Home for a Soldier (2 page)

The air left her lungs with a whoosh
as she slammed against his solid chest. His arms curled like a cage around her.
The world tilted and spun. With rowdy yells of victory, the entire platoon
trooped to the exit.

Grace stared at the face that hovered
above hers. The man had turned to talk to someone behind him, so she could see
little but the curve of a high cheekbone and a sliver of tanned skin. Faded to
gold at the top, his coppery hair hung too long for army regulations. He
stumbled, almost fell, but several of his buddies rushed up to steady him.

“Let me down,” Grace cried. “You can
barely stand up, let alone carry me.”

The coppery giant lowered his gaze to
her, and her heart must have stopped beating. There was no other explanation to
the kick that crashed inside her ribcage. Instead of the blue or green she would
have expected, Rory Sullivan’s eyes were so dark the pupils appeared to blend
seamlessly with the iris, and the heat in his gaze seared her skin.

“You little blackmailing bitch,” he
slurred. “I’ll let you down when I’m good and ready.”

A surge of anger jolted Grace from
the trance she’d tumbled into. She clenched her hands into fists and pounded at
his shoulders. “I’m not little, and I didn’t blackmail you. I made you a
take-it-or-leave-it offer.” She struggled against his hold, trying to break
free. “Let me down.”

The arms around her tightened, until
she felt like a cardboard box caught in a compactor. “Settle down,” Rory
grunted. “Mosquitoes bite harder than you hit. You’ll hurt your hands”

Grace tucked her fists under her
chin. How had he guessed? The force of the blows smarted on her fingers. It had
been like pounding at a rock. She sank in the cradle of Rory’s arms, trying to
reduce the jolts and bounces of his uneven gait, while at the same time avoiding
the sharp edges of the cardboard sign with her name on it.

As she glanced around, Grace spotted
an amused teenager in a miniskirt using her cell phone to take a photograph of
their motley procession. She turned to hide her face against Rory’s chest, so
she wouldn’t be recognized if the photo ended up on someone’s internet blog.

A big mistake.
A heady mix of sweat and male teased her nostrils, and the crisp hairs that
peppered Rory’s skin tickled her cheek. She could barely resist the temptation
to lean forward, part her lips and press a kiss on his taut muscles to discover
what he tasted like.

Then the world lurched again, and the
ground rose to meet her feet as Rory swung her down. Dazed, Grace clung to his
arm in an effort to remain upright. In front of her, two more men in jeans and
tattered T-shirts screeched up in a pair of identical olive green jeeps. 

“In you go,” Rory drawled. He picked
her up, tossed her on the back seat, and climbed in to sit beside the driver.
The rest of the entourage scrambled aboard, like ants conquering a hill. The
last stragglers stood up at the back, their feet wedged between Grace and the
two drunken louts who bracketed her like a pair of bookends.

To a chorus of riotous cheers, the
jeeps took off.

Grace leaned forward and dug her
fingers into the shoulder of the man at the wheel. “Excuse me, how many is this
vehicle registered for?” she shouted.

The black crew cut tilted toward her.
“Whaddaya say, sugar?”

“I’m sure it’s illegal to carry so
many people in this vehicle!”

“Illegal?” He glanced at her through
the rear view mirror and shrugged his shoulders. “Al and Tyrone!” he yelled.
“I’m gonna pull over. You need to get out.”

“Why?” yelled the man standing on her
right, who banged her ribs with his knee.

“What the fuck?” shouted the man to
her left, whose sneaker smeared dirt on her thigh.

“The bride thinks her transport is
too crowded. You can take a cab,” the man at the wheel yelled and started to
slow down.

Muttered curses and hostile glances
bombarded her. Grace shrank back in the seat. “They. Can. Stay.” She choked out
the words through clenched teeth. Shouts of approval whipped in the air around
her, but they didn’t ease her sense of impending doom.

With a growl of frustration, she
closed her eyes. Maybe when she opened them again, she’d wake up in her own bed,
instead of this nightmare.

* * * *

The alcoholic haze inside Rory’s head
soared to new heights as the jeeps rattled from the airport toward town. It felt
as if he had just lost something, something important, something he couldn’t do
without.

“Did I drop something?” he grunted to
Joe beside him. “It feels like I’m missing something.”

Joe roared with laughter. “Your
bride, you dumbass. You didn’t lose her. She’s on the back seat.”

In a careless swing that nearly sent
him toppling over, Rory whirled around.
There, on the back seat.
A tall
slim girl, with a serious face, framed by straight sandy hair in a blunt cut
that skimmed her shoulders. Her brows drew together, and her pretty mouth
clamped into an angry line as she glared at him.

The sensations flooded back. Just a
moment ago, he’d cradled her in his arms. Her tight little body had squirmed
against his as she tried to beat him with her dainty fists. One corner of his
mouth kicked up in a smile. It had felt good, holding her. What a pity she
seemed the sort of female who didn’t need a man to carry her, but preferred to
march through life on her own two feet.

“Grace,” he muttered. “Grace
Clements.”

“That’s right. Should be easy to
remember.” She pointed to his front.

“What?” He dipped his chin to follow
the direction of her finger. A cardboard sign bounced against his bare chest,
flapping in the breeze that swept through the jeep. As he deciphered the
upside-down name and saw the pair of red hearts that flanked the text, a shout
of laughter burst from his throat. He turned back to grin over his shoulder.

Grace looked as if she wanted to
throttle him.

Rory forced his mind to focus. “It is
customary to have a sign when meeting an unknown person at the airport.” He
pronounced each word carefully, managing not to mangle them.

“Unknown person.” She let out a
dismissive snort and rolled her eyes. “That just about sums it up.”

Looking backward in the vehicle took
a toll on his sense of balance, and Rory faced forward to conquer the nausea.
His stomach had barely settled down when Joe steered to an orderly stop outside
the Court House.

“Why are we stopping?” Rory slurred.

“Marriage license.” Joe jumped out,
and discreetly made sure Rory didn’t fall on his face when scaling down from the
jeep.

Thank God for Joe and Karim and the
rest of his buddies, Rory thought as he scrambled to the ground. They would
ensure he wouldn’t screw up, behave like an asshole and frighten Grace away.

As he glanced over his shoulder, he
saw Al and Tyrone helping her down. Instinctively, his eyes flicked to check the
position of their hands on her. Grace might be a stranger, but soon she would be
his wife, and proprietary instincts roared to life in his muddled mind.

“You need to fill in a form and sign
it,” he heard Joe tell Grace after they made their disorderly way inside.
Everyone had piled out of the jeeps and followed, as if worried about missing
something of great interest.

“I know,” Grace replied. “Where’s my
tote bag?”

Karim strode forward and handed her a
large putty-colored canvas bag. After thanking him politely, she bent to dig
inside and pulled out a sheet of paper encased in a protective plastic folder.

“Here’s my form. I printed it from
the Internet and filled it in before I left home.”

“Give it to me.” Joe snatched the
plastic folder from her hand.

Grace emitted a startled cry and
glanced around her with such a forlorn expression Rory feared she would burst
into sobs. But instead, her face drew into a sullen pout.

“Where’s your form?” She turned her
attention to him. “The marriage license must be issued twenty-four hours before
the wedding. If you are too drunk to fill in your details, we can’t get married
tomorrow.”

He observed the color that flared on
her cheeks and the misty look in her eyes that hinted at unshed tears. The rigid
set of her shoulders told him she was angry or frightened or both. Shame filled
him over the chaotic welcome they had given her, as well as his own amusement at
her distress.

“It’s okay,” he told her softly,
meaning more than just the form for the marriage license. “I’ve filled in one
too.” He patted his clothing, finally found the crumpled sheet in the back
pocket of his jeans, slipped it out and handed it to Joe.

“Wait.” Grace reached into her
shapeless green jacket and retrieved the metal-rimmed glasses she’d worn at the
airport. After propping them on her nose, she dug in her tote bag once more and
produced another plastic folder. “I’ve drawn up a simple agreement for us to
sign.”

“An agreement?” Rory drawled.

“Yes.” An earnest expression eased
the tension on her face. “Something to list the obligations of both parties, and
make sure there are no misunderstandings.”

Anger penetrated his drunken haze.
“What obligations?”

“Well.” She fingered the edge of the
plastic folder in a manner which revealed that she sensed his displeasure but
wasn’t willing to back down. “You’ll pay the rent, and give me the family
allowance. And you won’t try to get access to the apartment without prior
written notice. And—”

“Grace,” he cut in. “Aren’t you
forgetting something?”

“What?” She jerked her gaze to him,
and then quickly reached up to swipe the glasses from her nose.

“That we’re getting married. Not
forming a business partnership, or starting a company.”

She fiddled with her glasses, folding
the frame closed and open. “I regard this as a business transaction.”

He ran his gaze from the top of her
shiny hair to the scuffed toes of her sneakers, and something in his loins
stirred in disagreement. Uncomfortable, and in one instant feeling relatively
sober, Rory shifted on his feet to hide his physical reaction.

“No, Grace. This is a marriage,” he
told her. “A marriage is a union between two people based on mutual trust. You
have promised to marry me tomorrow and divorce me when I ask you to. I have
promised to let you live in my apartment and pass on to you any financial
benefits I gain from my married status.”

He paused, studied her, saw the
resigned acceptance in her eyes. Without that slight flicker of defeat, Rory
wondered if he would have dared to make his ultimatum. “If you’re not willing to
trust the promise I’ve made you, I’ll release you from yours.”

In silence, Grace gave him a single
nod.

“There’s a trashcan. He pointed to a
corner. That’s where your agreement belongs.”

“No.” She shielded the plastic folder
protectively against her breasts. “I want to shred it. You must always shred
documents with personal information on them.”

“Boys.” He nodded to Tyrone, who
gently forced Grace to release her grip on the folder. After pulling out the
printed sheets, Tyrone handed them out, and Rory waited while five soldiers
filled the room with muffled sounds of tearing paper as they performed the role
of a human shredder for the benefit of his bride.

“Is that good enough?” he asked when
the tiny scraps of paper had been buried in the trashcan.

Grace offered him another wordless
nod.

“Okay.” Rory ushered her down the
hall. “Let’s go and get a marriage license.”

His mouth curved with amusement at
Grace’s stricken expression when her form left the shelter of its pristine
plastic folder to be joined with his crumpled one.

And yet, satisfaction soared inside
him, mixing with the drunken bafflement of what had taken hold of him.
Grace
trusted his promise.
She would marry him. From tomorrow, they would be
joined by the laws of God and man.

* * * *

Grace clung to the seatback in front
of her as the jeeps roared up to a building with a low central section flanked
by two soaring towers. A row of white flags with
Hotel Palazzo
in gold
letters flapped from poles along the circular driveway, where they pulled to a
stop between a gushing fountain and the canopied entrance lined with marble
columns that gleamed in the sun.

Rory leaped out from the front seat.
Relieved, Grace decided he appeared a little steadier on his feet. Before she
understood his intention, he reached up to her, wound one arm around her waist,
and hoisted her down. The length of her body molded against his. The sun that
had bothered her during the drive faded in comparison to the heat that enveloped
her now.

Someone tossed out her bags.
Helpless, Grace swayed with the motion as Rory craned forward and snagged the
handle of the overnight case without easing his grip around her midriff. Her
canvas tote sailed through the air. With a cry of alarm, Grace lunged forward.
Rory’s arm dug like a steel barrier into her abdomen as she reached out to catch
the bundle before it landed on the pavement and spilled the contents for the
world to see.