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CHAPTER 4

Rogue

A t the end of the driveway, I pause to inhale. Why I brought her here I don’t know. It seemed like a good idea in the moment. Being here, though, it pulls at too many things inside me.

I never bring anyone home. Yet, hearing her scream, watching her process shock, everything inside of me said get her out and to safety. There is no place safer than here, especially for her.

While I find the woman attractive, I haven’t interacted with her enough for anyone to put two and two together that she’s with me. Outside of my weekly order she has her world and I have mine. There is no reason for anyone to come looking for her at my house. Unless they are watching her shop, then it is obvious since I broke the damn door in to get to her. If they follow us, it will be a suicide mission on their end. I promise I’ll be the one putting heads in boxes if they decide to come here.

Who sent her the dead man’s head? Who is the dead man? I have plenty of questions and zero answers. As soon as she opened her shop here in town, Havoc wanting to know everything, had a brother run a check. One thing about our President, he’s thorough. Attention to detail and knowledge is power are key things to the man. Every new person that falls on his radar, he is researching. Down to his core Havoc is about learning anything and everything about everyone around him.

Michele Leigh Cramer, twenty-eight years old. She’s from New Jersey. Never been married, no kids, and based on what could be sorted, she doesn’t even have a boyfriend. No siblings, parents died when she was a kid, grandparents stepped up and raised her until they died seven years ago. She calls home to chat with one cousin and that is it. Compared to everyone I know, Michele Cramer is the most tame and boring single woman around. Her life is a bubble and she has zero desired to get out of it.

I look back once more before letting out a sigh. I know better. Once something is behind you, it’s done. It can’t be changed. Trust me, if I could change the past, I would in a heartbeat.

Why I keep this place is beyond even me. Psychological warfare is something I trained in. If I had to categorize this home, it is absolutely a battlefield for my mind. Knowing this, I still can’t seem to let it go no matter how much I know it isn’t healthy. Once upon a time, this house had dreams, a future. Happiness once abounded inside the walls of this home. Nothing here brings me joy anymore, and not a damn thing can ever change it.

But she will be safe here.

Compartmentalize.

It’s how to survive a war zone. Everything and everyone has a box. Tuck each box away until necessary. Focus on the mission and nothing else matters.

This house it doesn’t ever stay in the box. In fact, my entire adult life becomes muddled the longer I sit in this driveway. The craving to put the gun to my head and pull the trigger arise inside me once again.

Why not? Who will miss me?

In death, I will find peace.

Would I see her again? Could I hold her in my arms once more in the afterlife?

I could do it. The cold metal of the barrel to my temple or under my chin, four pounds of pressure on the trigger and in a snap it would be done. The loneliness, the guilt, the pain, and this house would all be nothing anymore.

Shaking off the thoughts that haunt me, I twist the throttle and ride back to her shop. Upon arrival, the guys already have the front door off the hinges trying to replace the glass I shot out. It was a reaction, I went into mission mode and path of least resistance to getting to her was through the door.

Pulling up, I drop the kickstand and cut the engine off, but stay in my seat. Looking to my left hand, the tremors are present. The medication isn’t working anymore. The tingling sensations are brutal. It’s like my hand ‘falling asleep’ as my granddad always called it, but no matter how much I drop the arm to allow for blood flow, the pins and needles don’t stop. Sitting on my bike, I reach to the pocket inside my cut and pull out a joint. Lighting it, I take the first inhale.

Deep.

Closing my eyes, I let the weed do its job. As I take the next draw, I feel the pain lessoning. Whether it’s truly the medicinal purposes found in the marijuana or it’s simply in my head, I don’t care. This shit takes the edge off my shaking hand, my painful arm, and the thoughts in my head. Opening my eyes, Creed has approached.

“You okay?” He asks watching me cautiously.

I nod exhaling. Sure, I could get a ticket for smoking marijuana in public. I don’t give a fuck. I’ll take the hit and tell the judge I’d do it all over again. Sometimes a good smoke is necessary.

“It’s Monday,” he reminds me what I already know. “Why’d you come here?”

Taking another hit, I don’t reply right away. “Come on Rogue, I know you. I know this shit runs deep.”

“Came for my usual,” I give him the truth.

He raises his eyebrows in question without speaking. I don’t discuss it, therefore, he doesn’t know what my usual routine for being here is.

“In the front display cooler, that wrapped bouquet of tiger lilies, bring that to me, would ya?”

He doesn’t question me any further and goes inside to retrieve my order. This is why I find the only peace in my life within this brotherhood. These men know me, the good, the bad, the ugly, and the damaged, yet they still accept me. It’s the only place I don’t feel judged by others. There is no stopping the judgement I do to myself.

Popping open my saddlebag, I slide the flowers in. “Gotta be somewhere,” I tell Creed. “I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

“You need me at your back?”

I smile knowing he means that shit. “Nah, brother, some things I gotta do alone. This is one of them.”

“If you’re goin’ where I think you’re goin’ not sure alone is the best thing.”

“Can’t kill someone already dead. I’m good.”

He studies me but doesn’t speak. He’s concerned. I get it.

“Gotta do this, don’t miss a Monday.” I explain.

He nods and backs away with his hands raised in surrender. “Shit changes and you wanna ride to clear your mind, one call I’m at your six, brother.”

Handing the last of my joint to him, I crank my bike again. No other words are necessary. I take off and make the drive another twenty minutes outside of town. This is a ride I can make in my damn sleep. In the beginning I came every day. I didn’t know what else to do. Without her, I’m empty. Parking, I get off the bike, grab the flowers and make my way to the black granite tombstone.

Immediately, I hit my knees resting my head and hands on the top of her tombstone.

“Nixie, my girl. I wish I could trade places with you,” I whisper to the air around me. “If I could turn back time, I’d give up everything to hold you once again.”

Rolling back to rest on my heels I look at my daughter’s picture. “Forever three you will be,” I mutter as I remember

“Master Chief Benson, got a red cross message.” My commander explains standing over my hospital bed.

I jerk up crying out in pain as my arm begins the tremors yet again. Four days ago, on a mission with my SEAL team we were caught in an ambush. I saw the grenade incoming, yanked two of my teammates by their collars trying to get us out. The shrapnel wound to my arm has created nerve damage. Right now, long term we don’t know what my future holds. Every movement sends my arm into uncontrollable tremors, painful ones. With a metal fragment sticking out of my forearm, I managed to drag my unconscious frogman brother out of the line of fire. His head injury is undetermined at this time, but he is alive, which half of our unit isn’t. To say this is the worst week of my life is an understatement.

Now a red cross message.

That means something back home. There are only two people left back home to even need to send this kind of message.

“Ayla? Dominiks?” I ask as the panic fills me and my head throbs.

My team is either on a plane back home in a box, or laying in another bed in this German hospital waiting for release so we can either return to duty or home. In my case, Lieutenant Connor here has already given me the order that I’ll be returning home once I’m cleared to travel. Once home, I will await my career’s fate in the hands of the medical board.

“I’m gonna give it to you straight, frogman and it’s not good.”

I swallow the lump in my throat and steel my nerves somehow knowing I’m not strong enough for whatever he’s about to tell me.

“There has been an accident. We’re working out getting you a medical assisted flight home, Benson.”

“L-t, give it to me. There’s been an accident. What happened to my wife and daughter? I don’t have any other family and any other reason for there to be a red cross message.”

He shakes his head and I scream, “no!” Without the words, I simply knew.

The rest of the conversation is still a blur. In an instant, my entire world shattered. No one knows why, even to this day. Apparently being the wife of a Navy SEAL in a foreign country was too much. Maybe it was demons from her past haunting her. I’ll never know.

At thirty-two, I lost my career, my wife, and my kid. Not a single fucking medal from the Navy can ever replace what I lost. Awards, ranks, benefits, the honor in service is nothing to me anymore. Without them, I merely exist. Losing my job too, icing on the fucking cake made out of shit.

Ayla and I met when I was on a mission abroad. She was working at an embassy in Bulgaria. Instantly, I was sucked in by her beauty, dark hair that was natural, deep brown eyes, olive skin tone, high cheek bones and an accent that shot right to my dick, she was it. While she lived in a small providence that spoke Turkish, she was fluent in English thanks to her education.

In a whirlwind, I married her after two weeks together and sent her back to the United States while I finished my mission. At the time I was stationed in Little Creek, Virginia Beach and rented a small condo there. She didn’t like the deployments, but seemed to understand.

We had an agreement. I was going to do twenty years, but we would continue to build our dreams for after my time in service was done now. She wanted to move her mother over from Bulgaria and I agreed. First, we bought land in Alabama since I knew I wanted to return home after retirement. Once the land was purchased we had a custom built home. That is when Ayla decided she wanted to live in Alabama full time. She never seemed to find her place in Virginia. Friendships didn’t form. Being the wife of a SEAL, she didn’t engage the other wives like I had hoped would happen. Her sadness in Virginia was obvious. Therefore, her moving to Alabama, well, I agreed reluctantly.

She did make a few friends here in Bama, but she was still homesick. I came home as much as possible, even hopping quick flights just for a weekend with her. She did the same visiting me in Virginia as well. We even had her mom fly over as often as possible.

While unexpected, two years into married life, Ayla became pregnant. I have faced down terrorist, had my life flash before my eyes more than once on a mission. Becoming a dad scared me more than anything in the world. Dominiks was born and I have never been more in love in my life. From the moment the two pink lines showed on the stick, I wanted to be a girl dad. Having my pretty princess was a dream come true. They put her screaming, bloody, naked body in my arms wrapped in a small blanket and that moment is still the very best moment in my entire existence.

Wanting to be home, I decided after that enlistment I was done. No more twenty year plan. No more missions where my wife had to wonder what country I was in. No more chancing watching my baby girl grow up. Commitment is a core value to the Navy and I would see out my contract. Even though, I silently counted down the time left until I could be home with my girls.

Ayla tried to adjust. A lot fell on her alone. Things only the wife of a military service member can understand. I noticed it, but with work, I felt helpless. Post partum is a hard time on a woman’s body and mind. Her emotions were all over the place after birth. Having my commitment to the Navy I couldn’t easily be there to encourage her. As much as I had Ayla’s mother visit as we could afford, it wasn’t enough. With me gone, the stresses of motherhood, living in a foreign country, it all compounded.

One night the drinking won.

I knew she liked alcohol. I didn’t see it, though. Hindsight is twenty-twenty. The alcohol had a grip on her.

Ayla, the woman I loved with my entire being took our daughter out after drinking heavily. Why didn’t she stay home? What was she thinking? Was it intentional? Was she that drunk? I have more questions than answers and the answers will not come no matter how many times I ask myself the questions. Why she swerved into oncoming traffic, I’ll never know. But witnesses say she was driving on the wrong side of the highway in Huntsville for a while before colliding head on with an eighteen wheeler. The truck ended up driving over her small compact car, coming to rest with the driver’s tire of that truck literally on top of my daughter’s car seat.

Both my wife and daughter were dead on site.

Where was I? Not here.

Regardless of what Ayla did that night, if I had been home, it wouldn’t have happened. I never would have let her take Dominiks, our Nixie, out while she was drunk.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” I tell the stone in front of me.

“I failed you,” I tell my daughter before looking to the plot beside her. The same style headstone taunts me. “I don’t hate you, Ayla.” I explain to the air. “I hate myself.”

And that is the truth.

I hate myself for not protecting them.

I hate myself for not being with them.

I hate myself that I’m not dead with them.

I hate myself.

Period.