Impossible.
“I can’t,” he admitted in a moment of bald honesty.
“Then you really are an asshole.” Zack sounded as disgusted as Ben felt. “I’m heading out. I’d say call me if you need someone to talk to, but we both know you won’t, right?”
“I don’t need to talk.” Ben had repeated the line so much in the past few weeks—to his folks. To the LT. To McGinnis. To himself. But tonight the words sounded especially hollow. “But thanks. And Zack...” He took a breath. “I hope it goes well. The party. Maddox. All of it.”
“I’m never going to understand you.” Zack shrugged. “But yeah. It’ll be a good time. Night.”
And with that Zack was back loping across the parking lot, phone out. He was probably texting Pike, telling him he was on the way. God, the two of them were so in love that it hurt to watch them. Zack had that to come home to. Every mission. Every deployment. He had Pike right there waiting for him.
What would that be like? a secret part of him asked, but he kicked that door closed. He’d gone that route with Trey, hadn’t he? And what had it gotten him?
But you didn’t try it with Maddox. The inner voice refused to shut up. That could be you. Someone to text. Someone to make your favorite foods. Someone in your bed. Someone to bring home surprises to. Someone to go places with. Never walk into a gathering alone again. That could be you happy.
Fuck. He slumped down into the driver’s seat, rested his head against the steering wheel. Zack had courage that Ben wasn’t sure he knew how to tap. All he knew was that he was damn miserable with no end in sight, an endless string of days without Maddox stretching in front of him.
He picked up a six-pack on the way to his dad’s, half-tempted to kill it in the parking lot. Not for the first time, he thought about going to Hillcrest, getting drunk at his favorite places, picking up someone—
Nope. And that was where that thought ended. After Trey, he’d been only too eager to drown his sorrows in cheap booze and cheaper sex, using one-night stands as therapy until it went from painkiller to habit. Until he’d been using it less to get over Trey and more as bulwark against his feelings for Maddox, and they all knew how well that had turned out. And now for the first time in his life, even his own hand had limited appeal as it just made him miss Maddox that much more.
He let himself into the house, intending to head straight to his room, but Camilla’s voice called out to him from the kitchen. “Oh there you are! I’m making tamales. Come help.”
Ben groaned softly as he entered the kitchen. Maybe Zack and McGinnis were right and he really was an asshole, but he still couldn’t ignore Camilla. “I’m pretty bushed,” he said as he put the beer in the fridge, keeping one back to open. He took a swig. “And awful company.”
“So nothing’s changed for you.” Camilla bustled around, effectively ignoring him as she set up the tamale assembly line—soaked corn husks, filling, dough, all neatly laid out. Ben still remembered the first time he’d helped her make them. He’d been in a terrible mood then too.
“Boys don’t cook.” He had kicked his feet against the bar stool at the island as he glowered at her.
“They do if they want to eat.” The woman—his dad’s freaking girlfriend—hadn’t taken his complaints and shoved a pile of wrappers in his direction. She’d moved around the space like she’d been cooking there for years. The filling smelled like peppers and pork, and he hadn’t been able to keep his stomach from rumbling. “You don’t have to like me, you know? But the way I see it, you need to eat sometime.”
And sometime between that first batch of tamales and this one, Ben had grown to like her. More than like. Respect. She’d never ever taken his shit, and she wasn’t starting tonight either.
She nodded at his beer. “Your dad’s worried about you. You planning on getting drunk again in your room or you think you could grace us with your presence for dinner?”
Ben had laid off the sauce somewhat since the LT’s warning, being careful to not be hungover on duty, but the damage to his reputation both at work and with his family was going to take longer to repair. And off-duty nights were still another story as he struggled to make it through the long, lonely nights without Maddox. “I can eat,” he allowed, taking a dough scoop and starting to fill wrappers, mimicking Camilla’s practiced movements.
She tied the filled tamales in bundles of three, fingers flying. “This is my pork mole recipe. Haven’t done this one in a while. It was always Ray’s favorite.”