Patriotic Duty

PATRIOTIC DUTY

By C.J.
Pinard

Copyright 2013 C.J.
Pinard

This book is a
work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of
the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed
as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or
organizations is entirely coincidental.

This
ebook
is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.
This
ebook
may not be re-sold or given away to other
people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please
purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and
did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please
purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Dedication:

This book dedicated to all
military wives, for you have the hardest job in the military.

Acknowledgments:

Cover Art by: Austin Hobbs

Photos used with permission from
Shutterstock

Lisa P and Wendy G, thank
you for your extra sets of eyes!

RDF: Thanks for the
memories…

MLC… you, my friend, will
always know the truth. And we shall take it to our graves.

“…Ask not what your
country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

John F. Kennedy

CHAPTER 1

A bead of sweat dripped down my head and
slithered its way to my neck, coming to rest on the collar of my shirt. This
was an extremely unseasonably hot day for California – even for May.

I
wiped the sweat away and used my key to open my office door where I knew the
air conditioning unit attached to the wall would bring me some relief. The
buildings I worked in were old converted military barracks built in the
fifties, and therefore, had no central air. In all reality, the climate here in
Northern California was mild enough where we didn’t need it most of the time,
but there were occasions, like today, where central air would have been a nice
commodity.

Just
26 years old and already newly divorced, I had only been working for the
federal government for about a year. Working in corrections wasn’t my first
choice, but after my ex left me with a bunch of bills and a two-year-old son to
care for, my not-so-glamorous career as a hairstylist was all but over. I
needed a job with benefits and regular hours, and thanks to my friend, Miranda,
who was another secretary here, she suggested I apply, and I got the job.

The
job really wasn’t hard; just doing casework and such for inmates releasing and
transferring, and at least I didn’t have to pull all the crazy shifts the
correctional officers and lieutenants did. In return, I made less money but it
was worth it to me. Shiftwork is for the birds, I say.

I
twisted up my shoulder-length blonde hair and pressed my back against the air
unit and let its frigid air blast my body back to a comfortable temperature. I
closed my eyes as I thought about going home today, as I definitely didn’t have
any sort of central air, or even a window unit at home. Looks like I would have
to rely on ceiling fans, standing fans, and the good
ol
’
trusty spray bottle of water.

I
counted my files and locked them. I shut my computer down, and, grabbing my
purse from the drawer, I closed that also and turned off the light. I used my
keys attached to my belt once again to lock the door behind me.

“Goodnight,
Ms. Reid,” a female inmate called to me as I walked to the control center to
hand in my keys. “Have a nice weekend.”

I
smiled tightly at her and said my thanks, then internally rolled my eyes.
Female inmates have to be the nosiest species on the planet. She would probably
stab a fellow inmate if it would make her privy to what my weekend plans were.

Since
it was Friday, I didn’t have to go pick up Aiden from daycare, as his father
had him for the weekend, and I wouldn’t see my little guy until Sunday night. I
had a love-hate relationship with these weekends, so I tried to make the best
of them. I was almost home when my phone chirped with an incoming text. I
waited to look until I hit the red light that would take me down my street in
the small town I lived in. It was from Miranda.

Cowboys tonight! Yee haw!

I
laughed and rolled my eyes at her. “OK” – the two letters I managed to type out
and send before the light turned green. I tossed the phone onto the passenger
seat of my little ten-year-old Acura and pulled into the driveway of my tiny
little house.

I walked into my small
house and groaned. It was more like a duplex if I’m honest. The house was only
one level but was connected to another house, whose front door was on the
complete opposite side as mine. I didn’t really know the lady who lived there.
Another single mom; that much I knew, but she was older, and her
son was a young teen.

The house was sweltering
and I began opening windows to try to allow some air in. Flipping on the
ceiling fans, I peeled off my clothes. I quickly changed into a pair of shorts
and a tank top and grabbed my purse before leaving out the door again. I had a
hair appointment, and thankfully the salon was only a mile or so away.

I really couldn’t afford
to have my hair highlighted as often as it needed it, but thank God for the
ladies at the salon I used to work at. They usually did my hair for next to
nothing and I tried to tip them nicely when I could. They were with me through
the ugly divorce, which involved a lot of infidelity (on his part), and took
pity on me. It was tough being a single mom in one of the most expensive areas
of the country to live in, but it was home, and the only place I had support, so
what was a girl to do?

I lucked out and got the
salon owner, Debbie, who hooked me up with some awesome stripy blonde chunks
with a few low-lights thrown in. She cut it shorter too, a super cute A-line
bob that kept my hair off my neck, to which I was grateful. The girls gushed at
my cute new ’do and I left the salon in much better spirits than I had arrived
in.

My cell rang as I was
walking into the house.
Miranda.

“Cara! Girl, where you
been?”

I laughed at her.
“Getting my hair done, duh.”

“Oh
yeah.
Well, I’m
gonna
pick you up
at eight. You
be
ready by then?”

“Of
course.
What are you wearing?”

She sighed. “A skirt, I
guess. My ass is too fat for jeans right now. Plus it’s too damn hot for them.”

I laughed again because
her ass so wasn’t fat.
“Sounds good.
I’ll see you
then.”

I threw my cell onto my
bed and it bounced. I turned to my small closet and pulled out a pair of tight
jeans and a shiny pink tank top, laid them on the bed, and went into the
bathroom to shower.

The water cooled me off
but it didn’t last long, as the house was still a sweltering hot mess and I was
dreading having to blow-dry my hair.

After all was said and
done, I took a look in the mirror. Thankfully I had a nice enough chest to pull
off the tank top with a little cleavage and I always got compliments on my
legs. I pulled on a cute pair of hot pink cowboy boots. I scraped my blonde
hair behind my right ear and it got caught on the piercing I had in my upper
ear cartilage.
I hate it when that
happens.
I also noticed my makeup was already beginning to melt. I sighed
and turned to grab my phone when I heard a honk. I peered out my bedroom window
and saw Miranda in her little red Honda Civic. Grabbing my purse and keys from
the coffee table, I threw my phone in it, locked my door, and hopped into her
car.

“What’s up, girl?” she
said while applying a generous amount of lip gloss to her already perfect, full
pink lips. From her long, thick blonde hair to her eyes the color of whiskey,
she always turned heads. A good three-plus inches taller than my five-foot-five
self, she definitely had runway model written all over her.

She twisted the cap on the
gloss and chucked it into her purse. Putting the stick shift into reverse, she
backed all the way out of my complex’s long drive with a zip.

CHAPTER 2

Cowboys
was
our favorite country bar. It was always hopping on
Friday and Saturday nights and had plenty of hot guys to keep our interest. We
had been going there about a year, and we always had fun, no matter what night of
the week or how crowded or dead it happened to be.

As we pulled into the
parking lot, Miranda yanked a water bottle from her purse and twisted off the
lid, taking a large swig. She winced as it went down and I looked at her
curiously.

“What’s wrong?”

The smile quickly returned
to her pretty face, and she held the bottle out to me. “Want some?”

I continued to stare at
her amused face and then slowly looked down at the bottle. I sniffed it and
started coughing. “Holy shit, what in the hell is that?”

“
Everclear
.”

My eyes got big. “Are you
serious? You shouldn’t drink this junk! A girl on my senior beach trip in high
school drank this crap and got so sick we had to take her to the hospital.”

Miranda rolled her
amber-colored eyes and laughed. “I’m not
gonna
get
shitfaced! Just want a little buzz.”

She was almost laughing at
me at this point, so of course I had to drink some now. I took a swig and
coughed again. “Damn.”

Miranda laughed again and
snatched the bottle, screwing the lid back on and chucking it into the
backseat. She shoved her driver’s license and some cash into her bra and said,
“Let’s go.”

I did the same with my ID
and money and exited the car, walking to the front door of the club.

Cowboys
was
a huge establishment, almost resembling a one-story warehouse
with a glowing red cowboy boot on its roof. We entered through the front door,
paying our cover charge and showing ID, and sauntered inside. Since it was
barely nine p.m., the place wasn’t very busy yet. I looked at the large wooden
dance floor and saw one older couple doing some swing dancing to a fast-paced
song and everyone else seemed to be watching them, too. We made our way to the
bar and I ordered a beer. I wasn’t a huge beer drinker but I just felt like
having one, and that was probably my first mistake of the night.

Miranda also ordered a
beer and we finished them fairly quickly. We then ordered two shots of whiskey
each. I freaking hate whiskey but she insisted we had to do “whiskey chasers”
after our beer.

Whatever.

My shot was paused at my
lips when Miranda laid a restraining hand on my arm. “Wait!”

I looked at her with
raised eyebrows, impatiently waiting.

She lifted her shot glass
and I mimicked her. “Here’s to the men that we love. Here’s to the men that
love us. But the men that we
love,
aren’t the men that
love us.
So F the men, here’s to us!”

Except she didn’t say F,
she actually said the word, which had all nearby heads turning. I had heard
this toast before and just laughed as I tried to keep up with it. I downed mine
and winced. It was nasty but I was feeling very warm and buzzy at this point,
and I liked it.

The night wore on, I
danced a few times with nobody special, and then we saw a group of guys come
in. There were probably four or five of them, all tall with short hair. A couple
of them had cowboy hats on and they were all wearing jeans and T-shirts.

I was on my second beer
after the shots, sipping it slowly while watching the cute boys. They
alternatively looked over at us.

“That one in the black hat
is
smokin
’ hot,” Miranda said, elbowing me and
jutting her chin toward the guys.

I nodded. “They all are. I
like the tallest one. He’s definitely been looking over here.”

She grinned wickedly.
“Let’s play hard to get.”

I looked at her with mock
confusion. “What do you suggest?”

“Let’s go dance, c’mon!”
She grabbed my arm and led me to the dance floor, which was now getting quite
crowded, as it was nearing ten-thirty. They were playing a popular country line
dance song, which we knew the moves to from watching it a few times, and we
linked arms and proceeded to join the dancing crowd.

After that song ended,
they went right into another one, so we stayed and danced some more. I was
praying for the song to get over quickly, as I was starting to get sweaty and
needed to go outside for a breather and a break from this music. It’s good this
club always had hot guys, ‘cause I really didn’t care for country music.

As we exited the dance
floor, I threw my now-empty beer bottle into a nearby trash can and we went
toward the back door for some cool air.

I glanced at the group of
cute boys to see they were talking to some other girls, and elbowed Miranda.
“Your plan to play hard to get backfired, girlfriend.”

She laughed. “Oh, please.
You haven’t seen me play anything yet.”

I shook my head as we
headed out the back door, where a large patio was set up with random picnic
tables and a huge barbeque pit. Kind of odd for a nightclub, but I figured they
must host other things during the day. There were people out there smoking and
making out (some at the same time), so we didn’t stay out there long.

As we went back inside,
the lights had been dimmed and a slow song was playing. I saw two of the hot
guys on the dance floor dancing with girls much cuter and probably younger than
we were, and I decided to ignore those boys for the rest of the night. I was
having fun with Miranda and didn’t need any male attention. What I needed was
another drink.

“Margaritas!”

Miranda and I turned
around when we heard a female voice shout and saw a girl with short black hair
and lots of piercings and tattoos wearing a very skimpy French maid’s outfit
standing next to a barber’s chair. I laughed at the absurdity of a barber’s
chair in the middle of a nightclub until I saw what it was used for.

A guy wearing jeans and a
George Strait T-shirt handed the girl a five dollar bill and sat down in the
barber’s chair. I watched curiously as the girl picked up two large bottles
with special spouts on them – one margarita mix and
one
straight
Cuervo
tequila
– and began pouring
them into his mouth after she reclined the chair back. She continued to pour as
a crowd gathered. He chugged pretty good, took it like a man in my opinion, but
when he finally couldn’t take it anymore, he put his hand up and the girl
pulled the bottles upright, followed by his chair. She reached over and rang a
loud cowbell affixed to the post next to the chair and the crowd let out a
whooping cheer. The now very drunk man wiped his mouth with the back of his
hand and smiled big, then let out a huge burp.

Miranda and I were very
intrigued by this and continued to watch as the crowd got larger. After about
five people had gone, nobody stepped up, so the girl in the French maid’s
outfit shouted, “
Who’s
next?”

Miranda looked at me.
“C’mon.”

I dutifully followed and she
pulled a five dollar bill out of her shirt and handed it to the girl and
indicated for me to sit in the chair. I shrugged and sat, half excited, half
nervous I was going to choke or puke, but I was pretty tipsy so I rolled with
it.

Miranda leaned forward and
said something close to the girl’s ear. She smiled, then shrugged, handing
Miranda both bottles, which were now only a quarter full, and stepped back with
her arms folded, smiling. A larger crowd had gathered now, and Miranda, in a
last minute decision, handed the bottles back to the girl and proceeded to
climb up on the chair in which I now sat, straddling both knees on either
armrest, looking down at me grinning. She craned her neck around and held both
hands out, motioning for the bottles. The girl happily handed them over, and
Miranda bent over slightly and began pouring the bottles into my mouth in
unison, still straddling the armrests. I could see nothing but cleavage and
bottles now.

I chugged as best I could
but didn’t last more than ten seconds or so before I began slapping Miranda’s
bare thigh, indicating for her to stop. Luckily she did, and as she hopped off
the chair and sat me up, I was greeted to a crowd of cheering men waving five
dollar bills in the air. Miranda went over and rang the cowbell and more cheers
ensued.

I don’t even remember how
we got home, but blurred memories of a jacked up Chevy truck containing a gun
rack and the faint smell of Stetson cologne were flitting through my mind as I
passed out in my bed.

***

My head was pounding in
unison with the screaming alarm clock on my nightstand. I hated summer because
even at five-thirty a.m., light poured into the room, badgering me to get up.
It was Monday morning and the hangover from Saturday night still lingered. I
shut the alarm off and staggered to the kitchen for some aspirin.

Yeah, I said Saturday. We
were actually stupid enough to go out again, this time to a local bar to shoot
pool, and got tanked again.
This time on vodka.

Damn,
I have got to stop drinking!

After a quick shower, I
dragged myself to work but not before dropping Aiden at daycare.

By lunchtime, Miranda was
already blowing up my phone, talking about the weekend.

“Oh,
my God!
Girl, I didn’t even call you yesterday. My head was
totally
freakin
’ killing me, and the only reason I
got out of bed was to answer the door so my mom could take
Ashlynn
for the day. I couldn’t even deal.”

Miranda also had a
two-year-old, a daughter named
Ashlynn
, and we had
bonded through our horrid divorces, and were now inseparable BFFs.

“You’re so bad! I’m glad
my ex had Aiden. The poor kid would have had to eat Spaghetti-O’s and
Cheez
-
Its
all day if he was with
me!”

We both laughed.

“The last time I drank
that bad was during Fleet Week in The City. Remember?”

Oh, hell, did
I
ever.

We had gone to San
Francisco during Fleet Week. I had never heard of it, even though I had grown
up in the Bay Area, but was recently enlightened. The U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine
Corps came once a year on a couple of large Navy ships and docked, giving tours
of the ships and letting the service men and women off for a few days of R and
R and fun in the major cities.

Miranda and I had had a
blast there. We drove around Pier 30 until we found a parking spot and walked
to where the U.S.S. Lincoln was docked and “toured” the ship, but we both knew
we weren’t interested in anything on the ship except the men.

After tossing a blanket
over the child seat in the back of my car and laughing about it for an hour, we
drove around and met some cute sailors at a small dive bar near Pier 39. We had
so much fun that night, we went back the next day and strolled around the city
some more and met a lot of very nice and very cute servicemen visiting from out
of town.

“Oh, and check this out,”
she continued over the phone, bolting me out of my reverie.

God,
did she ever stop talking?

“I had to fill out this
tax form the other day and it made me laugh. It asked if I had any military
service and if so, to checkmark which branch. Girl, I could have check-marked
Army, Navy, Air Force,
and
Marines –
hell, even the Coast Guard. I’ve done my patriotic duty. I’ve been of service,
all right!”

I had been drinking water
I needed to swallow more aspirin and I spit it all over my computer screen and
keyboard, half of it coming out of my nose. “Oh, no you didn’t!” I choked into
the phone.
“Shit, girl!
I’m
dyin
’ over here!”

She laughed too,
then
groaned.
“
Ohhh
,
my head.
Crap. I have a damn inmate at my door. I’ll call you back
later!” And she hung up.

I shook my head, glad we
had been interrupted by a convict before she said too much and incriminated
herself with all her tales of debauchery.