Havoc (7 page)

Satisfied, I take in a long, deep breath. Sir
places his hands on my shoulders and nods. I nod in return. The
wall that we both prize, standing between us, losing a brick from
the bottom—not enough to make it come crashing down but enough to
be on high alert.

He lets go of me and addresses Haven, “I need
to wash up for dinner. Clint will help you get settled. See the two
of you shortly. Excuse me.”

With Sir headed to his room, his initial
thoughts revoked, and my angel with a new home, I do something I
can't recall the last time I genuinely did it. I smile widely.

I escort Haven up our cherry wood stairs and
to the first bedroom down the hall on the right. Mine. The guest
room is a couple doors down, but it doesn't matter. The only thing
she might keep in there are her clothes.

She carefully sits on the edge of my bed,
gripping my mattress like it’s her life. It seems like we go
through phases of fear and comfort. Any time there's the slightest
change, fear jumps on her face. The air-conditioner turns on, a car
drives by, the neighbor's dog barks, and she tenses up, panics.
Then, once she spots from my expression there's no reason to be
alarmed, she calms back down.

I watch her for a brief moment as she admires
the sight that I call my room. The walls are plain white, never
been home to anything other than Little League plaques and photos I
removed years ago. There’s my military-made bed, the nightstand
beside it, home to my cologne, aftershave, and the latest best
seller from my favorite author. None of it screams adventure or
non-trustworthy playboy. I hope she finds comfort in that.

As I open my white closet doors, I state in
the calmest manner I can, in the way I've been trained to in
delicate situations, “I know you're hungry. And I know you're
probably still terrified of the situation and the potential threats
that lie on the other side of the front door. But everything will
be all right, all right?” My eyes meet hers, feeling like those
words are a lie. That's what I'm trained to do—lie in difficult
situations. Never show my true hand. Bluff. But I don't want those
words to be a bluff. I will do everything I am capable of to turn
those standard lines into true ones. A flicker of hope enters her
eyes. My face twitches before I turn around and reach for a pair of
jeans. God, I still haven't showered. “We're going to have a
welcome-home dinner for me tonight. Any time I arrive back from
deployment, there's a dinner with everyone. Kind of a close group.
You need something to wear.”

Her delicate but curvy body isn't being done
justice. She's got on a light, long-sleeve shirt, jeans at least
three sizes too big, and a tattered bra. I can tell by the strap
that she constantly has to readjust to have it do anything for her.
Yes, she's dangerously thin. Yes, she has almost no amount of fat
to her. But the way her frame is structured, as soon as we get her
healthy and her body starts to fill in, she's going to be a walking
bombshell. My fist is going to end up breaking many jaws.

I toss a pair of jeans and a dress shirt out
for myself and mumble something about still needing a shower. Shit.
She'll probably need one too. “You'll also need–” My voice shuts
down as my body straightens up.

Her face is aimed down at the ground. Her
body is shaking in terror. I've seen enough victims in my time to
know what is occurring. She's reliving a moment with the bastard in
her head. She can't go back there. I can't protect her there.

“Haven, do not think of him.” It looks like
I've briefly got her. I have to keep her here. With a snap of my
fingers and a point to my eyes I state sharply, “Focus. Right here.
Right now. With me. Understand?”

She nods. She looks less frightened by her
memories now and more by my tone. Fine. I'll take that.

Knocking some things out of the way, I pull
out a long tote from the depths of my closet, more like the depths
of my heavily suppressed consciousness. Yanking the lid off, I try
not to get too lost at the sights inside. I remove the wooden
picture frame that's home to a photo of my mom, me, and Sir from
the first baseball game I ever had. I was three. Sir looks younger.
His face more cut. His body more lean. The deep features remind me
of a younger Josh Brolin. With his arm stretched around my mother's
slim shoulder, she looks even smaller than I remember. Her face
looks soft. Her features rounded. The glow on her sun kissed skin
all natural, the same shade as her hair. I remember being told how
she could be a stunt double for Kate Beckinsale long before I knew
who that was. And I'm at their feet, leaning on my bat, looking
like a miniature mixture of the two. Sir bought me that bat. It was
also one of the only games Sir did attend. My attention relocates
to the other objects in the container. Her jewelry box filled with
presents from Sir comes out next. I remember the day he went
looking to sell the stuff, swearing he had placed them in the
for-sale box. I don't want anything that's on the inside but didn't
want him to pawn my mother's memories for profit. An old teddy bear
she got me when I sprained my wrist joins the not-now pile. Her
planner from our last year together follows suit. With all those
things outside the tote, I can do nothing but stare.

“Have I mentioned how beautiful you look in
that dress?” he coos at her, stroking the back of her palm, staring
deep into her eyes, her blue anchor tattoo with the linked wedding
bands flashing at me.

Mom's brown hair is all pinned up on the top
of her head except for two curled pieces that hang by her face. The
black dress looks fancy. Her shoes look fancy. Everything from a
distance about her looks fancy. It's funny to me because Mom is so
not fancy. The bird tattoos on the back of her neck, the one on the
inside of her hand, the fact she's wearing his tags around her neck
instead of pearls. Come on now. That's not really fancy.

I wiggle around, so I'm sitting on top of my
bended legs. My hand pulls at the buttoned-up collar of this yellow
dress shirt Mom insisted I wear. I hate things with so many
buttons. Who needs that many buttons? I wish she'd let me wear my
baseball tee.

“Quit fidgeting,” she scolds, fixing the
strap on her black dress, her hand skimming across the trail of
peacock feathers that fall down her back. I love her tattoos. I
can't wait to have some.

“And sit on your bottom like a respectable
gentleman,” he demands.

I plop to my bottom and flop my face into my
hands. I'm not meant for fancy restaurants like this even if they
do have the best bread sticks in the entire world. At all the
tables are people like my parents. People huddled close. People
staring into each other's eyes. There are only a few with children
dressed up like me. Why do our parents insist on dragging us around
to places like this? I would've settled for pizza and a movie.

“I love you.” He raises her hand to his lips
and kisses the back of it.

“I love you too.”

A smile joins my face. While it's gross to
see my parents so into one another like the people you see on TV,
at the same time, I'm thankful we're all together. I'm thankful
they can still stand each other after all this time. I'm glad, when
they look at me, even to scold me, there's still love in their
eyes. Most of my friends’ parents don't behave like this. What they
have I think is special. I can't wait to have it someday.

With a sigh, I rise to my feet, hold up the
dress for her to admire, and nod, doing my best to put that memory
back in the past where it belongs.

“Might be a bit of a tight fit, but I think
it'll do.”

“An old girlfriend's?”

If only it were that simple. “My
mother's.”

She looks even less relieved than had it been
an ex’s.

“It was the only piece of clothing I kept.
She, uh, died of an unexpected aneurism when I was ten. Forced Sir
to retire early. I have no aunts or uncles. Both of my parents were
only children. Both of their parents died before I was born. Called
me the miracle that linked two family-less lives. I was supposed to
be one of many.” I lie the dress down on the bed beside her. I
didn't know that fact until the doctor announced postmortem that
she was pregnant. Death won again. “I packed away what I wanted to
preserve of her memory. She wore that dress every time Sir arrived
home from being deployed and every time he got ready to leave. It
was her hello–good-bye dinner dress.”

She stares at the light, soft material, and I
find myself wrapped up in her the way she is in it. As she gently
touches it, I long to be gently touching her, holding her again,
having her fit perfectly against me. It’s like she was made for me,
the way that dress is made for her. Geez, get a grip, Clint.

“I can't wear this. I just . . . can't.”

“Really. It's all right.”

“But it was so special.”

“And so are you.” There's a flicker of
something in her eyes. Almost like she can't believe me but wants
to. Or at least I think that's what I saw. It’s too quick. In any
event, she needs something, and this is what I’ve got to offer. I
hope she takes it. “Who knows? Maybe this could become your hello
dress.”

Haven glances to the floor and says in a
whisper, “Thank you.”

“I'm gonna check to see if there's any . . .
girly product stuff here somewhere from Sir's latest girlfriend.” I
shuffle toward my bedroom door. Almost out, I turn around and
command, “Stay here.” No, she's not a solider. She's not a small
child. She's not a dog, but I can't help but reinforce certain
things as a means to protect her from herself and her past.

Down the hall, at the end, past my bathroom,
the guest bedroom, and the bathroom is the master suite, the place
where Sir occasionally sleeps. I attempt to knock at Sir's door,
but it opens first as he exits.

In surprise, he raises his eyebrows at me,
“Yes, Clint?”

“Does your girlfriend, Krista–”

“Karen.”

“Right. Does she have any female stuff here?”
The words sound foreign and reek of confusion. I don't know what
women carry from place to place. It's my understanding that it
varies. At this point, until I get her to the store to pick out her
own toiletries, anything not manly will do.

“Like feminine product–”

“Like makeup or something.”

“Oh,” Sir looks relieved, like the thought of
it being that time of the month for Haven would be just one too
many problems for him to handle. For a brief moment, he's out of
sight, while I wait in the doorframe, eyes doing my best not to
settle on anything on the inside.

He hands me a small, pink pouch of some kind.
“Just let her use whatever. We'll replace it. I'm heading over to
Mindy's now to get an immediate handle on this situation. Now are
you sure–”

“Yes, Sir,” I nip the conversation in the bud
before he can attempt to create doubt within me. No matter how much
he doesn't want this or want me to want this, it is happening.
Haven is here to stay as long as she's willing.

I wonder if he’ll ever be at ease about the
situation. Thankfully, he lets it drop for now, “All right then.
We'll see you two over there shortly.”

I nod and let him walk past me before I
relocate myself back to my bedroom, bag still in hand. “I don't
know what you can use from this, if anything. I think there's some
makeup, though I don't know how much of it you can use. Uh, maybe
some perfume? Travel deodorant?” I glance down at the bag, “It's
been eleven years since Mom died. You would think the man would've
settled down by now, remarried—hell, just keep a girlfriend longer
than six weeks at a time.” Shit. I can't believe I just said that
out loud. “I'm rambling. I don't usually ramble. In fact, I don't
usually say much at all. I'm trained not to say much at all.
There's just something . . .”

Her eyes are doing it again, that thing where
they light up and force my heart to start pounding in my chest like
it's in a jailbreak. The luring, dark-brown layers seem to be
whispering my name, demanding I open up and lose myself to them.
Submit. And I find myself wanting to. It's like a toxic chemical
has entered my body and wreaked havoc on my brain. I have to get
away from her. Just a minute, I just need a minute.

“Would you like to shower before dinner?”

“Yes, please.”

Quickly, I show her my bathroom, get the
water started, the dress settled in, and the pink bag. Once she's
in and set, I jog over with my clothes to the guest bathroom in
desperate need of a shower myself.

The warm water washes over the top of my head
and down my shoulders, my arms bracing the tile walls. What's
happening to me? First I was feeling, then I was having memories,
and now I'm openly vulnerable. I don't do feelings. They make sure
to flush them out of you in training if you haven't already done so
before you enroll. I don't have memories. They're behind a locked
door with a cemented brick wall. I have facts from my past,
information. I don't have longing emotions for them. I don't wish
to relive them. I damn sure don't relive them inside my mind like a
highlights reel. My body swivels around so the water runs down the
angel-wing tattoos on my back, the ones that have my mother's name
engraved in them. I can't keep letting Haven do this to me. I just
can't. I don't know what's on the other side of that wall anymore,
and I don't need to know. I need to get a grip on reality, this
situation with her. I can't protect her if I'm some babbling moron,
emotionally unstable, a useless post-adolescent thug. She needs me
to be Grim, a Marine, a solider, a protector, not whoever it is
Clint may be if the wall goes down. When the wall goes down. A low
growl leaves me. That wall cannot come down.

Fifteen minutes later, I’m dressed in a pair
of dark-blue jeans and a white, button-up shirt with a navy blazer
on top. Out of habit, I pull at the collar, feeling a little like a
small child going to an adult dinner. I've done this a million
times before, but I feel nervous. I tug again. What if Haven hates
this shirt? I tug at the sleeves of the jacket. Or this jacket?