One Night With a Cowboy (23 page)

T
hrough the haze of sleep, the ringing fit right into her dream. Becca crawled her
way up out of the darkness and back to reality, or at least the fuzzy approximation
of it.

She took a second to register it was her cell phone’s ringer blaring away on the bedside
table. She’d stayed up late looking at websites dedicated to troop support until she’d
finally gotten so tired she’d given up and gone to bed.

It was crazy. She hadn’t heard a word from Tucker since he’d left weeks ago—not a
phone call or an e-mail or even a damn letter—but she was still obsessed enough to
go searching for information about soldiers online just so she’d feel connected to
him.

She’d been dreaming she was baking cookies to send to the troops, and the oven timer
began to ring, over and over again. Consciousness now told her it hadn’t been the
timer.

There were no cookies. Only sleep deprivation and a really loud cell phone ringtone.

Becca flung one arm in the general direction of the annoying object and eventually
connected with it. She juggled the phone, nearly dropping it as she somehow managed
to answer. At least she assumed she’d answered it.

The ringing stopped, which was a relief, but there was no way she could focus her
eyes on the glaringly bright display to see if she’d actually hit the right button
or the caller had just given up.

Only one way to find out. She pressed the phone to her ear and said through what felt
like a mouthful of cotton, “Hello?”

“Becca?” The static on the line cut away enough for her to hear a male voice, unclear
and far away.

“Tuck?” Even in her semi-asleep state she knew it was he. She struggled to sit up
against the pillows, more alert. Her heart began to pump blood faster through her
veins just from hearing his voice. “Oh, my God. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. I’m fine. How are you?” he asked.

How was
she
? She wasn’t living in a war zone like he was. Becca didn’t need niceties from Tucker.
She needed assurances. “I’m worried about you.”

There was a pause. The amount of static on the line made her wonder if maybe he was
speaking and she just couldn’t hear him until he finally said, “Please, don’t worry
about me.”

“How can I not considering where you are?” The pitch of her voice rose with the question.

“Because your worrying about me won’t change anything, and while I’m here I’d rather
picture you exactly how I remember you. Living your normal life. Pawing through dusty
old volumes of Chaucer in the library. Eating take-out pizza and barbecue at your
place. It helps, believe me. You don’t know how much.”

“All right.” She was willing to give him anything he needed to ease this deployment.
“Can I send you something? Do you need anything? Sunscreen, bug spray, baby wipes,
beef jerky, flip-flops for the shower, disposable razors . . .”

What else had she read the troops needed in that area? She racked her brain for any
other items he might need or want.

He laughed, a warm, genuine laugh. The laugh she’d first heard that night at the rodeo
when he was still just a cowboy, amused by her city girl ways. It was a really good
sound.

“That was some list, darlin’.”

“I read online at one of those troop support websites that’s what guys like to have
over there in the warmer months of the year. But it’s going to get cold soon so maybe
you need socks? Or hand warmers?”

He chuckled again. “No, I’m good. Really.”

“I want your address anyway. So I can at least send you letters.”

There was another pause before his answer. “Letters would be real nice.” When it came,
his voice had softened, all amusement gone.

“I wasn’t sure if I’d hear from you.” Becca hated the doubt and insecurity she heard
in her own voice. “You’ve been gone a while.”

And wasn’t that the understatement of the year.

“I know. I’m sorry. Communications are hard. There are a few shared computers with
satellite Internet set up, but only here at the firebase. We take turns rotating back
every couple of weeks from the outpost. There’s only radio comm there.”

Outposts. Firebases. Radio comm. These were all words—and a world—so foreign to Becca,
Tuck might as well have been speaking another language. She vowed her next foray on
to the Internet for research would be to learn some of the lingo.

“I can’t stay on much longer.” His voice broke into her relief over hearing from him,
because now he’d have to go and she’d be left to wonder and worry. Even so, she couldn’t
seem to bring herself to ask him if and when he’d call again.

“Oh, okay.” She wrestled herself all the way into a sitting position and pulled open
the bedside table. “Do you know your address so I can mail you?”

“Yeah. Got a pen?”

Thank God for her obsessive organizational habits. That, coupled with her love of
office supply stores, meant Becca had pads of paper and multiple pens in every room
of the apartment, as well as in her office at work. “I do. Go ahead.”

 

Tuck hung up the call with Becca, feeling both better and worse. Her voice had made
him homesick in the worst way, but hearing she’d researched what he might need was
a comfort. At least it meant she was thinking about him while he was gone. He’d wrestled
with himself for weeks about whether or not to call her and what to say if he did.

Now he was glad he had.

Back at his bunk he pulled off his body armor, grateful to be free of it, as usual.
While he was stripping, he pulled off his T-shirt and draped it on a nail sticking
out of the wall so it would dry. It was soaked with sweat from the hike from the outpost.
It would be stiff with salt, but at least it wouldn’t be wet. It felt good to have
air hit his damp skin, even if it was the stifling air of their living quarters.

Of all the many things they went without here—fresh meat, television, air-conditioning,
flushable toilets—he thought he’d miss sex the most on this deployment. It turned
out his nostalgia for daily showers was running a close second. On days such as today,
the shower might even win out over sex. Even sex with Becca.

He glanced around at the raw conditions they lived in and chuckled one more time at
the list she’d spouted off of things she’d thought he’d want.

Conseco lowered a magazine Tuck hadn’t seen him with before. They must have gotten
mail with the last drop off of supplies. “What you laughing about over there? Tell
me. I could use some entertainment.”

“I just called my . . . uh, Becca.” He still didn’t dare call her his girlfriend,
but after Tuck’s foxhole confession a couple of weeks ago, Conseco knew her name.

“And?”

“And she offered to send me razors and shower shoes.” Tuck scratched at the stubble
on his chin. He hadn’t gotten to shave yet today. Or yesterday. He thought he’d shaved
the day before, but he couldn’t be sure. Conseco’s stubble was even thicker and darker
than Tuck’s.

The big brass back at home or in Italy, or hell, even in Kandahar, would be appalled.
He’d have to toe the line when they got back to the real world, but here and now,
during the height of the fighting season, anything that took time and energy away
from keeping themselves and each other alive was a pretty low priority.

They were so far away from anything resembling a real base, little things like being
clean shaven fell by the wayside pretty quickly. He’d seen soldiers here run for the
guns in their underwear during a surprise firefight. Since a .50-cal could shoot through
a wall, Tuck figured it really didn’t matter if you were manning that bad ass of a
weapon in boxer shorts.

Even though he could walk around shirtless and stubbly and not get into trouble, he
wished the showers were a little more frequent. Rotating from a barebones outpost
with no running water, back to a firebase with limited showers, meant they walked
around dirty. Basically they all looked like Pigpen from the Charlie Brown comics.

Conseco let out a snort at the offer of razors and shower shoes. “Tell her if she
wants to mail you something, she should send some nice pictures of herself. The less
clothing the better. Those kinds of care packages are always appreciated.”

Tuck laughed. “I don’t think we’re at that stage in our relationship.”

“You two were doing the deed before you left, right?” One dark eyebrow rose in question.

“Yes.” Tuck inwardly cringed, feeling a little guilty now he wasn’t in the heat of
battle that he’d spilled so many of the details of his time with Becca.

“Then you’re at that stage. Trust me.” Conseco raised the magazine resting on his
chest, but it didn’t stay there. He lowered it again. “And speaking of relationship—you
tell her you love her on that phone call?”

“No . . . It didn’t seem like the right time.” Tuck rushed to explain when he saw
the judgmental look Conseco sent him.

There wasn’t even a lecture. Conseco simply pressed his lips together, shook his head,
and went back to his reading.

Tuck didn’t need him to say anything. He knew exactly what Conseco was thinking. Time
was the one thing none of them could be sure of.

“By the way, you got a package. Jinx dropped it off. I told him to put it on your
rack.” Conseco delivered that news from behind the pages of his magazine.

There was a big brown envelope on top of his blanket. Not sure who would be sending
him anything, Tuck frowned. Not that he was unhappy to see it. In a place where the
only entertainment was a good firefight, a package was a welcome sight. He sat and
picked it up to see who it could be from.

Tuck grinned when he recognized the return address. Good old Jace had sent him a package,
though God only knew what he’d put inside. Probably something against the rules, like
porn. Of course, way out here, who the hell was going to catch him or care if he had
a girly mag under the mattress? He’d rather have a picture of Becca, though.

He tore the flap open and slid his hand inside to find a slick, colored poster the
exact size of the eleven-by-seventeen-inch envelope. It took a bit of doing to slide
it out without wrinkling it more than transit already had or getting it dirty because
his hands weren’t all that clean right now. In this place, everything eventually turned
the color of dirt.

Finally he coaxed the poster out, and in front of him were the smiling faces of his
rodeo team. He laughed when he saw Jace had somehow wiggled his way into the team
photo. That was fine. Jace looked good there, grinning ear-to-ear at the end of one
row of students. It was an advertisement for an upcoming charity rodeo the team would
be competing in. Every member had signed it.

For a guy who was generally a joker and a dumbass, Jace could be really thoughtful
sometimes. Just looking at the poster made Tuck smile, but it upped his homesickness
another notch. He sized up an empty section of plywood sheathing and then glanced
across the room at the other bunk. “Is it okay if I hang something on the wall?”

Conseco lowered his sports magazine and cocked a brow, pointedly glancing at the wall
to the right of his bunk where there were numerous advertisements featuring scantily
clad females. “I think that might be all right. I wouldn’t hang a picture of your
girl up there, though. That’s just asking for trouble. The other guys are going to
comment until you’re good and pissed off. I can promise you that. I stick with the
pros myself.”

Tuck glanced at the Hooters calendar next to Conseco’s head. “So I see.”

“Here. You can have this.”

A tack came flying across the room. Tuck caught it in mid-air. If nothing else, combat
was good for your reflexes. “Thanks.”

With his thumb, he pushed the point through the poster and sank it into the wood.
“Home, sweet home.” Tuck stood back and admired his work.

“What the hell is that?” Conseco frowned at the poster and swung his feet to the ground.

Apparently even though he didn’t know what it was, it was interesting enough to get
him up off his mattress to come over and take a closer look.

“That is the Oklahoma State University rodeo team,” Tuck said with pride.

“I see.” Conseco nodded. “And might I ask what the hell you’re doing with it?”

He laughed. “I used to be their coach. Guess I still will be when I get back.” Unless
Jace refused to give up the position, in which case he supposed they could share it.

“Rodeo coach. What the fuck do you know about rodeo?”

“I took the state championship in bull riding and came in second in roping.” When
Conseco stared at Tuck as if he’d grown dick antlers, he elaborated. “I won the state
buckle years ago. Back when I was on the circuit full-time, before I enlisted. Nowadays
I only ride bulls. I haven’t roped competitively in years. With work and workouts,
I just don’t have the time it would take to get a good cutting horse up to competition
level . . . What?”

He stopped when he noticed Conseco’s mouth had dropped open.

Tuck laughed. “Close your mouth before something flies in it.”

He did, but it was only to open it again. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“Um, no. Why?”

“You’ve been here for what? A month? And you never told me you’re a fucking cowboy?”

“It didn’t come up. I guess I never thought it was important.” Tucker shrugged.

“That you willingly get on the back of a freaking bull and ride on a regular basis
isn’t important?”

“No. Not really.” They were in a province where there was a very real chance some
of them wouldn’t make it out. And if they did, it could be with a good amount of shrapnel
inside them. The fact he hopped on a bull a few weekends a month didn’t seem all that
important in comparison. “Sorry. I didn’t think you’d care. I did tell you I met Becca
at a rodeo.”