Were about to hit 5k yayyyy!!!! I hope you guys are enjoying book 7 and can't wait for you to read more and find out how this story unfolds.
Will Blaze finally get the truth from Maggie? Will she trust him enough to reveal what actually happened with Owen?
Keep reading to find out!
~Blaze~
"Okay," Maggie huffed, pulling my Tribe t-shirt over her head to cover her naked body after we went at it for round two.
Fucking that woman was an addicting feeling, one worse than any drug or alcohol I'd ever tried.
"What do you wanna know?" She questioned, crossing her legs as she leaned up against the headboard of my bed.
I knew I should be thinking about finally getting the truth out of her, but all I could think about was how fucking good she looked in my clothes. Maggie wasn't your typical pretty, she had messy hair piled on top of her head most of the time, and never wore makeup other than that black shit that coated her eyelashes and messily smudged underneath her eyes by the end of the day. She always wore sweats or baggy clothes, and now especially, they were hanging off of her. Maggie must have lost at least ten pounds since she first came to town and it was borderline concerning.
"Everything," I told her. "Start from the beginning."
I couldn't distinguish the look on her face. It was a mixture of fear, remorse and something else I couldn't quite discern.
"Well, I came back to Utah after I got fired from the restaurant I was working at in Chicago. I stole some money, some expensive caviar, some truffles—you know, the good shit. I tried getting a gig somewhere else in town, but my boss from the other place threatened to black-list me from any decent restaurant if I didn't blow him. I told him to go fuck himself and he spread the word that I was a thief. Apparently, he had some major restaurant connections, cos the only place willing to hire me was fucking Olive Garden. "
"Jesus," I groaned, already hating the sound of this.
"I stuck it out as long as I could, but I decided to come back home. I hated the idea of showing up here with my tail between my legs, but I didn't have many options. I ran into Lizzie inside a coffee shop on my way through St. George. We knew each other from school but were never really close. When she told me she was looking for a roommate, I thought it sounded better than showing up here."
"So, you stayed in St. George?" I questioned.
Maggie nodded, looking down at her hands as she fumbled with her fingers. "She got me the job with Owen shortly after that. He needed a head baker after his last one quit on him and he gave me the job on the spot. He didn't ask any questions and neither did I. The money was good and I knew he was Lizzie's boyfriend, so I didn't question it."
I pretty much knew most of this already from what she'd told everyone before. She may have been telling the truth about some things, but we all knew there was more she was hiding.
"When did shit go south?" I asked her.
"About two months into living in St.George, I found out about Owen's wife. She came into the bakery one day looking for him. I told Lizzie that night when I got home from work, but she wasn't surprised. She knew he was still technically married, but was under the assumption they weren't together anymore. I shrugged it off at first, it wasn't my shit to worry about. Owen's wife kept coming back in, and it was clear to me that they were very fucking together. I guess he was worried I'd tell Lizzie about it so he confronted me one night after work. He told me if I kept my mouth shut about what I saw he'd double my pay."
"That's a lot of money to keep you quiet," I mused.
Maggie shrugged. "I didn't know about the drugs yet, but my best guess was that he was using some of that profit to pad my paycheque. I figured Lizzie was a big girl and I had done my part by letting her know about the wife the first time. I kept quiet and he paid me under the table for months."
"So Lizzie thought he was leaving his wife and his wife thought he was being faithful?" I questioned.
"I guess," she nodded "Eventually, I learned to ignore it and sweep it under the rug. Owen was hardly around and was paying me stupid money to do my job and keep my mouth shut. When he and Lizzie started fighting, I knew I needed to remove myself from all the drama. She and I weren't really close, but she didn't deserve the way he used to talk to her. He was a total fucking ass-hat and whenever I tried to convince Lizzie she was better off without him, he would send expensive flowers to the house, a new pair of designer shoes, anything to keep her. Lizzie was so head over heels for him that it worked. One night she came home hysterically crying that they had gotten into a fight and he left her stranded in the middle of the road without her purse or phone. She was over three miles from our place and had to walk all the way home."
"What a fucking asshole," I seethed.
Only a poor excuse of a man did something like that.
"After that, I pretty much told her that if she didn't dump him right then, she was only asking for him to continue treating her like shit."
Fair enough.
"She didn't dump him. A couple of weeks went by when everything was good, but when I heard them fighting one night and heard the shit he said to her, I decided to take matters into my own hands. Lizzie was being a weak little bitch, so I went to work the next day and told him off. I told him he was a disgusting pig for not only cheating on his wife in the first place but also for treating Lizzie like shit while he continued to lead her on. He swore that he was gonna change and that he really wanted to leave his wife but hadn't figured out how yet. I knew better than to believe him, but somehow, he got me to think he was telling the truth."
"He manipulated you," I told her. "It's not your fault."
"He managed to convince everyone he was a stand-up, decent guy, but he was an absolute monster."
I was surprised that Maggie had been a victim to him since she seemed so perceptive of everyone around her. She knew when they were judging her, and was aware of someone spinning bullshit the second it left their mouths. I would think a girl like her would clock his bullshit from a mile away, but maybe that's just how good this guy was.
Maggie also had a history of making bad judgment calls, so giving Owen a pass sounded like something just up her alley.
"I didn't know why Lizzie kept going back to him until one night when I finally agreed to go out with her to meet Owen and his friends at some party. They were running underground gambling rings and sex parties in a warehouse just outside of town. The parties were crazy, but also the most fun I'd had since I'd moved there. I swear to god, it was like Mormons gone wild every Friday and Saturday night. There were so many men and women that I recognized as customers from the bakery, snorting up, playing backroom poker games and going at it in these cheap Ikea beds that were draped off all around the place. It was like a porno in a warehouse every damn weekend."
"And I thought the clubhouse was eventful on weekends," I deadpanned.
Maggie scoffed and shook her head. "You have no idea. I figured out very quickly that Lizzie kept Owen around not only for the gifts or his shit company but because he was supplying her with free coke whenever she wanted it."
Coke that belonged to Tribe.
"I'm no fucking prude, but hard drugs have never been my poison. I like a drink probably more than a regular person, but I'm not into coke, only sometimes smoke up, and never had any interest in trying anything harder."
Admittedly, I was glad to fucking hear it. Maggie was already a loose cannon as it was, I couldn't imagine her on an upper if she decided to erupt.
"I liked fooling around with some of the other people at these parties, probably got a little too drunk a few times, but I never came on to him," she specified.
I let out a breath, fighting the urge to ball my hands into fists as I prepared myself for what I was about to hear. "Did he force himself onto you?" I questioned, calmly.
"Not exactly," she shrugged. "I mean we'd already kissed that day I gave him shit about being an asshole at the bakery but— shit, did I forget to mention that?" she stammered.
They kissed? She definitely hadn't mentioned that.
Although I'd figured as much for months now, I couldn't help the way my fist clenched in anger.
"Nope, never mentioned that," I muttered, my voice pained.
She shrugged, running her hands through her messy hair. "It just kinda happened," she mumbled. "I bitch slapped him and threatened to chop his balls off if he ever tried to do that again. I loved the money, and I was starting to build somewhat of a life in town, so I tried to brush it all under the rug so that I could keep our arrangement going. But ever since the kiss, Owen was up my ass all the time. He was flirting with me at work, propositioning me with all kinds of dirty shit. I shut him down every time cos I was not even close to interested in that pig. The only reason I even tolerated his presence was for the money and because Lizzie brought him around."
That piece of shit already had one mistress, and then he wanted two?
"I ended up getting myself into some trouble with this guy I had been hooking up with. He was rich as shit and I'd been scooping fancy crap from his place every time I went over," Maggie said, only half remorseful.
"Jesus, Mags," I cursed. "What are you, a klepto or some shit?"
Fighting a smirk, Maggie shrugged. "I don't know, maybe. I just like nice shit and hate rich assholes who don't deserve it. Anyway—I was kinda in a rough spot, the guy found out and well, he was fucking pissed. He had slapped me around and was quite literally about to beat the shit out of me. I managed to get a few shots of my own onto his head with some fancy candle stick and locked myself in his bathroom to call Lizzie to help me out. She, of course, showed up with Owen, and knight in shining fucking armour that he was, he handled it for me."
"What's with you beating guys' heads in?" I questioned.
She shrugged. "It was either that or his balls. Anyway, he was still breathing when Lizzie and Owen got there, she and I took off right away and left Owen there to talk to him. I thought he was just gonna threaten him or something. He was a regular at the parties, he bought coke from Owen, I just assumed he had something on him that he could use to keep him quiet. I found out a few days later that Owen beat that guy to a fucking pulp. He's now paralyzed from the waist down and suffered severe brain damage. Last I heard, he was non-verbal and it didn't look like there was much hope for recovery."
This just gets worse and worse.
"I swore to myself that I would get back on track and stop with all the bullshit, but just when I thought I was scared straight, Owen started threatening me. He wanted me to sleep with him or else he was gonna go to the cops and claim that I'd called him to pick me up after I beat the shit out of that guy."
I felt my face heat red.
"That fucking asshole blackmailed you?" I questioned.
Maggie nodded, shamefully. "Owen was well-liked and connected in town, he knew they'd believe him. I have a record and I could be placed at his house a bunch of times too. If they figured out I'd been stealing shit, they had motive and evidence to prove I was good for this. No matter how much I knew it was wrong and all the reasons why I should run the hell away from him while I had the chance, I didn't. I knew no one would believe me, so I started sleeping with him just to cover my own ass. We'd fuck at work when no one was around, we'd fuck at the parties if Lizzie had drank too much and passed out—which was often. We'd even fucked at our place one time after Lizzie had fallen asleep. I'm ashamed as all hell to admit it—but I thought I was doing it out of self-preservation."
I knew it. I knew she was fucking him the entire time. I really wish I'd been wrong about it though.
"I'm sorry," I told her.
Maggie narrowed her eyes in confusion. "Sorry for what?"
"He manipulated you into thinking you had no choice," I told her. Similarly to what happened with her and Zack, Maggie didn't comprehend that she had been taken advantage of by both men.
Maggie shrugged. "I did have a choice, I just chose to protect myself instead of owning up to my part in all of this."
That was big of her to admit, but Owen preyed on her fear and used that to his advantage.
"When did you find out about him pimping her out?" I asked, changing the subject completely, I couldn't deal with hearing about Maggie sleeping with Owen in such detail any longer. Plus, what she'd told us about Lizzie had been the most disturbing part of all of this, so much so that I wished for Lizzie it hadn't been true.
"A few weeks before Christmas I was starting to get suspicious about it all. Lizzie was starting to disappear for hours at a time at every party. Owen never seemed concerned and Lizzie would wake up the next morning with no memory of it. She always seemed to think that she and Owen would go at it with rough sex. She'd complain every time the next day that she was sore, but I always thought it was weird cos I'd been the one with him all night. One Saturday night, Owen disappeared shortly after Lizzie did. I followed him into one of the back rooms and watched as he got paid by some creepy fuck while Lizzie was passed out on the bed in front of them. I didn't need to see more to put two and two together. When he came to find me after, I pretended I was feeling sick just so I could avoid him. I told him I'd ordered an Uber and pretended to leave. When I went back to where I'd last seen Lizzie, I saw another guy leaving the room as he zipped up his pants."
Jesus Christ. This dude was pimping out his own mistress while his second mistress was in the same room
Maggie's voice faltered for only a second before she cleared her throat and re-collected herself.
"I went home that night sick to my fucking stomach. I didn't know how to tell Lizzie what I'd seen, I didn't even know if she'd believe me. Hell—I was half convinced that I was drunk and imagined it cos Owen couldn't possibly be doing that to her. But then again, I knew for myself the fucked up shit he was capable of, so I shouldn't have been so surprised. I started doing some digging into Owen, I found out that he was dealing coke more than just during his parties and started connecting the dots," she went on.
"How do you mean?" I questioned.
"I knew if Lizzie was gonna believe me, I needed to get proof that he was a lying piece of shit. She already knew he was married, so outing him about his wife wasn't gonna do much, so I needed more. I started to wonder what the hell he got out of dating Lizzie in the first place and figured it all out. Lizzie flunked out of culinary school and started working in commercial real estate a few years ago. The company she works for held possession of that warehouse where Owen held all the parties. It was a huge space, away from main roads, and completely isolated. It was the perfect place for all of his dirty business and everyone in town wanted it. The area around it is gonna be developed in the next few years and the lot sits in the middle of prime real estate. Owen seduced Lizzie and used her to convince the owners of the company to sell him the lot in a private sale before it even went up for auction. Lizzie gave him early possession of the place, but the finalization of the sale kept getting delayed and every time they would fight, Lizzie would threaten to end the deal. Owen didn't like that very much. He knew that if he dumped her, she'd fuck him over on this deal, so he strung her along for months, pimped her out to other men, and lied to her the entire fucking time."
"Holy shit," I cursed. "Why didn't you tell her?"
This was some soap opera shit.
"I wanted to tell her, I just didn't know how."
I imagined that conversation would probably be a hard one to have, but fuck, the piece of shit was letting men rape her for a profit and Maggie knew about it. That was irrefutably fucked up.
"Mags," I sighed, knowing that was a cop-out if I'd ever heard one.
"I know, it's fucked up, okay? Lizzie is stubborn and I knew she wouldn't wanna hear it. Plus, I didn't think anyone would believe me. I kept my mouth shut for about a week after finding out, but when she confided in me that she was pregnant, I broke. She was convinced it was Owen's and they were gonna raise this kid together like one big happy fucking family. She needed to know that the kid inside of her could have been fathered by any one of those sick fuckers that Owen let rape her while she was unconscious. I told her everything, even admitted to sleeping with him, only because I knew that when she confronted him, he would use it against me later."
"How'd she take it?" I questioned.
Maggie scoffed. "About as well as you would think. She didn't believe a word I said. She accused me of coming on to him ever since he gave me the job and told me I was just jealous that she was the one having his baby. When I tried to explain, she kicked me out. I crashed in my car and went to the bakery the next day fully expecting Owen to confront me about ratting on him. That piece of shit was cool as a cucumber. Lizzie never told him anything other than she kicked me out, but he had no idea that I was on to him."
"What did he think happened between the two of you?" I asked.
Maggie shrugged. "Stupid girl shit. I don't know what Lizzie told him, but he had no clue that I'd exposed his repulsive ass. He promised me that he'd take care of it, that he'd talk to her and I played along. I wanted to watch his every move so I could prove to her that I was telling the truth. I knew there was a party that weekend, and I never planned on showing up, but I had a bad feeling. I ended up going to the warehouse that night and I snuck up to Owen's office. I could see Lizzie hanging out downstairs, she had a drink in her hand, but she wanted that baby, so I was pretty sure it was only water. She looked stone-cold sober—which was a damn change from what I was used to seeing from her at these things."
"What did Owen do to her that night?" I questioned, already seeing where this was going.
Letting out a breath, Maggie looked down at her hands. "He asked one of his guys to spike her drink. I wasn't sure what it was, but I couldn't get back downstairs to stop it before it happened. By the time I found Lizzie, she was choking on her own throw-up, overdosing on whatever the hell he gave her. I don't know how, but I dragged her out of there without anyone seeing us and took her to the hospital."
"Fuck," I cursed again. "Owen tried to take Lizzie out?" I questioned.
Maggie nodded. "He didn't want her to keep the baby cos it was proof of the fucked up shit he'd done. He knew that if she ever questioned whose kid it was, she could very easily find out it wasn't his, or if it was, he could lose his wife. Either way, his perfect public image would have been shattered."
"Did she believe you?"
"She kinda had no choice after that. She knew that she hadn't been drinking that night and that Owen's guy was the only person close enough to her to spike her drink. It was hard to hear for sure, but I'd told her I'd help her skip town and get away from him. She left St. George after she was released from the hospital but not before anonymously tipping off the cops about the warehouse parties."
"He deserved it," I scoffed, crossing my arms over my chest. I was never for bringing the cops into shit, but in this case, Lizzie had every fucking right.
"Yeah, he did, but I'd wished she would have warned me first. I went back to work trying to act normal while I figured out my next move, but when the warehouse got busted and Lizzie skipped town, Owen figured out it was me who orchestrated it all."
Now this made sense.
"So, Owen figured out you were the one who tipped off Lizzie and thought you were the one who narked to the cops about the parties?"
She nodded, biting her bottom lip. "He told me to come to the bakery after closing to hook up. I agreed, only because I was trying to play along with him. I didn't know that he was on to me, or that he was in full-on panic mode. He'd cleared all the drugs from the warehouse before the cops raided it and rubbed it in my face that he knew it was me who ratted. He told me he was gonna expose me to the cops, but not before he held a gun to my head and hit me across the face with it. Things got physical really quickly—and well, you know the rest."
That was a five-course fucking meal I was trying to digest.
"Jesus, Maggie," I sighed, not knowing what else to say.
"You wanted to know it all, that's all of it," she shrugged.
I did tell her I wanted to know it all, but I suddenly found myself wishing I had just minded my own business and pretended to believe the story she told us all at the beginning.
"Tribe Trainwreck is pretty fitting, huh?" she deadpanned.
I didn't wanna piss her off by agreeing, but it sorta was fitting. How the hell did she get herself mixed up in all of this?
"The situation is fucked up," I said instead. "Agreeing to fool around with Owen wasn't a good look and neither was keeping shit from Lizzie after you found out what that asshole was up to," I told her honestly.
Letting out a pained sigh, Maggie dropped her face into her hands. "You don't think I know that, Blaze? He was so sly and manipulative, that I didn't even realize how deep I'd gotten myself until it was too late. He fucked with my head so much that I didn't know what the right thing even was anymore. Why do you think I never told anyone the truth? I knew what they'd think—hell, I think the same shit about myself half the time—I'm a horrible person. Now Owen is dead, Lizzie hates me, and I'm a fucking basket case."
I knew she was guilty of a lot of shit—lying, stealing, and being a shitty friend but I couldn't help but feel bad for her. Knowing what I did about her past, especially about the situation with Zack and Fat George, I understood better now why Maggie lied about this from the start. She wasn't believed then, why would anyone believe her now? Maggie was unravelling at the seams and it was very clear to everyone that she was in no condition to be dealing with this shit on her own.
Maybe this all should have made me want to run, but instead, I pulled her in close and held her against me. The tough love act never seemed to work before, so maybe Maggie needed to feel supported and like someone had faith in the idea that she could actually change. Soft and supportive never worked for me, but who's to say it wouldn't be the key to crack Maggie?
"You've done a lot of fucked up shit," I told her.
"I know," she mumbled against my shoulder. "I never plan for it, but somehow I always end up in the middle of a shit storm of my own making—that's the Tribe Trainwreck for you," she teased with a chuckle, but there was no humour in the sound.
"You don't think things through," I went on.
"I don't," she agreed.
"You don't consider the repercussions of your actions," I continued.
"You're right," she said, nodding her head.
"And you very well might be a kleptomaniac," I told her seriously.
Maggie fought a smirk as she shrugged.
"But I don't think you're a horrible person. A flawed one, but not a horrible one," I assured her. "I also want you to know that I believe you, Maggie."
Hell, we were all flawed at the end of the day. Some more than others, but nobody was fucking perfect. My gut was telling me that Maggie wasn't lying to me so I was choosing to trust it.
Maggie couldn't hide the astonished look in her eyes. It was almost as if it was the first time anyone said those words to her and truly meant them, but I did. It explained so much about why she was having such a hard time and why everything piling up on her over the years had suddenly become too much to handle.
"Tha—thank you Boy Scout," she stuttered. I'd never known Maggie to be a nervous woman, but damn she looked so vulnerable right now. "You might be the only person who thinks so," she all but whispered.
"That's not true, Red," I told her, poking at her side again, just to piss her off.
She yelped, and instantly went in for an uncomfortably hard grab of my balls.
"Piece of shit!" she yelled as I cursed in agony. "I warned you what happen if you touched my fucking tickle spot again."
There's my girl.
I held a grip over my dick for protection as I breathed through the pain.
This woman was batshit crazy.
"Jesus, Maggie," I groaned.
Putting distance between us, Maggie scooted to the edge of the bed with her legs crossed. "I told you what would happen and you still did it. As far as I'm concerned, you deserved that," she said matter-of-factly.
"Fine," I relented, holding up my hands in defence. "You're right," I agreed, only because I figured it was safer for my balls this way.
"Good," she mused.
We sat there in silence for a few minutes, but it was a comfortable silence, one that I was worried I could get used to.
"Well," she said, uncrossing her arms and stretching her legs across the bed. "Now it's your turn."
Narrowing my eyes in confusion, I scooted in closer to her, figuring I was probably safe to do so again. "My turn for what?" I questioned.
"I told you everything, now it's your turn. Why'd you get dishonourably discharged?"
Well, shit. I hadn't exactly expected the tables to get turned on me.
"It's nothing interesting," I attempted.
I really didn't wanna drudge that shit back up.
"I don't care," she pressed. "You know why I'm fucked up, I wanna know why you're fucked up."
Letting out a breath, I ran my hands through my hair. I hadn't talked about this to anyone for over a year and I was worried what feelings might surface if I detailed it all over again.
But at the same time, fair was fair.
"Okay," I told her. "But this stays here," I urged, pointing a warning finger at her.
"Just like my shit does," she confirmed.
"Fair enough," I agreed.
Maggie lit up with a pleased smile. "Well, Boy Scout, from the beginning then,"
I couldn't tell her all of it, mostly because I didn't think I could get the words to leave my mouth, but also because if I did, I was sure she'd go running for the fucking hills. She wanted the truth and I wanted to give it to her, but I knew there were some things I just needed to leave out.
"I was deployed in Afghanistan for my second tour. At twenty-one, I'd seen more fucked up shit than most people had in their entire lifetime. By then, nothing bothered me anymore. I thought I was immune to it all. I'd already lost a couple of friends and escaped death once or twice too. I managed to keep my shit together and stay on track. I was looking to make the military a career, I wasn't in it to just serve my country for a few years and then fuck off to be some average Joe. I wanted to climb the ladder, so I did what I was told and I did it damn well."
"G.I Joe in training," Maggie teased.
"I took shit very seriously. My bunkmate during basic, Jonah was the total opposite. I don't even know how he made it through. He was reckless and carefree about everything. I fucking hated him for it at first for it to be honest. He'd mouth off behind our commanding officer's back, he'd go out and get drunk until three in the morning and barely make it to P.T. the next morning. Half the time I'd find him puking in the bushes when I was already on my third lap."
In short, we were polar fucking opposites.
"Sounds like Jonah and I would have gotten along very well," Maggie chuckled.
"He would have fallen in love with you the second he heard how you handled that asshole at Bugsy's place," I told her honestly.
I hadn't thought about it until now, but Maggie and Jonah were more alike than I realized.
Maybe that's why I felt this strange draw to her, maybe that's why I wanted to help her so bad.
"It was a proud moment for me, I must say," she agreed.
"Anyway, eventually he and I became friends. He was an idiot, but he was a loveable idiot. Plus, he made deployment go by so much faster with his stupid antics."
Being bunkmates with Jonah in Afghanistan on our first deployment was my worst fucking nightmare. I couldn't stand the guy. He was always laughing and goofing off, he liked pulling pranks on the other Privates and sneaking in contraband. He'd even steal my phone when I was sleeping and text my girlfriend at the time cheesy text messages pretending to be me.
"He was trouble, and bad news to me as a guy who was trying to move up the ranks quickly," I went on, getting back on track. "After almost dying together just outside the northern border during an enemy raid, I put all that shit behind me. Jonah saved my ass and ever since we were best friends."
"Aww," Maggie cooed. "How Brokeback of you."
Narrowing my eyes, I lifted my hand to only the near vicinity of Maggie's tickle spot before she frantically grabbed one of my pillows to shield herself.
"Fuck! I was just kidding, Boy Scout," she assured, holding up her hands in defence.
Letting out a breath, I let my hands fall back to my lap as I continued.
"We were a few months into our second deployment when our squad got called to an upcoming drone strike. It wasn't our usual kind of call, but we were the closest unit to the strike location so we were the team they chose to send. I didn't think anything of it, my C.O. gave orders and we all followed. When we got there, we learned the target of the strike was a known terrorist who was tied to hundreds of local deaths, and a bunch of American ones too. From the intel we got, he'd been the one responsible for the kidnapping of Diana Jones. Not sure if you heard about her," I shrugged.
Diana was a journalist who was kidnapped and tortured for months in Afghanistan before she was killed. She'd been going around to women in the city apparently trying to get them to give interviews for the piece she was writing about women in war-torn countries.
"I think I remember seeing something about her on TV," Maggie mumbled.
Her death had been a big fucking deal and got a lot of news time. I wouldn't have been surprised if Maggie was familiar with it.
"Anyway, command wanted us to jump on the target before we lost him. We showed up, everything was good to go for the strike. We had eyes on the target, and a clear shot for the drone. A few minutes before command ordered the hit, Jonah noticed a kid on the main floor of the building, and then another one and then about twenty more. It was a fucking school and it was full of kids. Our guy was there to enroll his son and command got tipped off by one of the teachers who was sympathetic to our cause. From what I'd heard, the school was supposed to be closed that day so he could have his meeting in private, but they let classes continue on the main floor. The teacher who tipped us off didn't have time to warn us before we showed up and my C.O. refused to report it."
"Holy shit," Maggie cursed.
"Technically, I shouldn't be telling anyone this. It's a matter of national security and all that bullshit, but it's the only way you'll understand why I did what I did," I told her.
She nodded, urging me to continue.
"When Jonah and I found out about all the kids, we flipped shit trying to get them to call off the hit. My C.O. was also a career guy and he didn't want it to look like he couldn't control his squad. We were losing our window and he just couldn't risk it being his fault that we got this close, only to lose him. Jonah ran in there against orders and started pulling kids out. I tried to go too but my C.O. threatened to report me for insubordination. Jonah pulled shit like this all the time and somehow always got away with it. I didn't wanna risk my career or my ass for disobeying orders so I stayed back. My piece of shit C.O. gave the go-ahead for the drone to strike even though Jonah was still inside. By the time I went running in there after him, he was already blown apart. The whole left side of his body was gone, probably thrown across that school with all the bodies of those innocent little kids. I'll never forget what it looked like inside of that school," I mumbled, feeling the bile rise in my throat at the memory.
"Jesus, Blaze," Maggie sighed, placing a reassuring hand on mine.
Shaking the mental image of blown-up children out of my mind, I leaned into Maggie's touch and continued. "I dragged his body as far out as I could, but it was no use. He was gone. The blast was heard from miles away and we got tipped off by command that armed insurgents were headed our way and we needed to go. I didn't know what the fuck was going on, I just knew that I had Jonah's body in my arms, half blown to bits and it was my fucking C.O.'s fault. All he had to do was wait for Jonah to get out of that building. Innocents are a causality of war, we all learn that going into it, but those kids didn't need to die that day. We might have lost our target, but we'd get another chance, it didn't need to go that way."
"That's bullshit," Maggie agreed. "All those kids' lives were sacrificed just to take down one man?"
I nodded. "Had my C.O. properly reported the kids were in the building, there's no way they would have sanctioned it, and that was the only reason I got discharged and not arrested."
"What do you mean?" she questioned.
Clearing my throat, I admitted what I'd done out loud for the first time in over a year. "When I looked down at Jonah in the rubble of that building, I just lost it. There were arms, legs—" I paused, fighting the foul liquid that threatened to shoot out my mouth at the memory. "Heads—it was easily the most gruesome hit I'd ever witnessed," I concluded. "I looked back at my C.O. as he reported the hit as successful and just lost it. I started hitting him and I just couldn't stop. I punched him and then I punched him again and again. At some point, I guess I took his gun and started beating him with that too. I don't remember much of it to be honest. It was all a blur, but I just remember wanting to hurt him, and I did. He was barely breathing at that point, bleeding so much I couldn't even tell where it was coming from. I remember wrapping my hands around his neck and wanting to squeeze until his fucking eyes popped out of his head. I would have done it too if it hadn't been for one of my teammates pulling me off of him. I would have kept going until that son of a bitch was in hell.
Unfortunately, I'd only gotten to do the job halfway.
"Our enemies were closing in on us and we needed to go, someone dragged me into the Humvee and we started to drive away. I didn't even realize they'd picked up that son of a bitch and put him next to me. I wanted so badly to pick his ass up and throw him overboard and leave him in the middle of the road with all the other lives he was responsible for taking, but when I tried, one of my teammates stopped me."
"He would have deserved it," Maggie assured.
To a normal person, my actions may have sounded more extreme than they did to Maggie. She had grown up around violence and shit like this all her life, she barely seemed scared off by it.
"When we got back to base, I was immediately arrested by the military police and put into holding for days while that asshole was brought to a hospital to recover. I gave my story, and my teammates corroborated everything I said. They sent me back home where I was court-martialed and I got dishonourably discharged," I shrugged.
"Damn, Boy Scout. And what about your commanding officer?" she questioned.
I scoffed, cos just thinking about him was a waste of fucking mental head space. "Supposedly, I broke his nose, jaw, one of his legs, cracked a few of his ribs and left him somewhat immobile for the better part of a year. He also got a dishonourable discharge and the last I'd heard he was facing a war crimes charge, but I'd skipped town pretty soon after and never looked into what ended up happening to him," I told her, deciding I was finishing the story at that. After all, she asked why I got dishonourably discharged and I had told her all of it. She never asked why I skipped town and fled to Utah. That was a whole other story I wasn't ready to tell.
"Why not?" Maggie questioned. "Don't you wanna know if he's paying for what he did?"
I shrugged, not wanting to go into detail about why I never went back to my hometown. "He's already paying—he has to live with that shit for the rest of his miserable life. As much as I would have loved to see him suffer, it won't bring back Jonah or any of those kids. I chose to try and let it go for my own mental health. I came to Tooele because I felt like Jonah's parents needed to know the truth about how he died, not just what the military decided to tell them."
While that was partly true, it wasn't entirely it.
"They didn't tell those poor people the truth?" she questioned.
I shook my head. "If that shit got out, we'd have an international crisis on our hands and probably start World War 3. They covered it up the best they could and threatened everyone who'd been there that day. I got discharged with no criminal charges only because I agreed and signed paperwork that I was never to speak of what happened to anyone. I did for a while. My parents never knew why I left, and none of my friends from my hometown, but I couldn't lie to Jonah's parents. I came to town to give them closure, and then somehow, I never left. I think I felt guilty that their son was gone and I was here. I was making myself sick thinking of all the things I could have done differently or how I could have stopped him so he would still be here, but at the end of the day, it was all useless. Jonah was gone and no one could ever bring him back."
"Wow," Maggie sighed. "I'm fucked up from killing a man and being a horrible friend—among a shit ton of other things, and you're fucked up because you have serious war PTSD and survivor's guilt. We're a fucked up pair, aren't we?" she deadpanned.
"We're damaged," I agreed.
She didn't even know the half of it.
"Damaged doesn't seem like a big enough word to cover me," she said with a self-deprecating tone.
"Guilt is guilt, Mags. We may have done different things to deserve it, but it eats at us all the same," I told her.
Nodding her head in agreement, I squeezed down on her hand once more. "Thanks for trusting me," I mumbled, knowing that it was hard for her to admit all of that out loud.
"Thanks for believing me. And, thank you for trusting me," she interjected, making my guilt intensify. "And for not thinking that I'm a terrible fucking person," she added.
Clearing my throat, I nodded my head and forced a smile. "You feel any better after getting that off your chest?" I questioned, knowing for myself that I suddenly felt so much lighter and I hadn't even told her all of it. I was worried bringing it all up again would set me back, but it strangely felt good to open up to Maggie, I couldn't help but wonder if she felt the same.
Maggie shrugged, biting her bottom lip as she crawled across the bed and over to me. "It felt good. Not as good as you did inside of me though," she teased.
I rolled my eyes, but I didn't stop her when she crawled into my lap.
"I think you were on to something when you said sex was the best way to make me feel better," she mumbled against my lips.
"I never said that," I told her, wrapping my arms low around her waist.
"You're right," she agreed, taking my bottom lip between her teeth. "I did."
Letting out a breath, I didn't fight it for even a second when she leaned in fully for a kiss, or when she tossed my t-shirt over her head and we went at it for round three.
I did say, fucking this woman was addicting, and shit was I right.
What is Blaze hiding? Did Maggie finally tell him the whole story or is there more to this that she is still keeping from him?
Find out next week!
xoxoxoxoxo
-Mary