GAGE: A Bad Boy Military Romance (11 page)

Ashley’s lips were soft. Her hands tightened against my skin and her body became like fluid as she relaxed.

It took fifteen minutes for the oil to wash off in the shower. The stuff was like superglue. It eventually washed off, but the smell of her perfume never did. It stayed on me, refusing to leave my body, as if had been stained into my brain.

I tried to get a set of weights in, but I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t shake that smell, or the feeling of her lips against mine, or her soft tits pressing up against my chest. After a few reps, I’d lost count of where I was.

“Shit,” I muttered to myself.

It was happening—I was becoming like the rest of them, with nothing but women on my mind, unable to process anything remotely important.

I had to remind myself that Ashley was an actress. She just wanted a fake relationship for the sake of self-promotion. She wasn’t interested in me. She didn’t like me. She’d perfected that kiss over hundreds of photo-shoots and movie-shoots.

I knew it was all a sham. But still, I couldn’t stop thinking about her.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Nancy shook me awake in the early hours of the following morning. She had dark bags under her eyes, and her hair was a mess. It was a frightening sight to wake up to, having never seen Nancy without makeup before, her plastic face was always at least buried beneath a thick layer of concealer.

“You need to get into makeup,” she said, turning to leave the room without telling me why. I thought the same of her.

It turned out, the people over at the Playboy Mansion had been inspired yet again. My viral shoot was still making its rounds on the internet, building momentum and gaining attention. My manager sent a message:

Ashley,

Good news first: they don’t want you to do the nude shoot. They changed their mind.

Now the bad news: They’ve been loving the photos you’re giving them—so keep it up. But they want to do a whole feature on their site, which means more shoots. They want to keep you in Iraq for a few extra days.

Paid, of course.

I tried to get a hold of you yesterday, but I couldn’t get through. So I just told them you would do it. I hope you don’t mind. It’ll be good for exposure. Trust me—the phone’s been ringing off the hook for the past few days.

Oh yeah, one more thing. They asked me if you were okay with guns. I assumed you were, so I told them yes. I hope that’s okay.

Brit Sanders

Morgan & Sanders Talent Agency

They were sending me to the nearby town of Shamiya, which had apparently been used as a hideout for terrorists before they set up the outpost I was staying at. Major Richards told me that they bombed the terrorists out, but he didn’t give me a very clear answer when I asked, “Is it safe?”

“You’ll have three of our best men with you,” he said. “Terrorist activity is rare in this province—very few attacks over the past year.” He never gave me the ‘yes’ I was looking for.

Two of the other girls came along for the trip, as well as Nancy and Vanessa, the Playboy makeup artist. Three of the soldiers and the reporter brought our total up to nine. The five of us girls were given bullet proof vests, much like the one the reporter always had on. The reporter’s vest said ‘PRESS’ on it. Ours said nothing.

Gage drove the Humvee. The town was almost an hour from the outpost, all down a bumpy dirt road. By the end of the drive, I thought I was going to throw up. Had we gone any further, I probably would have.

Gage didn’t speak much during the drive. He kept his head forward, and only answered direct questions with brief answers. Private Miller, one of the other men in the group, made a number of jabs during the drive. “I can’t wait to pick up my copy of Playgirl, Daniels. Will you sign it for me? Think they’re going to airbrush your bulge bigger?” Gage ignored the remarks, keeping his head forward, not responding.

I felt bad, like he was embarrassed and I was responsible—but at the same time, it didn’t seem like he cared. None of his fellow soldiers’ jabs succeeded in drawing even the slightest reaction out of him.

“Better be careful, Miller,” said Darby, a British soldier with a thick accent, “or you’ll end up like Hastings and Lyon. I hear they’re being sent to Baghdad for medical treatment. Gage really fucked them up.”

Shamiya was exactly what I had expected, a small, dusty town with just a few main roads. Each building looked incomplete, as if it should have been empty, but wasn’t. People poked their heads out of the holes where windows were supposed to be, and the openings where doors were supposed to be.

I wasn’t too nervous until a few moments after we parked the Humvee, and no one got out of the car. Gage, up in the driver’s seat, scanned the street but said nothing. The other men just waited, but no one said what we were waiting for. You could feel the tension radiating off of their bodies.

But the streets were mostly empty, except for a few kids kicking a ball back and forth, and a few elderly residents who stood, staring at the Humvee.

“Let’s get this over with,” Miller said. He opened the back door and was the first to step out. He motioned for everyone to follow. Darby got out, then the other girls got out, but I stayed, waiting for Gage to step out first.

“You alright, Miss King?” Darby asked, reaching his hand into the vehicle for me to take.

Gage did another full scan of the horizon and then he stepped out.

“Yeah,” I said, taking his hand and stepping out. I was scared. Anyone in their right mind would have been. The other girls were scared—even the soldiers were scared. But my instincts told me to follow Gage. Near Gage, I felt safe. I had the inexplicable sense that if anything happened, Gage would protect me.

It was an irrational feeling, seeing as I was almost certain Gage didn’t like me, and he didn’t want anything to do with me. But still, every time Gage told me to wait across the street while he went to talk to locals, I instantly felt insecure, vulnerable, like every passer-by was going to attack. But the moment Gage returned, the anxiety dissipated.

Gage and Miller were the ones to go speak with locals. Darby was assigned to me and the other girls. Darby seemed like a nice guy, funny, smart, well-spoken, but every time Gage and Miller splintered off, the anxiety rushed back and I wished that Darby and Gage would swap positions.

I was surprised to hear Miller, a tall, skinny white guy, speak fluent Arabic with the locals.

The reporter took out his camera and asked me to pose. Some of the locals stopped to watch. Gage and Miller disappeared inside of a nearby building.

As the reporter began snapping photos, a man ran out from a nearby shop. He was running straight towards me. Darby turned towards him and threw up the palm of his hand and started yelling, “Stop!” The man did not.

I froze. The other girls froze, too. My brain was screaming at me to run back to the armoured Humvee. But my body was incapable of moving, I was paralyzed.

The man ran past Darby and continued towards me, yelling something in Arabic. I started to stumble backwards, rigor still consuming my body.

Darby raised his rifle and ducked his chin towards his shoulder-strapped walkie-talkie. “Come in, Corporal—come in. We’ve got a possible Alpha Bravo. Doesn’t look armed, but he’s moving in on the BCs, over—cancel that, the Hajji’s got something in his hand!” Darby aimed his weapon and yelled again, “Stop, or I’ll shoot!” He couldn’t shoot. If he shot, the bullet would have ripped right through the attacker and hit me. If Darby shot, the man would have let go of whatever was in his hand—which could set off a suicide vest.

My heart was pounding against my chest. Backing up, my legs began to shake and I fell to the ground. The man stopped over top of me and bent over. He was speaking quickly, and I didn’t understand a single word of what he was saying. His hand was clenched in a fist around a pen-shaped object with a button protruding out the top.

Darby moved in cautiously with his rifle drawn. “Hands up, motherfucker!” The other girls backed away. “Step away from the girl.”

Gage came running out, gun drawn.

Darby was quick to yell, “Don’t shoot. He’s holding a trigger. He might have a vest. Don’t fucking shoot!”

That didn’t stop Gage, who acted fast, grabbing the man from behind and clasping his hand shut on the trigger in his hand, and spinning the man away from me. I wanted to crawl away, but still, I remained frozen.

Gage pinned the attacker to the ground. Miller came running out from the building. He approached the man cautiously, speaking in calm, slow Arabic. Gage’s face was red, using all of his strength to keep the attacker’s hands immobile, so he couldn’t press that button in his hand.

The Iraqi man squirmed and then looked up at Miller and spoke.

“What’s he saying, Miller? Tell him to stand the fuck down. What does he want? Ask him what he wants.” Gage said, his voice loud and deep like a lion’s roar.

Miller and the Iraqi man exchanged some Arabic dialogue. After a moment, Miller laughed. “He wants Miss April’s autograph.”

“Autograph. Naghham. Autograph,” the Iraqi man said with a big smile suddenly across his face.

“Jesus Christ,” Gage said, lifting the man up and inspecting the item in his hand. It was a pen.

Relief washed over me, but I remained paralyzed on the ground, my heart still racing. It was the first time in my life that I’d felt like I was about to die. And during that moment, the only thought on my mind was: I wished Gage was there.

And the moment Gage came out from that building, the thought that I might die left the front of my mind.

He risked his own life to save mine. Had the Iraqi man been wearing a suicide vest, Gage just might have been killed saving
me
.

Darby helped me up to my feet and I looked over at Gage. His face was white and his gaze was turned inwards. He was staring off into the distance, catching his breath.

“You okay?” Darby asked. Darby’s face was also white.

“I think so.”

Everyone’s face was white. Everyone thought I was a goner the moment that man ran past Darby. There was one face that wasn’t white, but was instead beaming with vibrancy—the reporter’s.

He checked the pictures on his camera with a  big smile. He didn’t freeze during the attack. He was too busy snapping photos to be worried.

He showed us his favourite shot. It was a clear shot of Gage picking up the Iraqi man and turning him away from me. I was on the ground with my arm up, blocking my face. Everyone else was a good twenty feet back, frozen, petrified. It was like an old painting of Hercules wrestling the bull, Achelous, to the ground.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

I took my dinner back to my bunkroom and ate alone that night. I knew that Major Richards was going to make some long-winded speech about heroism, like he always did when anything remotely scary happened, and everyone would take turns patting me on the back.

I didn’t want any of that. What they were all really saying was, congratulations on being dumb enough to tackle a possible suicide bomber to the ground to save a Barrel Cleaner.

It had nothing to do with heroism. Had the guy been armed, Ashley would have been blown up, along with Darby and the rest of them. All I would have done by running in and jumping the fucker was increase his kill count from seven to eight.

I also didn’t want to be around a large group of horny, babbling idiots. I was still shaken, still struggling to get my mind straight. During the ride home, Darby had to drive because my hands were trembling too much to drive in a straight line. A bunch of drunken Joes, screaming in my ear, weren’t going to help calm my nerves.

I was angry with myself—angry, not because I acted stupidly on impulse, but because I knew exactly why I jumped the guy, and I knew that it wasn’t an impulse move at all, but a completely intentional one.

I jumped the guy because I didn’t want to see Ashley hurt. I was falling for her. And I hated myself over it, because I knew that she didn’t really like me back—no more than her manager told her to, anyway. I wasn’t just becoming the man I dreaded, I’d already become him.

As I finished eating, there was a knock at the door. I had a feeling I knew who it was, and I was right—it was Ashley. She had a sad smile on and she lingered in the doorway for a moment before asking to come in.

Before saying yes, I stared at her and tried to figure out what it was about her that made me jump that civ back in town. She was pretty, but so were most of the others. She was smart, at least she seemed smart, but again, I’d met a lot of smart girls before. She was from the same part of Washington as me—her and a thousand other girls. The reason I liked her failed to present itself.

I let her in and she took a seat on my bed. “Thanks again,” she said. “For tackling that guy back in town. I really appreciate it—I know you didn’t have to do it.”

I nodded, unsure of what she wanted me to say. It was clear that she wanted me to say something; she just sat there, staring at me expectantly, with that sad smile still on her face.

“That what you came to tell me?” I asked.

“I know you aren’t done your tour for a while, but I thought when you’re home, maybe we could meet up.” She kept her eyes down at her hands where she was pointlessly fumbling with her pinkie ring, pulling it off, slipping it back on, and twisting it around.

“For another photo-shoot or something?”

“I thought like coffee, maybe.”

“No,” I said. I thought about telling her ‘sure,’ and pretending like it was a great idea, but I didn’t see the point in lying to her. It was pointless. I wouldn’t be home for two years. In those two years, she probably wouldn’t even remember my name.

There was no sense in giving her or myself a two-year long sense of false hope. Two years was a long time to be left along with an idea. Ideas grow fast. Thinking, ‘Oh, in two years we’ll go on a date,’ was just setting both of us up for a big disappointment in two years, not to mention all the lost time thinking about her over those two years. It made more sense to rip off the Band-Aid.

And there was a very good chance I wouldn’t come home, and that wasn’t fair for her—to keep her waiting, to keep her anxious, every day, and possibly to break her heart.

Her eyes became teary. If it was acting, it was damn good acting. If it was real, then my decision made even more sense—it saved her two years of worrying—worrying that I was off fucking BCs, and worrying that I would be blown up by some idiot with a suicide vest while on ground patrol.

“I like you,” she said.

“Don’t.” I didn’t like seeing her tear-up, but ending anything before it started was the best thing for both of us.

“I know you like me,” she said, looking back up at me with those sad, expectant eyes.

“I don’t.”

“You’re lying.” She was right, I was lying, but it was what she needed to hear. She sat silently, staring, her eyes watering.

I just stared back at her. “What do you want me to say? What are you waiting to hear? It’s not going to work. Sorry.”

“Why can’t we just try?”

I got up and looked down the hall, making sure the reporter wasn’t lingering around the corner with his camera, waiting to catch some sappy moment that would capture the hearts of all of Ashley’s fans, the world over. There was no one, she was alone. I looked back into the room. Ashley was standing now, her feet touching and her hands clasped together at her waist, looking vulnerable, sad, and beautiful.

I closed the door. “If this is part of your little show for that journalist—”

“—It’s not,” she interrupted.

“I could have been killed today. I don’t give a shit about your acting career or your Playboy spread, or whatever. I don’t care.”

“It’s not for the journalist. I don’t care about that.” She looked down at her feet. Her hair fell down in front of her face and she gently pushed it back, over her ear.

“So what, then? You want some sort of long distance relationship? With someone you’ve known for two days? Who you’ve only had a single meaningful conversation with. You don’t know anything about me, Ashley. You think you do, but you don’t.”

She kept her head tilted down but she looked up at me with her shimmering eyes. I wanted to tell her to leave, to not look back, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I didn’t want her to leave—but I knew we were just setting ourselves up for heartbreak later on. I kept opening my mouth to say it, to say ‘go!’ but no matter how hard I tried, the words refused to leave my tongue.

I thought for the first time of her leaving, and all I could feel was a hole inside of me, a hole from which regret crawled out and tormented my soul. I’d lost the battle with myself. I didn’t want to lose her.

“I know you’re not like the rest of them,” she said, with her head still pointed down and her eyes pointed at me.

“That’s where you’re wrong.” I walked to the door and opened it, stepping aside so she could go.

She walked up to the door and then stopped. “What about me?”

“What about you?”

“Do you think that I’m like the rest of them—like the other girls?”

“Yeah.” She was like the other girls. Sure, she was prettier, she was smarter, she was more talented, but at the end of the day, she wanted the same thing, and like the other girls, she was prepared to do whatever she had to do get it. If Spielberg showed up one day and said, ‘Screw him, I’ve got a lead role you can’t say no to,” she would be gone in a heartbeat.

“I’m not,” she said, finally letting those tears fall down her cheek.

She stepped out into the hallway and stopped, staring down at her feet as if she had more to say. I waited, but she said nothing. She looked so small and fragile as she stood alone in the hallway.