Page 20

LINDA

"W hoooo… look out!" Jake Hyunh, the Bravo Team Leader, Second Squad, joked as Linda gathered with the other Third Platoon NCOs in the motor pool as part of the regular Monday procedures. "Someone's wearing that nice perfume after this weekend. Smells like big bucks."

"No, smells like endorsement contracts and Astroturf," Terry Atkins, First Squad's Bravo Team leader, said. "Man, working with you at PT this morning left me having flashbacks to my highs chool dreams. Felt like I was playing in front of fifty thousand fans."

"Only position you'd play would be the left out," Linda tossed back, causing all the NCOs to laugh.

Everyone knew Linda was seeing Brutus. While she'd been worried about it at first, everyone seemed okay with it.

The NCOs for sure were okay with it, and any of the lower enlisted that had a problem with her relationship were smart enough to keep their opinion to themselves.

It allowed her to relax, and have some fun with her fellow sergeants.

"Own it Atkins, I've seen you play in the Turkey Bowl."

There were plenty of laughs about that. Each year, the 3/3 played against Fort Pickett's Garrison Command Group in a pair of charity flag football games.

One game was only officers, the others only enlisted.

Due to the 'ranking' system used in the rules as a way to prevent both groups from fielding a team of just out of school studs, NCOs were very valuable members of each team… except for Terry Atkins.

The man was a good NCO, and a good soldier. She was happy to go into combat, his fire team and her fire team working together.

Still, the man couldn't catch a football to save his life.

"Alright, let's cut the chatter and get squared away," Sergeant Lincoln growled, stopping the joking around.

Lincoln was always that way, all business and squared away. Joking was done after work was completed.

"We're coming out of our yellow cycle and going green starting next week, so focus on actual deployment equipment for this Monday.

With that, light, air loadable vehicles are the first order of business.

We're focusing on the lightweight vehicles today.

Major's orders—the heavy Humvees stay on base unless specifically authorized. "

"That's good, my squad's Hummer is a fucking rack queen," Nate Nichols said, using the military slang term for a vehicle that was always up on the racks getting maintenance.

"This afternoon I'll have a list of other light gear we'll get into, and we can get the boxes checked," Sergeant Lincoln continued. "The officers are going to be handling their own thing today, so if there's any issues you come to me, the El Tee may or may not be around. So let's get it done."

The group broke up, and Linda got her team going. She started work on one of their armored vehicles. As she checked the tires, she was reminded of doing similar maintenance checks with Brutus, and even though they'd only been apart just over twenty-four hours, it felt like more.

"Face it chica, you've fallen for him," Linda murmured to herself as she checked the box on the PMCS sheet. "You didn't mean to, you certainly didn't plan for it, but you're head over heels for one of the biggest football stars on the planet."

If she'd asked herself a year ago where she expected to be going into this spring, she could have said she would still be in Charlie Company. She liked her job, and she had no desire at the moment to try and leave the company and rotate to a more regular unit.

She could have said she expected to still be living in the barracks.

While as an NCO she could apply for living off base on her own in order to save barracks space for lower enlisted troops, the truth was that Linda didn't mind the barracks.

Having a whole room to herself helped, and there were no apartments in Blackstone that could measure up, or at least none she could afford on the military's housing allowance.

But to be the girlfriend and lover to Brutus Townsend, to spend nearly every spare weekend minute with him, exploring limits both emotional and sexual that left her shaky every Monday morning? No way in hell.

The morning continued on, and as eleven thirty came up on her watch, she was looking forward to lunch.

Over the past month she'd been hungrier than normal, and she suspected that all the sexual hormones and energy she was burning through with Brutus had her metabolism in overdrive.

The thought both thrilled and unnerved her.

She was changing, her body adjusting to this new life, this new relationship that still felt surreal at times.

She was in for a surprise however when Jess Adams approached her, her hands still slightly grimy from whatever vehicle she'd been working on that morning.

"Hey Linda, what do you think of lunch on me?"

"On you?" Linda asked, lifting an eyebrow. "I'd say you've got an ulterior motive. Ever since your sister moved in with you, you've squeezed every nickel you could until Tom Jefferson screamed. But if you're paying, I'm down. What's on the menu?"

"I'm thinking Tio's Pizza?" Jess offered. "Come on, you're down a pound or two, you can afford to share an extra large with me."

Linda couldn't object, and since Jess was driving the decision was made. Fifteen minutes later they were seated in a booth at Blackstone's best pizza restaurant, an order of Italian style hot wings between them while they waited for their order, a meat lover's supreme, to be delivered.

That was another advantage of Tio's. If you were in uniform and came in during lunch, you got moved to the front of the preparation line.

"You know, I never thought you'd be one to go to town on a pizza." Linda sat back, sipping her unsweetened tea. "You're always so… disciplined on your diet."

"Meh, I'm doing a mini-bulk." Jess shrugged.

"For the rest of this week I'll relax, and then dial it in once we go green.

And I'm actually trying to not be such a damn tightwad now with Sabby out of the house.

I'd like to have a bit more joy to my life than the endorphin rush of fucking up some big weights. "

"How is your sister doing anyway?" Linda asked. "I know I should stop by to see how she and Hollywood are adjusting to living in on-post housing, but I haven't found the time yet."

"Meh, no big deal," Jess said. "We talked with the housing office, and they're actually in the same house I used to be in.

So it's sort of a win-win. All I had to move out was my personal stuff, and I didn't have to worry about clearing housing and dealing with the inspection.

Sabby and Hollywood get to start off with some basic furniture, and the move-in was super easy and casual. "

"That's good." Linda plucked a wing. "So you're happily settled into your new place?"

"Yeah, it's actually really, really good." Jess grinned. "I've got an apartment right next to my gym. The gym owner's my landlord, if you can believe that."

"Sounds like you're in heaven," Linda said, glad for her. "And he's not charging you an arm and a leg?"

"Nope, in fact he's cutting me a deal," Jess said. "Basically, I keep an eye on the property when I'm around and off duty, and he doesn't charge me for gym membership. I'm literally making money living off post. So I guess I still am a bit of a tightwad."

"There's a difference between being a tightwad and being a smart negotiator, at least my business degree says so," Linda said. "So what's up? Why'd you want to grab lunch, anyway?"

"Well, I wanted to ask you something… off the books," Jess said. "About Hollywood."

Linda leaned in, intrigued. The two women couldn't be more different physically, despite being the same rank and in the same platoon.

But they'd always been at least professionally friendly with each other, bonding over the fact they were the only two female non-commissioned officers in the entire battalion.

In a lot of ways, Jess was the closest thing Linda had to a 'girl friend' on Fort Pickett.

But one of the reasons that they'd maintained their friendly professionalism was because they were, always and forever, professional. Both being team leaders, they might offer advice to each other, but also stayed out of each other's business as much as possible.

Business was business, and personal life was personal life. They rarely mixed in the relationship between Linda Castellanos and Jessica Adams.

However, Logan Goodman was someone they both had to deal with, and transcended the line between business and personal between them.

"What would you like to know, Jess?" Linda asked. "How he's doing? If I've been busting his chops too much?"

Jess laughed, leaning back in her booth seat. "Trust me, after dealing with me for a few months, Hollywood knows not to complain about his team leader ever again. Actually, last time he did say something about you. He said you were pretty cool. So take that for what you will."

Actually, Linda did. She knew that her style was different from Jess, who was hard charging. She was much more of a disciplinarian, more by the book while Jess was rough and tumble. But they both got the job done, and Linda was secretly pleased by Goodman's praise.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome. And Sabby's happy, so you're obviously giving him enough time at home to handle the… icky stuff." Jess made Linda laugh.

She was foul mouthed, could go toe to toe with anyone, and was maybe the toughest soldier in the platoon.

But anything to do with real-life penises in a sexual realm left Jess Adams feeling queasy and talking like a pearl-clutching old lady.

Dicks became 'equipment,' and sex became 'icky stuff.

' Linda had always been comfortable with Jess's sexuality, and had no problem exposing herself to Jess when there was a company-wide drug test and she, Jess, and Lieutenant Starr had to observe each other pissing into the plastic cups.