Chapter 20
Lance had been on enough deployments the past five years to know the routines.
Despite his issues since Friday, his pre-deployment checklists were done, checkrides all signed off, bags packed, and the normal anticipation was licking at his heels. He knew his mission, and he knew he needed to be ready to get out there and get troops and supplies where they needed to be.
But Wednesday morning, while family and friends gathered on the flight line for one last goodbye before the squadron went wheels-up, something was missing.
Allison had been there for Lance’s past two deployments, but he didn’t miss her today. She’d always been pragmatic—Not like you and Goose are battling the MiGs, she’d joked both times. You’ll be home soon.
He’d shrugged off the comparison both times too, though he hadn’t forgotten it. His passion for being in the air wasn’t about being Top Gun great. Didn’t have any need to prove he was the best. He just wanted to be one with the sky, serving his country.
Today, his parents weren’t coming either. He had a better shot of running into Cheri overseas than he did of seeing her here stateside. Neither of which bothered him—yeah, he was missing the holidays this year, but so was Cheri. They’d go home together and celebrate in the spring.
He skimmed a glance about the crowd, ears tuned for a sassy twang, even though he knew she wasn’t coming either.
She’d said as much last night.
And now, there was a hollow spot under his breastbone, and he felt as though he were leaving things unsettled here.
He’d miss her.
“You want me to send pictures of the pool parties?” Juice Box asked with a smirk.
God help him, he was leaving his house in Juice Box’s care. “You’ll freeze your nuts off.”
“Depends on who I bring with me.”
“So much to learn, Juicy. So much to learn.”
Juice Box angled closer and dropped his voice. “You nervous?”
He had been on his first deployment, and he had no doubt that was what the kid was thinking about.
He’d taken Lance’s spot in the next rotation so Flincher wouldn’t have to deploy again before he got orders to a new base.
“Old hat by now. I’ll show you around when you get there.
But I’ll fly back over there and kick your ass if I get home and find my house broken. ”
Juicy’s brows relaxed. So did his shoulders. “Cranky old man.”
“Captain Wheeler?” A brunette with a pixie haircut, round cheeks, and a ruby smile squinted at him. “I’m Madeline Scott. Evan’s wife.” She put a hand to her round belly. “I just wanted to say thank you.”
Flincher stepped to his wife’s side, holding a squirming little girl with two tiny pigtails that made her look like she had horns. “Still owe you, man.”
“Nah,” Lance said. “Doing me the favor. Good to get in the extra flight hours.”
But he wasn’t as excited to get out of Georgia as he’d been two months ago.
And that little blondie Flincher was holding was making Lance think about his favorite blonde.
Again.
Would she go to Germany? Would she take any more crap from her fellow professors?
Would she get back together with her ex-husband?
Lance nearly growled.
“You need anything, you let us know,” Madeline said. “Is your family here today?”
“Just me.”
The insta-pity in her eyes made his joints twitch. She patted his arm. “We’ll make sure to send you extra care packages. Hope you like drawings. Izzy here’s crazy with a crayon these days.”
“You don’t have to—”
“Yes, we do,” Flincher said.
We.
Flincher had a family. The sweet wife, the adorable tot, one more on the way. Even Pony had a few buddies out to see him off.
But not Lance.
Because he’d fucked up with the only person in the world who would’ve wanted to be here for him.
Two weeks into December, Kaci and Tara hadn’t found any new members for their club, but they were doing just fine on their own.
Kaci had gone to her doctor for antianxiety medicine.
She’d made appointments to meet with fellow physicists from Austria, Japan, and six other countries while she was in Germany, and she had a hypothesis niggling at her that she wanted to investigate as soon as she got back.
Her speech was ready and approved by the dean, and even her cranky, girl-hating, fellow physics professors hadn’t been able to find fault with it.
Ron had canceled his plans to attend the conference too.
The Physics Club kids were tweaking Ichabod in anticipation of a watermelon-flinging contest coming in June that was within driving distance and, with Kaci’s endorsement, three of them had been selected for scholarships from the James Robert Physics Association alumni group.
Life was good.
Except she kept checking the base’s webpage for Lance’s squadron.
It had been a slow news week when Lance and his buddies shipped out a few weeks ago, so they’d been covered on the local news.
Tara had been working that night, and even though Kaci knew she should’ve put on a movie or streamed a TV show, she’d recorded the news and then watched, craning for any glimpse of Lance, reaching for Miss Higgs, who wasn’t there, stifling tears when Lance himself came on for an interview, steady and authoritative and heart-stopping in his aviator sunglasses and green flight suit.
And she might’ve rewound it to watch it again.
And another one or two—dozen—times.
He was doing what he was born to do. Kicking ass and taking names. Keeping the world safe.
So she needed to do what she was born to do. Make the world better through physics.
She was trying not to throw up the night before her flight when Tara got home from her shift at Jimmy Beans. “You okay?” Tara asked.
Kaci mumbled a mmph and nodded. Then tried to telepathically send Tara a message asking how her final went, since she was pretty sure if she opened her mouth, she’d puke.
Tara missed the message.
“Here. I picked up some ginger mints for you. They’ll help settle your stomach.” Tara climbed onto Kaci’s bed and peered in the pink suitcase. “Wow. Is that an Hermès scarf? What else are you hiding in your closet?”
“You pass your finals?” Kaci croaked out.
“Hope so.” Tara twirled a curl around her finger. “You’re going to do great, Kaci. You know that, right?”
That was what everyone kept telling her. “I still wish he was coming with me.” Admitting the truth was painful, but admitting the truth to Tara was also a relief.
“Aw, honey,” Tara whispered.
“I just want him to hug me again. I want to hear his voice again. When Ron and I broke up, I didn’t miss him.
Because I never wanted to hug him. His voice wasn’t special.
I didn’t want to have his babies. But Lance—I would’ve had Lance’s babies, Tara.
I don’t even know if I want kids, and I would’ve had his babies. ”
Tara squeezed her in a hug. “You’re going to be okay, Kaci. You have bigger things to do.”
“I just miss him.”
“His roommate came into Jimmy Beans last night.”
Kaci’s nose wrinkled.
Tara plopped down on the bed. “Sounds like it’s been an easy deployment so far for the guys over there.
Devon said you can stop by anytime. His girlfriend slugged him.
Nikki’s a grad student in the English department, and she kinda offered to help me with my redneck fairy tales.
She’s doing research into the ways storytelling is shifting because of the digital marketplace, so I’m sorta going to be the subject of her master’s thesis.
But I’ll meet with her at her place. Or alone here.
I told Devon he’s not allowed to know where we live. ”
Kaci rubbed the sore spot to the left of her breastbone. “Do what you need to do, sugar. Life goes on.”
So long as her plane was airworthy tomorrow. And the other one, too, that would bring her back from Germany.
Where she’d actually be closer to Lance than she was today.
“I can still drop everything and go with you tomorrow,” Tara said. She’d never once come out and said she knew Kaci was terrified to fly, but Kaci knew she knew.
She’d probably known since the night Kaci came home complaining that some hot guy in a bar had kissed her and run away. Because that was the kind of friend Tara was.
“I got this,” Kaci said.
Her fingers were numb, but she’d be fine. She’d get on that plane. She’d have the time of her professional life in Germany. She’d come home.
And life would go on.
Really, it was good that she and Lance had called it quits. If they were still dating, she’d be doing that helpless female thing, begging him to save her, and she’d be making excuses not to get on the plane.
She squeezed her eyes shut.
If she’d never met Lance, she wouldn’t be getting on that plane tomorrow.
She was going because he’d believed in her.
She was going because he called her strong.
She was going because he’d gone out of his way to show her planes were safe and then delivered her safely to the ground even with engine problems.
She owed it to him to do this. To not toss her cookies. To not cry. To not cause a scene.
And to enjoy it.
“And did I tell you we have a new club member?” Tara added with a sly grin.
“No!”
“Mrs. Sheridan.”
“The base commander’s wife?”
“Yep. Turns out, the commander’s her second husband.
She was married to another military guy before that, and she thinks the ex-wives club is awesome.
She’s offered to be either a full member or an advisor, whatever we want or need.
She’s not planning on divorcing General Sheridan, but she does believe in supporting both current and former military spouses. ”
“Shut the front door.”
“So, anyway, you have to go kick ass in Germany. Because we need you to get back home and put more flyers all over campus and town. Okay?”
Kaci nodded. “I’ll do my best.”
Deployments didn’t leave much downtime, but Lance found a few hours a week to catch up on email. He could also call Cheri toll-free through the base phone system, so he’d been bothering his twin as often as humanly possible.
It helped center him.