PRIVATE: A Military Romance Novel (Military Men Book 2) (2 page)

Chapter 2

Sasha

҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉

My first day on the job and I’d already blown it with my boss. Scrap that, it wasn’t even the first day – it was the first
minutes
. If I hadn’t needed to pee so badly I would have crossed my legs and held it for as long as it took to make a good first impression.

Corporal Rafter was a bit of an ass about it, though. I was only a minute longer in responding to him than I should have been. It wasn’t like he’d waited hours for me. A girl had to pee.

As I followed him around the base, I tried to take in everything he told me. I got the feeling Rafter wasn’t one to repeat himself.

It was only a temporary base anyway. As soon as we were cleared we would be shipping off to Afghanistan on a deployment that would last for six months. That was when the real work would begin.

I was chomping at the bit to get started. Time in waiting was just that – time passing. The mistake I’d already made with Rafter still crackled in the tension between us and I was more determined than ever to show him what I was made of.

Being in the military was something I’d waited my whole life for. It took me twenty-two years before I could finally step foot on this base and have a home in the platoon. I wasn’t going to waste my shot.

“This is your dorm, your name should be on a bunk,” Rafter said as he finished the tour. “What is your first name, anyway?”

“Sasha.”

He rolled his eyes. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, sir, I am.”

“Even your name is girly. You’re not going to last two minutes here,” he grumbled. I was expecting some resistance from the assholes that hadn’t caught up to the twenty-first century yet, but I was hoping my superior would be a little less rude about it.

Ignoring his comment, I wandered into the room. Rows of bunk beds lined both sides of the pathway down the middle. Not many of the bunks had names on them. I found mine and dumped my swag on it.

“What are my orders?” I asked.

Rafter shrugged. “Get settled in and wait for dinnertime, I suppose.”

Helpful, he was not.

An asshole, he definitely was.

“Don’t you have afternoon drills? Shouldn’t I be getting changed and lining up with the others?” My brother George had quizzed me on the standard roster of the Camp San Luis Obispo Army Base. I knew when things happened in the facility, I wasn’t going to miss anything.

“
I
have afternoon drills,” Rafter said.

“May I join you, corporal?”

His eyes went to the ceiling as if he would find the answers written there. I got the distinct feeling he would rather have been anywhere except standing in front of me.

Which was kind of a shame, because Corporal Rafter was hot. Like panty-dropping hot. His cropped blond hair was gorgeous, even if shaved into a buzz cut. But it was his eyes that really sealed the deal. They were the greenest green I’d ever seen.

He finally sighed, defeated. “Fine. Get your ass in the field in ten minutes and prepare to work. I don’t show mercy to anyone, not even women.”

“Yes, sir. I wouldn’t want it any other way.”

I saluted him again and he half-heartedly returned it before leaving.

Thankfully, when I packed my bag this morning I had anticipated arriving and going straight into drills. My workout gear was on the top of my pile. I quickly changed in the lighter khaki pants and T-shirt.

Rafter hadn’t exactly shown me where the field was where we did our drills. He had merely waved in the general vicinity. I had to hurry around the base to find it.

The grass across the field was short from the hours of abuse it suffered under the soldiers’ boots all day long. It was largely men running up and down the worn track, I only noticed one other female.

I spotted Rafter and his men huddled around in the far corner and made a beeline for them. There were eight in total, all men and all sweating.

Rafter didn’t even acknowledge my presence as I slipped into the group. He was giving orders – something I think he enjoyed a little too much – and the men soon scattered.

We were running laps, including making our way through obstacles along the way. I put everything I had into keeping up with them.

I ran like there was no tomorrow. Down the path, over the wall, under the barbed wire track, and zigzagging over the tires in the dirt.

My heart was racing in my chest while I gulped in breaths. I’d trained for hours like this at home and at the army college. These drills were nothing new to me.

They were not going to leave me behind, I made sure of that. Rafter could kiss my ass if he didn’t want me there, I wasn’t going anywhere.

I ran alongside one of the men as we crossed the imaginary finish line. He gave me a kind smile as we slowed down. “So you’re the new recruit?”

“I certainly am. I’m Kincaid, nice to meet you,” I replied, holding out my hand for him to shake. He took it, his grip firm and serious.

“Watson. Nice to meet you too.” So far he was the only one who had spoken to me from the group. “You from around here?”

“No, sir. I’m from a little itty bitty town near Omaha called Bennington. Ever been?”

He shook his head. “No, but I’m sure it’s really nice. Good luck here. Don’t take any shit from Rafter, okay? He’s grizzly in the mornings but he gets better closer to dusk.”

“I’ll remember that, thank you.” My lips worked their way into a smile. After the reception I got from my new boss, it was good having someone that seemed genuinely nice.

“Kincaid,” Rafter barked my name, grabbing my attention. “You dropped out on five of those pushups. Run the whole course again.”

“Sir, I didn’t—”

“Now, Kincaid! Before I make you do double.” He pointed to the field and didn’t let his arm fall until I was doing exactly as he’d said.

I had
not
wimped out on the pushups.

Rafter really was an asshole.

Chapter 3

Matt

҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉ ҉

“Looks like you’ve got your hands full,” Watson said with his patented smirk.

We took our dinner trays over to a table and sat down. The whole mess hall was overcrowded with people as they ate.

“I can’t believe Atoll stuck me with her. She’d going to be a disaster when we get out to Afghanistan,” I replied, shaking my head.

It made no difference to me that Kincaid had kept up with us during our drills. It didn’t change my mind about her. Being in training conditions was a lot different to the conditions she would have to put up with in the warzone.

Where would she plug in her hairdryer?

“She seems like she has what it takes,” Watson said. “Maybe you’re just worried she’ll show you up. She made those last drills her bitch. I don’t think I could even run it that fast.”

He was joking, of course. Corporal Derrick Watson hadn’t been one of the youngest recruits to ever be promoted to corporal a few years ago for nothing. He could outplay us all.

“She has no place here. And she sure as hell shouldn’t be being shipped off to the middle of the fucking desert. If the military wants to make a show of enlisting women, they should keep them behind a desk and leave the fighting to us.”

Watson shook his head slowly, disagreeing with me. He could do that as much as he wanted. At the end of the day Kincaid was my responsibility as the leader of my platoon. I was going to have to look after her and the rest of the men without any of us getting killed.

She was going to slow us down.

She was going to make us look sloppy.

I bet she would run the moment she caught a whiff of the enemy. She had no place being on the front line and nothing anyone said or did was going to change my mind.

Even if she did look fucking hot in her tight T-shirt.

*

“Well done, men,” I said as we finished training the next day. I’d ridden them hard but they had all managed to step up to the plate.

All except one.

Kincaid was a pain in my ass.

“Kincaid, stay behind. Everyone else can leave.” She shot me a scathing look while the rest of the group left for their rec time. She’d worn that look on her face for most of the day.

“Yes, sir,” she said as she moved to stand in front of me. Sweat was rolling down her beet-red face from the exertion of the rigorous training schedule I’d implemented.

“You’re all over the shop out there,” I started. “I need all my soldiers to be at the top of their game. Otherwise people are going to die. You need to be faster and stronger.”

Her jaw grew tighter the longer I spoke. I was waiting for her to bite back, say something that could cause me to report her for insubordination. I wanted proof of my suspicions, something I could use to get her grounded before we left.

Silence was all that greeted me.

Until she finally opened her mouth. “Yes, sir. I’ll train harder and work on my skills.”

I fumed. “Get started then, I don’t want to be here all day.”

She shot me one last look before she took off in a run. I thought for sure giving her extra drills would have made her snap. I was pushing her beyond the brink of many people but she hadn’t even batted one of her pretty eyelashes.

She was quick, too. Watching her run through the obstacle course was like looking at a professional athlete do their training. Her feet were swift and smooth, her sculptured arms setting the rhythm as they pumped by her side. I could imagine those arms pumping something else with equal vigor. My cock hardened with the image.

She’d tried to contain her boobs with a sports bra but they still bounced with her steps. They were almost hypnotic. Thankfully I was too far away from her to be caught staring. There was nothing sexier than a healthy, fit woman. Kincaid was the perfect specimen but that didn’t mean she was able to handle her own out in a warzone.

No matter how goddamn sizzling her body was.

My gaze alternated between her tits and her ass. She was in great condition, her body was full of curved muscles that kept everything tight.

I bet she was like that all over.

Tight.

The last set of drills was done in record time before she returned to me. She stood there waiting for her dismissal, her pink lips parted as she dragged in some deep breaths. I could picture her on her knees with those pink lips, puckering them before wrapping them around my cock.

“I expect you to do better tomorrow, private,” I barked.

She nodded. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry to have let you down today.”

“I don’t want to see it happen again. Now get out of my sight.”

She left, limping slightly as she disappeared inside. I felt like a jerk suddenly, working her so hard she was physically suffering. It just proved my point that she should not be going onto the frontline.

*

The following few weeks were more of the same – training and preparing for our mission in Afghanistan. I continued to ride Kincaid hard and she was still yet to crack. I was running out of time but she hadn’t placed a foot out of line yet.

It was after drills one afternoon when I got a message to visit Major Atoll. I reported to his office straight away. “Yes, sir.”

“You’re shipping out tomorrow, Corporal,” he said. “Chatter says the Taliban are planning something big so the brass are bringing forward all deployments. Tell your team to be ready by five hundred hours.”

I thought we’d have more time to prepare but my platoon was ready. We all took our jobs seriously, we knew our lives would depend on it.

But there was one of my crew I wasn’t so sure about. “Sir, I have my doubts about Private Kincaid.”

Atoll leaned forward on his desk, his mouth set into a frown. “What doubts are those?”

“I don’t think she’s ready. She needs more time, I would like to formally request that she be removed from this deployment.”

My superior set me in his gaze as he considered the request. I’d proven myself to him before, he needed to trust my judgment now. I could then be rid of the woman so she couldn’t get herself killed in action.

He finally replied. “Request denied. All my reports have stated her to be a very capable young woman. She is an asset to your troop, not a liability.”

‘’But, sir—“

“I won’t hear any more about it. Whatever your problem is with Kincaid, I suggest you work it out prior to tomorrow morning. She’s going with you, whether you like it or not.”

“Yes, sir.” I saluted and left, angry now. They expected me to take a soldier over to a warzone that was likely to get killed. The shit was going to hit the fan eventually, I just hoped it didn’t cost any lives.

I passed on the message to my troop, everyone received it with the same level of enthusiasm and nerves as I felt.

We’d trained for this, everything we fucking did was to get over there and fight the bastards. This was what we lived for. I just hoped we would all come back alive at the end of the tour.

I sought my bunk out early, determined to get as much sleep in as I could before the early morning wakeup call. It would probably be the last good night sleep I would get in a long while.

Thankfully, the bunks were all empty so I had the place to myself. It would be the last time I would have some privacy until we returned again.

I’d just closed my eyes when I heard the door to the dorm slam shut with so much force that the wall shook. I flicked on the light, ready to tell whoever it was to fuck off.

The small lamp revealed Kincaid standing at the end of my bed, her arms crossed over her chest and her face red with anger.

“What are you doing, private?”

Her arms uncrossed so her hands could rest on her hips. “You’re trying to keep me grounded? What the hell have I ever done to you that said I deserved to be left here when the rest of my troop get deployed?”

I sat up, my own anger rising. “Who the fuck told you that?”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“And you didn’t answer mine. I outrank you, private. Do I need to remind you how inappropriate this is? I can have you reported.”