Page 16 of Forever Fallen

Rolling her eyes, she pulled into the gravel lot near the runway and put the car into park.

“Can you fake it for just a little while?” Ryan asked suddenly. “I don’t want them to think something is up. You can pretend you are shy again like you did at the chapel, but I need them to believe this for a little bit and then we can relax… it will actually be more believable that way, when we divorce in a few weeks.”

“Yup. I gotcha. Acting skills are a must.”

“Thanks.”

“Alright… “ he whispered nervously. “Time to drop a ‘crowd pleaser’…”

“A what?”

“It’s a slang term for a nuke…” he uttered, getting out of the car, and walking to her side to open the door.

He was now acting just like a suitor!

Polite, gentlemanly, and cordial… even going so far as to take her hand in his. As Sophie stepped out of the car, she saw a couple of men exit the building… and their mouths dropped open in shock.

“Hey fellas…” Ryan said easily.

“What’s going on?” one of the guys asked bluntly, coming down the steps and quickly walking towards them.

“Firefly? Armadillo? I’d like you to meet my wife, Sophie.”

CHAPTER7

SOPHIE

“YOUR WIFE?”both men hollered in unison, their voices carrying along the flat land… causing a third man to emerge from the hangar in the distance. She watched as he quickly began to jog over towards where they were standing.

Ryan took her hand in his, lacing his fingers with hers.

“This is my beautiful Sophie, my bride,” he began, his voice hesitant and strangled. “These are some of my fellow airmen that were stationed with me in Ghazni, Soph… this is Armadillo…”

“Nice ta’ meet you, ma’am…” the cowboy said, yanking off his hat and nodding politely before looking at Ryan in obvious confusion.

“And this is Firefly.”

“I cannot believe you actually got married, Reaper!” Firefly grinned, looking over his shoulder to the other man that had just run over to them. “Alpo! Hey Alpo… did you hear this load of dirt? Reaper went and got himself married! Your wife is going to be so bummed.”

“I’m Alpo,” the man said, extending his hand politely towards Sophie, before wiping it on his pants quickly, and then sticking it out again. “Sorry, grease. It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Merrick.”

“Yes, it’s very, very nice to meet the woman that could actually land Reaper. What did you do? Drug him?”

“Got him drunk,” Sophie admitted innocently, looking up at Ryan – who smiled back.

That answer seemed to amuse all of the men as they started laughing easily, patting Ryan on the shoulders, and moved forward, hugging her like she was a long-lost sister of theirs.

Weird… but sooo nice.

But why did they keep calling her groom ‘Reaper’?

“C’mon inside,” Armadillo invited. “We were just wrapping up the day and everyone’s going to be so surprised. We’ll have to all get together, so you don’t have to repeat the details fifty million times. You want some coffee, Mrs. Merrick?”

“Please, call me Sophie – I insist,” she smiled sweetly. “Mrs. Merrick sounds so… pretentious and stuffy.”

Ryan snorted – and covered it with a cough.

“Bless you,honey,” she said quickly, realizing she could have a lot of fun with putting Ryan on the spot. It would be a fun distraction to take her mind off the visit to the funeral home tomorrow morning.

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