Grady
Another fucking waiting room. Man, I was sick to death of doctors. Probing my flesh, their compassionate yet condescending smirks, insincere offers of hope. Today, I’d get another skin graft, fuck my life.
I shifted in my seat, wishing I were anywhere but here. This place was stuck in the eighties, like I was on a Miami Vice set: Kenny Loggins played over the speakers, the walls were painted pale peach, the air reeked of baby powder and bleach, and a vase of plastic flowers was placed on the floor, not even worthy of a cheap coffee table.
I pulled out my phone but had no fucking reception. Dammit. My hand shuffled through the basket of magazines; a Playboy would’ve been nice, but I’d settle for a Men’s Health.
I grabbed a pile of crap—last year’s Good Housekeeping, Star, Vogue. I was about to give up and just stare at the cracked paint when something caught my eye.
A “Ten Years of Dancing under the Stars” special edition. And there in the corner of the cover was a small picture of a girl dancing. Black hair, incredible body, killer smile.
Isa.
The hot chick from the one-night stand I couldn’t stop thinking about, the girl who stole my bullet.
What the fuck?
I focused on her face, her body, her hair. It was fucking her. I’d bet my medal on it.
I knew I’d seen her before. I’d even fucking asked her why she looked familiar but she lied to me. Couldn’t for the life of her know where I could’ve possibly seen her? How about fifteen million people watched you every night for two years? My grandma loved that show—used to force me to watch it every fucking week. And now I remembered that Meemaw’s favorite dancer was “that sweet American girl.”
I thumbed through the magazine, desperate for some more intel.
Bella Applebaum won the 5th and 6th seasons of Dancing under the Stars. She left the show in the middle of the 7th season, with no explanation. Her current whereabouts remain unknown.
Isa. . .bella?
Why did she leave the show? Unknown whereabouts? Why the secrecy? What was she hiding from?
A reality star—of course she’d never want a relationship with me. She’d probably run off and marry some liberal war-protesting Hollywood pretty boy.
She was like one of these goddamn celebrities who pretended to support our troops but actually charged the charities to make appearances. Give back to your country, fuck a war vet.
My mind raced. Who the fuck did she think she was, trying to disarm me? I needed to see her again—get some kind of closure. I’d fucking flat out ask her why she slept with me, then ran the fuck out the door the first chance she got.
Man, I sounded like a bitch. I just couldn’t accept that I’d read her so wrong. I honest to God thought she was into me. The sex was incredible, and she hadn’t abandoned me after my PTSD freak-out at the party. She seemed to want to get to know me even if it was only to help me since she claimed to want to become a psychologist.
And that damn bullet. Maybe the episode at the party had been tolerable to her, piqued her psychobabble curiosity, but once she found herself trapped in an apartment with a PTSD war vet with a loaded gun, she bolted. I can’t honestly say I blamed her. I was a fucking mess.
“Mr. Williams, we’re ready for you now.”
I glanced up. A hot young nurse waited to escort me back to a room so I could be tortured. My flesh would be manipulated and scraped so I could pass for a human and not an alien. A swig of the whiskey hidden in my water bottle took the edge of my pain.
Across the room, I recognized a fellow Marine, his leg amputated, his wife clutching his arm, attempting to comfort him. I wondered what it would be like to have someone like that in my life who would love me no matter what.
I stood up and followed the sexy nurse down the barren hallway. Meeting Isa, having her take my bullet, seeing her in the magazine, these incidents couldn’t all be coincidences.
I had to see her again.