Halos and Heroes Ch. 19

Thank you all who have been reading and following along. I always appreciate getting feedback. It helps with becoming a better writer and it's always an ego boost, so feel free to reach out. I will always respond!

The usual spiel: This isn't a stroke story, (more porn with plot.) Be warned, it's very long. 33+ chapters, and many sexless ones to come before it gets sexy, which is why it was originally published under novels/novellas, but readers asked for it to be put under gay male due to content, so here we go.

This book is dedicated to all of the brave service members and their families who sacrifice so much every day so that the rest of us can enjoy the liberties that they swear to protect and uphold.

Although references in this novel may be made to actual places or events, the names, characters, incidents, and locations within are complete works of fiction. They are not a resemblance to actual living or dead persons, businesses, or events. Any similarity is coincidental. In an effort to do the United States Army justice, and to show my respect to my country, I have applied all possible efforts to merge fact and fiction to entertain, while portraying the military, and the hardships and achievements of soldiers, with respect, dignity and accuracy to the best of my abilities. It's my hope that I've done you all justice, and that all of the creative licenses taken with this novel are understood to be the efforts of imagination, and not any judgment or disrespect against the U.S. military. Thank you all for your service.

The cure for anything is salt water—sweat, tears, or the sea.

—Isak Dineson

I'd lied to Ben. Getting four people to the beach took longer than an hour when three of them were female. Even Emma proved high maintenance, insisting on the one damn pair of pink flip-flops that we couldn't find among her extensive collection. They'd eventually appeared under Sofia's bed, guarded by an army of dust bunnies.

By the time we'd packed up the car with everything except the kitchen sink and arrived at the beach, it was just before noon.

I spotted Ben standing in the parking lot, leaning against his truck. When he raised a hand to wave at us, Adelyn let out a low wolf whistle that made Sofia giggle. The dirty look I sent her way only promoted another laugh. This time Emma joined in though, so I let it go.

"Hey," he said when we put the windows down. "I was beginning to think I'd been stood up."

"Uncle Sam isn't a very good finder of lost stuff, Father Ben," Emma volunteered. "I told him to pray to you for help like he did before but—"

"Okay, time to get out of the car," I interrupted, feeling my ears heat up even in the shade.

Adelyn snickered but silently took the cooler I held out. Sofia just stared straight ahead.

Ben looked between the three of us, grinning. "Am I missing something?"

"Nope, not a thing," I assured him, gently nudging Emma toward the beach with the back of my foot. She giggled up at me. "The heat just does weird things to her little brain. Makes her talk crazy."

Still smirking, Adelyn got out of the truck and started helping Sofia unpack.

All around us, children in a rainbow variety of swimwear were competing for the street cred that came with choosing the best spot for catching waves. Sparkling blue water encouraged them to careen down the beach at full speed, leaving their parents behind with beach chairs, lunches and floaties. Adults were there as pack mules and not much else. I didn't have many happy memories of childhood, but I remembered being this age.

Emma held my hand on one side and Ben's on the other, walking happily between the two of us. Every so often we'd time the swing perfectly, and she'd shriek in delight when her feet left the ground. Adelyn and Sofia were a little in front of us. Sofia's smiling face was turned up toward the sunshine, and Adelyn was sans headphones for once.

"I want to make a big sandcastle, Uncle Sam," Emma was saying. She let go of our hands long enough to demonstrate span with her hands. "A giant one."

"Sounds like someone in the family is a size queen," Ben murmured under his breath.

"There's a good spot over there!" Emma interrupted my muffled laughter. "Let's go before someone takes it."

"Run ahead and claim it for us, sweetheart. We'll catch up. Good looking out."

"Okay, Uncle Sam!"

We fist-bumped to Ben's amusement before Emma scampered off.

"That's a good kid."

"She is. Honestly, I didn't really know her before. She was just a baby when I stopped coming around."

I watched Emma squat down with Sofia to inspect a large open space a few yards down from us, close to the water's edge. It'd be a bitch to get wet sand out of my crotch. Worth it though, if for no other reason than the laughter that wafted from Emma as she and Sofia splashed one another in the waves.

My smile curved slow and easy for the first time in a long while. It faded when my gaze landed on Adelyn setting up shop on an old blanket. She'd shucked the tent-like shirt she'd been wearing, and was blinding me in a bikini that looked like hot pink dental floss. Thankfully, Sofia won the short battle that resulted in a sheer shirt put over what apparently passed for teen swimwear.

"Adelyn keeps testing limits," I muttered.

"She's a teenager. They do that, but she's a good kid. You don't have to worry about the choices she makes."

"Except her taste in boys, though she did break up with the last tool she was seeing."

Ben snickered. "That's news for celebration. I have the perfect solution—have coffee with me tonight."

"Smooth segue."

He grinned. "I know."

"Not sure if I can make it tonight."

"I'm a marathoner more than a sprinter, and one day you will get tired of running away from me, Sam."

"Let me guess—you'll still be here?"

"Maybe. Maybe not." His brow rose in challenge. "But if you screw this up, you will be missing out. Just thought I'd throw that out there."

I rolled my eyes. "The size of your balls amazes me."

"And here you said you weren't a size queen," Ben quipped before I could protest. "Shush. It's just coffee, Sam."

"Just coffee my ass."

Ben socked me in the shoulder with a light fist. "I'm interested, not easy." He cut me off with a laugh, wiggling a no-no finger at me before I could come up with a zinger. "We'll continue this later. We're being paged."

I glanced over my shoulder to see Emma's little arm waving in the air like she was flagging down planes. To make sure I got the point, she shouted out my name twice before Ben and I were halfway to her.

"Sam?"

"What?"

"I ran a local 5K once and came in third place. Just saying."

* * *

Someone smarter than me once said that we always go back to where we started. As I watched Sofia allowing herself to be transformed into a sand mermaid, and Adelyn playing with Ben, I thought about that, and I felt something inside me loosen as I watched my family moving on.

It mattered more than anything I'd ever believed in or worked for in the past. A soldier without a mission was doomed to fail, but I'd found a purpose in my family and was determined not to fuck it up. The only potential kink in that plan was the guy showing my nieces a good time.

Adelyn sent the Frisbee sailing high over Ben's head, a red disk that blotted out the sun for a moment. Even though he was still wearing his shirt, I admired the flex of hard muscle beneath as he twisted up to catch it. Adelyn's laughter carried over to me as Ben's foot slipped, and he hit the ground. Emma clapped her hands, sending a fine sandy mist everywhere when Ben got up with quick grace.

He bowed, earning a cheer from the three female members of his audience. If I hadn't known which way he swung, I'd have been grilling him about his intentions toward my family. As it was, I questioned his persistence in reaching his goal of fitting into my life. No one had ever shown that much interest in me before, and other than Max, I'd never felt such a strong desire to let someone else take the reins. They were twisted and knotted together after what'd happened with Devlin, but Ben didn't seem afraid to tackle their untangling.

I felt my mouth curve into a crooked smile. A few days ago I'd have said Ben had bitten off more than he could chew with me. But after having caught a glimpse of the hot-as-fuck dominant side of him earlier today, my blue balls had changed my tune.

"That's a good look for you."

I strove for casual, arranging a bag of chips strategically over my lap when Ben plopped down beside me. "What is?"

"Serenity." He grinned, his face sweaty from exertion, already showing a faint burn along his nose and cheekbones. "I don't think I've seen you relaxed since we met."

"When we met I was hugging a toilet bowl. Anything would be an improvement."

"I don't know. I find something endearing about a man who could probably crush my larynx in seconds with some insane military move, curled up on the floor all needy and vulnerable."

Needy and vulnerable my ass.

My arms crossed my chest. "I'd have figured it out."

He snorted. "It's okay to ask for help when you need it, Sam."

"Glad to hear it. If I ever do, I'll let you know."

Ben chose to ignore me, but reached over into my lap to steal a chip from my bag with a wink. Even knowing better I smiled back.

Getting used to the life of a civilian where survival parameters weren't mapped out for you, and orders were replaced by choices, was as difficult a transition as I'd expected. But what I'd rallied hard against when I'd first come back to Florida, was now something I craved desperately. I wanted to belong to this new world. Not just because of Ben obviously, but he was quickly becoming an unnerving catalyst for the change, which scared the piss out of me.

"You're thinking again."

"What?"

"I can hear your brains frying from here," Ben said, protesting when I threw sand at him.

"It's a hundred-plus degrees out here. There's not a part of me that isn't fried."

"I can think of a few parts."

Ben's leer was more silly than seductive, and I laughed.

"I guess I'm just wondering when the other shoe will drop," I said, reaching into the chip bag again.

"What do you mean?"

I gestured toward Sofia and the girls by the waterline. "They seem happy, but the cracks are still there. They have to break open eventually."

"Or they could heal over and be all right," Ben pointed out. Amusement—most likely at my expense—glinted in his eyes. "Settle down, Chicken Little. Life has a way of working itself out."

Ben followed my gaze, drawing a smiley face in the sand beside my hand. I erased the smiling face with a sweep of my palm, and replaced it with a snarling one complete with jagged teeth.

"Max doesn't think I can do it."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm as trusting as a feral cat."

"What?"

"Eh, just something Max said. He's right. It's difficult for me to do domestic."

"That's because you're trying too hard to control things. Let them happen at their pace. You can start by having coffee with me tonight and seeing where that leads."

"Okay," I said without hesitation this time. I hid a smile at Ben's obvious surprise, which morphed at once into pleasure. "But only because I hate seeing grown men beg."

"I'll remove the mirror from my ceiling."