4
4
BEACH DAY
M arriage material. Two words that had never popped into my brain just did. I eyed her speculatively, a cattleman assessing a heifer at auction. I thought of her biting words to me after the Mikey bomb: You could do a lot worse for a brother than Mikey! Could do a lot worse than the Kitty-Kat for a wife. I watched her frolic with our brother on the beach. Mikey was shrieking and chasing after the curling whitecaps while she laughed and chased after him. I noted that she refused to dip farther into the biting water than her ankle line. After hauling Mikey in from the frothing tide, she fell onto the stark navy towel a few feet from mine and declared: “I’m freezing!” The two shrinking spheres puckering the front of her swimsuit bolstered this statement, yet seemed to have the opposite effect on my own swimsuit. This line of thinking seemed incestuous, although I knew it wasn’t. Technically.
So many feelings I held on to. The hard and the soft. Maybe the right feeling, like truth, was somewhere in the middle.
Could I afford to buy her from The Academy? She would come at a high price. A plan started to take shape in my mind, and it took the shape of the bright-eyed, pink-nosed brunette, swallowing her curves with my blocky sweatshirt.
“You really don’t mind?” she asked again, even though I’d already handed it over.
“I really don’t.” I casually shrugged even though I loved the idea of her wrapped up in my shirt. But wrapped up in my life? That was a whole different matter. My wife. That would help protect her from Weston’s ongoing plans for her and Mikey. The powers-that-be generally frowned upon marriage amongst cadets, feeling the bonds of family loosened a cadet’s allegiance to them. There were exceptions. These traditional alliances were usually reserved for the officers and brass who were more in the public eye. Hence the compact family units dotting the back corner of the campus.
Weston himself was an exception. Marrying an exceptionally pretty Persian cadet, who no longer had to do anything but administer to his needs. Hmmm. That sounded pretty good.
“Apple-cheeked and apple-bottomed. Mature and immature in equal measure. Everybody likes her.” I thought of Ryan’s succinct first impression of her after that camp as I eyed her ass giving that spandex a workout. He nailed it. Truth was . . . I’d been wanting to do her since the night I chased her down that alley in those booty shorts and boots. I recalled how she’d looked at Davenport—dewy eyed. I wondered what it would feel like to have her look at me that way. Something moved inside my chest at the thought. She caught me staring at her the way guys are supposed to hide in the presence of any girl that wasn’t a stripper or hooker. I let her see it. Was caught red-handed anyway.
A gust of wind whipped her hair around her face, but it couldn’t hide the color bringing her cheeks to life. She instantly diverted her attention back to Mac. She’d be a challenge, that’s for sure. What had Davenport called her that night? A filly. It would be like breaking in an untamed filly. I’d pretty much botched the training so far. Spooked her off. Broken the spirit. Neglected her. Then she was beaten by that sicko. I’d have to undo a lot of damage. A lot.
And I was just the cowboy to do it. With the right training, this particular filly could grow up to be one helluva show pony. This elicited a smile, and she graced me with one in return before quickly getting back to the business of building sand castles with Mikey. Was she dreaming about a handsome prince who would come sleigh the dragon for her and rescue her from this locked castle? The one (she thought) I’d put her in.
I psychoanalyzed her. What did she want most in the world? A mother? Couldn’t provide that. Score another one for Davenport. A father figure then. People always try to relive their broken childhoods over and over to get it right. I knew she hated her father for his treatment of Mikey. (I did too and thought I’d bust him one, right in his schnauzer, for it one day.) I could provide that for her. I knew that my fair treatment of Mikey is what won her over in the first place. Score one for me. Also, she wanted a semblance of normalcy. I was sure she harbored ideas of love and marriage, kids—a white-picket-fence kind of life. A step up from the life she had growing up. What she didn’t realize was that she’d already stepped into the best life—here. Especially one with me . . . it would be miles better. Living an elite life at The Academy seemed to me the best life you could have on earth. With a family.
Like the one Davenport had growing up. No wonder dude was so happy all the time . . . until his brother died and wiped that smile right off his face for a good long while . . . until the Katie-Kat brought it back.
I thought of what kind of awful death science had procured for that kid. A knot of fear, I worked to undo, tightened my gut. Did a similar fate await our own little brother?
“Wook, Wanguh!” Mikey held up an object too small to make out. “A sand cwab!” He laughed his head off, so delighted by the miniscule mollusk you’d have thought he’d never seen one before. Then I realized—he probably hadn’t. I felt a pang that I’d let this go on so long. No wonder she’d been colder than a witch’s cat when I got back from Mexico.
“That’s great, buddy,” I enthused. “Why don’t you put it in your pocket, and we’ll have Chef Saryan boil it up for dinner?”
Mikey looked outraged by the proposal. “I don’t know ‘bout that, Wanguh!”
“He’s only kiddin’, sweetie.” The Katie-Kat followed that up with a scathing look at me. I’d been on the receiving end of a lot of those looks since I got back from finishing the Mexico mission, until I finally made good on that beach day promise to Mikey. And then she was just barely cordial.
“A day late and a dollar short” is about all she had to say to me when I reappeared in their room a couple of months later with a hand-painted blue-eyed Mexican doll for her and a set of maracas for Mikey. Not quite the reception I’d hoped for.
I pulled out her roster of flaws to go over to make me change my mind. She wasn’t an exceptional beauty. Cute pretty. Without make-up. Cute beautiful with. Girl-next-door, if you if you were the luckiest bastard on earth, which blows blow-ass beautiful away in a dude’s book any day of the week and twice on Sunday. The kind of girl you find yourself making excuses to your buddies to, so you can stay home and watch the game. And cuddle.
I made a face. Had never been one of those before.
Her body was sick. I mean sick. But her ass technically made her a bit out of proportion. I snorted over that one—the kind of flaw a man can take in his lady. Let’s see . . . personality. She was stubborn as a mule and could sulk for days if she didn’t get her way. But only to right a wrong, as opposed to say I wanted pizza tonight and you took me out for sushi instead. Girl never complained about shit like that.
Wasn’t a complainer. Period. I thought of all the shit I shoveled at her these past couple of years that she just took. Like a queen would a peasant spitting in her face, knowing he could get away with it because her kingdom was taken over. With grace. Like I was too ignorant to know any better.
I inwardly winced. I sounded like Davenport, like I had it bad. Truth was: it was hard to find anything about the girl not to like. I even liked her goofy buckteeth before The Academy fixed them for her. Made you want to go Oh gee, would you look at that poor country girl . Then you’d imagine how pretty she’d be if only she got them fixed. How perfect. And then, once they were fixed, you realized you missed the slight flaw because it only enhanced her air of vulnerability. Made you feel more like a man. Like you could actually offer her something, so you’d deserve her.
Protection. That’s what I could offer her. In the form of holy matrimony.
Hell, I hadn’t even considered getting married. Scratch that. I hadn’t considered getting married before the age of sixty-five. And then it would be to my twenty-five-year-old Swedish nurse. I’d leave her my fortune for taking such good care of me in my old age and for tickling my old balls.
Now here I was in my prime. Twenty-seven in a couple of weeks. Thinking of marrying a child-woman to save her sorry ass from The Academy, the organization I’d pledged my life and allegiance to, first and foremost. And she was in love with another man—T-shirt Number One.
My chest started to burn like when Chef put too much serrano pepper in the chili. No way I was anyone’s number two. I could out finesse anyone with the babes. Even pretty-boy Davenport. Next to chasing bad guys, chasing skirt was my favorite sport.
Even if I failed (which I knew I wouldn’t), I sure would have fun trying. I was worn down from trying to dislike her. It was like trying to hate on a kitten. They were so darned cute, even if you weren’t a cat person. Which I wasn’t.