G.I. BABY (6 page)

He couldn’t help it.

He grinned like a smug Neanderthal and pumped his fist.

——*****——

Having a mother who was a perpetual
hopeless romantic that resulted in three children with different fathers was not a happy thought for her growing up. It was an embarrassment. It was proof that love, when mishandled by starry-eyed fools fucked up lives. She should know. She was a living testament to it.
 

Love? Hah! Her mother was a sucker for that. Her mother wanted the fairy tale. She believed every man she was with would be THE one, that one man who would love her unconditionally for all time.
 

She was in for a rude awakening, three times, the poor woman.
News flash Mama Mia! All that blasted love brought you for believing in it like a devoted pilgrim were bastards. Two half-whites, one half-black. All minus their fathers.

Ah love…true love for that matter was a unicorn indulged in by men and women with charmed lives. They had plenty of time to worry about petty stuff like relationships. They didn’t have issues with money, identity and surviving life in general.

Now, she hadn’t kept her virginity all these years because of some romantic sentimentality. She just didn’t have time for romance and all that shit. Her goals for her future came first than anything else. Her eye-popping GPA would prove that.
 

She had more important things to think about than having a boyfriend. She’d reckoned she had to lose her V-card at some point. Practicality dictated she should get rid of it before she graduated from college, at least, to prepare her for her professional life. A woman who knew sex was a woman who knew how to navigate the corporate world ruled by men, which she intended to conquer in the near future.

She had some vague fantasies about how to lose her V-card to some lucky bastard but none of them included a guy who looked at her like she was a damn freak after satisfying his lust with her thrice.

That ungrateful wretch! A woman would only lose her virginity once. The least he could do was say thank you! He got it way too easy! Though she wouldn’t put the blame on anybody but her stupid self, she will not stand for any man ridiculing her choices in life no matter how hot-looking he was!

She just planned to doze off for a few hours last night, bone tired from cleaning the entire apartment after coming off of her day shift at a restaurant she was working in as a waitress. She took two jobs to save extra cash for her expenses not covered by her scholarship next semester. She was entering her third year now at the University of Miami, taking up a Bachelor’s Degree in Accountancy.

She had a headache so she took a paracetamol. No wonder she was slow to wake up when that bastard started molesting her! By the time she came to, it was too late. He already lay siege to her body.

He forced her. Had she been awake, she would never—

She sighed. That was not true. She could have fought him for real. But she didn’t. She allowed him to take her. Because she
wanted
it, too.

That was the truth.

She scrubbed her skin harder, wanting to remove the memory of his touch. Okay, she was not the first idiot to commit this kind of screw-up but it was certainly not the end of everything. She can walk away from this and carry on with her life, with her plans. Move forward. Forget this ever happened.

She finished her bath quickly. Fresh from the shower, her self-recriminations draining with the water, her composure was restored to a certain degree. She hoped she could hold it down until she was out of this damn building, never to return again.

He was in the military, he’d said. Owning a digs like this, he must be high-ranking now. All the more reason to get out of there fast. The last thing she needed was to get involved with a man from the service. She detested his kind. Silver-tongued liars who promised the moon and stars to every woman who was stupid enough to fall for it.

Yeah, yeah, serving the American people with their very lives. I get that and thank you, American soldiers, but my father was a bastard for spawning a bastard like me and leaving me to live with my mother who’d slept with enough GIs that could fill an entire USS.
 

But still, she had to thank that mother who was able to identify the father of her eldest child and wise enough to appeal to him to help her enter the United States so she can have a better future. Luckily, her mother had a sister in the US too, who turned out to be a decent human being married to some decent Puerto Rican migrant.

Now here she was, six years in the United States, struggling to get a college degree. She wasn’t totally down on her luck as God had blessed her with enough IQ to be able to graduate as valedictorian in high school and score a scholarship at a university, but it was apparent now, she wasn’t endowed with enough common sense to excel at the University of Hard Knocks.

Ah well, bitter as it may to swallow, that had to be chalked up to experience. Indeed, experience was the best teacher and she’d learned this particular lesson the hard way.

Yeah, harrrrd way, indeed,
her conscience mocked her.

If her conscience were a bitch, she’d know what would come next.

Yeah, you could use a slap in the face, smartass who isn’t so smart after all.

She pulled a deep breath. Her conscience was a merciless heathen today, but she had to get past the devil himself.

——*****——

She emerged from the bedroom
fully dressed.

Craig was standing in the hallway, impatiently waiting for her. He’d been burning holes on the carpet as he restlessly paced the expanse of the living room back and forth, looking intermittently at the wall clock. She stayed a good thirty minutes in the bathroom. It felt like goddamn forever.

She continued walking, not meeting his eyes, gripping her books tight to her chest. Her impassive demeanor set him off again. She actually meant to just walk away. Just like that?!

He blocked her way.

She stopped and met his eyes. She was small, the top of her head barely clearing his shoulders but she was looking at him with such superior air he was momentarily taken aback. Very few men would look at him that way and even his superiors treated him with grudging respect despite his occasional insubordination. His kill record in the cockpit had accorded him some tolerance. The rest steered clear of him. They knew better than to raise the demons inside him. One stupid comrade did that once a long time ago and landed in a hospital with broken ribs. He, in turn, was sent to the shrink for a thorough check-up in the head. However, his skills in the skies were genius level and they couldn’t afford to suspend him for long. He was back in the cockpit after a week. Nobody dared to talk shit at him ever since.

Now this slip of babe didn’t know him, had no idea how dangerous he could get. She was eye-sparring with him like a little Valkyrie, goading him, challenging him.

Somehow, that really pleased him. He couldn’t stand hysterical or simpering women.

“Let me pass,” she said in a clipped tone. That sounded like an order, too.
 

“We need to talk.”

“About what?”

“About…what happened.”

“Look, what happened happened. Will you just say slam bam thank you ma’am like a typical guy and let me go? I promise I’ll not think badly of you.”

In spite of her antagonistic tone, he was amused. She was giving him a clean way out, free of any responsibility. The best deal any man could ever have under the circumstances. Really, he should grab it and show her the door.

Yes. Now.

“C’mon, have some coffee.”

“No, thank you.”

“You’re not leaving until I say so.”

“I will scream.”

“Go ahead.”

She gave him a withering glare. “What do you want from me?”

You. I want you again.

Fuck.

“C’mon. Just one coffee won’t hurt, would it?”

——*****——

His immovable stance
and the implacable look on his face told her he wasn’t taking no for an answer. The man commanded quiet authority and she recognized that. She didn’t have any energy left to go head to head with him. Not today.
 

So, okay, she will spend a few more minutes with him to indulge whatever he wanted to talk about. Anything to get him out of her hair.

He gestured for her to lead the way to the kitchen. Seething with restrained anger, she walked ahead with him following closely behind her, self-conscious that he was watching her back.

He pulled one of the high stools for her at the island counter. She flinched when he held her hips to help her up, her nerves jumping.
 

“I can manage, thank you,” she said curtly, hating her physical reaction towards him at the tiniest contact. It seemed that after last night, her body now recognized a familiar stimulus, the touch of this man.

Without a word, he went behind the counter and got busy with the coffee maker. It was hard not to stare. It wasn’t everyday that she had a shirtless hunk serving her breakfast. He was tall and built solidly, compact all over…ripped and strong and…

Her kitty clenched in remembered bliss.

She averted her gaze, feeling her cheeks heating up. Would she ever forget this man? The way he looked wasn’t easy to forget as it was. How much more the way he felt, smelled and tasted? The way he touched her?

He placed a steaming cup of brewed coffee in front of her.

“Creamer?”

She nodded.

“A sweet tooth.” He poured liquid creamer onto her cup and stirred it for her. She waited silently. It was both sweet and weird, being taken care of like this, especially by this man.

“Drink your coffee while I finish the French toasts.”

She took a sip. The warmth instantly traveled to her stomach, relieving some of her tension.

He worked efficiently on the flat stove. His kitchen was designed like a chef’s dream, equipped with the most sophisticated appliances.

A few minutes later, she had in front of her a plate of French toasts with scrambled eggs and fried bacon strips. Damn, how can she forget this colossal stupidity when it came with a sumptuous-looking breakfast?

“Let’s eat.”

He drank from his own mug of coffee.
 

She dug into her own plate. Strange, but how come this tasted so good? It was just French freakin’ toast. But she finished her food in only a few minutes.

She caught him staring at her with amusement.

“You want more?”

“Uhm…”

He put the remaining scrambled eggs and bacon strips from the skillet onto her plate. The bread on his plate, he transferred to hers.

She couldn’t help but smile at him in appreciation. If a man spent the whole night making you delirious with pleasure and then fed you breakfast he cooked himself in the morning, how would you feel?
 

Crazy stupid volume 3. But understandable. Thrice is a charm.

“Aren’t you hungry?” she asked him.

“Not as hungry as you.”

“Sorry. I just remembered I hardly ate last night.”

“Then finish that. I don’t want you losing weight.”

What did he care if she lost weight? Like they would still see each other after this. That put her back in the real world. For a while there she got lost in some fantasy, of lovers spending an idyllic morning-after together.

She quickly finished her food and her coffee. She’d been avoiding “the talk”, pretending to concentrate on her food but now, she had to end this. She schooled her features into a neutral calm and met his eyes. “So?”

Apparently, he was ready with his questions and was just waiting for her to be done eating. “How come?”

“How come what?”

“How come you were still a virgin last night?”

She sighed, her ire rising back quickly. Not that topic again! “Are you one of those insecure guys who have such little manhood you need to rub in every lay you’ve scored?”

He smirked. “We both know I’m hardly little.”

She rolled her eyes. “Insecure then.”

“How so? I just asked you a question.”

“You know, if you find it so weird that I’ve kept my V-card this long, please don’t flatter yourself in thinking I was saving it for you.”

“Regardless, I popped your cherry. Why me?”

“It wasn’t for lack of opportunity.”

“I know. A lot of guys would have wanted the honor for sure.”

The way he said honor, with that mocking look made her bristle all the more. Why the hell were they having this stupid conversation? Only a man who cared about her would still bother to inquire about her lost virginity. And he clearly didn’t give a shit.

“I was going to get rid of it. You just happened to be there,” she fibbed to save her pride.

“I see. How old are you?”

“Do I need to answer that?”

“Yes. Just making sure you’re old enough to fuck.”