The operation orders had called for the insertions of four SEALs and a seven-mile hump to the caves. Marine security covered their right and left flanks, watching for enemy snipers hiding in the cracks and crevasses. The assault took longer than expected because of the rough terrain and heat. They’d paused halfway to strip off the jackets they’d worn for the flight in, but that still left him packing water, MREs, H-gear, assorted weaponry, body armor, and ballistics helmet.
The first thing they’d noticed as they’d neared the objective was that the bombs the flyboys had dropped earlier to soften the area missed about eighty percent of their targets. The platoon patrolled up to the entrance and entered the caves like they would a house or ship. The lights on their weapons faded in the deep caverns.
“ ‘Little surprises around every corner,’ ” Wilson said as they rounded the mouth of one cave. Before anyone asked, he added, “Willy Wonka. The original movie. Not the fucked-up Johnny Depp remake.”
“Shit on rye. That’s an ass-load of Gobstoppers.” Vince shone the light from his weapon on boxes of Stingers. “Looks like someone planned on playing war with us.”
Wilson laughed. That deep staccato
Vince set the sledgehammer on Luraleen’s old desk, which he decided to keep for old times’ sake, and grabbed pieces of busted-up wood and counter. Thinking about Wilson usually made him smile. Dreaming about him made him shake like a baby and run into walls.
He walked out of the office and through the back door he’d left wedged open with a brick earlier. He moved a few feet to a Dumpster and tossed the debris inside. He figured it would take a week or two to finish demolition and another three or four to renovate.
The fading evening sun lowered in the cloudless Texas sky as a red Volkswagen pulled to a stop in the back. A trickle of sweat slid down his temple and he lifted his arm and wiped at it with his shoulder. Becca cut the engine of the Bug and waved through the windshield at Vince.
“Sweet baby Jesus save me.” For some inexplicable reason, she still stopped by on her way home a few times a week. He’d never done anything to encourage the “friendship.”
“Hi, Vince,” she called out as she walked toward him.
“Hey, Becca.” He turned toward the building, then stopped and looked back. “You cut your hair.”
“One of the girls did it at school.”
He pointed to the left side. “It looks longer on one side.”
“It’s supposed to.” She ran her fingers through it. “Do you like it?”
He supposed he could lie, but that just might encourage her to stick around. “No.”
Instead of getting all upset and leaving, she smiled. “That’s what I like about you, Vince. You don’t sugarcoat things.”
There was a reason. Sugarcoating encouraged relationships he didn’t want. “You’re not pissed about that hair?” The women he’d known would have freaked.
“No. I’ll get it fixed tomorrow. Do you need your hair cut? I’m getting pretty good with the clippers.”
Again she laughed. “I’d use a number two on you ’cause you look like you like it high and tight.”
He thought of Sadie, and not for the first time since he’d left her house. He’d thought of her several times a day since then. If there’d been anything going on beyond mindless demo work, he might be worried about how much he thought about her.
“I need your advice on something.”
“Me? Why?” He’d given his sister advice but she’d never listened to him. Becca wasn’t even related, so why should he suffer?
She put her hand on his forearm. “Because I care about you, and I think you care about me. I trust you.”
Oh no. A bad feeling pinched the back of his neck. This was one of those times that called for finesse and a precision extraction. “Becca, I’m thirty-six.” Much too old for her.
“Oh, I thought you were older.”
Older? What? He didn’t look old.
“And if my dad was still alive, I think he’d listen to me like you do. I think he’d give me good advice like you do.”
“You think of me like your . . .
She looked at him and her eyes rounded. “No. No, Vince. More like an older brother. Yeah, an older brother.”
Sure. The only time he felt old was when the cold settled in his bones and cramped his hands. There’d been a time when the cold hadn’t bothered him much, but he certainly wasn’t
Behind Becca’s Bug, Sadie’s Saab rolled to a stop, and he forgot about being Becca’s dad. Her running lights shut off and the door swung open. The orange sun shot golden sparks off her sunglasses and hair. She was all golden and shiny and beautiful.
“I stopped to get some super unleaded. What’s up?” she asked.
“I’m closed for a while.”
She shut the car door and moved toward him, the smooth walk she’d learned in charm school with a slight bounce to her step and breasts. A smile tilting the corners of her mouth. The mouth she’d used on him a few nights ago. A hot, wet mouth he wouldn’t mind her using again. She wore a white dress he’d seen on her before. One he wouldn’t mind taking off her.
“Hi, Becca.”
“Hey, Sadie Jo.”
The two gave each other hugs like the true Texans that they were. “Your hair looks good,” Becca said as she pulled back.
“Thanks. I just got the roots touched up today.” Sadie ran her gaze over Becca’s hair. “Your hair is . . . darling.” She glanced at Vince. “Short and long at the same time. Very clever.”
“Thanks. I’m in beauty school and we practice on each other. When I get better, you should let me color your hair.”
Since Sadie wouldn’t be around when that happened she said, “Fabulous.”
Becca dug her keys out of her pocket and looked at Vince. “I’ll stop by tomorrow and say hey.”
“Fabulous.”
Sadie turned and watched Becca scoot into her Volkswagen and drive away. “How often does she stop by to say ‘hey’?”
“A couple times a week on her way home from school.”
“Well, that haircut is just tragic.” She looked up at Vince through her sunglasses. “I think Becca has a crush on you.”
“No. She doesn’t.”
“Yes. She does.”
“No, really. Just take it from me.”
“As we say in Texas, ‘She’s sweet on you.’ ”
He shook his head. “She looks at me like I’m her . . .” He paused as if he couldn’t bring himself to finish.
“Brother?”
“Dad.”
“Seriously?” For several stunned seconds she simply stared at him, then her laughter started as a low chuckle. “That is hysterical.” As if to prove the point, her chuckle turned into a full-blown laugh fest.
“It’s not that funny.” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his cargo pants. “I’m only thirty-six. Hardly old enough to have a twenty-one-year-old daughter.”
She clapped a hand to her chest and took a deep breath. “Technically it’s possible, old man,” she managed before she burst out all over again.
“You about done?”
She shook her head.
He frowned to keep from smiling and gave her his dagger stare. The one used to incite fear in the hearts and heads of hardened jihadists. It didn’t work so he kissed her to shut her up. A press of his smiling lips to quiet her
