Page 9 of Rescuing Mary

But it was about time to admit that maybe that would never happen.

He’d hoped that if he gave her enough time, Mary would come around. That she’d see how much he loved her, that he’d never let her down. But even after everything they’d been through, she still held him at arm’s length. They slept next to each other every night, and they’d even shared a few kisses, but she still hadn’t given him any indication that she wanted to move their relationship from the weird friend zone it was in to more.

Truck wanted more.

He deserved more.

He loved Mary. Knew he’d never find another woman who made his heart race every time he looked at her. She was prickly and had shields at least a mile high, and Truck had hopes he could scale those walls and they’d be inseparable as a result. But he was finally admitting to himself that maybe whatever had happened to make her so wary wasn’t something he could overcome.

“I’m okay,” Truck told Ghost.

It was obvious his friend didn’t believe him, but to his credit, Ghost didn’t say a word about it.

“Are we still headed out at the end of the week?” Truck asked.

Ghost frowned, but allowed the change in subject. “Yeah. Hollywood is staying here, but we’re headed out with the other Delta team.”

“Trigger and his crew, right?” Truck asked.

Ghost nodded.

“They’re good people. Do we have any new intel on the area?”

“Not yet. Commander Robinson is working on it. You know how he is…he refuses to send us anywhere until he’s got enough information to be sure of what we’re heading into. Insurgents have been extremely active, and he’s not happy about the situation as it is right now. The last thing he wants is an ambush.”

Truck nodded. “Good.” He slapped Ghost on the back. “I’ll see you tomorrow at PT.”

“Yup. Later.”

“Later.”

Truck made his way through the room and gave chin lifts to his friends and hugged the women. Annie ran over to him as he was leaving. He knelt down so he could be eye to eye with the almost eight-year-old.

“You leavin?” she asked.

“Yup.”

“Where’s Mary?”

“Something came up and she couldn’t get here today.” Truck hated lying, but he wasn’t going to tell Annie what the issue was.

“I miss her. I haven’t seen her in for-EV-er. Will you tell her I learned some new signs? Frankie taught them to me and I wanted to practice with her.”

Truck blinked in surprise. He knew Annie had a little boyfriend who lived out in California, and that Frankie was deaf. They “spoke” to each other using a special program on their tablets. But he didn’t know Mary had been practicing sign language with the little girl. “Of course I will. When did you last practice with her?”

“Last week,” Annie said glibly. “She installed the same program me and Frankie have on her tablet and she calls me and I show her what Frankie taught me. We’re learning together.”

Truck was speechless. He hadn’t known Mary was doing that.

Lately, it seemed as if everyone knew his wife better than he did.

“Mary told me that Frankie was lucky to have me for a girlfriend,” Annie said proudly.

“She’s right,” Truck said.

“I was sad one day because a girl in my class was making fun of me for having a boyfriend who lives so far away. She told me to tell Carrie to stuff it. That having a boyfriend who lives in a different state is tough, but not impossible. And that if I really liked Frankie, I should do whatever it took to make him feel good. And he should do the same for me. I’m gonna marry Frankie, so I want to be sure to treat him really really good.”

Truck was flabbergasted. Mary had told Annie to do what she could to make Frankie feel good. That was surprising. He knew Mary didn’t exactly have a good track record when it came to men, and she’d said more than once that men generally had ulterior motives when it came to relationships. It was one of the reasons he’d been going so slow with Mary. He didn’t want her to think he’d married her and put her on his insurance in exchange for sex.