21 Marine Salute: 21 Always a Marine Tales (122 page)

“Okay, so your girl was pregnant, you asked her to marry you, she said no. And?” Really, the story could have ended there, but it didn’t.

“She wanted to put the baby up for adoption.” Damn, if that didn’t still claw at his insides. “I argued against it. We have big families, strong ties in the community, and if we got married, I could provide for her and the child.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw skepticism on Zach’s face, though the man said nothing.

“I get it. Next to nothing income and deployment coming, but we could have made it work.” Want something bad enough, and ways to make it happen could be found. He believed it to his bones, and maybe so had Zehava. She hadn’t wanted that life enough—not the uncertainty, the shitty pay, the lengthy separations—none of it.

“Did she?” Zach asked after Isaac went silent.

“She did.” She’d offered him a picture of the baby once, and he’d turned it down flat. The day the paperwork arrived for his signature, he’d been tempted to ignore it and see how far she got if he did nothing at all. “I’d been in Iraq—two, maybe three months—when she gave birth. I found out about a week after the fact when the adoption paperwork arrived for my signature. Turns out for her to do everything, she needed my legal consent.”

“You gave it.” Not a question.

“Yeah, I gave it. She wanted it, and I was eight thousand miles away. Not a hell of a lot else I could do.”

“That’s the pussy response.” The harsh words turned Isaac around, and Zach met his stare, hard and unyielding. “You signed the papers because you knew it was the right thing to do. You’re not a stupid guy, Isaac. You’re not a jackass, either. She didn’t want to marry you, she wanted something good for the kid, and you were too far away to do anything about anything, so you gave your consent.”

“How the hell do you know?” Isaac scowled.

“Like I said, you have a crap poker face.” Zach leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his hands resting loosely between his legs. “So what’s the problem?”

“She gave our son up for adoption, and the first time I see her, it kicks me square in the gut. I hate her.”

Zach shook his head. “That’s not it.”

Isaac glared at his friend. “Seriously, that’s what you have for me?”

“Well, if you want to shovel that bullshit for yourself, go ahead. But you don’t hate her. All right, look….” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You know Logan and I got married.”

Isaac blinked. “What?”

Zach grinned, lightning fast and amused. “Not to each other—to Jazz. Our girl.”

“Wait, what?” He couldn’t wrap his mind around it. He’d heard a rumor and dismissed it, because what guy shares his girl?

“That part isn’t important.” Zach waved it aside, laughing. “What’s important is she’s a stubborn Marine herself. Logan and Jazz are probably two of the hardest, most boneheaded Marines I’ve ever met. Makes it damn hard to win an argument, so you gotta be patient. You gotta let the tempers cool and wait for reason to return. When that happens, you see the bigger picture. You’re pissed right now. You’re pissed at her. You’re pissed at you. I get it—you’re
pissed
. But you don’t hate her, you hate how you feel about her, because you think you shouldn’t still care and you do. A tough nut to crack.”

Isaac had locked on the shared marriage concept, and it took a moment for the rest of his words to sink in. “She gave up our
kid
.”

“Yeah, but no.”

He would regret asking this, he knew it. “Why
yeah, but no
?”

Clapping a hand on his shoulder, Zach gave him a quick shake. “You signed the papers, man. At the end of the day, you’re angry because you couldn’t see an alternative to her plan. She didn’t give up your kid. Adoption isn’t surrender. It’s putting your kid before yourself.”

“So you’re basically saying I’m being a dick.”

“More or less.” Zach gave his shoulder another squeeze. “I need coffee. Great place around the corner, and we can walk for it. You in?”

The man was halfway down to the field and Isaac chewed on that thought. “Hey, Zach?”

“Yeah?”

“You realize that’s pretty fucked up. You and Logan being married to the same lady?”

The man grinned. “It’s our kind of fucked up. You gonna have a problem with that?” Despite the easy smile and general cheer, Zach dared him to make something of it.

“Not really any of my damn business.” Isaac rose and started down the steps. “But it’s fucked up.”

“Fair enough. Say that to my wife and you’ll be picking up the pieces of your jaw. Got it?” The lighthearted tone enveloped the steel core of the threat.

“I’m a dick, not an idiot.”

The old Zach returned, easygoing and affable. “Good to know. Now, coffee, then I’ll give you the nickel tour and introduce you to the captain. He offers everyone a job, so start thinking about how you want to turn it down if you’re not interested….”

“He did
not
say that to you.” Shannon Fabray stood in the center of the community center’s art room, hands on her hips. Zehava hadn’t meant to confess, but the sculptor was an old friend and a wildly popular guest teacher at the center.

“In all fairness—”

“Screw fairness.” Shannon had stopped by to deliver sculpting supplies for the class she planned to teach when Hanukkah passed in the weeks leading up to Christmas. While Zehava appreciated her dedication, Shannon fought to stay busy because the man she waited on had four more months of deployment.

“Shannon….”

“Don’t you
Shannon
me. If Brody heard him say something like that, I’m pretty sure he would have punched him. Hell, I want to punch him. I don’t care who this guy is, Z. He shouldn’t get a free pass to be an—” Shannon paused and scanned the room, even though none of the kids were there yet. “An asshole.”

“Sweetie, we have a history.” Yeah, the excuse sounded weak to Zehava. Hard to explain to someone who hadn’t been there.

“Forgive my choice of words here, but again—screw history. You’re being way too understanding of truly douche-like behavior.” The sculptor flipped open one of the cardboard boxes and began to unload the containers of pottery mix. “In fact, if I had time, I’d march right down to his house and give him a piece of my mind.”

“I’m really glad you don’t.” Picking up a second box, she joined Shannon in the unpacking effort. “Have time, that is. Really, really glad. He’s home for a few days, and it’s the first time in years. He deserves a little understanding.”

Shannon put a hand on hers. “How do you do it? How are you this calm? The man verbally slapped you, so don’t dismiss it or try to dress it up. That’s abuse. It drives me crazy.”

She’d met Shannon during a life study class and discovered a mutual passion for art, but Shannon always retreated from intense social situations and men—definitely men. That had changed a little over a year before when she’d met a Marine named Brody. While she didn’t reveal how they met or anything really of their few days together, she’d been so different since then. She talked about him all the time. For once, Zehava wished she’d change the subject back to her Marine.

Clasping her hand, Zehava gave it a squeeze. “Because I made peace with my decision. I always knew he didn’t like it. He’s been sitting on that anger for a long time, but—” She shook her head when Shannon opened her mouth to interrupt. “But it’s more than that. Our history has some really dark moments in it and some really beautiful ones. My freshman year in high school, a couple of men with guns walked into my family’s store and demanded everything out of the register. My father didn’t challenge them or try to fight, just gave them the money and asked them to go. They shot him anyway.”

Shannon paled and her grip tightened. Tears swam across Zehava’s vision. It didn’t take much to catapult her to those years. “The police came to school. They asked me to step out of class. For some reason, Isaac and I were in the same class that year, I don’t even remember which one. He saw the police in the hall, left his seat, and followed me out. When the police asked me if I knew how to reach my mother, I remember thinking,
she’s at my grandmother’s in Florida
. I didn’t have a cell phone, but I knew the number…. With great regret, they told me what happened.”

Standing in the hallway in front of the lockers and just a few feet away from her classmates, Zehava struggled under the tidal wave of grief threatening to drown her. “Isaac? Just a guy from the neighborhood, the Jankos’ son. I didn’t know him any better or less than any of the other kids, and he put his arm around me and started asking questions, a lot of them. I remember his tense voice, so much deeper than I’d expected. He never let me go. The teachers couldn’t release me because my mother wasn’t there and my older brother had left for his freshman year in college. Isaac called his grandmother, and she came down to the school. They walked me home. Isaac never left. He was my rock.”

Zehava swiped a hand against her cheek and blew out a breath. “What’s funny, is everyone thought we were dating by the end of that year. We weren’t, or maybe we were? Isaac came over for dinner with my mother, kept me studying even when I didn’t care. When I started working at the store after school, so did he. We have history, Shannon. He was—he
is
—my family. Family doesn’t run away when one is angry, they let them be angry.”

“That’s kind of beautiful.” Shannon sniffed once. “Okay, maybe I like him. A little. But I still think he needs to apologize.”

“As it happens, I agree with you.” The warm, masculine baritone washed over her, and Zehava spun. Isaac leaned on the doorjamb to the art room. She hadn’t even heard him come in.

“Well, then….” Shannon blinked and dusted her hands. “I think I’ll go.” She grabbed her purse and gave Zehava a quick hug. “I’m flying to Boston late tomorrow afternoon to get ready for my show. I left you Liam’s number, and you have my cell….”

“Okay.” It happened too fast for Zehava to stop her. Shannon paused at the doorway and eyed Isaac sternly.

“You
will
be nice to her.” The implicit
or else
hung in the air and, to his credit, Isaac didn’t smirk or laugh.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Take care, Shannon!” Zehava called after her. The front door banged a few moments later, leaving Zehava alone with him. “How much of that did you hear?”

“Pretty much all of it,” he admitted, entering the room slowly, hands in his pockets. Dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, he looked like he had in high school—just older and maybe a little more careworn.

Nerves jangling, she returned to finish unpacking the supplies. Better to keep her hands busy, even if she couldn’t stop glancing at him. “It’s rude to eavesdrop.”

“Well, it seems I’ve been delivering my share of rude this week.” Instead of keeping his distance, Isaac picked up a box and carried it over. “Z—”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. I behaved like a jackass.” He didn’t touch her, but fixed her in place with a steady gaze. “A real jackass and you didn’t—and don’t—deserve it. Your friend is right; I owe you an apology. I’m sorry.”

Just like that, he became her Isaac again, the boy who’d held her hand on the worst day of her life. The one who made her smile even when she was sad, who made her feel beautiful when she complained about her too prominent nose or lack of boobs or—worse—the day she realized she’d inherited some of her mother’s features. In his eyes, she’d always been the most beautiful version of herself, and he made her believe it.

If Zehava kicked him to the curb, he wouldn’t be surprised. Yet she did nothing of the kind. Instead, she studied him with gentle, liquid black eyes that saw right down to his soul. “Okay. Those jars need to go on that shelf.”

He glanced down at the grayish powder and shifted to reach the shelf she indicated. “What is this?”

“It’s for pottery. They mix it with water and make stuff.” She grimaced. “It’s for Shannon’s class.” Wrinkling her brow, she stumbled over her words and broke down the box she’d emptied with jerky movements.

The temper he’d chewed on for five days sat like a sour rock in his stomach. “Zehava.”

“I know you have things to do, it’s fine. I need to go check on the snacks for tonight….” Tears glittered in her eyes, and he caught her arm before she could escape. Tentative as hell, he kept his grip light.

“I really am sorry.” He felt like his hat should be in hand. “If anyone else spoke to you like that, I would have kicked the crap out of them. As it is, I think someone should kick me.”

The moment the words left his mouth, he should have expected her reaction, but the dampness in her eyes undid him so he barely saw her foot move before it connected with his shin. He winced at the strike and let go of her arm. A faint smile curved the corners of her mouth. “You’re right. I should have kicked you. Thank you for pointing that out.”

Isaac laughed. “You feel better?”

“I do.”

He finished with the box and collapsed it. “So you think we can start over at the top of this week?”

“How so?” She reached for the third one, but he beat her to the cardboard, emptying it before flattening it like the others. When she would have picked up another, he claimed it and jerked his chin to the door. “Where do you want these?”

“I can do it. Look.” She rounded on him and a spark lit in her eyes. “You don’t have to clean up or help. You apologized, and that was thoughtful. You’re here to see family….”

“I know. And you
are
part of my family.” He raised his eyebrows and waited for her to argue against it. Grateful when she didn’t, he nodded. Hadn’t she said exactly the same thing to her friend? “That’s what I thought. Now, where do you want these? And what else can I do to help?”

Exasperation twisted her smile, and she chuckled. “I keep some for projects in a closet in the hall. If you could stick those there, the rest can go out to the recycle can. I have some other supplies that came in with the mail yesterday. I want to unpack those, too. Then I need to move the Toys for Tots collection box up to the very front.”