Collide Into You: A Romantic Gender Swap Love Story (34 page)

I shrug. “The way I see it, you’ve already given up on your father’s company without any interaction from Brookshire Mierkle. I see little trust or faith between you. You both want to be your father, but you have different leadership styles and different skills. Neither of you is singly qualified to run the company as a whole. I’m sorry, but it has to be said. Now, if the company was uncoupled, so to speak, with one branch concentrating on finance and federal contracts whereas the other specialized in logistics and supplies, then maybe—just maybe—as sister companies, you might stand a chance. Otherwise…” I leave the alternative hanging out there for each of them to imagine the worst-case scenario.

“What role would Brookshire Mierkle take in all of this?” Amanda asks.
 

“Is Brookshire Mierkle in agreement?” Ken asks at the same time.

Amanda reopens her day planner and appears to be looking at her calendar.

“Mr. Brookshire has given me full authority to do what I will with Joy Fromm. If you want to explore this option, then I’ll be with you the entire way. You’ll have the full backing of Brookshire Mierkle. If you do not choose this option, then I’ll show you to the door, and I’ll walk out with you and start my own job search.”

The room is silent. It’s only a minute, but it feels like it stretches out for an hour.
Am I doing the right thing, or are they going to call my bluff?
In that minute, my self-esteem plummets fourteen floors.

“Ken,” Amanda says stiffly. “How does your schedule look for Monday? We can come back in then and work out all the details.”

At first, it appears the half-brother might refuse.
Refuse
to answer Amanda.
Refuse
the deal.
Refuse
to breathe, since his face is turning blue.

Finally, he says, “Monday is good. Don’t forget that Tanner invited your boys to Thursday’s game in Arizona.”

“I have it down in my calendar. Jacob and James are looking forward to it.”

I feel like I’ve been thrown a curveball.
There can’t be two Tanners in the MLB
.
 

“Excuse me,” I interject, “but are you referring to Tanner Nguyen, Nats shortstop?” This might be too much of a coincidence.

“Yes,” Ken says, his eyes narrowing slightly. “Tanner’s my cousin from my mother’s side. I don’t see how it’s relevant.”

I feel like celebrating from here to Sunday. I wish we had established this early on. It would have saved us a lot of time.
 

“You’re probably not going to believe me, but Tanner is one of my best friends.”

Dillan

I
SIT
,
STUNNED
,
WITH
THE
molten lava still between my hands—even after ten minutes, it’s still steaming—as General MacWilliams finishes his own love story, which is to say how he and his wife met forty years ago.

It wasn’t something typical, like they met in college or she was his high school sweetheart. No, at eighteen, he had gotten into a fight with one of the boys down the street, both were arrested, and she—his future wife—was one of the precinct’s secretaries. Love at first sight, but only on his side.
 

“I tried to find ways of getting arrested just to see her, Sergeant Holtslander,” General MacWilliams says with a hearty laugh. “I got arrested so many times that summer that the judge said it was prison or the Army. I think you know which I chose. It took a couple of years of wearing her down, but I’m a persistent chap, and thirty-five years ago, she made me the happiest man alive.” He pulls out an ancient wallet and shows me pictures of his kids from when they were in grade school. “She gave me five kids. Most of them were rotten—they were just like me—but they grew out of it. All but one joined up. I may have the stars on my chest, but my wife wears the pants. So if she ever calls and you answer the phone, it’s best if you tread carefully. In fact, it’s probably best if you don’t answer the phones. Leave that to Mrs. Atkins. She knows how to handle Mrs. MacWilliams. The secretary out there is probably the reason I’m still married,” he laughs. “So, now tell me about the letters.”

I look down at the coffee. It’s bubbling.
How is that even possible?
I’m still hoping to find a place to put it, but I’ve given up on that quest, and I’m sure as hell not going to drink it now. Not with the bubbling.
 

I inform the general of my basic assessment, about how William and Greta are more or less pen pals, and how, once it reaches 1957, their communication is more affectionate and headed in a romantic direction.

“While I have many more letters to sort through, I’m of the opinion, at this point, that there is no classified information contained in the letters. This may change in the future letters. I can only give you my current assessment. William and Greta have graduated into emotional topics, such as feelings, family, and opinions on events of the day, whereas before, their text centered on the weather, more weather, the 1956 Summer Olympics, and non-opinionated cultural events. If the progression continues, I fully suspect that by the end of the letters, they will have declared their love for one another. I’m curious to know what became of them.”

“What do you mean,
became of them?
” General MacWilliams asks.
 

Someone knocks on his door and Mrs. Atkins pops in. “I have the CENTCOM Commander on the phone, sir. Says it’s urgent.”

I stand up. It’s obviously my cue to leave.

“Where are you going, Sergeant?” he asks me gruffly.

“Apologies, sir, I thought you would need privacy before taking the call,” I say.

“You do not leave until I dismiss you.” He turns to Mrs. Atkins. “Tell General Zimmerman I’ll be with him in one minute.”

My face turns red as Mrs. Atkins, who was pointedly staring at my cup of coffee, closes the door.
 

“I was caught up in the story, General,” I say. “Please accept my apologies.”

“Sergeant, nothing can top a good love story in my mind. Now tell me:
became of them…
What do you mean by the question?”

“I wonder if they end up together or if something bad happened. You must admit that it is strange, and perhaps tragic, that both sets of letters are together.”

“Strange, yes. Tragic, no. I see that Colonel Benson did not convey everything to you. William and Greta married in 1957 and had nine children. Unfortunately, William died in 2003. Greta lives in a nursing home in Silver Spring, Maryland. However, your mission has not changed, Sergeant Holtslander. I still need to know why the letters were hidden away in a wall of the Pentagon, why they were together, and if they passed classified information back and forth.”

“Will do.”

“Dismissed.” He picks up the phone just as I leave his office. I close the door behind me.
 

I can’t wait to tell Keira everything about William and Greta. She still has work to do. I don’t care how we fix this thing with Ellen, but come hell or high water, we have to swap tonight or live in each other’s bodies for the rest of our lives. I, for one, have no interest in being in the Army. I’m not cut out for this shit. Every muscle in my body hurts from sitting stiffly in the general’s office.

Mrs. Atkins offers me a kind smile. Her gaze shifts to the cup of coffee I’m cradling carefully. She pulls something out from under her desk. A trash can.

“You’re an angel, Mrs. Atkins,” I say with immense relief. I’m sure I would have found a place to discard the coffee, but there’s something reassuring about her pulling it out from under her desk for me. “I’m guessing the fourth point was don’t accept the coffee?”

“You got it. He’s proud of that stuff. I have to line this sucker with ten heavy-duty trash bags because he’s the only one that can drink that goop. Go and put a little ice on your lips. The bottom one’s looking a bit puffy.”

Keira

S
OMEHOW
I
MANAGE
TO
MAKE
it through the day without getting fired by Johnson Brookshire. After my meeting with Amanda Joy and Ken Fromm, LouAnn took me to Old Ebbitt Grill for lunch, and she celebrated by drinking two glasses of wine.

I had water. While she talked, I tried to appear to listen, but my mind was mostly focused on tonight. On my conversation with Dillan. Several of the waitresses acted like they knew Dillan, but with my success with the Joy Fromm siblings and my optimistic feelings about tonight, I wasn’t about to let jealousy dampen my mood.
 

“I already know how I’m going to decorate his office once he resigns,” LouAnn boasts after the second glass. “And you’re coming with me, kiddo. I don’t know how you did it, Dillan. I even had an empty box waiting for you in my office in case everything went to shit.” She stops what she’s doing and looks at me closely. “It may be the wine talking right now, but when I look at you, it’s almost like I’m looking at someone else. I thought you had green eyes, Dillan.”
 

LouAnn shakes her head, takes another bite of her salad, and moves our one-sided conversation in another direction. Something about how she plans to fire half of the fourteenth floor.

I thought you had green eyes, Dillan.
He does, and his eyes are brilliant and deep, and all I want, more than anything else, is to see his eyes look at me. The real me.

I watch LouAnn eat, I see the wine glass go back and forth to her lips, and I hear the muted sounds of the restaurant around me, and I know something’s different.
 

Whatever it is, it isn’t earth shattering. It feels more like a gentle shift in balance, like a small part of me—of Keira—is fading out. I don’t know how else to explain it. Is this part of Ellen’s plan? Is something of Dillan’s true nature coming back into his body?

I wonder if my letter has anything to do with this? For all I know, in five minutes my mind will travel outside of Dillan’s body and jump back into mine. What will my body be doing right now? I’m pretty sure my appointment with General MacWilliams has already happened. I think I was supposed to meet with the Historian’s office. Internally, I sigh. I forgot to tell Dillan about that.

Checking the watch at my wrist, I groan. I have hours to go before I see Dillan tonight.

Dillan

T
HE
WAITING
IS
KILLING
ME
. I keep checking the clock on the wall, but it sure as hell isn’t moving any faster. In fact, I’m pretty sure the ticking hands are moving slower on purpose.

“If you keep looking at it, Keira, I have a feeling the clock will develop a complex.” It’s Justin. I didn’t hear him come inside the secure office. He’s sporting a bruised jaw and his uniform looks extremely wrinkled, like he just came back from a wrestling match. With a bear.

I don’t know how soldiers are supposed to look, or act, or what most of them do day in and day out, but most of the military in the Pentagon, from what I’ve seen over the last two days, do not look like how Justin looks right now.

“I guess I’m a little on edge,” I say. I place the letter I was reading down on the desk.
 

It’s the last letter, and I can positively answer one of General MacWilliams’ questions. However, now that I know the outcome, that William and Greta got married but that William died in 2003, it turns on some sort of emotional switch within me. I’m happy
and
sad.
 

Mixed in with all of this is my lack of patience. I want it to be six o’clock already.

Justin looks at the empty box. I’ve stacked the letters I’ve read in another set of containers next to the desk.
 

“You’re a fast reader. What are your initial thoughts?”

“I know why the letters are together. And, to be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever read something so romantic. Like,
real
romance, Justin. An ocean couldn’t keep these two souls apart, though it took something of a misunderstanding to bring them together. In one of the last letters, Greta talks about her past. She was orphaned during World War II and lived a nomadic, almost gypsy-style life before finding work at a German canteen when she turned eighteen. She confesses that, in late 1952, when she met an American soldier—William—stationed at the new United States European Command in Frankfurt, she found an opportunity of bettering her life.”
 

I look up at Justin, who’s still standing near the door but takes a step closer to the desk. I ask if he understands what I mean.

“Her intentions were self-serving at first? She wanted to marry an American soldier to leave her home country?” Justin asks. He looks at the letter on the desk with interest.

“Exactly, and
Ardently Yours,
William, who wasn’t exactly a
wet-behind-the-ears
kid, but a soldier with ten years of service, probably wasn’t thrilled about that. But…” I pause for effect. “There’s a twist.”

“I’m all ears,” Justin says with a smile.

I pick up the last letter and read it aloud,
“My dearest William, my last letter must have been unhappy in your hands since I have yet to receive your reply. I will not, I cannot, take back my words. I must seem deceitful in your eyes. Please know that it was only because, when I first met you, that I knew I was destined to be with you. It was during our exchanges that I fell in love with your warmth, your kindness, and I cherished every word you wrote to me. It is because of my love for you that I can admit my actions were, at first, less than honorable. I regret that this will be my last letter to you. No doubt you have noticed that I have returned your letters to you as well. I cannot bear to look upon them without another part of my soul breaking. As I close this letter, please know that I will always be Affectionately Yours, Greta.”

“Ouch,” Justin cringes.

From the letter’s envelope, I pull out an aged, yellowing card and place it facing away from me so that Justin can see it clearly.
 

He picks it up and grins. “It’s an airline ticket from New York to Frankfurt, Germany.”