The words on the page jumped out at Tiffany and she paused, her lips still pursed. Her excitement rose and she could not suppress the grin that crossed her face. She never did anything impulsive, she always planned everything, thought things through, and looked before she decided to leap but right now, she wanted no part of any of that.
“I am going to have to say no Lou. Good luck with getting Madison to sign on her new project with you guys.”
Lou actually sputtered, “Who told you?”
“I still subscribe to the newspaper. I know that makes me horribly old fashioned.”
“I can offer you the same salary you were making when you left.”
Of course he could. They both knew that Madison Yates had signed on with Koehler because of the work that Tiffany had done to bring her account into the company. If Madison asked for Tiffany and she were unavailable she would go elsewhere, and Tiffany was willing to bet that Lou planned to give her the boot once more, as soon as the contracts were finalized and the checks signed.
“Loyalty, Lou. Look it up.” Tiffany hung up the phone and managed to fight off the panic rising through her elation. What she had just done had felt incredibly good but she knew it was akin to committing career suicide.
Her mind went back to Craig. Working with him had rekindled her love and passion for her work. From the day they had pulled into the driveway of the house they were currently working on and she had seen him crawling around on the floor to get a better look at the flooring and moldings she had known he loved what he did.
He had run his fingers over the rotting banister of the staircase in a way that gave her shivers, he stroked it as sensually, and softly as he might have stroked the flesh of a lover. She wanted to know him better, she wanted to see the house that they were working on become what it would and could become.
And maybe they could grow something between them as well.
“You are not even divorced yet.” Tiffany spoke aloud without meaning to but the words poked holes in her good mood. The letter still laid there, its black ink scrawled across the pages like a harbinger of certain doom.
In a way it was. Having to pay Steve alimony would literally force her into starvation. He obviously had no idea that she was no longer employed by Koehler because the income he had stated that she made was her old salary. A nasty grin crossed her face as she realized he was in for a surprise.
Tiffany had not wanted to bring her family into the situation. They knew Steve had moved out but not all the particulars. She had just said they were separated and left it at that. She could not put off telling her family about it anymore because right now she needed some help.
She found a frozen packet of fish fillets in the very back of the freezer, half-hidden under a bag of lima beans—Steve’s favorite and her least favorite—and tossed them into a sink filled with cold water to defrost.
There were some potatoes still left in the bin in the pantry and just enough milk to make them creamy if she mashed them. Deciding she needed as good a meal as she could get before she went to her father for assistance she pulled the last of her carrots and onions out and began to wash and cut them.
Her doorbell rang just as she was sliding the fish into a baking dish with a little oil, dill and lemon. She went to the door and peeked out to see Craig leaning against the doorframe. Her heart literally skipped a beat. She had known that eventually they would have to talk about what had happened that afternoon but she was not prepared for it just then.
Still, she opened the door and smiled, “Hi there. How did you know where I lived?”
“You filled in a tax form.”
“Oh, that makes sense.” She winced at the inane words coming out of her own mouth. “Is something wrong?”
He twiddled his keys and cleared his throat. “Ah… about today, I do not usually…er…that is to say I do not expect you to do that as part of your duties. And something is burning.”
She turned to look down the hallway and swore loudly as she saw noxious black smoke rolling through the house. “I have not even put the food in the oven yet!”
Craig followed her inside and down the hall to the kitchen, he quickly located the problem—the preheating eye had burned a large corner of her newspaper. Embarrassed and uncertain of what to say to him Tiffany offered up, “I usually do not burn paper.”
Craig was busy looking around without seeming to, a little trick twenty years in the military had taught him. There were things missing, which made sense given her story that her husband had left her suddenly and without warning. There was no television in the living room, there were bare spots on the walls where pictures had once hung, and the house was far too quiet.
There was a stack of bills on the kitchen table along with a laptop, some scrawled notes and a calendar marked with grim reminders of what was due when. Then there was the letter from a lawyer, he would have recognized that anywhere.
“Would you like some dinner?” Tiffany asked, nervous and a little unsettled.
“It’s not newspaper soup I take it?”
“No, it’s not that bad yet.”
Craig was pleased to see her smile, it lightened the worry in her face and he wanted to go find her ex and kick him around the block a time or two for putting that worry in her face in the first place.
Tiffany knew it was too warm in the house. To save money she left the air conditioner on the setting least damaging to her utility bills but Craig saved her from having to turn it lower or explain by saying, “It’s started to rain a little, maybe we should sit out on the porch.”
Tiffany dabbed a little more oil onto the fish and slid them into the oven, the heat flushed her face and dampened her hair. “That would be nice.”
She poured them both long glasses of sweet tea choked with ice and lemon. They headed out to her front porch and sat down, it was raining in earnest and the heat had died off a bit as the daylight had begun to fade, the scent of the honeysuckle planted near the porch railings drifted to them and Tiffany began to relax.
“I don’t normally do that either.”
Craig chuckled, “I didn’t think you did. I, well, I’m not at all sorry about it.”
“Neither am I.”
“Perhaps we should agree to keep our relationship professional from here on out.”
That was the last thing that Tiffany wanted. The fire he had started in her body had not faded with the orgasms he had given her, if anything they only made her aware of just how starved she really was for good hot sex.
She said, “I don’t see why we can’t have both, if that is what you want and what I want.”
“Tiffany, I do not want to coerce you into sleeping with me just because I am your boss.”
“Did it feel like you coerced me?” Her voice was breathless.
“No, it did not.” She had wanted him, and they both knew it.
“I am not looking for love and marriage, “Tiffany forced a laugh. “I mean I have a divorce on my hands as it is. But we are clearly attracted to each other and we are both adults, so why not have some fun?”
His face revealed nothing of his thoughts. “Can we still work together if we have a more personal relationship?”
There it was, the question that Tiffany had asked herself. The truth was that everything about Craig appealed to her. He lacked that sense of entitlement that had been so much a part of Steve’s character but it was not just that. He had an air of protectiveness about him that called out to something within her.
Tiffany prided herself on being independent, and that had always been the worst issue in her marriage to Steve. He had wanted all the benefits of her career but he griped because she was often late getting home and too tired to cook. His jobs petered out quite frequently but he still expected her to be the woman and clean and do the laundry and smile when his buddies came over for poker night. It had never occurred to her until after he moved out how much she chafed under his chauvinistic ideals.
“I think we worked together today after that happened without incident,” she said calmly. “I need to go check on the fish.”
Craig went with her and, to her pleased surprise, he knew his way around a kitchen. He mashed the potatoes, helped to sauté the onions and carried his own plate back out to the porch. When she commented on it, he shrugged.
“I have been living alone a long time.”
Tiffany knew he was not married so she asked, “Why didn’t you ever marry?”
“Oh I did. I went into the military when I was seventeen and I got married when I went back home on leave from basic training. I married the girl I had always had a crush on in high school and I was so stunned she wanted to marry me I never asked questions.”
Tiffany could not help but ask, “What happened?”
“She wanted out of her parent’s house but she did not want to go to college or work, and honestly I was content to let her be the homemaker. It worked for both of us for a long time, but then one day it did not anymore.”
There was more to that story but Tiffany had the tact not to pry. His face had closed when he spoke about it, a guarded expression overlaying his normally good- humored face. He took her plate and his and went back into the house. She went with him, and they did the dishes together.
Tiffany hoped he would ask to stay the night but he did not, instead he pulled her close, so close that she could hear his heart beating below the thin shirt that he wore. He brushed a kiss across her forehead and backed away.
“Thank you for dinner, lunch tomorrow is on me. I hate to eat and run but I have…something I need to get done.”
Tiffany decided to overlook the vagueness on his part. After all, this was new and she did not own him, and he did not owe her an explanation for his every move. She was still disappointed slightly though as she watched him climb into his truck and pull away. Her body ached for more of his touch and now that he had left, she understood just how big and lonely the house was.
Sighing she locked up for the night then went upstairs to her bedroom. Once upon a time, she had taken an extreme amount of pleasure in the room. She had hunted down the sleigh bed frame in antique auctions and thrift stores, and she had searched for months for the mirror that stood above the dresser. Everything except the mattresses and clothing in the room was something she had found and refurbished, lovingly and with lots of her own labor.
Steve had wanted new furniture, modern stuff that looked like everything else on the showroom floor and had constantly criticized everything she bought.
Tiffany turned the fan on full blast, stripped naked and crawled into bed. Putting her hands behind her head, she stared up at the ceiling trying to fathom how she could have been so unhappy and so ignorant of that unhappiness all that time.
She could not pinpoint exactly when the passion had died between her and Steve; she just knew that it had at some point. They had stopped making love but worse, they had lost the intimacy as well. They had stopped cuddling each other at night and begun living separate lives that had intersected there in the house.
She sat up, uttered a few curse words at herself for letting thoughts of Steve intrude on her night. She had forgotten to call her father too so she retrieved her phone and tapped out his number.
There were a few good things about being the daughter of a lawyer, and free legal advice was one of them. Right then she needed all the advice she could get.
**
Craig sat in front of the building, watching others going in. He had not wanted to leave Tiffany, he had wanted to carry her up the stairs to her bedroom and ravish her in a way that would have left them both exhausted and spent.
A scowl marred his forehead at that thought. He could not afford to get entangled with her, yet he already had. When she had suggested that they just have fun he had wanted to say no, to tell her that he wanted more than that from her—but what could he offer her right then?
“You’ve been alone too long buddy,” he told himself, “The last thing that woman needs is you trying to rope her right back into a relationship when she is still so raw from her last one.”
He got out of the truck and headed for the building, a long wedge of amber light shone out onto the sidewalk when the door swung open. The smokers on the sidewalk called out greetings and waved at him through the fog that surrounded him and he responded but as he passed through the door he wondered, what Tiffany would say if she knew how he spent his Wednesday nights.
The coffeepot sat in its usual place, the same stale cookies that always sat around were on the paper plates, and there were a few new faces in the crowd. It was easy to spot the new people, they were the ones trying to be invisible and standing out because of it.
Someone called the meeting to order, chairs scraped the floor and people sat, the last of the talk dying away.
Craig smiled at a young woman who had taken the chair beside him, she smiled back nervously, and he pushed thoughts of Tiffany to the back of his mind.
**
“I wanted your input on something.”
Craig looked up from the section of flooring he had removed. Old houses had always drawn him, he had always looked at them and seen things others had not seen. When he had been fifteen he had spent most of the entire summer combing through the wrecked remains of a Victorian home right near the military base they had lived on. His father had punished him for not staying away from the place as he had been told but the punishments had never been enough to dissuade him.
The house they were working on was like a work of art that someone had painted over. The flooring in his hand was cheap laminate. Below that was some sticky old tile but beneath that was a beautiful oak floor.
“What is it?” He asked, he did not mind being interrupted since he knew that Tiffany would not have bothered him unless she thought it important.
“The Battle House.”
He blinked at her. “What about it?”
“It is about to undergo restoration.”
“I know, I read it in the newspaper.”
Tiffany had a point but she kept forgetting what she wanted to say. Craig was incredibly strong and he had peeled the flooring back with his bare hands. The exertion had left his nude upper body clothed in the same glow of perspiration that had turned her on so much the day before, and the muscles of his arms and chest drew taut. She had caught him in a moment between rest and force. That pose made him look not unlike the statutes of Greek gods she had seen in books and her mouth literally watered at the thought of licking away the tiny dewy bead of sweat that hung right above his navel.
Craig was having trouble focusing as well. The heat was incredible and she had worn shorts today. They were modest enough but they cupped the firm curves of her ass, molded themselves to that flesh in such a way that he could not stop staring at it.
He was not the only one either; he had sent more than one warning glare at the guys working on the lawn.
He stood up and dusted his hands off. “I think it is just about time for lunch and I promised you it was on me today.”
“Yes, you did.” Her white teeth flashed behind her plump pink lips. “Why don’t you..ah…put a shirt on and we will discuss this over food.”
He was sure that he knew what it was she wanted to discuss. The house was the oldest in the city, and a historic treasure. It was also falling down. To top it all off, it was owned by the Historical Preservation Society so there would be a nice paycheck involved. There was no doubt that it would be a major feather in their caps to pull off a job like that one.
It was not just the thought of the paycheck that excited him though; it was the thought of restoring the house to its former glory.
He grabbed his shirt and pulled it on. Tiffany felt a pang of regret when the fabric covered his body, even if it did cover it in the most attractive way. They walked down the street to a Mexican restaurant that Tiffany had had her eye on for a few days.
She had long believed that you could always tell how good a restaurant was by its smell, and she hated places that had the same sterile smell as a department store. That was certainly not the case there—the smell of slow cooked meat, fried onions and garlic and rich cheese assured her that they would have a good meal.
The friendly waiter brought a basket of warm chips and a bowl of warm queso to the table, took their drink orders, and vanished. Tiffany dunked a chip and popped it into her mouth, chewed, swallowed and then spoke.
“I can get that account.”
“I believe you can.”
Tiffany had expected doubt, or even derision. Being one of the only women at Koehler’s had meant engaging in constant battles with men who did not think she could do the work. Craig had been speaking sincerely, and that made warmth radiate through her body.
“I do have one question though.”
“What is that?”
“Tiffany, have you considered, honestly considered, how much work we would be taking on? We have at least four months of work on the current project…”
“And most of that is sub-contracted out already. At this point most of what we have to do could be done within a month, after that it would be mostly a case of supervising the contractors.”
“That’s true,” he conceded with a grin. She had thought of it, and the fact that she was willing to put that much work into something, that she was not afraid to get out there and earn her living, made her even more appealing.
He had to wonder again what kind of man would have let a woman like her go. Tiffany was intelligent, funny, and willing to be a partner. She was the woman he wished he had married.
“I know Madison, and I know she despises Lou. We have a shot at this, especially if we can come in on what she considers a reasonable budget, which means double what she is offering.”
“I have been itching to get into that house ever since I moved here,” Craig admitted.
“How long have you been here?”
“I was stationed here seven years ago.”
The waiter came to take their orders and the conversation stalled then started back up. “Do you like it?”
“I do,” Craig said. “I always thought I would go back to Colorado when I got out of the military but I drove past the house I own now, and fell in love with it.”
“You grew up in Colorado?”
“No,” his face darkened once more, “My father was a career military man so I grew up all over the country and Europe.”
Tiffany wondered what caused that darkening of his countenance but she resisted the urge to pry and asked, “Where is your house? I mean you never let me see your application so I can’t just show up at your doorstep.”
Craig laughed, “I never thought about how odd that might look until after I left. I live in Gulf Breeze.”
“Oh, you’re right on the beach.” Tiffany could not disguise the envy in her voice.
“Yes I am, I would love to show it to you sometime.”
“I would love to see it.”
They chatted easily as their food arrived. Both of them had forgotten how pleasurable it was to share topics of conversation over a meal—Tiffany had rarely found anything to talk about with Steve and Craig usually ate a solitary dinner—and the time passed far too quickly.
They went back to work, walking down the street together. Tiffany’s shorts-clad hip bumped his occasionally as they traversed a broken section of sidewalk and Craig’s body reacted. His dick began to stiffen and when she almost fell on a large chunk of the broken concrete he reached to steady her and she fell against him, her body sagging into his.
His dick prodded against her hip, Tiffany felt that incredibly masculine stiffness and her nipples hardened, her breath caught painfully in her throat and she had to swallow hard in order to get a word out of her mouth.
She mumbled, “Sorry,” before his mouth came down on hers. The sun beat down on their heads causing sweat to pop up on their bodies but that heat was nothing compared to the heat that ignited between, and inside of them as the kiss intensified and lingered.
Craig ended the kiss but only because an older woman walking her dog past the two of them snapped out, “Why don’t you take her to a motel and do that in private?”
Tiffany giggled helplessly as the woman stormed past them, her face set into a mask of disapproval. “You are such a bad influence,” she said.
“Me?” he managed to put a look of innocence on his face but it did not last long. “I think you are the bad influence.”
The kiss did not assuage the fire between them; it had only heightened that need. Tiffany wanted to touch him again, to kiss him wantonly and deeply right there on the street but just then she saw the roofers they had hired pulling back into the driveway of the house they were working on.
She said, “I guess we should get back to the old grindstone.”
“Nothing about working with you is the same old grind,” Craig replied. “And I am very glad about it.”
“Me too,” Tiffany said as they started back toward the house. “But I still think you are the bad influence.”
Craig watched her sashay away, and a mischievous light entered his eyes as an idea came to him.
**
Tiffany pulled into Craig’s driveway, killed the engine, and smiled widely. Craig’s house was modest in comparison to the others that stood near it but it radiated charm and care. It was a Florida cottage situated on a large corner lot with water views on three sides. The house sat back on the lot and the palm trees and lush azalea bushes provided more privacy.
Tiffany admired the hardwood floors and the comfortable furniture while Craig poured them both a glass of wine. They sat on the low sofa and Tiffany relaxed, her body ached from the physical labor that they had been engaged in all day and when Craig began massaging her shoulders she sighed with pleasure.
The kiss started slowly, only slightly recalling the fierce need of earlier. Craig’s fingers stroked her neck and jaw and she submitted to his caresses eagerly, reveling in the taste of his mouth and the feel of his fingers on her heated flesh.
She was lost in the haze of desire and warmth so she was wholly unprepared for the snap of the cold metal around her wrist. Her eyes flew open and she stared at him, flabbergasted and turned on in equal measures.
The metal around her wrist gleamed dully and made a musical rattle as he connected her hands behind her back and locked the second cuff into place. Her pussy grew even wetter. Her panties were soaked, and they chafed against the delicate flesh of her labia as she squirmed against the couch cushions.
Craig smiled and stood. His strong fingers caught her shirt and pulled her to her feet. Her head bumped his chin and her breath escaped from her in a long exhalation that left her dizzy and panting for air all at once.
His fingers stroked her breasts through her shirt. The cuffs pulled her shoulders back so tightly that her breasts lifted high, leaving the tight pucker of her nipples vulnerable to his caresses.
His mouth left wet stains on her shirt, his teeth nipping through the fabric of the shirt and her bra. Tiffany cried out, her legs trembled and she twisted her hands together in a vain attempt to escape the bondage. She wanted to touch him so badly her hands literally itched.
Craig took full advantage of her inability to protect herself, he pushed her shirt up to expose her nipples and he suckled them, biting and licking at the hard peaks until she cried out in a mixture of thwarted desire and need.
The cuffs would not allow him to take her shirt off but he managed, his teeth grazed the tender flesh below her navel and his tongue teased at the flesh he exposed when he unzipped her tight shorts.
He licked the small triangle of skin, causing her to dance across the floor. Her feet were still in her heavy shoes and he pulled them off, grabbed her foot, and pressed his thumb into the pocket of flesh right below her big toe, sending instant relaxation into her body.
Tiffany fell into the sofa, her body going limp and her center growing so wet that liquid slid past the hem of her panties and smeared her inner thighs. Craig tugged her shorts down, she pressed her feet into the floor to gain leverage so she could help him to strip her lower body bare.
His hands spread her legs up and back while his tongue found her clit and three fingers slid into her, hard and fast. He worked his fingers faster as her walls clenched and opened around them. Her sugary sweet juices coated his lips and tongue, pearly white drops of her come beaded up around her clit and he licked them away.
Tiffany shuddered and dug her heels and toes into the carpet, her ass shaking with tension and effort as she strained against him. The orgasm that hovered so close was denied to her however, Craig withdrew his fingers and mouth from her flesh.
“Oh fuck! Please!” Tiffany got out.
Craig looked down at her. Her face was flushed with desire, her eyes dilated and her mouth had fallen open, her hair lay spread out across the sofa cushions and he paused, drinking in the glorious picture she made.
He stood and undid the buttons on his jeans. The heavy hard length of his cock leaped forward, trembling and ready. The patch of thick dark hair that furred his groin and thighs was tangled with his own oils of arousal and he stroked himself, letting his own fingers and the sight of the bound beauty on his sofa inflame his desire even further.
He knelt on the sofa and his cock teased at her pouting pink labia, parting them. He watched his flesh disappearing into hers, caught up in that sight he did not realize at first that Tiffany was staring down at their joined bodies, as enraptured at the sight as he was.
His cock stretched her entrance, pushed against her slick walls, and opened her even further. Tiffany’s lower belly trembled as she came hard and unbidden, covering his prick with her dripping juices.
His hips pumped harder and faster, his hands gripped the sofa’s back and he buried his face in her soft silky hair as his own orgasm rushed through him, his seed spilling inside of her in sticky waves that left him and his manhood both limp and drained.
He let her out of the cuffs and she rubbed her arms, laughing at the pins and needles that filled them. He cuddled next to her on the couch, cradling her body into his and breathing in her sweet scent as he kissed her long and slow.
Craig’s phone rang; a long shrill sound that snapped him out of the languorous doze he had been enjoying with Tiffany. That specific ringtone meant one thing, trouble and he wished he could simply ignore that call just one time but he had made a promise, and he kept his promises.
Tiffany stirred as Craig slid off the sofa and picked up his phone. She was not trying to eavesdrop, and the way he pulled the bathroom door shut behind him was a clear signal that he wanted privacy. The closed door muffled his words but it did not take a genius to figure out that the call was personal and whomever he was speaking with was incredibly upset.
Too many years with a man who cheated as casually as he lied set her suspicions on red alert. Tiffany knew it was an over-reaction but she could not seem to help it. She slid off the sofa just as Craig spoke loudly enough to be heard clearly.
“Just hold on. I will be right there.”
The bathroom door opened and he came out, his black hair still mussed from their wild lovemaking and the pillows. He looked at her, his face unreadable and said, “There is an emergency and I have to go tend to it.”
The curt and abrupt way he spoke filled Tiffany with a swinging combination of emotions. Hurt and anger were chief among those emotions, she did not know how to react to the sudden change in mood and circumstances. She did not know how to ask him the question on her mind without sounding clinging and possessive so she decided not to deal with it at all, and just leave.
“I’ll see you at work,” she said as she snatched her clothes off the floor and threw them on. She went out the door before he could finish pulling his jeans on and she heard him call her name but she ignored it, sprinting across the soft grass to her Jeep and jumping in it just as he came out of the house.
Her headlights illuminated him, washed him in golden light and he looked so damn handsome she almost wrecked the vehicle. She peeled away, her tires leaving dark marks on the driveway and it was not until she was out on the highway that she realized she was sobbing.
“You are such an idiot!” She told herself as she coasted through the silent and darkened streets. “You fell in love with him and you knew better!”
The reasonable part of her mind assured her that there was a perfectly good explanation for what had happened, but deep down she suspected it was something she did not want to know about.
She had heard the voice on the other end of his phone—and it had been a woman’s voice. Preoccupied by with her aching heart and with her mind clouded by confusion she did not register the car sitting in the driveway in front of her house. It belonged there, after all, even if it had not been there for quite some time.
The lights blazed and she walked in, only comprehending that something was not what it should be when she saw Steve’s blonde head bent over the remote control. Tiffany’s stomach dropped to the floor and her mouth sagged open as she tried to sort out the scene before her.
Steve’s suitcases were on the floor, many of them opened and spilling out clothes. The television was back in its usual place and there was the smell of food cooking coming from the direction of the kitchen. She could tell by the scent it was the steaks she had bought on sale and had been hoarding for a special occasion.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Her voice did not sound like her own voice; it was ragged and hoarse with the anger and pain that filled her.
“You refused to give me enough money to live on so I had to change my living situation.” Steve’s voice was as smooth as silk, “Your father even hit me with court costs.”
“You left me.” Tiffany got out. “Surely you do not expect me to support you after you left me.”
“He has the right to expect to be cared for in the same manner he was cared for within the marriage.”
Tiffany just could not believe her eyes or ears. Caroline, her former best friend, stood in the door between the kitchen and living room, one long and thin arm hanging carelessly by her taut waist.
“Why are you in my house?”
“She is here with me.” The bravado died out of Steve’s house as Tiffany turned her blazing eyes to his face. In all the years they had been together he had never seen her angry, a little mad or irritated yes but never angry, and it frightened him a bit even as it turned him on. Her face was flushed and her eyes were bright, her body trembled and her fingers clenched. He had never seen her look so beautiful or so alive. Or so incredibly dangerous.
“Get out.” Tiffany said. “Or you will be terribly sorry.”
**
Craig knew he had upset Tiffany, but he was paying off an old debt he had incurred after he had made his own call for help a few years before.
As soon as that call had come his old military training had kicked in and he had gone cold—his mind searching through ways to deal with the situation while his body had moved automatically through the motions and so had his mouth, he had spoken coldly and without thought to her feelings. He had wounded Tiffany with that, and he knew it and wished he had not.
He knew that what he should have done was kiss her softly, tell her he would return and then leave but if he did that he might have had to explain it all to her, and that he did not want to do. His fingers went to the scar on his face and he stroked it absently as he thought about the woman who had called him.
They had been in the same unit and they had both been in the tank when the IED, a homemade explosive device, had detonated beneath them. Craig had gotten luckier than most of those he was with, he had not lost a limb or his life—but he had to live with the aftermath.
Craig had tried to exit the tank, and to carry one of his fellow soldiers to safety but the enemy had rained bullets down on them. One had struck him in the arm, and another had struck his friend in the hand. All Craig could do was watch those he cared about die as the day wore on and the heat raged higher.
He had survived though, as had Sharon, the woman who had called him tonight. He knew it was his duty to go but he wished he could confide in Tiffany, let her into his darkest of places but he didn’t dare to do that. Doing that had cost him his wife, and he did not want to lose Tiffany too.
“What if you already did?” He asked aloud and winced at that thought.