Two
“Four days and a wakeup,” Trace McGuire, T-Mac to his friends, said as he sat across the table in the chow hall on Camp Lemonnier. They’d returned from their last mission in Niger with news they were scheduled to redeploy back to the States.
He glanced around the table at his friends. When they were deployed, they spent practically every waking hour together. In the past, being stateside was about the same. They’d go to work, train, get briefed, work out and then go back to their apartments. Most of the time, they’d end up at one of the team members’ places to watch football, cook out or just lounge around and shoot the crap with each other. They were like family and never seemed to get tired of each other’s company.
T-Mac suspected all that was about to change. All of his closest SEAL buddies had women in their lives now. All except him. Suddenly, going back to Virginia wasn’t quite as appealing as it had been in the past. T-Mac sighed and drank his lukewarm coffee.
“I can’t wait to see Reese.” Diesel tapped a finger against the rim of his coffee cup. “I promised to take her on a real date when I get back to civilization.”
“What? You’re not going to take her swinging through the jungle, communing with the gorillas?” Buck teased.
Petty Officer Dalton Samuel Landon, otherwise known as Diesel, shook his head. “Nope. Been there, done that. I think I’ll take her to a restaurant where we don’t have to forage for food. Then maybe we’ll go out to a nightclub.” He tipped his head to the side. “I wonder if she likes to dance.”
“You mean you don’t know?” Big Jake Schuler, the tallest man on the team, rolled his eyes. “I would have thought that in the time you two spent traipsing along the Congo River, you would know everything there was to know about each other.”
Diesel frowned. “I know what’s important. She’s not fragile, she can climb a tree when she needs to, she doesn’t fall apart when someone’s shooting at her and she can kiss like nobody’s business.” Diesel shrugged. “In fact, I’m looking forward to learning more. She’s amazing. How many female bodyguards do you know?”
Big Jake held up his hands in surrender. “You got me there. None.”
“I can’t wait to see Angela.” Corpsman Graham “Buck” Buckner, the team medic, smiled. “She’s interviewing for positions around Little Creek.”
“With her doctor credentials, and the work she did with Doctors Without Borders, she’s sure to get on pretty quickly,” Big Jake said. “If not one of the military hospitals, there are lots of civilian hospitals and clinics in the area.”
Buck nodded. “I can’t believe after all these years, she’d want to be close to me.” He smiled. “I’m one lucky guy.”
“Yeah, and maybe she’ll talk you into going back to school to finish your medical degree.” Built solid like a tank, Percy Taylor had the tenacity of a pit bull, thus his nickname, Pitbull. He gave Buck a chin lift. “You’d make a good doc.”
“What?” Buck spread his arms wide. “And give up all this?”
T-Mac chuckled. “I know. It’s hard to believe anyone would want to stop being on call at all hours of the day and night, deploying to some of the worst hellholes on the planet and not getting back to see your family for months on end. Who would want to give up all that?”
“Hey, are we getting cynical in our old age?” Harmon Payne clapped a hand on T-Mac’s back. “We’re the ones who are going to suffer. We all have women to come home to now.”
“All except T-Mac,” Buck pointed out. “Maybe we should fix him up with someone? You think one of our women knows someone who could put up with his being a computer nerd and all?”
T-Mac shook his head. “I don’t need help getting a date, thank you very much.”
“I’ll bet Reese has met some pretty hot chicks in the DC area through her work as a bodyguard,” Diesel said. “Or maybe she still has some connections in the mixed-martial-arts community. One of those women are bound to be able to stand toe-to-toe with our guy.”
“Seriously.” T-Mac pushed to his feet. “I don’t need a woman in my life. You all know how hard our lives are without relationships. I’m surprised all you self-confirmed bachelors broke the cardinal rule.”
Pitbull stabbed the mystery meat on his tray with his fork and held it in the air, inspecting it with a frown. “What cardinal rule?”
T-Mac pounded his fist on the table. “Don’t get into a permanent relationship as long as you’re a full-time SEAL.”
“Nope.” Harm’s eyes narrowed and his lips twisted. “I don’t remember that line in the BUD/S training manual.”
“Before we came to
