Unlikely Lovers (14 page)

“That’s it, baby, beg. I always loved it when you begged for it.”

“But I do love you,” she cried as tears began to roll down her cheeks. “Beg, Jessie…tell me again how much you want me. You love making love with me, you don’t love me. Tell me the truth for once in your life.”

“Cody, don’t be so crude
, you know that’s not true.”

“Why not, baby, isn’t that what boy toys do? Give you hot, nasty sex. I bet your buddy in uniform can’t give you what I can, now can he?

“No, Cody, he can’t,” she replied, trying to hold back her tears.

“That’s right, baby, and don’t
you ever forget that. I told you you were mine forever. I meant that. You’ll never forget our nights together. They’ll haunt you forever.”

She began to cry
in earnest then.

When he saw
her tears, he got up and with horror etched on his face stood back. “I’m sorry, Jessie, if there’s one thing I won’t do it’s force a woman to have sex. I lost control and it won’t happen again.”

She begged him to
make love to her one last time. He looked deeply into her eyes and then quietly obliged her. In a heart wrenching fury, he made love to her as he’d never done before and when he finished, he got up and dressed. He picked up his bag and turned to go.

“Where
are you going?” she asked from the bed, the tears flowing again.

“Where the hell do you think I’m going? Away from you, and by the way I know you got off on that little display that just took place on the bed, which proves my point. You’re in it for the
sex and you like it rough. Wish I’d known that sooner…we could have had some really good times together.”

“Cody, don’t leave me.”

“You’re capable of driving yourself home. Keep the room, go home in the morning. Oh, and keep the key to my apartment. You never know when you might get the itch and need a good lay. I’ll be available for stud service.”

“Cody,
don’t say that. I love you. I want to marry you. I was going to tell you everything tonight.  Wait…” But it was too late, he was already gone with a slam of the door. She collapsed on the bed in a torrent of tears.

“I’ve lost Cody,” she
repeated over and over as she tried to sleep. But sleep wouldn’t come.

He looked out the window, bleary-eyed from
his tears.

“Damn. I shouldn’t have left her there alone,” he
said sadly. “I should go back and apologize for my behavior. Then we’ll go our separate ways.”

He grabbed his keys and looked in his wallet. The room key card was still in there. He’d left in such a hurry he hadn’t left it at the desk. He jumped in his truck and drove back to the hotel, quietly slipping into the room.
Jessica was asleep, huddled in a little ball in the big bed. He quietly took off his shoes and climbed under the covers, pulling her close. It was almost dawn.

She rolled over and opened her eyes
to stare at him through red-rimmed eyes.

Finally, he broke the silence. “I came back to make sure
you’re all right, Jessie. I shouldn’t have left you here alone. And I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry for the way I acted earlier. I was very angry. I shouldn’t have acted the way I did. I would never do anything to hurt you, please know that.”

“You had your reasons.” She looked into his eyes with a sadness that broke his heart.

“We need to go our separate ways after we leave here, you know that, Jessie? I don’t think we can be together.” It broke his heart to say it, but he knew it was the only way.

She looked away, trying to stop the tears from flowing again. Finally, she said, “If that’s what you want, I have no choice.”

He pulled her to him and held her close one last time. “Baby, it should have been different for us, but too many hurtful things have been said and done.”

“Will you ever forgive me?”

He didn’t answer, only continued to hold her. Finally, he got up. “I have to go.”

Pride kept him from telling her he still wanted her.
What’s the use? She’ll be leaving soon anyway.

She dressed, threw her things in her bag and
he watched as the only woman he had ever loved drove out of his life. Then he drove home, opened another Bud, then another, and kept it up until he drank himself into oblivion.

Cody went to work on Monday but was in such a foul mood all day Andy finally asked him what was the matter.

“You don’t even want to know. Jessie and I won’t be getting married, after all
,” Cody told him sadly.

“What happened?” Andy asked.

“Let’s just say, we’re both at fault. She failed to tell me some things. I found out in a bad way and I reacted in a way that I’m very ashamed of. So it’s better for us to be apart. Too much damage has been done.” Cody looked away.

“Cody, did you hurt her?” Andy
accused.

“I’
m afraid I did,” Cody answered quietly, still ashamed of what he’d done.

“Is she
all right?” Andy demanded.

“Physically, yes. Emotionally, she is a wreck.”

“I’m sorry. Maybe with time?”

“I don’t know, Andy.
I just don’t know.”

From that point on, most of Cody’s nights and weekends consisted of drinking alone at home until he was too plastered to care that when he finally stumbled to his bed
Jessie was not in it.

****

Jessica went back to work the following week, but wasn’t eating. She just couldn’t seem to choke down food these days, it seemed to catch in her throat. She was living on coffee and cigarettes. She hadn’t smoked since her tour in Iraq, but suddenly it seemed to be the thing to do to relieve her stress. Her time at home when she wasn’t at work was spent in her lonely bed, depressed. She was losing weight and Karen was growing increasingly concerned. She sent an urgent text message to Missy and told her what was happening.

The next thing she knew her phone was ringing.

“Missy, I don’t want to talk.” Jessica told her sadly.

“Not even to me, sweetie
? Please, let me help,” Missy begged.

“Go ahead and say I told you so.”

“No, Jess, I won’t say that. What happened that night? Can you talk about it? Andy said Cody found out before you got a chance to tell him but he didn’t know the particulars.”

“Dan happened.”

“Dan? How in the world did he get involved? And after all this time, I don’t understand.”

“He came to our table in the dining room of the hotel and said horrible, disgusting things about me and Cody and he
addressed me as Major Walsh. He told me I was slumming with Cody, insinuated he was my boy toy. He told me he’d get even with me for not marrying him that day in my office and he certainly did. He ruined my life, Missy. And the ironic thing was I was planning to tell Cody, really and truly finally tell him everything that night. And he was going to ask me to marry him.”

“You know about that?” Missy asked. “He told Andy he was going to ask you.”

“He told me during his fit of anger. I tried to tell him I would marry him, but he was livid.”

“My God, are you al
l right?”

“I’m fine
. We did make love but it was bittersweet. He was angry and I begged him for it. It was not pretty, Missy.”

“Stop it, you begged because you love the man and you didn’t want to lose
him.”

“He said terrible, dirty, nasty things to me. I tried to tell him to stop, but he said he knew I loved it…that’s what boy toys do and he was nothing more than my boy toy.”

“He was angry. He didn’t mean it.”

“He walked out, but he came back later and apologized and walked me to my car then he said we had to go our separate ways. He said too much had happened.”

“Give it time, honey. He may come around.”

“I don’t have much time to give it. We both know I could get my orders any day. Then I’ll move away and never see him again. That’s Army life. I knew it when I signed up.
I just never thought it would cause my life to become so complicated.”

“And if you do
get your orders you know what you have to do. You can’t let it end like this. You can always ask him to go with you.”

“Not now, there’s no chance of that.
I’m going to hang up, Missy. It upsets me to talk about it.”

“Take care of yourself. You’re no good to anybody if you make yourself sick.”

“We’ll talk again, when it’s not so fresh and raw for me,” Jessica promised.

“Call me anytime. I mean it. I wish I could be there for you. And for God’s sake, eat something. Karen told me
you’re a walking skeleton.”

“Thank you. And leave it to Karen to exaggerate the situation. ”

“I somehow doubt she was exaggerating much.”

Jessica began to eat again, but was still extremely depressed. She stayed home except
when she was on duty and she put all of her energies into her work, poring over her newest assignment with as much enthusiasm as she could muster under the circumstances.

It had apparently worked for her, because she was notified a few months later her commission to Lieutenant Colonel had been approved.

One Friday evening, she forced herself to go to the mall to do some much needed shopping. She was hurrying to get done so she could return to the safe haven of her apartment when she almost bumped head on into Andy. He was coming out of Old Navy just as she was about to enter.

“Hi, Andy, how was your trip to Kansas?”
she asked, knowing that he’d been to visit Missy recently.

“It was great. Best two weeks of my life, Jess
,” he answered happily then looked at her with concern in his eyes.

“Any luck finding work?” Jessica asked to be polite.

“As a matter of fact, I have an interview next week.”

“I talk to Missy now and again, but I haven’t been very talkative lately, so I hadn’t heard that latest development.”

“She misses you, Jess. She’s worried about you, you know.”

“I’ll be okay. Tell her to concentrate on her life with you. At least one of our relationships worked out. Who would have ever thought it
would’ve been the two of you and not Cody and me, though?”

“Jess, you really need to go see him. He’s drinking way too much. I worry about him. I
’ll be leaving to join Missy as soon as I find work, so he’ll be alone. I won’t be here to keep tabs on him.”

“I had no idea. I haven’t talked to him since the morning we said our goodbyes. I’ve been afraid to call him.”

“He loves you, Jess.”

“But he can’t forgive me,” she replied softly.

“I think it’s more a matter of forgiving himself. He knows he acted badly that night. He thinks you’re better off without him.”

“I still have a key to his place. During his ranting and raving that night, he told me to keep it and I never gav
e it back. Maybe I’ll stop by,” she said thoughtfully.

“You realize he told you to keep it because it was a way to keep the door open, don’t you?”

“I don’t know if we’re salvageable, Andy. It’s been so long and we’ve not talked at all.”

“Try, Jess. It’s all you can do. You’ll never forgive yourself if you don’t. I know you still care about him.”

“I will, Andy, and yes I do still care. Thanks for the info.”

She left the mall without making her last purchase and drove straight to Cody’s apartment. She pulled into the driveway, saw
his truck and got out. She practically ran to the door and bravely rang the doorbell. She took a deep breath. No answer. She rang it again and was just about to use her key when he answered.

Andy had been telling the truth.
Cody looked like the living dead and it was evident he’d been drinking.

“Well, well, well, look what the wind just blew in. Finally get that itch, Jessie? Need your boy toy?”

Jessica shuddered.
He isn’t going to make this easy.
“May I come in?”

He stepped aside. “Come on in, pretty lady.”

Even looking as bad as he did, unshaven and obviously drunk, the mere proximity of him sent familiar ripples of desire racing through her body.

“You’ve been drinking.”

“What are you now, my mommy? Oh, excuse me, I forgot, my commanding officer.” He sneered at her, mocking her with a salute.

She knew it was the liquor talking and tried to remain calm. “Cody, stop it.”

“Now, baby, those are three little words I never heard from you, along with a few others.” He glared into her eyes with his chocolate ones.

“I did say the three little words you wanted to hear, Cody. You just wouldn’t listen.”

“As I recall, there were a lot of things you failed to say to me.” He went on as he continued to glare at her. “You here for stud service? It took you longer than I thought it would, but I knew you couldn’t go without your boy toy forever. Maybe you’ve been getting it from that fancy officer friend of yours to tide you over. Couldn’t measure up to my loving, though, could he, baby? And we both know how much you like that.”