“I figured I’d hand it over myself.” I reach into the inside pocket of my jacket and slide the envelope across the counter to her. “It’s the Booster Club check. It should cover the new uniforms for the basketball team.”
She glances at it, then back up at me, her lashes fluttering a little faster than normal. “That’s really generous of you guys. The kids will be thrilled.”
“We’re glad to help.”
Her eyes linger on mine for a second too long, a flirty, too-wide smile stuck to her lips. “Have you ever coached?”
“Nope. Not much of a people person.”
She laughs. “Well, if you ever want to stop by a game, I’m sure the moms would love to thank you in person.”
“I’ll pass that along,” I say, already turning toward the door. “Thanks, Mara. You have a good day now.”
Getting the hell out before she can hold me up any longer, I stride back to my truck and climb in, but I don’t start the engine right away. I just sit there for a second, looking out at the quiet parking lot.
Mara has been flirting with us for years, pretty much since the first donation we’d made to the Booster Club. Maybe she could’ve been the one, but she has a thin golden band on her left ring finger, and we don’t screw with marriages.
I finally turn over the engine and head to the market.
3
CHANCE
In the home gym I grip the pull-up bar, knuckles white, shoulders screaming. Muscle memory carries me through my morning routine, with every rep reminds me I’m still here.
Still alive.
Still on this side of the world.
Still in a house perched above a valley where the wind cuts clean and the snow sits heavy on the pines in winter. Through floor-to-ceiling windows looking out at the mountains, I stare at a view that couldn’t be more different from the place my mind often goes.
A place that had been dull and sandy. A place where fall-colored leaves and lush greenery under a clear blue sky had never existed. Not in my experience, anyway.
For a second, though, I slip and my mind wanders the way it always does when it has nothing better to latch onto. The next moment, I’m back in Afghanistan, smack in the middle of a mission that had gone sideways so fast, it’d left a scar on my brain.
We’d been clearing a village. Simple recon, quick extraction. That was the word they’d used.Simple.
Now, call me crazy, but to me, simple doesn’t include the hum of gunfire in your ears while you realize someone on your team isn’t coming back. It doesn’t include the look on a kid’s face when he runs straight into danger because someone has to coveryoursix.
On that mission, I’d stepped into that dark side, cold, precise, and unyielding. I’d gotten those I could out alive, and I’d come back with medals, PTSD, and a reputation I never wanted.
Montana has been my salvation. Fresh air, wide skies, and mountains that don’t care about my past. A place where the three of us can build something lasting, our business and our home. It’s our little patch of peace.
Except lately, the peace has been feeling restless. Something gnaws at the edges of it, an itch I can’t scratch with pull-ups or long runs on the trail that snakes away from our back door. I know I’m the only one feeling it.
Boone has been staring off into the distance a lot more than usual, as much a slave to the demons that haunt him as I am. Dillon has been baking so much that it’s like he thinks he can slay the restlessness with a stick of butter and a whisk.
I drop from the bar, my muscles burning and sweat slick on my back. Flicking the cap off a bottle of water, I bring it to my lips and am halfway through draining it when Dillon strolls in.
“Hey,” he says, holding up a half-eaten chocolate chip cookie like it’s a trophy. “Want one?”
I roll my eyes. “No.And it’s ridiculous that you eat like that and still somehow stay in shape.”
He grins, as proud of his metabolism as if he’d handpicked it. “It’s a gift. Don’t hate me for being built like a god. I can’t help it.”
“Whatever.” I sigh and grab a pair of gloves, sliding them onto my hands before I move across the room. “Hold the bag.”
He saunters that much-too-tight-for-all-that-sugar ass over and braces one hand against the punching bag, the cookie still balanced in the other. “See? Easy. I really am a god.”
