“I’m sorry you had to leave.” She stopped herself and he smiled as she put her hands up the way he sometimes did with her. “Just a slip of the tongue. I’m working on it.” It was hard not to apologize all the time. But she was indeed working on it.

“I just want to hold you until you fall asleep. Then I’ll lock up and head home. I promise.”

“Sometimes, Duke? You’re so perfect and you say exactly the right thing and I get really freaked out.” Carmella hadn’t meant to share in that level of detail, but once it was out, she was glad she had.

He led her to the bedroom. “Perfect, huh? Can I remind you of this the next time I fuck up and you’re mad at me?” He shrugged a shoulder and winced.

“What’s wrong?”

“My back. I screwed it up when I was in the army. Tonight during the race I moved wrong probably. I’ll take some pain reliever when I get home.”

Carmella pointed to the bed. “Shirt and pants off.”

“Uh? Okay.”

“I’m going to give you a massage. If you want a happy ending, we’ll discuss that after.”

He laughed, giving her a hug. “I like you a hell of a lot, Carmella.”

He was incorrigible. She kissed him quickly and pointed at the bed again. “I like you too. Now, clothes off, on the bed facedown.”

“This is supposed to be about you,” Duke said as he pulled his shirt off and all his ink was bared to her.

“Trust me, Duke. I am all on board with what I’m looking at.” At his saucy grin she just laughed.

“At least tell me you get naked too.” He shucked the rest of his clothes. “I always want a happy ending. I can tell you that up front.” He got on the bed.

“You’re so full of it. It’s lucky for you that you’re gorgeous and talented with your hands.” She pulled her pants off, but left the shirt and panties as she scrambled atop his body, resting her ass on the backs of his thighs.

Carmella gave in, sliding her palms all over his back and shoulders, just getting a feel for his muscles. There was a knot she found and circled slowly. “This here?”

“Yes.” He groaned.

She poured a little almond oil into her palm and slowly began to work her fingers and the heels of her hands into the bunched-up muscles across his back and up his spine.

Carmella let the rhythm of it lull her. Over the minutes, the knot got smaller and his muscles looser. And weirdly enough, she felt closer to him. Like the trust she’d allowed had deepened after the way he’d given over to her touch.

“Where’d you learn that?” he asked lazily into her pillow. “You’re so good at it. I don’t want to move for an hour.”

She kissed his neck as she dropped to lie next to him on the bed. “I was taking an accounting class at North Seattle Community College during my senior year of high school. You know one of those tech credit things? They had a variety of community enrichment-type classes and one of them was massage. So I took it.” To have a few more nights a week away from her house as well.

“Cool. A plus. You told me something else about yourself.” He turned his face her way.

“I’m not trying to be mysterious. You tell me something now.”

He was quiet for a bit before he started speaking. “Like what?”

“You said you loved living near the beach but you enlisted. Why? Why leave that behind to go to war?”

“Truthfully?”

She nodded. “Yes. That’s always my answer to that question. The truth might hurt, but lies are worse.”

“Good to know. I agree, by the way. I’m not like my siblings. They grew up in a world where they never remember the way our parents had to struggle. They grew up accepting that college was a reality. I came to that too late for it to change me the way it had them. I loved surfing and the beach and all that stuff. But I wasn’t at home there. I thought the army would be a way for me to get my shit straight so I could come back and start my professional life. I just … well you can’t really know what it’s like until you’re there.”

“The military? War? Or the Middle East?”

“The army was okay. It had rules. I grew up with rules. I was expected to be resourceful to get the job done. I liked that. They appreciated my mechanical skills. Rewarded them even. I didn’t mind that, though I hated the loss of my personal freedom. Iraq was hot. Really, really hot. The people, the ones who were caught in the middle? They were amazing despite all the chaos.”

He was silent awhile and she thought maybe she’d pushed too far. “You don’t have to say anything else if you don’t want to.” She heard the pain in his voice and realized she’d taken him being in the military more casually than she should have. He was decorated, had seen a lot. She shouldn’t go stirring up his bad memories.

He smiled, still on his belly with her beside him. “No, this is good. War sucks. It sucks no matter what or where or why. But we were out there on the ragged edge. Every week there were firefights. People got injured and killed all the time. It ages you. It makes you wary and suspicious. These nineteen-year-olds get there and within three months they look ten years older. It was hard not to get cynical or bitter. But I learned a lot about myself. I had Asa and Mick and the rest of my crew there. We had one another’s backs. It was harder than I ever expected, mainly because I had no idea what to expect.”