Five
RIOS
Noise spilled out of the open windows of the Brewhouse onto the outer porch. Fans whirred overhead, stirring the heavy air. The smell of fried fish and malted hops drifted in lazy waves. This time of day, it was mostly locals, who’d emerged now that the lunch wave of tourists had gone off for a nap or back to the beach to bake themselves all afternoon.
Sawyer spotted me first and waved from the back deck. “’Bout time, man. We were starting to wonder if you’d decided to steal Hoyt’s boat and make a run for Aruba.”
I slid into the empty chair. “I considered it.”
Ford snorted, one corner of his mouth quirking. “You always did like to make an entrance.” The tattoos on his forearms shifted as he leaned back, sunlight catching on the edge of his tea glass. “You eat yet?”
“Not since breakfast.”
I’d put in my obligatory appearance at Caroline’s first thing. She was still giving me The Eye—something she’d perfected since her offspring had been born—and I was gonna have to actually tell her the truth about my presence here, since, by everyone’s expectations, I should still be deployed. But I wanted to talk it over with my brothers first, so here I was.
Ford flagged the waitress with two fingers. I put in an order for the blackened fish of the day and a Coke. Once she’d left, the three of us fell into the kind of silence that only happens when you’ve spent years earning it. No pressure to fill the gaps, no need to pretend. Just the hum of conversation around us and the creak of the boards under our boots.
Ford was the first to break it. “So, you gonna tell us what’s really going on, or do we get to guess?”
I huffed a quiet laugh. “That obvious?”
Sawyer leaned back in his chair. “You’ve been back for near to a week. Not like you to hang around this long between deployments. We figured something was up.”
“Yeah.” I let my fingers drum once against the table before flattening them. “Something’s up.”
Ford’s gaze sharpened. “You taking a new posting?”
“No, nothing like that.” I took a breath and let it out slow. “I’m out.”
That earned a synchronized blink from both of them.
“Out as in—?” Sawyer prompted.
“As in done. Separated. Or will be once the paperwork is done processing.”
Ford sat forward, forearms braced on the table. “What the hell happened?”
The waitress came with our food, and I waited until she’d walked off before answering. “There was a case. Someone who’s been preying on female sailors. One of them was a friend of mine.” My mouth flattened as I remembered how I’d found Bridget brutalized because she’d fought back. “I started an investigation. Gathered enough statements and evidence to show a pattern going back a decade or more. A senior commander who believed his position entitled him to do any damned thing he pleased to whomever he wanted. But when I tried to run the case up the chain of command, I hit a wall of brass and old favors. They shut it down.”
Ford’s jaw tightened. “You pushed anyway.”
“Yeah. And they pushed back. Made me an offer—early separation with full honors, clean record, and a quiet exit. The alternative was a long, ugly fight that wouldn’t end with me in uniform or the son of a bitch behind bars where he belongs.”
Sawyer’s eyes darkened. “So you took the honorable route.”
“If you can call it that.” I picked up my fork, stabbed a piece of fish, didn’t eat it. “I took the route that didn’t end with me losing everything I’d built since I was twenty.”
“The route that forced you to walk away while a predator is allowed to go free,” Sawyer observed.
My teeth ground together at the reminder. “Yeah. They strongly encouraged the officer to retire, and so far as I’m aware, he took it. But it’s cold comfort.”
“That’s bullshit,” Ford said.
“Welcome to the military justice system.”
For a long moment, none of us spoke. Somewhere inside, a blender started up. Somebody laughed too loudly at a bar joke. The ordinary sounds of life moved around us like nothing had shifted, even though everything had.
Ford finally said, “You did the right thing.”
