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“I guess so. One down and one to go. I guess the real recovery will start after that.”
“Hey,” Hunter interrupted, as he finally breezed in past the curtain. “There’s a guy down the hall with the coolest robot legs, and they have him doing jumping jacks and leg squats and all kinds of things. He showed me how the new joints are like titanium-powered springs, and now he’s like an incredible bionic man. Maybe they’ll give you some legs like that, Coop.”
As exciting as the kid made it sound, Cooper needed the reminder that he was lucky to still have all of his own limbs. A lot of soldiers had injuries so much worse than his. “I don’t know, little man. I’m kinda attached to these legs right here.” Cooper patted the sheet that he’d finally gotten into place.
“Can I see your stitches?”
“Hunter.” Maxine blushed, and Cooper enjoyed seeing the pink flush stain her cheeks. It made her seem warmer somehow. “Leave his bandage alone. He probably needs his rest.”
“I’m okay,” he said, wanting to reassure Maxine that her son didn’t bother him in the least. He pulled the sheet back so Hunter could get his curiosity fix.
“Oh, wow, they had to shave your leg and everything. Just like a girl.” Hunter screwed up his chubby little face in disgust. “Dr. McCormick didn’t tell me about that part.”
“When did you talk to my surgeon?” Cooper asked. Maxine’s puzzled expression must have matched his own.
“When I called him yesterday to ask how your surgery went and to see when we could come visit. He said today was fine, so Mom brought me down.”
Maxine raised her shoulders and shook her head, as if to tell him she had no idea her ten-year-old son was capable of navigating his way through a busy hospital’s switchboards and acquiring confidential patient information. But Cooper wasn’t the least bit surprised. In fact, he wouldn’t put it past Hunter to know what he’d had for breakfast, how many times the nurses had changed his IV bag and when his next sponge bath was scheduled.
Looking at Maxine, whose arms were now akimbo in confusion, and whose perfectly formed breasts were on proud display under her snug white cotton top, he couldn’t help but wish that she could be the one to assist him at bath time.
“I brought you my Lord of the Rings DVD series.” Hunter’s voice brought Cooper back to reality. “My mom got you that plant. It looked better when she picked it out in the grocery store, but Gram says Mom has a black thumb and kills everything she touches.”
“Well, it’s the thought that counts,” Cooper said, trying to muster up something positive to say. He couldn’t very well agree with Hunter’s grandmother, could he?
“Now you sound like Mom when she makes me wear the stupid clothes Gram picks out.”
The little white phone by his bedside rang just then, and before Coop could move, Hunter jumped to answer it. “Gunnery Sergeant Matthew Cooper’s room.”
“Sorry,” Maxine whispered as her son spoke into the corded receiver. “I thought you were the one who told him he could visit. I didn’t know he was calling your doctor directly.”
“It’s okay,” Cooper whispered back, actually surprised by how much seeing them both had boosted his spirits.
“Yeah, he’s right here.” Hunter spoke with the importance of an adjutant screening a four-star general’s call. “But he still has the same ole boring human legs. Okay, hold on, Colonel Filden.”
Cooper grabbed the phone from Hunter’s hand and covered the mouthpiece as he spoke to his guests. “Thanks for coming to visit, but I have to take this call.”
“Okay, I’ll come back in a couple of days,” Hunter promised, but Maxine shook her head at the boy while attempting to quietly lead him out of the room.
He hoped they understood that he wasn’t trying to dismiss them out of rudeness. But this was possibly the call that would decide his entire future. And no matter how cool Hunter was—or how pretty his mom—Coop wanted nothing more than to get the hell out of here, stat.
Chapter Three (#ulink_e69b177c-10c9-5da6-8155-738e1df3ed50)
“Hello, sir,” Cooper finally said into the receiver once he knew Maxine and Hunter were well on their way down the hall.
The men exchanged general pleasantries for all of twenty seconds before his commanding officer finally cut to the chase.
“Here’s the bottom line,” Filden said. “They’re not needing as many soldiers, and they’re getting real stingy with the retirement pay. Your record speaks for itself. You’re a phenomenal marine. An asset to the squadron. Your men respect you and look up to you. I did my best to push for your reenlistment, but it doesn’t look good. Hell, if it were up to me, you would’ve been promoted to First Sergeant after your last deployment. But when you add this new injury to the mix, there’s just no way the government is willing to take the gamble. Anyway, nothing’s official yet, but I figured I’d give you a heads-up so you could start thinking about your future and any possibilities that may arise.”
The itch near Cooper’s incision flared up, and he wanted to throw the phone across the room and rip his bandage off. But he took the conversation like a man. As much as Cooper hated hearing the truth, he was grateful the colonel wasn’t shining him on. “I appreciate your candor, sir.”
“You’re made for police work, Gunny. And right now, just about every major department and agency stateside is hiring cops. I’m just saying it’s not a bad idea to put some feelers out. See if there’s anything open in your hometown.”
“Yes, sir,” Cooper said, knowing full well he’d never step foot in his old neighborhood if he could help it. The truth of the matter was that Cooper didn’t have a home, let alone a hometown. Nor did he have anyone he could talk to about what his options were.
“I’ll let you know if I hear anything different,” Filden added. “But a marine is always ready for anything, right?”
“Right, sir. Semper Fi.”
Cooper was almost surprised at the gentle way he eased the receiver down. Probably because he’d never wanted to throw anything so badly in his life.
So there it was. One minute he’d been out for a jog along the base perimeter with his dog, Helix. The next minute, a sixteen-year career in the Corps was gone in the flash of a detonated suicide bomb strapped to some poor insurgent’s chest.
* * *
To: matthewcooper@usmc.mil
From: hunterlovestherockies@hotmail.net
Re: Surgery
Date: March 1
I didn’t know that Miss Gregson’s family has a cabin up here in Sugar Falls. That’s so cool that they’re letting you stay in it when you get out of the hospital. I still think you should stay with me and my mom so we can take care of you and make sure you don’t fall or bust your knee back open. But at least we’ll be close enough to see each other every day.
How long are you going to be able to stay? I know you’re bummed about being discharged from the marines, but there are some real great cop jobs all over Idaho. Did you check out any of those applications I printed out for you?
Anyway, me and my mom will pick you up on Sunday and give you a ride to the cabin. Or to our house if you get smart and change your mind. And don’t forget, you’re gonna play catch with me when your leg is better.
See ya,
Hunter
No! No, no, no.
What had Hunter done?
He’d left his computer on when he’d gone to Boise with Cessy to see the latest superhero movie, and Maxine had only come in to collect the smelly socks and inside-out pants that were piling up in the corner.
But his laptop screen was open to his outbox and she soon realized the perfect small town world she’d created for herself and her son was about to change.
She went to the kitchen and grabbed a bag of barbecue potato chips before coming back to Hunter’s room to reread the email her son had sent that afternoon.
For years, people had been telling her that Hunter needed a positive male role model in his life. She knew some manly influence wasn’t necessarily a cause for alarm, but she wanted to be the one to decide who exerted that influence.
And now Hunter had invited this jerk to their hometown to recover from his surgery. He’d even volunteered her to pick the guy up at the hospital! She should have grounded him after that airport ride stunt, because apparently the boy hadn’t learned his lesson.
Geez, what should she do? She wanted to call someone to ask for advice, but who?
Her friend Mia understood kids. But Mia had a late-night dance class. Kylie was probably on a date, and Cessy’s advice was never an option, even if her mother-in-law wasn’t with Hunter. It sucked that her son certainly didn’t have a father she could share her parenting concerns with.
That was probably the reason Hunter had gotten into this situation in the first place. No father figure. And no matter how hard Maxine had tried to be both mom and dad, she must not have pulled it off. There was obviously something lacking in Hunter’s life that drew him to some random soldier like a heat-seeking missile.
After the day that Cooper had shooed them out of his room to take a phone call, she vowed she wouldn’t put herself in the same room as the marine again. And she hadn’t. Each time she’d taken Hunter to visit, which had been every week for over a month, she would walk the boy to Cooper’s room and then wait for her son out in the small lobby near the nurses’ station.
Just then, a window flashed in the bottom of the screen, signaling an incoming Skype call from Cooper.
She wanted to close the lid, but she couldn’t avoid the guy any longer. It would be better to get this matter settled before Gunny Heartthrob muscled his way into her their everyday lives. Her fingers paused over the mouse before she slowly moved it to the box and clicked.
The chat screen shot to life and Maxine was immediately faced with a live version of her son’s pen pal soldier.
“Hey, kid.” The grainy image displayed the same lonely eyes she’d seen in that one picture, but his head was lying back against a white sheet on a hospital bed. That is, until he braced himself up on his elbow, narrowed his eyes and gazed into the screen. “Oh. Hi.”
“Hi. Hunter’s out. I was just in his room, uh, cleaning.” Geez, she sounded as lame as she looked. In the small box in the corner, Maxine recognized herself, with her curly blond hair pulled messily into a ponytail on top of her head.
Was that how she really looked on a webcam? She should’ve put on some lip gloss instead of going for the chips. Speaking of which, she slowly slid the now-empty bag out of view from the camera.
Of course, Cooper looked great. He was 100 percent male and even in a hospital bed, he was still as gorgeous as hell. She didn’t need him running around her town all healthy and virile.
Ugh. She needed to get a grip. And not just of the rustling bag that was teetering precariously off the edge of the desk.
“So, I hear you’re getting discharged soon,” she said, when it appeared that Cooper wasn’t going to start the conversation.
“Yep. I was trying to stay in until I could retire, but I guess...stuff happens.” He appeared to lose his balance and cursed, then looked a little embarrassed. “Look, I don’t usually cuss like that in front of your son. Seeing you on my screen just kind of caught me...ah...off guard.”
This was her opportunity to tell him that this whole Sugar Falls visit had caught her off guard and wasn’t such a great idea. But at that exact moment, Hunter walked into the room.
She hadn’t even heard him enter the apartment because she’d been staring so intently at Coop’s beard stubble and wondering what it would feel like rubbing against her...
Whoa. She was not going there. Especially now that her son was present.
“Oh, cool, you’re talking to Cooper. Hey, Coop, are you coming to Sugar Falls?”
Maxine hadn’t even had the chance to cast her son a reprimanding look before Hunter leaned over, and then practically crawled over her to get in view of the tiny webcamera.
“What’s up, little man?” It was hard to register on the megapixels blurring on the screen, but she was sure that the look in Cooper’s eye softened when he saw Hunter. His tone of voice certainly did. “I was just going to talk to your mom about that.”
But before Maxine could get any answers, Cessy popped her perfectly coiffed head in the door, and Maxine jumped up to hustle her former mother-in-law out of the room.
She wasn’t sure why she didn’t want the woman to interact with their pen pal—
Wait! When did Cooper become theirs?
Whatever. All she knew was that the less Cessy was involved, the better.
Besides, it wasn’t as if Maxine had anything to hide. She wasn’t cheating on Bo or anything. Bo was dead. And Cooper wasn’t even in the running as a candidate to replace her husband. As if she would ever get married again. That ship had sailed.
Maxine steered Hunter’s grandmother toward the back door as Cessy talked incessantly about her latest shopping spree. Hopefully, the older lady didn’t even realize that her grandson just ditched her to do some online hero-worshipping. Or that her former daughter-in-law was blushing like a schoolgirl with her first crush.
She needed to get Cessy out the door so she could go back and tell that marine that under no circumstances was he to come visit. So she hugged the woman goodbye and thanked her repeatedly for taking Hunter shopping—yet again. But before she could turn the lock, Maxine’s cell phone vibrated.
Kylie.
Maybe Maxine should ask her friend for a quick opinion before rejoining the Skype chat. She had to talk to someone, even if it was her chronically single best friend.
“Is the date over?” Maxine asked instead of answering with a polite hello.
“No, I just snuck away and am debating whether or not my big ole booty will get stuck if I try to crawl through this bathroom window.”
Maxine reached into the back of her pantry and found a forgotten snack-sized package of pretzels. The empty bag of chips she’d left by Hunter’s computer had been the last of her emergency stash.
“Why do I do this to myself?” Kylie asked. “Frankie is a tax attorney I met at that seminar last week. Who knew a guy with such a party name could deliver a mind-numbing monologue on the importance of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act through a mouth stuffed with sautéed spinach in chimichurri sauce? I’m about to—”
“Listen,” Maxine interrupted. Kylie’s Bad Date Story From Hell: Volume 89 would just have to wait until tomorrow. “I need your advice. Hunter is trying to talk Cooper into coming to Sugar Falls after he gets discharged from the hospital.”
“You mean Gunny Heartthrob?”
Maxine nearly dropped her phone. “Stop calling him that.”
“You called him that first. You told us he literally made your heart throb when you met him. Anyway, if he comes to town, would he be staying at your place? I have a sexy nurse’s costume you could borrow to help him on his road to recovery.”
“Kylie! Are you serious? I have a son. Even if I wanted to, which I don’t, I can’t be shacking up with some marine from who knows where.”
“Listen, Max, the guy seems cool. Hunter thinks the world of him, and I hate to point out the obvious, but that poor boy needs a man to talk to. Better a military cop than some lowlife gangbanging druggie.”
Great. Maxine didn’t need the reminder that he was in the military and a cop. Matthew Cooper probably couldn’t cram any more testosterone into his camouflage pants if he tried.
“Where would he find a lowlife gangbanging druggie in Sugar Falls?” she asked her friend, before realizing they were getting completely sidetracked.
“That’s a good point. This town can be so boring sometimes.”
“Kylie, focus. Hunter invited this man to come here.”
“So what? Hunter also asked Jorge de la Rosa from the Colorado Rockies to come to his class presentation for that baseball book report he did. De la Rosa didn’t show and this guy probably won’t, either.”
“You may be wrong.”
“Do you think he’s actually coming?” Kylie suddenly seemed way too perky. Maxine tamped down the jealousy that crept its way around her closed-off heart.
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. That’s what I need to ask you about.” She quickly filled her friend in, explaining about Hunter’s email and then the awkward Skype session.
“I bet Hunter would be thrilled to see his pen pal more often.”
“Well, he’d be the only one.”
“Max, just because the guy rubs you the wrong way doesn’t mean he’s bad for your son.”
She knew what Kylie said was true, but it was still a tough pill to swallow. “So you don’t think I should go back in there and explain that it’s a bad idea for him to come out to visit?”
