Fight to the Finish (First to Fight #3) (24 page)

“I need to close my eyes now,” Kara said, feeling the beginnings of another headache. Not being the type to suffer silently, she reached for the little clicker the nurse had shown her and pressed for more pain medication. “Talk to me for a few while I keep them closed?”

“No problem. Let's start with how the site director, Al, hit on me this morning.”

Kara let the darkness act as a balm, and her friend's voice ground her.

*   *   *

GRAHAM
hated crutches. They were a menace to society. He hobbled as best he could, keeping an eye out for his friends. As he rounded the corner, he saw not only Greg and Brad, but the entire damn team filling the waiting room. They stood as one when he came into view, and several let out an “Oo-rah!”

“Shh!”
hissed the nurse at the nearby desk.

“Sorry,” one of them called out from the back, earning another evil glare from the desk nurse.

Greg pulled out a chair like a waiter in a fancy restaurant. “Your seat, good sir.”

“Buzz off.” But he sat, because his armpits hurt. That was the worst part about crutches. He remembered now.

“How's Kara?” Brad asked as the team members settled themselves again.

“Concussion, lots of bruises, raw throat. She'll be sore for a while, but okay. She can't fly home, for sure. Not yet. I'll be renting a car and driving her home.”

“With a bum leg?” Simpson asked, looking confused.

“It's my left leg, numbnuts.” He tapped the side of the thick knee brace that ran from the middle of his thigh down
to the bottom of his calf. “I can drive with the right. I'll be fine. No other choice, really. Tell me what's going on with the games? I'm sorry I hurt our chances.” His dropping out of the competition left a gaping hole in their roster, and a lot of ground to make up.

“First, let's just clear this up.” Coach Ace stood. “I trained you all to be warriors and fighters. Boxing is one way to showcase that, but it's not the only way. I'm damn proud of you, Sweeney. You did what you were trained to do. Fight for the right side. You probably saved that woman's life. So I don't want to hear about letting anyone down, or being sorry. That's damn stupid, and you're not a stupid guy.”

Graham watched as Coach Ace sat back down with a decisive nod. “Uh . . . thank you, Coach. So . . . results?”

Brad had been knocked out of the running that afternoon. He was serious enough about the sport and the team, Graham expected to see more disappointment. Brad shrugged. “When you've seen a life-or-death situation not long before, it suddenly puts things into perspective.”

Greg was in the finals for his weight class, as was Tressler and several others. It looked as though their chances of bringing home a team win were almost nil. But their spirits were high regardless.

Maybe Brad was right. Having watched one of their own—as Kara was certainly their own now—nearly die had given everyone a little perspective about the games themselves.

Team members slowly trickled out after shaking his hand. Many asked him to tell Kara they were thinking about her. They had come to consider her a member of the team, as she'd supported them, taught them, and come to be involved with one of them. She was family. That conclusion was cemented when Coach Willis walked past and dropped a small T-shirt in his lap. “For Kara,” he said in his gruff voice, beard shaking. “I really like that girl.”

Graham nodded, then looked at the shirt. Marine Corps Boxing Team, size medium. For her. He couldn't talk around the lump in his throat, so he resorted to handshakes and head nods as the last of the team filed out. All but Greg and Brad.

He sat back, wishing he had one of those pain med IV drips like Kara did. “You'll miss the bus.”

“They're leaving us here. Reagan's gonna take us home.” Sitting forward, Brad laced his fingers together beside his knee. “Marianne's gotten some of the story from the MPs when they interviewed her, but not all of it. Apparently his older brother was in the Corps about four or five years ago. Ready to separate and move on, and he got recalled for one last deployment. Was killed in action in Afghanistan.”

Graham dug his thumbs in his eyes. It jived with what they'd told him thus far when they had come to take Kara's statement.

“Levi and his brother were close, and he took it hard,” Greg went on. “Blamed the military, the government, and anyone else he could for his brother's death. His parents thought, when he accepted the internship with Marianne, that he'd gotten over it.”

“Apparently not,” Graham said dryly.

“Apparently not,” Brad echoed. “So he's been looking for ways to ‘punish' Marines. Little ways here and there. I think they believe him when he says he never wanted to hurt anyone. Not really. Just embarrass us, inconvenience us, and eventually make it so we couldn't compete.”

“Hurting us, just in a different way. Because from his fucked-up viewpoint, if he didn't physically hurt us, he was better than the Marines, who killed his brother.” Graham had seen enough trials with nut jobs to know how they rationalized anything and everything.

“Exactly. The current theory is the fire was meant to stay contained, just to get rid of the uniforms. He has a thing for
fire,” Brad added with a roll of his eyes. “But nobody thinks he honestly meant for it to get as out of hand as it did. Or to hurt anyone.”

Graham's hands tightened around the chair. Whether he'd meant it or not, Kara's life had been well and truly in danger thanks to that fuckhead's actions.

“But he's not getting out of jail for a long time. Well, hospital first, because he got burned worse than Kara. I'm guessing they'll do a psych eval while he's here. Hopefully he gets the help he needs far, far away from Lejeune, but either way, he won't be bothering us.”

Greg yawned and stretched out his legs in a way that made Graham long to do the same. Reading his mind, his friend asked, “What's the prognosis on the knee?”

“Fractured patella, but the best kind of fracture, if such a thing exists. Not displaced, so should heal without surgery as long as I stay off it. Six to eight weeks.”

“You'll be back up in six.”

Graham appreciated Brad's confidence in his healing powers. “I should get back to Kara. I don't want to leave her for too long.”

“Understood, man.” Brad waited until he was steady on his crutches, then asked with a grin, “I guess we won't see you back on base tonight?”

“Guessed right. Keep me updated,” he added when Brad gave him a back slap, then steadied him as he pitched forward a bit.

“Sorry,” Brad said sheepishly.

“Good luck tomorrow. Kick some ass,” he told Greg who came in for a quick guy hug.

“Goes without saying. Now, go give Reagan the boot so she can drive us home.”

“Already booted. She's sleeping,” Reagan said, placing a light hand on Graham's shoulder. “And it looks like she's actually resting, so try to be quiet when you go back in. I'll come
check on you in the morning and hopefully I'll be able to drive you back to her hotel, but call me if anything changes.”

“Thanks. You're the best.” He kissed her cheek, which had Greg raising a brow.

Then Reagan linked arms with Greg and walked between him and Brad toward the exit, heels clicking on the worn linoleum flooring the whole
way.

25

T
hey left after breakfast, once the morning doctor had cleared her to check out, and managed to make it into Shreveport, Louisiana, before Graham called it a night.

“I could have figured out how to get home.” Kara reclined on the hotel bed, feeling foolish and not a little guilty that Graham had left the games early to drive her back. He wasn't 100 percent healed himself, but insisted he'd rather drive her than risk her flying so soon after a concussion. She hadn't had the energy to argue at the time, but having slept most of the first day's drive, her fighting form was back.

“Yeah. Fly home, and watch your brain explode midflight. Great option.” He rested his crutches next to the bed and slid down beside her. His knee was still in its brace, which was much thicker and longer than the one Brad wore.

“How long do you have to wear that?”

“Only until we get back and I can get into a doctor at home. They knew I'd be traveling home so they gave me a
sturdier brace than I'll probably need on a regular basis. How are you feeling?”

He'd checked in with her every step of the way, insisting they pull over often, and that she sleep when she could instead of keeping him company. Being coddled should have annoyed her . . . but she was still in pain enough to admit it felt wonderful.

As he shifted and rolled, she let him settle down on the bed with the TV remote, then snuggled up against him. He'd been so careful to touch her, avoiding contact beside a whisper of a kiss here or a light graze of the fingers there. Now she needed the comfort of his heat, his skin, his touch. Needed it more than her next breath. When his arm opened and gave her more space to cuddle closer, she did without hesitation. Her head jostled slightly as he wrapped his arm around her back to pull her in tighter, but she bit back the moan. If she said anything, he'd insist they sleep separate. She couldn't handle another night without him.

“Zach sounded okay, didn't he?” she said as he turned the TV on to a nightly news program, closed captioning on and sound muted. “He wasn't suspicious of us taking a car back, and being a few days late?”

“Not really. He sounded more depressed that I ‘lost' than for you to be late getting back.”

“I need to find a way to thank Frank and Mary for taking him in in the first place, and then keeping him longer than planned without warning.”

“We can invite them over for dinner. Or a bottle of wine. Check with Marianne.”

“He sounded like he was having a blast though,” she said, relieved.

“Face it, Mama. He's having fun without you.”

She pinched his side and had the satisfaction of his grunt, though he didn't budge. “I'm still his Important Person.”

“Of course you are.” He kissed the top of her head, then started surfing channels, still on mute.

“You can be an Important Person, too.”

He was quiet for a while, still flipping. Then he whispered, “Thank you.”

She nearly fell asleep with the warm, reassuring sound of his heartbeat and the pain medication she'd taken home with her coursing through her veins. But then he squeezed her gently and asked, “Will you guys move in with me when we get home?”

“That's . . . wow.” She took a moment to think. Because she'd been focusing on his heartbeat to lull her, she noted that it had sped up exponentially. “It's a big step.”

“You already agreed to marry me. I'd say moving in together is sort of a half step back from that.”

Reasonable. But still . . . “Engaged isn't married. I figured we had several months before we'd hit that point. I figured you'd want to wait for the termination paperwork to come through.”

He reached up and played with her hair, careful of the side that had hit the metal rod in the storage room and caused the concussion. “I want you and Zach now, and later. Whether the termination comes through in a month or three days before Zach turns eighteen, he's still going to be yours, and mine. Paperwork changes nothing but logistics.”

With a sigh, she nodded. “Slowly. We'll do it in stages. Zach will love it, I'm sure, but just in case, I want to make the change slow. Set up a bedroom in your place for him, try some weekends over there.”

“And I want to get a dog.”

“What?” She sat up so fast her head spun. Closing her eyes, she moaned and rested her forehead against his shoulder. “Damn it. You can't do that to me right now.”

“It's a dog. How was I supposed to know you'd react that
way?” He rubbed up and down her back while the urge to vomit passed. “I've wanted a dog for a while. I'm a dog guy. Zach's a dog guy. Now that I know someone would be home to take care of one if I have to work late, it seems like a good time to get one.”

“A dog,” she said again on a pained moan . . . but it had nothing to do with her concussion. “Changes everywhere. Wait . . . you're in Hubert. It would mean he'd have to change schools, too. That's not easy, with his restrictions.”

“Luckily, you've got a guy who knows the legal requirements for accommodations. What?” he asked when she looked up at him. “I read your blog. I've done a little research of my own. I know what you have a right to ask for.”

“Maybe I should have you write a guest column for the website,” she teased. “Ask Graham your legal questions.”

“I'd do it. I think the blog really has a shot at taking off, if you wanted to devote more time to it.”

“I do. I love yoga, and I'll still always want to practice, and teach. But less classes. More time for Zach.” It sounded like heaven, especially when she was so tired.

“Perfect. Find the balance and go with it. It's not about the money,” he added when she started to bite her lip. “It's about the life. You've worked so hard for so long. I know you want to be there with Zach. With other kids, as they come along.”

Another baby. She cupped her belly in hope. A baby wanted, loved, adored, cherished by both parents from the moment it was created. “You're right.”

“Music to my ears. Woman!” he yelped as she pinched him again. “If you were back up to full speed, you'd pay for that.”

“So I better take advantage now.” He flattened his hand over hers against his chest, staving off any additional pokes or prods.

“I really love you, you know,” she said, pressing a kiss to his chest. “What's with the shirt, by the way? You always sleep without one.”

“As we're not going to be getting into any funny business, the shirt stays on.”

“Aw.” She slid her hand under the hem, loving the feel of his skin under her palm. “Shame. Looking at your body is one of my favorite pastimes.”

“Not tonight, oh, horny one.” He gripped her wrist gently and pulled it back out. “You're concussed still. No physical activity for two weeks. Doctor's orders.”

“Shame, since tomorrow's our last night alone together for a while.”

“Such is life. I've spent the last two months—stop—building up endurance and—Kara—learning how to cope with—okay, you have to quit.”

She looked up from where she'd slithered down—gently, of course—to tug at the drawstrings of his athletic shorts. “Spoilsport.”

“That's me, running around ruining the fun for everyone. Well, not running,” he added with a grimace. “Get back up here. We want to make decent time tomorrow, so we're starting early.”

“Yes, Mr. Bossy Pants.” She curled back up against him again. As his breathing evened out, she whispered, “I love you.”

“Love you too, yoga girl.”

THREE MONTHS LATER . . .

Graham walked in to chaos. He'd come to expect the chaos, as it was a near-daily occurrence anymore after Kara and Zach had fully moved in two weeks earlier. Her fears of Zach handling the news about their engagement had been overblown. The boy had taken their news with a whoop and a fist pump, along with an immediate request for a puppy. He'd also handled the shifting of schools like a champ, and with Kara's
firm but calm request for accommodations for his allergies in place, he'd begun to thrive in the new environment.

Kids. Resilient, demanding suckers.

When Zach had asked if Graham wanted to be called Dad, Graham had looked to Kara for advice. She'd given him free rein, and in the end he'd left the decision up to Zach. Zach chose to stick with Graham, as he liked feeling more adult by using an adult's first name. Later, in private, Zach had told him even if he called him Graham, could he still think of him as Dad? Graham wondered how one kid could make a grown man want to cry.

Mom, however, would still always be Mom. No debate.

They'd moved in, gotten a puppy—much to Kara's dismay, as she'd lobbied for an older dog past the chew-and-accident stage. She talked a big game, and had feigned disgust when her son had picked the ugliest, hairiest dog at the rescue shelter. But she spent a majority of her free time carrying around and snuggling with the shaggy mutt Zach had picked out. The love was mutual, as the pup had imprinted largely on Kara, following her around the house like a fuzzy shadow whenever he wasn't wrestling with Zach.

“Zachary! Zach, get back in here now!” Kara bellowed from the kitchen window into the backyard. “And wipe that dog's paws off on the towel before you do. You've left your school crap everywhere!”

Graham grinned and let his own bag drop on the sofa beside the front door. His cover received better treatment, placing it on the bookshelf where he always did. “Hey.”

Kara whirled on him, her face red and her hands covered in yellow rubber gloves. The front of her T-shirt—the boxing team shirt she'd been given in the hospital—was splotched with wet patches, and her yoga pants were cuffed up, too. “That dog of yours—”

“Zach's dog.”

“That dog of yours,” she repeated, “has driven me to the
mad house today. And that kid has lost his mind if I am going to think for one second about adding
another
dog so the first one isn't ‘lonely.'” She blew out a raspberry. “I kicked them both out of the house, only to realize he'd left yet another mess for me to clean up.”

“The dog or Zach?” he asked with a smile. “Okay, okay. Let me change and I'll come help. Just point me in the right direction and I'll help clean up.”

“Just pick a spot!” she yelled after him as he went back to the bedroom to change from his uniform to jeans and a T-shirt. As he came back, she pointed with one gloved hand at the table. “What's that?”

He picked up the thick envelope, and the small but heavy box. “The box is our wedding invitations. The printer called before I left work, so I swung by and grabbed them.”

“Oh.” She ran to the kitchen sink and tossed the gloves under the cabinet, washing up before hurrying back to sit with him at the kitchen table. “Let me see, let me see. Gimme.”

“You know,” he said conversationally as he pulled out his pocket knife and slid through the tape sealing the box, “for a woman who avoided my advances for weeks, and insisted we couldn't get married, you're very attached to the planning of this wedding.”

“Well, I'm only doing it once. You're stuck, buddy. And I want to make sure it's right. Oh,” she breathed as he opened it fully and she saw the top invitation. Printed with silver lettering, it was delicate, simple, classic . . . exactly what Kara exemplified in Graham's mind. “They're perfect.”

The wording had been difficult, as custom dictated the invitation include both sets of parents' names. Graham felt odd having just his parents included, and had been grateful when his mother and father had agreed to be left off the formal invites to spare Kara the awkwardness. They'd loved her when they'd come to visit two weeks earlier, and had been delighted with Zach.

Not as delighted with the puppy. On that, they sided with Kara.

“Three months from tomorrow,” she said, running her fingertips over the raised date. “Fast.”

“Not fast enough, far as I'm concerned.” He kissed her cheek, then pulled the other envelope out. “And this, I picked up after the printer's.”

“You're quite the errand boy,” she said absently, still looking through the invitation box, now focused on the envelopes.

“It's not wedding invitations, but it's something. I picked it up from Tasha's office.”

That got her attention. She pushed the box of invitations to the side and scooted her chair closer. “What is it?”

“Papers are signed, and a court date has been set. It's not a guarantee, but it's going in the right direction so far. She's confident it will all turn out.”

Her eyes filled as she looked through the copies of original paperwork that would forever sever the ties she and Zach had with his biological father. The man was a first-class asshole, and he'd never have a place in their lives. But Graham understood that even with a situation like that, there were emotions involved. “You okay?”

“Hmm? Oh, yes. I'm good. This is a good thing. Sorry.” She knuckled away a stray tear. “Just really, you know . . . it's a lot.”

“It is.” He held her a moment, let her gain her composure. “I talked to Greg today, gave him a heads-up on the wedding date so they can plan ahead. He said to count him and Reagan in.”

“That's funny, because I talked to Marianne. It sounds like California agrees with her . . . though I have a feeling much of that is being with Brad and less about the geography. She's settling in nicely at the university. Division II athletes seem like a breeze after handling you guys.”

“Yeah, no kidding. We were a pretty high maintenance bunch.”

“And no interns,” she added with a grin.

Zach stormed in then, the puppy scrambling to make the same turn and follow.

“Zach, did you wipe that dog's feet off?” Kara demanded.