“Behave.”
I turn on the TV, flipping through channels until I find an old action movie, hoping the mindless car chases might help to distract me.
But knowing Noia is just upstairs, probably still flushed and bothered by our slow-burn tête-à-tête, keeps me distracted.
Taking a long pull from my beer, I lean back and try to focus on the screen, but my mind keeps wandering.
This whole slow-burn game is torture, but I can’t deny there’s something intoxicating about the build-up of sexual frustration igniting the fire of anticipation.
My plan is to play this out over the next few days and into next week, then take her on a slow-burn overnight date.
The party at Skin & Ink is only a couple of days away, and the thought of showing her off makes something possessive and primal stir in my chest.
Setting my empty bottle on the coffee table, I grab the remote and turn up the volume, trying to drown out the sound of her keyboard clicking upstairs. Each tap is a reminder that she’s up there probably writing about us.
About me.
I groan and adjust myself. “Fuck.”
This kind of dry,metallic heat doesn’t come from the sun; it comes from the air itself, and it’s boiling me from the inside out.
Sand scratches my throat when I breathe in, clinging to my skin as it works its way into the crevices of my gear.
My world is full of dust and beige as my boots crunch on the sand.
I know where I am, because I’ve been here before.
Afghanistan, 2009: Operation Tumbleweed.
I grip the handle of my M4, heart thudding low and hard in my chest. My vest is soaked in sweat and my hands are shaking.
Get it together, Blackwood.
“Ryder, move!” A voice shouts from behind me.
I spin around to see Kade, his face looking just the way it did before the mortar hit. He’s waving me toward the Humvee, shouting something else I can’t hear. His lips are moving, but the sounds in my head have gone muffled, almost as if I’m underwater.
He takes one step and my world explodes.
BOOM!
The sound hits me like a sledgehammer, flinging me backward to the ground. My ears are ringing and the air tastes like metal, burnt meat, and fire.
I scramble forward, my palms tearing open on the jagged rocks. Someone is screaming, but I can’t tell if it’s me or someone else.
Smoke curls around my face, and all I can see is what’s left of a leg and other body parts strewn across the ground in bloody pieces.
My stomach lurches.
Kade is gone.
My lungs refuse to expand. I can’t breathe.
My heartbeat is a loud drumming in my ears as I look around, searching for my gun, but it’s gone.
Disoriented, I turn my head, and the desert landscape shifts, blurring to black.
Bolting upright, I immediately fall out of bed.
