Page 74 of Constantly Cotton
Jason’s eyes burned, and he shook his head. “There are probably at least sixty-eleven things on my desk right now that absolutely can’t be put off,” he said. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
“I’m better than that,” Burton retorted, stung. “There’s only eleventy-twelve.”
Jason laughed a little as they made their way to the SUV that would take them to the military plane that had been sent to apprehend Deavers after Jason had made his call to Talbot.
“No,” he said, the words weighing about twelve-thousand pounds. “I’ll go, be a good boy, and get back to work.”It’s not like you have anything better to do.
“No offense, sir, but I don’t think there’s a medal for sexual martyrdom.”
Jason did a spit-take, and then covered his mouth with his hand. “I beg your pardon?” he said, staring at his subordinate—and his friend.
“Why can’t you bring him out to the desert?” Burton persisted. “Remember when you told me to go fetch Ernie? Best thing I ever did. Added years to my ability to do this job. What, you’re not good enough to get laid like someone in the lower ranks?”
“It’s not about me,” Jason said doggedly. “It’s abouthim.He’s barely twenty-two. Did that escape everyone’s notice?”
Burton snorted. “Nope. We just thought that twenty-two years was a long enough time to feel alone in the world, and maybe you could sort of fix that for him.”
“By practicing job and lover polygamy?” Jason snapped. “What kind of man would that make me?”
“A human one! But never mind. I’ll start looking for the sexual martyrdom medal in the mail for you, sir, because we all know that’s the next best thing!”
Jason groaned and scrubbed his face with his hands. “Twenty-two,” he muttered.
“Yeah,” Burton replied. “But that doesn’t mean shit if you love him.”
Jason growled into his hands, and Burton patted him on the back. “Think about it, sir. But, you know, maybe after a little bit of sleep.”
TWO WEEKSlater, Jason sat up in his tiny officer’s bunk room, Cotton’s name clawing to escape his throat. With a deep breath, he wrapped his arms around his knees and shook, trying to remember what had scared him so badly.
Had Cotton been in danger? Was that what the dream was about? Because if Cotton was in danger, maybe Jason should do what he promised and reach out? He remembered reaching—reaching for that slender, capable hand, needing to feel it clasped around his own, needing to hold on to it, pull himself up, so he could breathe past the murky water that threatened to suffocate him, so he could remember what the sun looked like again.
“Shit.”
Cotton hadn’t been in danger.Hehad.
That had been the dream. That had been what had awakened him, fighting with his covers and swimming in sweat.
Just his own subconscious, trying to save his soul.
The next morning he left Burton in charge.
“Where are you going, sir?” Burton had asked, taking the tablet with all of the active targets and their retrieval teams. Burton hadn’t launched any new campaigns while Jason had been laid up, which had been a canny move on his part because Jason was really the only one authorized to decide which targets could be brought in and which ones needed to be neutralized, and Jason didn’t want his friend with those decisions on his head. Unfortunately that meant they had a record number of people in the field at the moment. It was really not a great time to leave.
But Jason was tired of fighting.
“To see my sister, in San Diego,” he said.
“Your sister?”
“I’m not sure I ever told you about her,” Jason said with a slight smile. “She teaches nursing at a junior college on the outskirts of the city. She’s also,” he added, face flaming, “Dean of Student Admissions.”
Burton’s smile was wolfish. “Godspeed, Colonel.”
“Thank you, Captain,” Jason responded. He gave a slight smile. “I don’t know if he’ll even come,” he added.
“And you won’t until you try. Now hurry, before any of this shit explodes and leaves me with a big mess. Go!”
San Diego Medical Training Collegewas the ungainly lettering across the front of the administration building, but other than that, the graceful stucco buildings of the campus projected a stolid sense of purpose against a San Diego blue sky. The October weather was scorching and humid, and Jason was grateful he’d changed into civvies before he’d left.
