Warriors,Winners & Wicked Lies: 13 Book Excite Spice Military, Sports & Secret Baby Mega Bundle (Excite Spice Boxed Sets) Read online

  He wondered whatever happened to Linnea Fey. He hadn’t seen or thought of her in ten years. He’d joined the Marines and she had gone to college. They made big plans that summer after graduation about staying together but those things never happened. Divorce statistics were dismal enough, but high school sweethearts had double the chance of their relationship ending in failure. It was better it had ended when it did, so he could remember her that way, all white-blond hair and big blue eyes, like the night he’d picked her up in this car.

  Most things were better when you looked back at them through the warm haze of memory.

  He pulled into a spot at the front of the hospital lot and grabbed the handicapped placard off the seat beside him—he’d almost forgotten it and had to go back to his room to hunt for it in the mess—hanging it on the rearview mirror. He was careful to roll up the window and lock the car before heading in. There was no way his father would forgive him if the Boss ended up stolen. The air condition blast when the automatic doors whooshed opened made goose bumps rise on arms. It felt good after the blistering heat. Twenty minutes in ninety degree weather made him nauseous anymore. A dark, cool room was like heaven on earth in his condition.

  He took a number and found a seat. The lobby was crowded. Most of the patients waiting were on the north side of sixty, some far past seventy or even eighty, he guessed, watching an old man struggle with his wife’s oxygen tank while trying to push her in a wheelchair. The poor guy wasn’t in much better shape than she was, but at least he was walking. The old woman patted her husband’s hand as he lifted her O2 tank, setting it gently in her lap, and Woody felt a brief flash of sadness. What would it be like, that kind of tenderness? At one time, he would have said being old and sick didn’t seem like such a great thing to share with someone—but what did he know?

  Not much, Captain…

  He gritted his teeth at the sound of the cricket chirping in his head. Sometimes he thought, if Bernard Crick had appeared in front of him with those words on his lips, he would have punched him in the face. Of course, that wasn’t really true. He probably would have hugged him hard enough to break his ribs.

  He picked up a Popular Mechanics and flipped through until they called him.

  “Number eighty-seven?” The receptionist was young, pretty, with a swishy brunette ponytail that swayed when she looked up and smiled at him as he approached.

  “Number eighty-seven reporting for duty.” He dropped his crumpled number into the basket on her desk.

  “Have a seat.” She snapped her gum as she began taking his information—name and serial number—long red fingernails clacking on the keyboard. His back was killing him—the Vicodin was wearing off already—and his head was beginning to hurt again. Before long, it would hurt too much to hold it up. He wasn’t looking forward to that point.

  “Okay, hold out your wrist.”

  He complied, letting her snap a hospital bracelet on his arm. She offered him a sheet of paper and gave him directions down the hall to the elevators.

  “Third floor.”

  He found the elevator and took it up, handing over his sheet of paper and showing his bracelet to another receptionist behind another desk. It all seemed redundant to him, but his experience with at the V.A. facility had taught him there were a few things hospitals were good—like bureaucracy and requiring mountains of paperwork. This was the civilian hospital, so they moved twice as fast as the V.A. hospital—which wasn’t to say they moved fast.

  He took a seat in another lobby, this time flipping through Field and Stream, before someone called his name. He followed the girl in scrubs down the hall and around a corner, into a room where she nodded to a chair next to the table.

  “Have a seat. We’ll be with you in a minute.”

  A minute. He craned to see the clock behind him on the wall. A minute in hospital time apparently meant twenty. He’d already been there an hour. His appointment time had long come and gone. The girl in the scrubs left, closing the door behind her. He was really hurting now and closed his eyes against it, putting his elbows on his knees to cradle his head in his hands. Times like this it really felt like he wasn’t going to be able to lift his head again of his own volition. His vertebrae felt like they were so wobbly in there, he could have removed his noggin and tucked it under his arm for safe keeping.

  He didn’t look up when the door opened.

  “Hello there.” Another girl. She sounded distracted, rushed. Par for the course in this place. “Your first visit, I see. Are you in pain now?”

  “Yeah.” He opened his eyes, seeing her white nurse’s shoes. Pink scrubs. He still didn’t look up.

  “On a scale of one to ten…” Her voice trailed off and he heard the shuffle of paper. Of course, he knew the pain scale. He’d been telling them “ten” for months. Before the first surgery. After the latest surgery.

  “Ten. Ten,” he insisted again. Moving his head was like lifting a bowling ball with his neck. “Fucking ten.”

  “Levi Woodyer.” She said his name like she knew it.

  “Yeah.” He tried to focus. Something about her voice was familiar.

  “You don’t remember me.”

  He looked at her, sure he must be dreaming, as she leaned against the examination table, clipboard clutched to her chest. Tall, cute in her pink scrubs, quite a contrast to her shock of hair. She flipped it over her shoulder, seeing him staring.

  “My hair wasn’t blue back then.”

  “Linney?” He said her name but he couldn’t believe it. He’d just been thinking about this girl for the first time in years, and here she was, standing in front of him, the same devilish blue eyes and now with hair to match. It was a bright, Smurfy sort of blue that should have been weird, but instead made his cock jump in his jeans.

  “Levi.” His name in her mouth. Christ. That mouth. “Wow. What happened to you?”

  That was a damned good question. He just shook his head. He had no idea where to start.

  “So you…” Damn, the girl looked fine. And the way she smiled at him—like she had a secret. He swallowed hard and sat up straighter. “You’re a physical therapist?”

  “Yeah.” She put her clipboard aside, sliding up onto the table, comfortable and relaxed now instead of brusque and businesslike. “Well, I was a massage therapist first. Then I went back to school for PT. What about you? I heard you joined the marines?”

  “Medical discharge last year.” He hated saying that. “It was a good ride until the end.”

  “You always did like to go out in style.” She smirked and he couldn’t get over how different she looked, even though it was still Linney—he remembered her hands, just calmly resting in her lap now, how she liked to paint her nails dark colors that drove him crazy whenever she knelt between his legs and stroked his cock. Fuck. He was really hard now. Achingly hard. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

  “So you… married? Kids?” He shrugged off his camouflage jacket, sliding it over his lap, hoping to use it to camouflage his erection. With as much pain killer as he had in his system, his dick should have been as limp as a wet noodle but it felt like a steel bar against his zipper.

  “Uhhh…” She blinked, hesitated. “Married.”

  Bad luck, Captain.

  He shushed Cricket in his head.

  Of course she was. Some guy had snatched her up. He fought the overwhelming feeling of disappointment curling in his belly, putting on what he hoped was an “I’m so happy for you,” face.

  “For a little while anyway.” Her eyes darted away, glancing down at the chart beside her. “He had a bad habit.”

  “Oh yeah?” He couldn’t believe the thrill that shot through him when he discovered she was single again. “What? Heroin?”

  “Worse.” She smirked, shaking her head. “Women.”

  “Ah.”

  “How about you?” She flipped through his paperwork, probably looking for his marital status. He hoped so, anyway.

  “Married to the Mari
nes,” he confessed

  “But not anymore.” That secret little smile again. Her eyes danced, little blue flames. He couldn’t get over the hair. Her hair had been such a turn-on, all that long, white blond silk, but the blue intrigued him.

  “No,” he agreed.

  “Were you shot?”

  “No.” He swallowed, remembering. Wasn’t even in a damned combat zone. “I jumped out of a plane.”

  She raised her eyebrows, writing something down. “Bad landing?”

  “Bad timing.” Bad everything, really. The whole thing had been FUBAR from the beginning. He should have called it off, should have listened to Cricket. “The chalk was dropped in twenty-seven knot winds.”

  Linney shook her head, glancing up at him and frowning, looking for a translation.

  He gave her one. “Thirteen knots is the legal limit for civilians.”

  “Ouch.” Her eyes widened.

  “You can say that again.” He flashed a bitter smile, counting off his injuries on his fingers. “Let’s see, I’ve got severe cranial nerve damage. There was extensive ligament damage, all the way from the top of my head down to the middle of my spine. My jaw was actually torn away from my skull. I couldn’t talk for three months. I broke my tailbone, my rib cage was torn away from my spine…”

  “I got it, I got it.” She held up her hand, shuddering.

  “Oh hell, I was lucky,” he scoffed. “One guy didn’t make it.”

  “Oh Levi, I’m so sorry.” The compassion in her voice made his throat close with emotion. “So you’re here for help with your pain?”

  “I’m here…” He shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest and looking at her askance. “I’m here because my dad bribed me. He told me I could drive the Boss if I showed up to this appointment. You can’t help me, Linney. No one is going to be able to put humpty dumpty back together again.”

  “Well we’ll see about that.” She offered him a smile, and a hand. “Will you lie down for me?”

  Damn but she was irresistible. Her hand was small and warm in his. It was laughable, the idea of her helping him up, but he took her hand anyway, letting her lead him toward the examining table.

  “On your belly,” she directed. He did as she asked, stretching out, arms crossed over his head, cheek pressed to the paper on the table. Her hands moved slowly, carefully, over his back, her fingers feeling each vertebrae of his spine. “So, how is your dad?”

  “As stubborn as ever,” he snorted, wincing as her fingers made their way up to his neck.

  “Face down.” She reached around, adjusting the table so a hole appeared for his face, allowing him to turn his head. Her hands pressed, pulled, making him cringe. It felt like there were marbles in there, shifting painfully under her probing fingers. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, does it?”

  “Damn, Linney, do you have to be so honest?” He gritted his teeth as her thumbs met at the base of his neck, pressing hard, spreading. “Fuuuucccck!”

  “Does that hurt?” She asked the question but didn’t stop when he groaned in the affirmative. “Besides, honesty is the best policy. I could have dealt with heroin. But cheating? Behind my back? You know how much I hate lying.”

  “I remember.” He did. It was one of the reasons he knew it would never work, as much as they talked about trying. You couldn’t be a marine and not keep things from your girlfriend—or wife. And Linney hated lies, even if they were for her own good. Or for the sake of national security. He could almost hear her scoff, “Oh whatever!”

  She’s a keeper, Captain…

  Damned Cricket.

  Shut the hell up, he argued back, feeling ridiculous. I missed that ride a long time ago.

  “I’m sorry he hurt you.” He wasn’t just apologizing for her ex, and the way her hands moved over his back, it felt as if she knew it. Somehow, whenever Cricket talked to him, he was almost always moved, even if he argued with the bastard in his head.

  Her touch was suddenly gentle, caressing the wings of his shoulder blades, cupping his bare shoulders and squeezing. His body remembered her. Her hands on his shoulders reminded him of the way she clutched him when he entered her, wrapping those deliciously long legs around his waist. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, loosening his muscles, and he groaned, letting himself close his eyes and enjoy the sensation. His cock ached, throbbing against the table.

  “Can you roll to your back?” she murmured, so close to his ear he felt her breath against his cheek. She smelled delicious.

  He did as she asked, slowly, urging his erection away and praying she wouldn’t notice.

  “Nice ink,” she commented, running a finger in a slow line down from his shoulder.

  “Most marines make ink a hobby.” He glanced at the place where her finger stopped.

  “The ‘semper fi’ makes sense,” she said, rubbing the words on the inside of his forearm. His entire team had the same tattoo. “But this? Reminds me of that book we read in grade school.”

  “What book?”

  Her hands moved again, this time exploring his shoulders, his chest, her expression intent, head cocked as if she was listening for something.

  “Cricket in Times Square. Do you remember that one?” She smiled at the inked cricket on his shoulder. “Yours is so realistic!”

  “Yeah, I remember.” He sat behind her in fifth grade while their teacher, Mrs. Duganer, read aloud. He used to stare at Linney’s hair. Sometimes he’d lean forward far enough so he could smell her shampoo. He hadn’t sat by her again until Calculus.

  “Oh sweetheart, you were really torn apart, weren’t you?” She had moved down to the end of the table so she could push and pull on his legs, making his spine curl inside his skin, as stiff as a dried up spider.

  “Like I said, there’s really not much you can do. I live on painkillers.” Oh what a vantage point, looking at her, kneeling up on the table now, hands on his thighs. He tried to think of something else besides undressing and fucking her right there on the examining table but his cock wasn’t listening to reason.

  “They’re still giving them to you?” She raised her fair, arched eyebrows. “Do you go to the pain clinic?”

  “My surgeon, the V.A., the pain clinic, you name it, I’ve been there.”

  “Oh Levi.” Her hands on his thighs, squeezing, the shift of her lithe body between his legs. He wasn’t even trying to hide his erection anymore. He was surprised his cock hadn’t burst, alien-like, right out of the denim. “How long has it been?”

  “A little over a year.” He watched as she climbed down, hands still roaming over his legs, pulling, pushing, forcing his spine to do things it clearly didn’t want to. “I can sit in a chair for short amounts of time now but I still have to tie my jaw closed at night.”

  She blinked at him. “Spasms?”

  “Either that or demons trying to get out of my head,” he joked as she moved around the table, hands cupping his face. “I tend to think it’s the latter.”

  “You’re not possessed.” She smiled, thumbs caressing his cheekbones, fingers cupping his jaw. It hurt but not in a bad way. “And I think I can help you.”

  “Don’t give me hope.” He caught her hand, keeping it there, resting against his cheek. “It’s cruel.”

  “I won’t hurt you.” Her fingers stroked his cheek, her eyes so kind it hurt him to meet them. “I promise.”

  She’s telling the truth, Captain…

  He had his doubts—on many levels. But there was the cricket in his head, chirping again.

  “But you need to come see me. Regularly.”

  “Yeah, that’s not going to happen.” He shook his head, quick to dispel the hurt look on her face. “It mean, it’s not you—it’s me. Or rather, the V.A. Veterans Affairs gave me severance and then, after reapplying because they lost my paperwork—six times—a whole whopping twenty percent disability. Now I have to pay back my severance with my disability.”

  “What?”

  “Right. Of course, i
f I’d been wounded in combat, I wouldn’t have to pay it back at all.”

  The lady or the tiger, Captain?