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Five
JACE
I didn’t plan on overwhelming Dakota with everything at once, but keeping her in the dark wasn’t doing her any favors either. It also didn’t help that Aurelius and Merrick knew. Yet as my brothers-in-arms they knew everything, and always would.
“Sorry I didn’t get you guys a gift or anything,” Aurelius teased. “But if you give me a few days, I’m sure I’ll come up with something.”
Merrick dug one of his pre-made protein shakes out of the fridge and chugged it down. Wiping his mouth with the back of one arm, he jerked a thumb at me.
“Whatever you do, make sure he doesn’t skimp on the honeymoon,” he told her. “Jace has a tendency to half-ass everything, if you let him.”
“Is that right?” I challenged glibly. “Did I half-ass pulling yourownass out of the fire, back in Al Fallûjah?”
Merrick grunted and went silent, as I knew he would. It was his only option.
“Thought so.”
I turned my attention back to Dakota, who was sitting there sipping her coffee. In the span of just eight or nine years so much had changed! Gone were the braces, the freckles, the last remnants of baby fat. The long-legged blonde sitting before me was a full grown woman now, and a gorgeous one to boot. She could’ve easily been a total stranger, if not for those piercing, arctic blue eyes I’d grown up with for so many years.
God, she’s beautiful.
She really and truly was. That part might come in handy, of course. But when it came to the favor I needed, I had to push everything — including appearances — to the side.
“So two weeks before every Christmas there’s an officer’s ball,” I began finally. “It’s the most important off-duty event of the year. Especially this year, and especially for me, because I need something very specific from my CO.”
She wrinkled her nose. “CO?”
“Commanding officer,” said Merrick. “The big guy.”
“Oh. That’s right.”
“See, I shouldn’t even be there,” I told her. “At the ball, I mean. I wouldn’t even be part of this whole ridiculous thing, but for my CO who insisted I come.”
“Why shouldn’t you be there?” Dakota asked innocently.
“Because I’m not an officer. And I’ll never be one.”
I saw her avert her eyes for a moment, almost uncomfortably. But she had the wrong idea.
“Dakota, I’m a Green Beret. Highly decorated. I’ve completed dozens of successful missions, across eleven different countries and seventeen conflicts.”
Her eyes flitted to the others, perhaps expecting them to interject some kind of sarcastic response. There was none, of course. Both Merrick and Aurelius knew the validity of every single one of those conflicts. For more than a few of them, they were right there beside me.
“After Special Forces training I rose through the ranks fast,” I explained. “In fact, I got promoted quicker than anyone in recent Army history.”
“Why aren’t you an officer then?”
“By choice,” I replied simply. “I’ve been a Sergeant Major for a lot years now. I must’ve turned down advancement half a dozen times, most of them from my increasingly pissed-off CO.”
“Verypissed off CO,” Aurelius agreed.
“But as angry as he is that I won’t accept a commission, he’s also a man I deeply respect. General Burke came out of Vietnam a genuine hero. He earned two Silver Stars and the Distinguished Service Cross, plus countless other citations too. And shit, I don’t even know how many Purple Hearts.”
“Four,” Merrick chimed in. “I think.”
“He was there for Desert Storm,” I added, watching Dakota’s reaction. “Just as your father was. And though he’s pushing past seventy, the old man’s still got it.”
Dakota’s father was another man I respected all throughout high school, but even more now after my service. He’d been a heavy equipment mechanic throughout the conflict, working on everything from Abrams to Apaches. He served all the way through the Gulf War, and was there for the liberation of Kuwait. I knew these things because I’d looked them up. I’d seen his file.
