her. She’d seemed fine, and then all of a sudden, she hadn’t.

  “Seriously,” she replied. “It’s fine. Go have fun. You should be chatting up girls, not hanging out with a bunch of old married ladies.”

  I opened my mouth to explain about Merlin needing a wingman, started to tell her that hanging out with her was all I’d wanted to do tonight, that I would rather spend the evening with her than with anyone else, when she shot me down.

  “Come on, she’s cute. I know you—you don’t want to miss out on a chance to get laid.”

  She delivered the line casually, as if she didn’t realize the power it had, that she’d effectively sliced me open, her words shattering something inside me. Noah was right; I was an idiot. We were friends. That was it.

  How could she love someone she thought so little of?

  Dani took a sip of her drink, the diamonds on her finger sparkling in the light, dimming something inside me, and suddenly I had to get away before she saw the truth in my eyes, the love I feared was etched all over my face. Becca saw it. The sympathy in her gaze hurt like hell.

  “I’ll see you later,” I mumbled, not waiting for her to answer. I needed to get the fuck out, now.

  DANI

  My face felt hot as he walked away, as I choked back unshed tears.

  “Why did you do that?” Becca asked.

  I had no clue how to answer her. I needed Easy gone, somewhere far out of reach, somewhere where I wouldn’t be tempted by anything other than friendship. Because I was so fucking confused I couldn’t think straight. For years I’d seen him as nothing more than a friend, and suddenly, someone entirely different stared back at me.

  “I don’t know,” I whispered. God, I’d basically told him to go fuck that girl. What the hell was wrong with me? It was the last thing I wanted, and now I had a different image in my head of Easy naked, sliding over her body . . .

  I wasn’t emotional by nature, had always managed to tuck my feelings into neat little boxes, but now the lid had sprung open, the contents spilling out, and I was on my knees in the middle of the bar, rushing, panicking, trying to scoop everything back inside me again.

  “I’m going home.”

  I’d officially reached the point in the evening when no good could come out of me staying out, and more than anything, I wanted to retreat to the one place where my life had made sense, where I’d been happy.

  “Do you need a ride?” Becca asked. “We’re about to head out, too.”

  “That would be awesome, thanks.” I didn’t allow myself to glance back at Easy. “Are you sure you’re ready to go home? I feel bad making you guys leave early.”

  “No worries. Honestly, I’d rather spend time alone with Eric. I’ll go find him and let him know we’re ready to leave.”

  “Thanks. I’m going to say bye to a few people. I’ll meet you by the entrance.”

  I said good-bye to some of the guys, exchanging hugs and telling them to be safe. When I’d finished, I hesitated, wondering if I should go say something to Easy. I really didn’t want to interrupt what he had going on, but at the same time, I couldn’t imagine not saying good-bye to him before he deployed. I knew better than anyone how final “good-bye” could be.

  I took a deep breath and headed toward his table, my heart racing with each step, my legs wobbly. Everything had shifted between us, and I would never look at him the same way again.

  Easy laughed at something Merlin said, and then he turned his head to the side and caught sight of me. I watched as the smile slid off his face and his gaze narrowed, his entire stance changing as though he braced himself for an invisible blow.

  I couldn’t meet Easy’s gaze as I offered a halfhearted wave to the girls, as I gave Merlin a quick hug and wished him good luck, but I could still feel the weight of his stare on me, could sense the anger emanating from him. I forced a smile on my face, stepping into his body, giving him a little half hug, all too aware of the beautiful girl who stood next to him.

  “I’m heading out.” Thanks to our height differences, I didn’t even have to look into his eyes. “Be careful, okay?” I swallowed, my eyelids stinging, unable to believe this was it. “Take care.”

  I pulled back, the tension building in my chest, unable to meet anyone’s gaze, when suddenly a hand touched my shoulder.

  I didn’t need to look to know it was Easy’s fingers pressing into my skin.

  “Can I talk to you for a second?” he asked, his voice so low I had to strain to hear him, his lips brushing against my ear in a move that had a shiver sliding down my spine. A shiver that had never been there before.

  I nodded.

  He said something to the group, his words obliterated by the white noise rushing in my ears. I expected him to let me go, but he didn’t. Instead he took my wrist, tugging me forward so I had no choice but to follow, leading me to a quiet corner near the entrance.

  I stepped back into the corner and my back hit the wall as I tried to put some distance between us, to give my body much-needed space and a chance to cool off. It felt like the flu, this sensation coming on strong, hitting me hard, and leaving me staggering and delirious in its wake.

  “Why are you leaving without me? I gave you a ride here; I’ll take you home.”

  I looked everywhere but at him.

  “Don’t worry about it. Stay and have fun. I’ll catch a ride home with Thor and Becca.”

  “What’s going on with you tonight?”

  He leaned forward, bracing his arm above my head, his scent surrounding me, his giant man-bicep inches away from my lips, and I realized my crush was a little worse than I’d thought. A lot worse than I’d thought.

  I wanted to lick him there, wanted to suck on his skin. That someone else probably would was nothing less than utter torture.

  “Nothing,” I snapped, realizing I’d gone full-on unhinged but lacking the ability to reel myself back in. Something had been unleashed inside me, and I found myself lashing out, the calm, rational, adult side of me standing outside my body, looking on, wondering when I’d lost my mind, while this other side of me took over.

  “That right there. I’m not stupid. You’re pissed at me.”

  “I’m not pissed at you.”

  “You are. You’ve been distant since we got here. Why did you come if you didn’t want to be here?”

  “I’m surprised you noticed, considering how little time you’ve spent with me.”

  His gaze narrowed, and he shifted forward, getting even more in my space, his presence sucking up all the air around me. In the years I’d known him, I’d never seen him lose his temper, and had definitely never seen him be annoyed with me.

  “Are you pissed because I was talking to those girls?” he asked.

  Maybe he sounded harsher than he’d intended, but his words scraped over me, peeling off a layer of s
kin.

  I opened my mouth to say something, closing it almost immediately. There was nothing to say, no explanation I could give, other than the absolute truth.

  Yes.

  “You practically threw me at them when I came to talk to you,” he added. “I wanted to spend the night with you. I wasn’t out looking to get laid.”

  “When are you not looking to get laid?”

  I heard the words leave my mouth, and as soon as they exploded between us, I knew I’d fucked up. Bad.

  Easy’s arm left the wall, dropping away from me. He took a step back from me as though I’d hit him, his expression shuttered.

  The hurt there—I never wanted to hurt him.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that—”

  My throat closed up, the words clawing at me.

  I’d spent the night defending him to Becca; there was so much more to him than his call sign and his rep with women, and yet I’d said the words without thinking—no, that wasn’t true. I’d wanted to hurt him, to push him away, and now that I had—

  “No, you meant it exactly how it sounded.” His voice dulled, all the anger filtered out of him. His hurt was so much worse than the anger had been and it shamed me. “I’m the guy who fucks anything that moves, right?”

  “Easy—”

  I reached up, my fingers closing around his arm, trying to bring him closer to me, hating the distance between us, but he shook me off with no effort at all.

  “There hasn’t been anyone in months.”

  I froze.

  “It doesn’t matter, though, does it? You’re always going to see me as the guy who’s screwing his way through life, who thinks with his dick and doesn’t care about anyone but himself.”

  The pain in his voice pushed me out of my momentary stupor.

  What had I done?

  “No. I’m sorry for what I said. It was stupid and thoughtless. I don’t think that. I’m so sorry.”

  He shrugged me off. “It doesn’t matter.”

  But it did. Because the affection that was always in his eyes when he looked at me had completely disappeared.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered, tears in the back of my throat. “So sorry.”

  “I’m going to head back.” He shot me a twisted smile that wrenched something in my gut, shooting up to my heart. “After all, I have a big night ahead of me.”

  He didn’t bother waiting for me to respond, just turned on his heel and left me standing there, gaping after him.

  Becca found me a moment later. “Eric’s almost ready, he’s. . .” Her voice trailed off. “What happened now?”

  Somehow things had exploded, and I had no idea how we’d even gotten to that point. I should never have said what I did, but at the same time, I’d never expected him to act that way. The Easy I knew was good-natured and took his reputation in stride. I’d never seen him lose his temper, never imagined a comment about his women would set him off.

  I wanted to cry.

  “I don’t know. I got into a fight with Easy.”

  “Seriously?”

  I nodded, trying to swallow past the giant lump in my throat.

  “I’m sure whatever it was, he’ll forgive you,” Becca replied, her voice kind.

  My gaze followed him through the crowd; it took everything I had to keep from going after him.

  “I don’t think so. I really hurt him.”

  And as the words fell from my lips, as he became a smaller and smaller speck in the distance until he disappeared completely, I felt like I’d lost something I’d never recover, something—someone—I couldn’t live without.

  EASY

  I didn’t go back to the group. After everything with Dani, the last thing I wanted was to be around other people. I hit the bar instead, ordering a shot of Jeremiah Weed. It was standard fighter pilot fare, and right now I needed the hard stuff.

  Someone came up behind me mid-shot.

  “Hey, I’m going to head out . . .” Thor’s voice trailed off, a look of censure that definitely wouldn’t have been there a fucking year ago stamped across his face. “You’re getting drunk tonight?”

  “Apparently.”

  I definitely wasn’t getting laid. I didn’t think my dick would even work after Dani had essentially shamed it into submission.

  “Thanks for taking Dani home, by the way,” I muttered.

  “What now?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Jesus. You’re being such a pussy. What the fuck happened now?”

  I took another shot, the liquor burning a hole in my gut. “Fuck off.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not the one you’re pissed at, man.”

  “Well, I can’t exactly tell Dani to fuck off, now can I?”

  Thor’s lips twitched. Dick.

  “I’m pretty sure Dani’s heard worse.”

  “Not from me, she hasn’t.”

  “Why? Because you walk on eggshells with her?”

  “I don’t walk on eggshells with her.”

  “Dude, you fucking do. You don’t treat anyone the way you treat her.”

  Not tonight.

  Fuck.

  I hated that I’d lost my temper with her. Her words still cut me.

  I tossed back the third shot, the Weed burning liquid fire down my throat. I slammed the glass against the wooden bar top, wiping the stray alcohol from my lips.

  “We got into a fight.”

  “So what? Becca and I fight all the time.” His tone of voice suggested an eye roll probably accompanied that statement.

  “Yeah, you guys also bang all the time, too. It’s a little different in this case, asshole.”

  “Why, ’cause you can’t kiss and make up?”

  I flipped him off.

  “You’re not really doing a great job convincing me you’re a mature adult.”

  “I’m crushed.”

  “Do you want to know the truth?”

  “Please. Enlighten me.”

  Thor shook his head. “You really are being a dick. Truth is, yeah, I think something’s up with Dani.”

  “Really? I fucking figured that out when she bit my head off.”

  “Yeah, but why did she bite your head off?”

  “If I knew that, do you really think I’d be standing here?”

  “Did you ever think that maybe it bothered her to see you talking with those girls?”

  “Yeah, I did.” I ran a hand through my hair, impatience building inside me. I wanted to fix this, but I didn’t know where to begin. “Maybe I hurt her feelings or something. Maybe she thought I’d ditched her.”

  “Maybe she didn’t like seeing you hitting on the other girls when she’s used to all your attention going to her,” Thor countered.

  I froze.

  “You think Dani is jealous?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  For a moment I couldn’t speak, and then I voiced the thought that had been in my mind ever since I’d seen the look on her face. Hell, the question had been there for weeks now, lingering in the background, the fucking hope of it—

  “You think Dani’s into me?”

  Even the words sounded strange coming from my mouth, but I clung to them now.

  “She might be, yeah,” Thor answered after what seemed like a fucking eternity. “Maybe she doesn’t realize it, maybe it’s a physical thing, maybe she really is into you. What the hell do I know? It’s not as cut-and-dry as you guys being friends, and the more this shit comes up, the more things are going to be uncomfortable between the two of you.

  “Think of it this way: How would you feel if the roles were reversed and you had to watch her hit on some dude?”

  As though someone had kicked me in the balls.

  I stared at the empty shot glass, needing about f
our more to slide into oblivion. I didn’t want to deal with this shit, didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want her to hate me, didn’t want to fuck this up. Everywhere I looked I was faced with the possibility of screwing this up with no way forward.

  “What would you do if you were me?”

  “You’re really scraping the bottom of the barrel, asking me for advice, aren’t you?”

  “You’re all almost married and shit. I figure you have to have learned something.”

  He was silent, and when he finally did speak, his answer shocked the hell out of me. “Maybe you should make a move. A small one. A move that’s not a move. See if she responds.”

  “‘A move that’s not a move’? What the fuck does that even mean?”

  “That you should do something that gives her an out in case she’s not interested so you don’t freak her out. Do I really need to spell this out? Aren’t you supposed to be a woman-whisperer or something?”

  “Or something.”

  “You’re worried about Joker, aren’t you?”

  Joker. Dani. My heart.

  I leveled him with a stare. “If something happened to you, and I made a move on Becca, how would you feel?”

  “Considering I’d be dead, probably not much.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  He sighed. “If she lost me, I’d want her to be happy, and I’d want her to move on with her life. And if she did move on, I’d want to know that she’d moved on with a good guy, a guy who would treat her how I did, who would love her the way she deserved to be loved.”

  I swallowed, my throat dry. “I fucked up tonight.”

  “Yeah, you did. I’m guessing she did, too, though, to put that look on your face.”

  “She made a comment about me fucking around. I’ve never wanted her to see me like that.”

  “I get it. You want my advice? Give her some time. Don’t do anything before the deployment. Give her the chance to see where she ends up while you’re gone. If she moves on and is happy, then there’s your answer. If she’s here when you get back, then go for it.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yeah, I do.” He jerked his head toward the entrance. “I’m going to take the girls home.”