Page 28 of Rescuing Mary

“You might as well divorce Mary the second you get back then,” Beatle said. “Because there is no such thing as a Disney relationship.”

Truck looked at his friend in surprise. “Don’t tell me that Casey doesn’t love you more than anything.”

“Oh, she does. But there are plenty of times when she’s not happy to see me at the end of the day. She’s tired and cranky from teaching and driving all the way back home from Baylor. I’d move in a heartbeat, so she could be closer to work, but you know as well as I do that I can’t. I have to be near the post in case we get called up for a last-second mission. And there are plenty of nights when I go to bed, ready to love my woman, and find her dead to the world or she tells me she’s just not in the mood. Relationships are messy, Truck. You might see me and Casey holding hands and smiling at each other in public, but you don’t see the times we fight or when she refuses to get anywhere near me. When I’m so tired from work all I want to do is sit and watch football on television, and she tries to talk to me and I snap at her to leave me alone.”

Truck stared at Beatle with wide eyes. “You two having trouble?” he asked.

Beatle blew out a silent breath of frustration. “No. You’re missing the point.”

“Then make it clearer, asshole,” Truck huffed.

“Being with someone you love means you deal with the shit as well as the roses.”

“I think I’ve dealt with more than my fair share of Mary’s shit,” Truck told his friend.

“Yeah, Mary having cancer sucks, but just because she’s better doesn’t mean that everything is going to come up roses from here on out. How does she feel about her diagnosis? Is she scared it’s going to come back? Does she have other side effects from the disease or drugs that are making her irritable? She had a mastectomy, right? How does that make you feel? How does she feel about it? Does she have to wear different clothes now?”

Truck was silent for a beat, then admitted, “I don’t know. We don’t exactly talk about that stuff.”

“Communication is key,” Beatle said. “I screwed up when Casey first moved in. I didn’t ask her how she was feeling about a lot of stuff. Her new job, leaving Florida, if she had any residual fears from her LSD trip…I just assumed she’d talk to me about that stuff if it was bothering her. Turns out, she thought I wasn’t asking because I didn’t care.”

“I care,” Truck said immediately. “I want to know everything about Mary. About her childhood—which I know was shitty—about her job, about how she’s feeling. I love her.”

Beatle leaned in closer and hissed, “Then talk to her, man. If she won’t touch you, you reach out to her. Tell her how much you love the feel of her hand in yours. Tell her when you’re feeling vulnerable about your scar. Remind her that you chose to be with her over every other woman.”

Truck thought about Beatle’s words for a long moment and realized he was right. He’d been afraid to talk to Mary, really talk to her, because he didn’t want to hear her say that she wanted a divorce. That since she was better, she didn’t need to be married to him anymore. But maybe she was waiting for him to make the first move. That made more sense. As much as she was brash and bold, she wasn’t all that confident when it came to relationships. He knew it was because of how she was brought up, but he hadn’t ever come out and asked her point-blank about it.

She needed reassuring as much as he did. And the second he got back to Texas, he was going to be a different kind of man for her. He wouldn’t force her to talk to him, but he was going to make sure she knew how much he loved her, and that he was there to talk whenever she needed it. He’d open up to her about his own life, his own feelings. Not about her—although he was going to make sure a day never went by without him telling her how important she was to him—but how he felt about work, his family, their friends…everything.

“Thanks,” Truck said softly.

“You’re welcome,” Beatle responded, then picked up his binoculars and gazed down on the rebel camp.

“Moving in sixty seconds,” Ghost’s voice said through their earbuds.

“You ready to kick some ass?” Beatle asked as he grinned over at Truck.

“More than,” Truck responded. “Those fuckers are as good as dead.”

“Damn straight,” Beatle said.

The two men shifted and got into position. Their job was to attack from the back side of the chow tent. Twenty or so of the rebels were inside eating lunch. If they could take them out, it would cut the number of rebels in half, making the rest less likely to turn on the girls and more likely to flee for their lives.

Beatle and Truck heard Ghost counting down from ten in their ears, and at the word Go, all hell broke loose.

Time had no meaning in the middle of battle. If asked, Truck would be hard pressed to say if minutes went by or seconds. He focused entirely on the task at hand and everything else faded into the background. He focused on covering his teammates and getting the job done. Truck didn’t know how many rebels he’d taken out once the shooting started, but ultimately, it didn’t matter. He lost track of Beatle in the chaos of battle, but knew the man was to his right somewhere. The air was full of smoke and the smell of gunpowder, and he could hear yelling outside the tent, but he didn’t take his concentration from the men hiding behind overturned tables. Every time a head popped up from behind a table to try to shoot at them, Truck fired.

He heard a yell from his left and turned to aim in that direction, then hesitated for a split second—because he wasn’t expecting to see what he did.

One of the rebels hadn’t just popped up from behind a table to shoot at him. No. He’d leaped over it and was running toward him as fast as he could.

Truck squeezed the trigger of his weapon, taking the man down, but not before he’d gotten way too close for comfort.

The man went down on his knees and swayed. His hate-filled eyes met Truck’s for a split second—and then he grinned. An evil, nasty grin that made the hair on the back of Truck’s neck stand up. He raised his weapon to fire again…and noticed too late what the man held in his hands.

Grenades. Two of them. And the pins were nowhere to be seen.

Truck had enough time to yell “Gre—” but before he could finish the warning, the chow tent exploded in a shower of body parts, wooden table pieces, and metal.