Chapter 15
Willow
“You really don’t have to stay,” I said.
Deacon sat on the couch with Gus curled up next to him, the gigantic dog snuggled in like a puppy.
He wasn’t allowed on the couch normally, but I made a command decision that minor surgery and losing the interesting, new, spiky plaything you were hunting meant you got to curl up on a soft blanket and watch Netflix.
Deacon stroked the back of Gus’s neck, where the quills had missed him.
“We’re just going to hang out all night. ”
“He’s already got his head on my lap so comfortably,” he said. “I can’t do Gus like that.”
I grinned at the sight of the big, tough dog asleep on Deacon’s muscled thigh and grabbed a beer from the fridge for the makeshift cushion.
“Message Cruz?”
I nodded and handed him the bottle. “I sent him a text thread with some photos.” By some photos, I meant thirteen, both pre-and post-quilling plus pics of the medicine to make sure he had proof that his baby was okay.
“Do you think he’ll see it when he wakes up?
Or when he gets…back?” I’d gotten used to not knowing exactly what my brother’s day-to-day was like, especially when he was deployed, but Deacon would know more. He’d been in his shoes.
Deacon nodded. “He’ll see it as soon as he can.” He didn’t say anything more, just kept stroking Gus’s fur.
I was young when Cruz joined the Air Force, and I didn’t exactly understand what he did as a PJ until later, when I learned how dangerous it could be. I studied Deacon now, his back straight and shoulders square even as he relaxed with the dog. “What made you want to join?”
“The Air Force?”
I nodded and tipped my beer to my lips, taking the sliver of couch not occupied by Gus and sliding my legs along his furry torso. “Yeah. You like big, important questions, right?”
His phone buzzed on the end table near him, and he silenced it. “Like your favorite stuffed animal. Yeah, okay. Big questions.” He scratched his jaw and glanced out the window behind me before looking back at me. “Well, I always wanted to be a superhero.”
I would have thrown a pillow at him if I wasn’t worried about jostling Gus. “You’re not a superhero.”
He flashed that cocky smile at me and motioned to his chest with his free hand. “You’re right. My physique is more godlike now.”
“Are you going to give me a real answer?”
He dropped his hand. “I was being serious, actually. I love superhero movies, comics, cartoons. Always have, and I wanted to do that, to save people and be part of a team. My parents weren’t around a lot, but I was close with my grandma.
She was part of an all-woman firefighting crew in Texas in the sixties before my mom was born.
She was a badass and kind of my role model.
She never met a problem she didn’t throw herself in front of fixing.
” He shrugged. “We moved around a lot, and I never got to make many friends or really join things before we’d be off to somewhere new.
Fighting a good fight with a group like she had always seemed pretty great to me.
And I didn’t want to go to Texas, so I looked for other ways to be a superhero. ”
“But the Avengers weren’t hiring?”
“The pay is for shit, and you have to bring your own costume! Did you know that?”
I laughed. “Admit it. You were embarrassed to wear that spandex and leather.”
“Please,” he said, silencing his phone again.
“That’s my normal Saturday night.” He glanced at the screen and then flipped the phone over.
“Anyway, I got it in my head that’s what I was meant to do, so when I realized Iron Man wasn’t an actual job, I looked at other options.
And the PJs…” He scratched his jaw again and cut his gaze to a photo on Cruz’s bookshelf of a group of pararescuemen in fatigues.
I recognized Deacon’s smile on the right side of the photo, and Cruz was in the middle.
“Of all the options, that looked the closest.” He ran fingers through his hair and gave me a wan smile.
“How much did Cruz tell you about the job?”
“Not a lot of details.” I’d done my searching, late-night googling that I regretted and that left me awake at night worried my brother might not make it home. “But I know it’s hard to get on the team. Like, the training is intense. Most people don’t make it, right?”
He nodded with a distant smile. “Something like five to ten percent of people make it through, and intense is one word for it. If you didn’t feel like throwing up at least once a day, you weren’t working hard enough.”
“That sounds like hell.”
“Yeah,” he said, his own gaze straying to the photo and then back to the top of Gus’s head. “A kind of hell, but kind of heaven, too, if that makes sense.”
It didn’t to me, but he straightened his back and chuckled.
“Never mind. I’m sure that doesn’t make sense at all, but it did for us.
It’s far from perfect, the military. Far, far from perfect.
There’s still sexism and homophobia and politics are what they are.
But the people. My people. They were my community. ”
“And you saved a lot of people.”
He nodded again, though his mouth was set in a line.
I hadn’t often seen Deacon like that—reflective and somber, and I wasn’t sure what to add, but he kept going.
When he spoke next, it seemed like it was more to himself than to me.
“That’s the job. These things we do, that others may live.
” The words hung in the air for a moment until his phone buzzed again, breaking through the silence.
“Is that why you chose psychology at school? To help people?”
Deacon shrugged one shoulder. “Just sounded interesting,” he said and his phone buzzed again.
“It’s okay if you need to check that.” I pointed to the iPhone sitting on the table, the message senders clearly waiting for a reply. “You’re popular today.”
He shook off the expression that had painted his face a moment earlier and gave me a cocky smile.
“I’m always popular.” As if he’d planned it, his phone buzzed again, and he picked it up to look at the screen before shoving it in his pocket.
“There. I’ll text back later. Are you done interrogating me with big questions? ”
“One more,” I said, settling back on the couch. I thought Gus might have cuddled against me, but he was out and Deacon was his only touchpoint.
“Okay. Did you want length in inches or do you prefer metric? Just know that without circumference, you’ll be missing the full picture.”
I threw a pillow at him, which he snatched from the air before it hit him in the face. “What?” His smile grew wide as he feigned innocence. “You said you had one more big question.”
I had an actual question, but I also liked the way he’d returned to this version of himself, with humor and life emanating from him, so I dropped my other question about the job and instead asked about something else I’d been wondering. “Okay. Were all those texts from a woman?”
He shrugged and patted his pocket where he’d shoved the phone. “A few women.”
“Wanting to go out?”
Gus gave a little whine and stretched his body out along mine before sinking back against Deacon, who shrugged again. “Go out, come over. Say hi. One was just checking in, I think.”
“Cruz always told me you saw a lot of women.” I hated myself for the comment and wanted to pull the words back immediately. Why did I care if there were a lot of women? It’s not like we were a thing.
He gave me that lazy smile again. “Are you slut-shaming me, Willow?”
“I never called you a slut! And I would never.” I tugged at the hem of my T-shirt. “Was just curious.” I stroked the German shepherd’s leg, now pressed to my thigh. “I’ve never been that popular. I should take lessons from you.”
“Nah. You don’t want that.” He scratched his jawline. “I mean, those women are great. They’re fun, smart, kind…” He chuckled. “Well, Val isn’t kind, but she has other positive attributes.” He took his phone from his pocket and looked at the screen before handing it over to me.
There were several texts.
Amber: Hey—I miss you! Around Saturday?
Emma: Roommate is out of town this weekend. Want to come over and wake the neighbors with me?
Val : I bought this today. Come over tonight.
The next message was a photo of a complicated-looking sex toy that made me press a hand to my mouth once I turned the phone sideways and realized what it was.
Meg: I’m in town for a few days. Would love to see you. HMU.
DJ: Still on for tonight? Looking forward to it.
“Wow.” I skimmed the texts again. “You were asked out like five times in the last hour. I really should take lessons.”
Deacon accepted his phone back, and our fingertips brushed. “You don’t want that, though. You want something special.” He tapped out a reply to one message, and I was dying to know which.
“They’re not special?” I pointed to the phone in his hand.
“They are. They’re special and incredible people, but what we have isn’t special.
It’s…fun. It’s comfort.” He shoved the phone in his pocket again.
“When I was on active duty, the job could be a lot, and it was hard to have a relationship. I mean, I never tried, but I saw guys try. But it was still nice to have someone to spend time with when you got home.”
He kept his voice light, but it sounded false.
“No one wants to be lonely,” I offered, thinking about how much time we’d already spent in this house together. When I arrived, I worried I’d be alone all the time.
“Exactly.” He shifted in his seat, twisting his shoulders, and I wondered if the angle was hard on his back. “So I met women. I found company. And I guess the habit stuck.”
His phone buzzed again in his pocket.
“You must be good company.”
He shifted again, and Gus gave a little snort of displeasure at being jostled. “I treat them well. They treat me well. Everyone knows what’s what.”
“Did you ever want something special?”
“Would never work with the job.”
“But when you have a regular job and are done with school? You might enjoy it then.”
“Yeah,” he said. “That might be nice. ‘Hey, honey, I’m home!’ ” he called out, loosening an imaginary tie. “It was a hard day at the office. A hard day of…businessing.” He chuckled. “Kind of falls apart there.”
“Wait,” I said, making grabby hands for his phone again. “That last woman said you had plans tonight. Like a date? You did this again?”
He shrugged. “I met her at the grocery store. We were both buying apples. I’ll tell her we need to rain check.”
“Don’t cancel on my behalf! Go on your date.” I didn’t want him to go, but I felt awful being a burden to him. “You told Cruz you’d look out for me, and I appreciate you helping with Gus, but you can’t skip a date for me again! This could be your Red Delicious something special!”
“That sounds like a sex position.”
I shot him a glare. “Seriously.”
“Seriously,” he said, tapping on his phone, “it’s not a big deal.” He shifted in his seat again and grimaced. “It’s done.”
I let out an exasperated sigh and stood, holding out my hand.
“What?”
“Climb out from under Gus. You are clearly uncomfortable.”
“What if this is a ruse to kick me out so I go find Red Delicious?” He still took my hand and slid out from under Gus, who whined, groaned, and then stretched to take over the whole couch, his head sinking back down onto the cushion.
Deacon’s hand wrapped around mine as he pulled up and arched his back.
“Now you can stretch.” I reluctantly let my hand fall from his so he had room. “You looked uncomfortable.”
He gave me a side smile, but did stretch out more, bending from side to side and then down to touch his toes. And damn, Deacon’s ass was a thing of beauty. “Sorry,” he said, looking over his shoulder from his bent state. “My lower back gets weird if I sit at odd angles for too long.”
“Can I help?” I stepped closer and pressed my thumbs in circles along his lower back.
The groan he let out startled me and I jumped. “I was going to say no, but damn, Low. You missed your calling as a massage therapist.” He groaned again as I pressed my fingers into the muscle of his lower back. “And I’m not even saying that as foreplay.”
I chuckled, more to let out the giddy anxious feeling I got from touching Deacon than because it was funny. “I know.”
“Thank you,” he said, eventually stepping forward and away from my touch. “Still getting things…you know, back in order.” He eyed Gus and then slumped onto the floor with his back against the couch.
I lowered myself to the floor and sat next to him, nudging my shoulder against him. “I still think you should go on your date.”
“I don’t date, Lewis. It’s not in my programming.” He propped one knee up. “But it is in yours. Excited about your night out with the vet?”
My face warmed at the mention of Theo. I hadn’t thought about him at all since we left the vet’s office. “First date. Well, second first date,” I said, making my voice sound bright.
“Nervous?”
I nodded. “A little.”
“You’ll be good,” he said, bumping his fist against the side of my knee. “He’ll adore you. Who wouldn’t?” Deacon’s voice fell lower, and I looked up from the spot on my knee where he’d touched me, the tingles still radiating up my leg. “But if he steps out of line, Gus and I will come for him.”
I giggled and knocked my fist against his knee. “Sounds good.” Behind us, Gus snored loudly and let out a little bark. “But I think you’re going to be doing the heavy lifting.”
Deacon chuckled and reached back to scratch Gus behind the ears.
The movement pushed him farther from me, and I pulled my hand back to myself.
“Thanks for hanging out with me,” I said.
I’d genuinely felt bad he’d canceled plans for me, but knowing he’d do that, knowing I ranked high enough on his list of people to duck out of a date made me feel warm all over.
I pushed some curls off my forehead, still not used to the shorter length.
It would be so easy to sink into a crush on Deacon, so it was good I had a date the next day.
“I won’t keep you from meeting with your Red Delicious something special tomorrow night. I promise.”
He chuckled, but not as enthusiastically as usual, and looked down at Gus. “I’m happy where I am.” His chocolate-colored eyes caught mine for a moment. “This is plenty special.”