LITMIR.BIZ

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      Thane held up his plate. One dog with ketchup and relish, one dog with mustard and sauerkraut. That was genuinely how he liked them, so he raised an eyebrow, too. “Well? What does this mean?”

      “It means,” she said, her smile breaking through as her voice dropped into a quiet purr, “that you are a very interesting man.”

      “Watch out, everybody.” Bill held up his beer and plate and took a step back. “Get out of Chloe’s way.”

      Thane kept his focus on Chloe. “Let’s see how you dress your hot dog.”

      “Can’t do that.” She held up her plate with her still-plain hot dog. “You see, I prefer mine...naked.”

      Marcus took a step back. “That’s it, I’m outta here. Retreat.”

      Thane let Chloe lead the way to the little iron-lattice patio table in the shade. When they’d been sitting on the edge of the pool, feet swishing the water and accidentally touching now and then, she’d asked most of the questions. He’d lived at Two Rivers since it opened two years ago, he was from South Carolina, yeah, still a touch of the accent, and no, he hadn’t been home since last Thanksgiving, a little less than a year now. It was a fifteen-, sixteen-hour drive so you really needed to fly and flying sucked lately, and yes, Austin was less than an hour’s drive from here. Great city.

      It was his turn. “Do you live here at Two Rivers or did your friends invite you over?”

      “I live here.”

      “You must have just moved in.”

      “One whole week ago. What made you guess that?”

      Thane polished off his first hot dog. “There’s no way I wouldn’t have noticed you already if you’d been living here for more than a week.”

      She went a little still at that. He hadn’t said it like a cheesy pick-up line. He’d stated it as the fact that it was. Maybe that had been too direct. Maybe he was too accustomed to speaking bluntly during military operations. It was the truth, though, and she seemed like the kind of person who could handle a straightforward comment. She dealt with a pack of lieutenants like they were her brothers, when he suspected they were really angling for more. Surely, she could handle him.

      “You’re just flattering me now.” She popped the last bite of her naked hot dog into her mouth. “I like it.”

      Yep. She could handle him.

      “You’re in the army, aren’t you?” he guessed.

      She nodded her head as she chewed, but for the first time, her expression dimmed a little. She was watching him closely for his reaction.

      Were there men out there dumb enough to pass up a chance to spend time with her because she was in the military? Yeah, he knew a few guys like that. Old-school chauvinists. Insecure cavemen. Their loss.

      She swallowed her last bite. “Is that a bad thing?”

      “I hope not, since I’m in the army, too.” He winked at her.

      She laughed.

      She was too young to be one of the NCOs who lived here, but just to be safe, he pointed to the center of his chest, where his rank would be if he wore ACUs. “First lieutenant.”

      She tapped the knot of the towel. “Second lieutenant.”

       Perfect.

      Thane pushed his plate out of the way and leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. “It’s not a bad thing that we’re both in the service. It just makes it a little more challenging to coordinate our schedules if we wanted to do something like go to a movie. I’m willing to try it, though, if you’d like to go see a movie.” Maybe he was holding his breath, maybe he was praying she wouldn’t turn him down.

      She leaned forward, too, and put her arms on the table. “That sounds like fun. Since you’ve been here a few years, you can show me which theaters are the nicest.”

      “I’ll take you to the best one.” He meant it. The pickings were generally slim in army towns, but Fort Hood was the largest post in America, so Killeen had become a good-sized city with it. Dinner, movie, drinks—he’d take her to only the best places. He had the crazy thought that he’d be doing those places a favor, letting them be graced by a woman who radiated such happiness. Dinner and a movie in Killeen would be just the start. He’d love to take her into Austin.

      “What made you guess that I was in the army?” she asked. “I thought I was being a pretty normal civilian. I haven’t been speaking in acronyms, have I?”

      He chuckled and leaned back in his chair. “You asked how far it was to Austin, so you’re obviously new to the area. The main reason new people pour into Killeen is because the army sent them here.” He nodded toward the apartment buildings. “And the main reason people live here is because it’s conveniently priced for a junior officer’s housing allowance.”

      She chuckled, too, and leaned back in her chair.

       This couldn’t be going better. God, I’m glad I came.

      “I thought my friends gave it away with their regulation haircuts. I didn’t even know they were going to be stationed at Hood. I just ran into Keith at the PX yesterday, so I knew he was at Hood, but I didn’t know he lived here in Two Rivers. Keith’s the one who went swimming.”

      “It’s a small world, five of you here from one college.”

      As soon as he said it, he knew. She had to be from West Point. They all were.

      The vast majority of officers came from ROTC programs, but even if there were sixteen ROTC officers in a unit, they would most likely be from sixteen different universities. There might be only three West Point officers in comparison, but they always seemed to know each other. For her to have found four college friends in this one apartment complex? Yeah. They had to be ring-knockers.

      “We all went to West Point,” she offered, oblivious to what was obvious.

      Thane had checked her left hand earlier. No engagement ring. No wedding band. Now he looked at her right hand. No West Point ring.

      She caught his look and held up her right hand, wiggling her bare fingers. “I don’t wear the ring all the time. It’s not a requirement, you know. You’re not wearing your class ring today, either. I’ll have to guess where you went to college. Let’s see, South Carolina...maybe Clemson? Wait—not the Citadel? Tell me you’re from anywhere but the Citadel.” She made a horrified face.

      She did it so comically, it made him laugh. The Citadel was a private college that ran itself like a military academy. Thane had never had the money to go to a private college, which was one of the reasons he’d enlisted in the army at eighteen. “Nothing that bad.”

      “I know. I was joking.” She dropped her horrified face and beamed at him, looking relaxed in his towel and ready for a long chat. “You’d definitely be wearing a big, honking ring if you were. Everyone calls us ring-knockers, but have you seen a Citadel ring? You’d think they won the Super Bowl or something. So, where did you go to school?”

      “Duke University.” He’d been able to start there at age twenty, after two years of enlisted service had helped him win an ROTC scholarship.

      “North Carolina. Tricky of you. And your ring?”

      “I don’t ever wear a college ring. I didn’t buy one.”

      “Why not? Duke’s such a prestigious school.”

      “Now you’re just flattering me. I like it.”

      She laughed, but she was still looking at him expectantly.

      “I don’t know why I didn’t buy one. It’s not really a big deal there.”

      She studied him. “That’s interesting, that rings aren’t a big

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