Jump Start (Texas Hotzone 1)

“That’s a pricy rental there, soldier,” she said, flipping off the lights as she stepped outside.

“Just call me Sugar Daddy,” he joked and kissed her. He took her keys, as if it were second nature, and locked the door, as he explained, “Free upgrade. They lost my reservations and I had to wait an hour.”

“Still got a pickup at home?” she asked, as they walked to the parking lot to the right of her condo.

He stiffened, a barely perceivable shift in his body, but she didn’t miss it. “If you mean at the base,” he said, holding the door of the shiny silver Infiniti open for her as she slid inside. “A white F150.” He didn’t give her time to respond, shutting her inside the car, where the scent of new leather threaded through her nostrils, sadness in her chest.

He claimed the driver’s seat and started the engine, sudden tension palpable. Jennifer glanced at his profile, noting the hard set to his jaw. “I didn’t mean to imply this isn’t your home,” she said softly. “I… Well, you’ve been gone seven years.”

“You didn’t say anything wrong,” he said, maneuvering out of the parking space. “This isn’t my home. It hasn’t been for a long time. Hell. I don’t know why I have a truck back at base. I’m deployed more often than not. I’m rarely even in the same country where it’s parked, let alone driving it.”

“You’re gone that much?”

He nodded. “My unit is small and specialized,” he said. “We don’t technically exist. Top secret, done off the grid that no one else will touch. It’s not exactly a situation cut out for home and family. In fact, one of our members just opted out of reenlistment after meeting a woman he wanted to marry. He didn’t want to put her through the hell of the life we lead. And it was the right decision. He almost got himself killed on his final mission. He was distracted. Survival in our unit means treating our duty, and nothing else, as our home. Lives depend on it.”

The butterflies were back in Jennifer’s stomach, but this time, they felt more like bats, clawing her inside out. “And does it?” she asked softly. “Feel like home?”

Seconds ticked by before he replied in a low, gravelly voice, his attention latched on to the road, “It’s been the only home I’ve had for seven years.”

Jennifer tore her gaze from his profile, and stared out of the window, the sun lowering rapidly into a skyline blended with blues, yellows and oranges. He was leaving. She’d known this, but maybe on some level, she’d prayed it wasn’t true despite telling herself she was ready for closure, ready for goodbye. Prayed that there could still be something between them beyond the past.

But he was married to duty; duty was home. The only part of the past that could exist was goodbye. That should be liberating. The pressure was off. The fling was on. Closure could be found without turmoil. It was liberating. It was everything she should want. So why wasn’t she relieved?

***

AS SOON AS THEY HIT highway I-35 driving toward San Marcus, Bobby gently nudged Jennifer into talking about her clinic. Fortunately, once the topic of her animals was rolling, Jennifer was quick to forget about his past, or future, in the Army. And the more she talked, the more he realized what a good life she’d made for herself. The more he knew that his decision to keep his enlistment status a secret was the right one. Somehow, some way, when these two weeks ended, she was going to be happy, with or without him. Without guilt, without regret. Hopefully without throwing things, because that would mean he’d gone terribly wrong somewhere along the line.

Arriving at the show grounds, Bobby’s one regret was the need to detour from his plan to bury the ghost of the past, for an investigative operation. They parked behind one of two large warehouses, overlooking an airfield.

Well-populated steel bleachers were set up on the building side of the airfield. Not far from the seating, smoke floated from several oversize barbecue grills near a large concession stand.

Jennifer stepped out of the car as Bobby held the door open. She inhaled. “Oh, that smells good,” she said and pressed her hand to her stomach. “I’m hungry.”

He laughed. “For a little thing, you’ve always had the appetite of a linebacker.”

She shoved her hands on her hips. “Your point?”

“Other than I like that you actually eat and don’t pick…” he said, taking her hand and leading her toward where they had to register. He was about to get his first look at Rocky Smith and his Hotzone skydiving operation, that might well be a cover for running illegal drugs to and from Mexico. “No point at all.”