The Colonels' Texas Promise

by Caro Carson

  “Matthew never turns down ice cream,” she said.

  Panty-dropping? Had she seriously just thought that? Panty-dropping? The term hadn’t crossed her mind since graduation.

  “Great. We can hit the hotel and the school and then head for an ice cream place that’s just off post. I haven’t been there, but they must be good. They’re always busy.”

  “It’s just...” She could see her reflection in his glasses, her sharp hat, her crisp white collar. She looked like a professional army officer. She needed to act like it. “Matthew’s wearing a necktie. He wore it for my promotion ceremony, because he knew I’d be in my service uniform.”

  “He can take off his tie. You can’t.”

  That was a simple truth. The uniform had to be worn complete at all times. She couldn’t undo her tab-tie or shrug off her jacket at an ice cream parlor. She gestured toward Evan’s camouflage uniform, the ubiquitous ACUs, or Army Combat Uniform. “You’re in something comfortable. It’s just a plain Friday, isn’t it? But if I were to get into civilian clothes, I’d feel awkward. Matthew would know that while he’d been working hard in class, all dressed up for my sake, I’d been kicking back at the hotel, unpacking my jeans. It doesn’t seem fair to him.”

  She couldn’t begin to read Evan’s face. His Ray-Bans hid his eyes. His mouth gave nothing away. He might as well have been standing at attention, expressionless. No longer laughing. At least he wasn’t frowning at her as if she was, once more, saying something insane.

  She wasn’t crazy. She was just a mother.

  Same thing.

  “I know you’re probably thinking I’m attaching too much importance to a necktie, but it was more than a tie. He put a lot of effort into that tie. It was his idea. He wanted to look like a grown man this morning, and he did it all for me. A sign of—a sign of respect, I guess.”

  He’d been trying to be a man, like his absent father.

  Rather than looking at her own reflection, she looked at Evan’s throat, visible at the open collar of his combat uniform. Where the knot of a tie would be, his tan uniform T-shirt was visible. “It’s going to be good for him to have you around. He’ll be able to see how you wear a tie. We had a little trouble this morning, figuring out how to tie the knot.” She fell silent, because she was afraid that she sounded like her world revolved around mundane minutiae.

  It did. And she was asking this sexy, single man to restrict himself to her world. Some friend she was.

  Evan uncrossed his arms. “All right. Let’s stop by my house, and I’ll put on my blues.”

  “You’ll—” She caught her breath.

  “The point is to have a little fun, not to make a child feel like he’s dressed as the odd man out.”

  “Yes, exactly,” she said on a rushed exhalation.

  “Let’s go.” His eyes stayed masked by those mirrored lenses, but his mouth curved into a grin. “We’ll all eat ice cream in our Sunday best, if that makes you and your son more comfortable.”

  How odd to be understood. Stranger still not to have to plead her case or resort to making a demand. Was this how things could be in a relationship? So much less stress.

  She found it easier to take her next breath. “You know what? Matthew’s an army brat, born and raised. He’s not going to think twice about meeting an officer in ACUs. Why don’t we just stay as we are and head to the school now? We’ll beat about fifty other cars to the parent pickup line.”

  She could see Evan raise an eyebrow despite the sunglasses. He walked around her to open the door of her Lexus, as if he were a valet. “Please get behind the wheel. Please. I don’t care if you turn this car toward the school or my house, the Holiday Inn or the Taj Mahal, but please get us out of this parking lot.”

  “Right. Sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” He shut the door once she was seated, walked around the hood while returning another salute from yet another soldier, then got in. He shut the door, and they were sealed into the interior together, the sounds from the rest of the world instantly silenced. She was acutely—absurdly—aware of his size and his presence. There was such a big difference between sitting in this closed space with a child and sitting with a man.

  Naturally, there is. Get a grip.

  She’d driven other men in this car, taking her sergeant to lunch or giving another officer a lift home. No big deal. She was around men all day, year after year, intelligent men, physically fit men, men in uniform. But they were all people she worked with. This man was not.

  It made more of a difference than she would have guessed. She’d come to see her old college buddy, but now she had a man in her car who wanted her to slip into something more comfortable. This wasn’t the old friend she’d come to see.

  As she backed the car out of the space, Evan tossed his hat onto her dash. He’d done that with his baseball cap, too, when she’d given him a ride to their college’s practice field. She could practically see his burgundy baseball cap where the camouflage patrol cap sat now. She sneaked a quick peek at his profile as she drove away from his headquarters, and her heart rate finally slowed. Baseball cap, patrol cap—he treated them the same. He wore them the same. This man was Evan. Still him.

  She stopped at a red light and let go of the steering wheel to smooth one hand down her skirt. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  For being Evan. “For being my friend. You were always my friend.”

  He raised his hand and she braced herself for another masculine touch on her throat or her cheek, but he was holding out his pinkie finger to her. She linked it with her own.

  “I always will be,” he said. “As long as we both shall live.”

  Since he wore the mirrored sunglasses, her eyes fell to his lips. Those lips had kissed her. Today.

  “Everything is going to work out, Juliet, my friend. Let’s get your son and go eat some ice cream. It’s time to have a little fun.”

  * * *

  Never had a child looked so miserable while sitting in front of a banana split.

  “Your ice cream’s melting, honey.”

  Evan watched Juliet prompting her son in a voice of pure kindness and concern. Maternal love—this little grouchy guy was too young to appreciate it.

  Juliet had that same cheerful, you’re-the-best smile that had once blinded Evan at a reunion tailgate, but it was only the same on the surface. Back then, she’d practically been glowing from within. Today, her cheerfulness struck Evan as determined, like the laugh she’d forced when she’d said their plan was insane, but she’d wanted him to run with her to the courthouse right that minute anyway.

  He almost wished he had. He kept catching her darting little glances his way as her son resisted her attempts to engage him. She didn’t need to be so nervous; Evan wasn’t going to not marry her just because her son was letting his ice cream melt.

  Juliet could only get one-word answers from Matthew. How was school? Good. Did anyone say anything about your tie? Teachers. Did they like it? Yeah. Do you have any homework to do before Monday? No. This had been accompanied by a vigorous head shake, at least.

  The only complete sentences had been spoken in the school parking lot, after Matthew had pushed his backpack into the back seat and climbed in after it. Juliet had introduced Evan as Colonel Stephens. Evan had turned around and Matthew had shaken his hand like a little adult. Pleased to meet you. My name is Matthew Grayson-Jones.

  You can call me Evan.

  You can call me Matthew.

  Evan had nodded and turned back around, amused at being given permission to address Mr. Grayson-Jones as Matthew.

  “Did you turn in the money for your baseball uniform?” Juliet asked. “I can’t wait to see it.”

  “Yeah.” Matthew darted another look at Evan. He knew something was up. Smart kid. Matthew’s one-word answers were his way of playing his cards close t
o his chest—even smarter, in Evan’s opinion. He’d be suspicious of himself, too.

  Enough was enough, though. Juliet wanted her son to enjoy the ice cream outing, that much was obvious, but she was forgetting to eat her own ice cream in the process. If they didn’t all stop being so awkward, they’d end up sitting at three sides of this little square table with three melted sundaes in front of them.

  This wasn’t the kind of situation Evan normally found himself in, but he applied an old military adage: Lead by example.

  Evan ate his ice cream.

  He talked in complete sentences, too—to Juliet. “I can’t believe you’ve been here for two weeks without letting me know. This whipped cream is amazing, by the way. It would be good in coffee.”

  Under the table, he tapped the toe of Juliet’s shoe with his boot. Play along.

  “Ah... I’m not usually one for anything sweet in my coffee.” But she turned away from her son and sat squarely in front of her sundae. Evan enjoyed the picture she made, so prim and proper with her tightly closed collar and her pristine hair bun, her straight rows of ribbons a dignified contrast with the sloppy monstrosity of a sundae before her.

  “Where were you stationed before Hood?” It was a genuine question for Juliet, but to Evan’s surprise, Matthew answered.

  “Fort Benning.” Matthew poked at a banana slice with his finger.

  Two whole words. It was a start.

  “Benning.” Evan shook his head at Juliet. “And you’ve been here two weeks? Why didn’t you let me know sooner?”

  She waited for the excess hot fudge to drip off her spoon before eating it, her eyes lowered to her ice cream, her lashes hiding those gold-flecked eyes from him. That look was just as alluring as when she’d stood at his desk and looked down at her insignia. He’d thought she was another man’s wife then.

  She was going to be his wife.

  He waited as a fresh wave of wonder passed through him, a physical sensation. Then he leaned forward. “Did you really think two weeks would have made a difference?”

  “I hadn’t been promoted yet.” She looked up from her sundae, directly into his eyes. “I didn’t want to leave anything to chance.”

  She’d wanted him to say yes. She’d succeeded. As she stared him down across giant sundaes, she finally started to smile a genuine, Juliet smile, one that said she was the girl who’d gotten her way, the cat who’d gotten the cream.

  God knew what his smile was saying, but he could feel himself smiling back, truly happy to see—

  “Fort Benning is in Georgia,” Matthew informed him.

  Juliet looked down at her sundae once more. Evan sat back.

  “Have you heard of it?” Matthew asked.

  Evan tore his gaze from his future wife to look at her suddenly talkative child. “I was stationed there once.”

  “Oh.” Matthew seemed disappointed.

  “Not for very long. I went to Airborne school there.” Evan tapped the embroidered black wings above his name tag. Juliet’s were shiny silver on her service uniform.

  “Yeah, my mom has those, too.”

  “I noticed.”

  “So does my dad. He said so.” Matthew poked at the banana some more, this time with a spoon. “I don’t remember, because I was a baby when he was a soldier. But he was a real soldier.”

  Nobody was enjoying a conversation about Airborne school. Evan hadn’t meant to derail the boy’s attempt to initiate a conversation about Fort Benning. “I went to Airborne school so long ago, I was an ROTC cadet. I had to live in the barracks, so I didn’t see anything except that one little piece of the post. Did you live on post?”

  “Yeah.”

  “See anything cool?”

  Matthew studied him for a moment, his skepticism clear.

  Evan ate another bite in silence as he waited for Matthew to decide whether or not this grown-up stranger really wanted to hear from him.

  This grown-up really did. What did an eleven-year-old boy think was cool nowadays? If it had been ages since Evan had been an ROTC cadet, it had been even longer since he’d been eleven.

  “There’s a museum there.” Matthew dredged his spoon through the whipped cream and took a bite.

  Glory, hallelujah. “What kind? An art museum or a science museum?”

  “It’s about the infantry. There’s a helicopter hanging from the roof. Remember that, Mom? And there are really, really old cannons.” And with that, Matthew was off and running, describing a museum with an enthusiasm that matched the way he began slurping down spoonfuls of mostly melted ice cream between sentences.

  Evan sat back and enjoyed the monologue. How could he not? All that enthusiasm and animation made Matthew look like a miniature, male version of Juliet. The actual Juliet, his Juliet, was listening to her son with such an expression of love on her face, it took Evan straight back to that tailgate party.

  Evan had always thought of Juliet as attractive, but he’d never seen her in love before that tailgate. She’d been so in love with that baby. The sight of Juliet laughing at Matthew had made something in his heart, something in his whole pitiful soul, shift into a new place. The concept of having a wife and child had crystallized from an abstract idea—sure, he’d get married someday and have kids—to something real. That wife he’d have someday when he was older suddenly became someone he wanted now, because she was a woman he enjoyed being around, a woman who was so much more than attractive. A woman he wanted. Why would he want to wait another day for that?

  Why hadn’t he realized a wife could be fun and gorgeous? Marriage meant that fun and gorgeous woman loved him back, loved him so much that she’d want to have his baby—and she’d love the baby that was half him.

  Evan had watched Juliet set her cheek on her baby’s head when the little guy snuggled into the curve of her neck. Everything that’s worth having is right there.

  Evan had never recovered from the impact.

  Rob Jones had been the most fortunate bastard on the planet, but he’d blown it and walked away. Evan hadn’t missed the implication this afternoon when Juliet had said Rob had moved out for the last time. Rob had put Juliet through the wringer more than once. He was no longer a fortunate bastard. Just a bastard.

  The guilt was harder and harder to shove down. Evan had been the reason Rob had been able to win Juliet. Evan had never recovered from that, either.

  “Ms. Libling knew more stuff than the stuff that the museum put on those little signs.” Matthew segued from his description of the museum to the teacher who had led his field trip there, then from the teacher to his school in general. Speaking more slowly, tapping his spoon, he mentioned the kids he’d traded some kind of cards and discs with, and then silence. No more words. No more tapping. Just a child who looked down at the table, dark lashes hiding his eyes.

  Evan liked it when Juliet glanced down like that, because he knew that when she lifted her eyes again, they’d be fierce or laughing or anything else that reflected the way she’d decided to handle whatever had made her turn introspective.

  With Matthew, Evan didn’t like it at all. It just looked sad.

  “Sounds like you liked Fort Benning,” Evan said.

  Matthew still didn’t look up. “I had a lot of friends there.”

  But not here.

  Evan could practically see Juliet’s heart turn into a sad slush. His own heart melted a little, too. Kids were so vulnerable.

  But being with a sixth grader was bringing back Evan’s memories of being in sixth grade. He’d had so much pride that he was no longer in elementary school, so much anxiety because sixth graders weren’t nearly as big as eighth graders. He certainly wouldn’t have wanted a man pitying him, cooing over him in sympathy. God, no.

  Evan was more than done with his ice cream. All that sugar and fat had gone past the point of deliciousness and into that zone of t
oo much, too rich. He took another bite anyway, to keep the conversation casual. “Yeah, every time the army moves me, I have to leave my friends behind, too, and start over at the next place. I know I’ll make more friends, though, because I do every time, but it’s a pain in the neck for a while.”

  Matthew looked up at him, perplexed. “You have friends?”

  “Of course.”

  “But you’re a grown-up.”

  Evan ate another bite of ice cream to keep himself from laughing.

  “Hey, grown-ups have friends,” Juliet said in mock offense.

  “You don’t, Mom.”

  She almost faltered at her son’s somber response. “Just like you have Bill and Ronny, I had Miss Teresa and Miss Catherine. Did you forget about them?”

  “Those were neighbors.”

  “Neighbors can be friends.” But Juliet had hesitated before answering.

  Kids spoke the truth, or so everyone said. Evan wondered how many friends Juliet had made at Benning, or rather, how many she’d had time to make, since Rob had left everything on her shoulders.

  Evan pushed his ice cream bowl away. “I’m her friend.”

  Matthew looked from his mother to Evan and back, plainly trying to decide if such a thing was possible.

  “For real. I met her at school, same way you made your Fort Benning friends. Same way you’ll be making your Fort Hood friends, sooner or later.”

  “You met at school? Airborne school?”

  Evan smiled at the logic of that.

  So did Juliet. “I met Evan before I was in the army. I was in college. He’s a Masterson Musketeer, just like me...and Daddy. In fact, Evan was a good friend of Daddy’s.”

  “Oh.”

  “They played baseball together, like you and Tim.”

  Evan bristled at the description of himself as a good friend of Rob’s—they’d been teammates, nothing more—but Matthew’s reaction was stronger. He’d been looking at Evan with the wide-open, curious eyes of a child, but with the next blink, those eyes narrowed in a keen sort of calculation, reassessing Evan now that he had this new piece of information.