Chapter 2
Sev
Sitting next to a gorgeous woman in a wedding dress at a bar on Christmas Eve was not on his bingo card.
Sev would have been an idiot not to have noticed the stunning blonde the moment she entered the room. The way the entire bar hushed was a good indicator to him that something was coming. But when she took a seat near him? He couldn’t believe his luck.
He hadn’t frequented the Second Call very often, given that he wasn’t off base a lot, but he’d discovered how quiet it was a few months ago when he was running things to his parents’ house for storage.
It was a nice spot, out of the way. It had a lot of locals and people who mostly wanted to stay out of your business.
Yet the moment Kelsey had arrived, he wanted to know everything about her.
He couldn’t say how long the fight on TV had gone on for.
Maybe an hour? Maybe two? Still, chatting aimlessly with her had easily become one of the better times he’d had in recent memory.
He hadn’t spent a lot of time with women, even though there were plenty of them looking for Sailors at the establishments off base.
He had dated a few when he first got stationed back home, learning quickly that they weren’t really looking for anything long-term.
Or short term. Or anything past someone who just wanted a showpiece to parade around.
Which made him refocus on his goal of furthering his career.
When he’d finally gotten the chance to transfer to the unit he’d been dreaming of joining since boot camp, he knew the opportunity to climb the ladder was finally becoming a reality.
He was heading out on a mission in just a couple of days and, if he continued to prove how reliable and hardworking he was, he knew he’d be climbing the ranks before long.
First, he had to prove himself. Which wasn’t going to be an easy task, but one he was up for nonetheless.
“The winner, by unanimous decision, Reza!”
Sev smiled as he dropped his head, giving it a shake. From next to him, he could practically feel the reverberation as Kelsey slapped after the two five-dollar bills next to him, slipping them off the bar, and tucking them away in her wallet.
“Nice doing business with you,” she said ruthlessly, and somewhere inside of him was an urge to lean over and kiss the sass right out of her.
“I can admit when I’m wrong,” he said instead, holding his hands up partly to show her he came in peace.
The other part was to keep him from grabbing her, hauling her close, and never letting her go.
She grinned at him as she dramatically zipped her wallet closed.
A brief moment of silence passed between them as the TV changed to the next program.
He watched her eyes drift to her empty glass, followed by a sigh and a complete shift in her spirit.
Within seconds, he watched this bright, vivacious, spitfire of a woman become withdrawn and melancholy.
When her sad, blue eyes lifted toward the door, Sev knew he needed to do all he could to keep her around a little longer.
“So, what’s with the dress?” he asked, giving in to his curiosity.
It’d been a long time since he’d had a chance to talk to someone he actually found interesting.
Besides, he was going to be gone for a good few months.
Being able to look back at this stunning woman and the smile on her face would be something he could carry with him while he was away.
Kelsey looked down at herself, lifting her face to meet his stare and giving him a half-smile. Shrugging lightly, she said, “I called off my wedding.”
“See, I was going to guess that,” he jested, causing her to laugh a little bit. “The wedding dress gave it away.”
“Ya think?” she asked, looking down on either side of herself where this cream lace dress hung from her perfect frame. “I was just down the street getting it fitted when everything sort of… blew up.”
“Oh, now I need to hear this story,” Sev said, leaning his arm on the bar and getting comfy.
Kelsey rolled her eyes as her fingers fidgeted in her lap. “We never should have gotten engaged. We probably shouldn’t have been dating, if I’m being honest with myself.”
“That doesn’t tell me much,” he said, the urge inside of him to poke after her almost overpowering. He could almost taste how much he wanted her attention. “Why’d you call it off?”
“His girlfriend posted photos of them on social media.” She sighed, her face dropping as she looked down at her fingers mindlessly running over the lace in her lap. “I won’t be any man’s second choice.”
“Good for you,” he praised. “Though I can’t imagine a man stupid enough to stray when he had you.”
“Thanks,” she said, giving him a sad smile.
“So what are you going to do now?” he asked, tipping up his bottle for the last dregs of his beer.
She shrugged her slim shoulders once again. “I’m really not sure. Go back to school? Try to forget it all happened, I guess.”
“C’mon, you can do better than that,” he goaded. “What’s a bright woman like you got planned for her life?”
“Not much, really,” she said hesitantly. “I mean, I’m set to graduate this June, but I don’t have a job yet. I don’t really want to go home, but I’ve been dragging my feet applying for work.”
That didn’t seem to jive with the woman he saw in front of him. “Why’s that?”
She filled her lungs with a deep breath as her eyes focused away from him. “Just… nothing out there I’d be good at.”
“Why do I have a feeling that’s not true?”
Kelsey’s eyes shot up to him. “What do you mean?”
This time it was his turn to lift a shoulder. “You seem bright to me. On the ball. I have a feeling you know what you want to do with your life, you’re just holding yourself back for some reason.”
One of Sev’s gifts had always been reading people.
It was part of the reason he was placed with his unit; his ability to communicate effectively not only with his team, but also with the locals, civilians.
Anyone really. He was an effective negotiator and always had a handle on whether things were going well or if they were about to take a turn for the worse.
And he had a feeling that once someone like Kelsey started cracking the shell she hid behind and burst through it to be her true self, there’d be no stopping her.
“I’m holding myself back because I need to do something reliable with my life.”
“Is that what he told ya?” Sev asked bluntly.
By the look of shock on Kelsey’s face at the realization that Sev was spot on, he knew this fiancé of hers hadn’t been treating her well.
Well, at least she realized it.
“It’s not just that…”
He waited for her to finish her thought, but when she didn’t, he figured he’d help her along.
“Let me guess,” he said, setting his empty bottle down on a thick paper coaster.
“This guy was the kind who didn’t like to be outshone by anyone.
His chief complaints were when he was getting outdone by his siblings, his classmates, his friends.
And he spent the majority of your relationship putting you down, too. ”
“He didn’t put me down…”
Once again, as the wheels in her brain began to turn, he simply waited for her to come around.
“I’m going to even go so far as to guess that you’ve dealt with his overgrown man-boy tantrums to the point that you don’t remember how a real man is supposed to treat the woman he’s dating.”
“Now that’s not fair,” she said. “I know exactly how I should be treated.”
“So you… put up with it anyway?”
She sat and bit her lip. Yep, apparently she had.
Sev to the rescue.
“Tell you what,” he proposed, laying his arm on the bar again, and casting a long look at the old jukebox in the corner. “I have a proposition for you. Let’s get you ready for the next guy to come into your life.”
“Get me ready… how?” she asked, clearly skeptical of whatever it was he was proposing.
At this point, he was just flying by the seat of his pants. He really wasn’t sure himself where he was going with it.
Still, it felt right.
“A mock date.”
Her eyes widened. “A… what?”
“You heard me,” he said, grinning at the idea of keeping her off kilter. “Let’s you and me have ourselves a mock date right now. I’ll show you what it is you’ve been missing.”
“A mock date, huh?” she asked, cocking her head to the side as she studied his face. “And then what happens tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow doesn’t exist,” he said. “This is right here, right now. Christmas Eve. When the clock strikes midnight, we’ll look back and evaluate.”
“Evaluate?” She burst out laughing. “You make it sound like you’re expecting a review. Five stars for a job well done.”
“Smart aleck,” he said, that urge to kiss the sass from her cranking up a notch. Still, knowing he was going to be shipping out in just a few days, Sev dialed it back. “This isn’t the end of your life, Kels. If anything, it’s the start of something greater.”
He hadn’t planned on dropping the nickname, but she didn’t seem to mind.
Instead, the stars came out in her smile. “My dad always says something like that.”
He furrowed his brows. “Something like what?”
“Start from where you are.”
“Sounds like a good plan to me,” he said, holding out his hand to her once more. “How about you?”
She paused for a beat as she looked at his hand, anticipation and caution clearly warring for spaces in her mind and heart. He was a stranger, after all, and she had just broken up with her fiancé, probably an hour ago. She had every right in the world not to trust him.
But he already knew something about Kelsey that she didn’t remember about herself.
He could tell she was fearless. Determined.
Coming to a strange bar dressed as she was, in a vulnerable state when anyone else would seek to hide away.
And if she didn’t take his hand and step into her own future right now at his insistence, it might take her forever to do it on her own after they’d parted ways.
If she ever did again.