Fraternizing (12 page)

All of my
earlier attempts at putting my jumbled nerves on ice were completely thwarted. If
it was this obvious for Jensen, then others must have noticed as well. It
shocked me when that thought sprung to mind, but I couldn't find a fuck to
give. Getting a taste of Bennett felt like a mission that I had to complete,
and unfortunately for me, missions required a certain level of precision to
attain, and I never abandoned one.

Ever.

On my way back
to the classroom, Castillo stopped
me,
worry clouding
her eyes as she stood before me.

"You
alright, Cruz?"

"Just
fine," I answered, not wanting to get into this with anyone else.

"Well hey,
I know you've got duty tonight, I was thinking about skipping Coyotes. I can
drop off dinner or something." A smile touched her lips, making me relax
the rigidly held muscles in my face that had formed into a tight scowl.

"You really
don't have to do that. I can manage."

She smiled
again, this time larger.

"I know you
can manage. Call it returning the favor. I owe you dinner, from our last
date."

She smiled
again, patting my shoulder as she walked by. We hadn't been on any dates, so I
wasn't quite sure where that shit had come from.

My eyes followed
her out of the courtyard, landing on Bennett not too far away—she had
heard our conversation. The look on her face punched me in the gut, turning my
stomach and making me weak. She looked at me with contempt in her eyes, and for
the girl who I was ready to risk it all
for, that
was
the last way I wanted her to see me. I wasn't about to let her slip through my
fingers before I‘d even gotten the chance to have them explore her.

 
"Stay in tonight," I told her
after casually making my way over to her. I didn't know what was going through
her mind, but I was sick of fucking around with mine.

She looked at
me, albeit briefly, then turned for the walkway as if nothing had ever even
happened. I knew every time I got too close to her it was a reckless move, but
I felt like I was losing ground. I needed her to know that I wasn't just having
lewd thoughts about her; I wanted her. Even with the rules and consequences
laid out before us, I was willing if it meant both of us getting to fulfill the
ache that lay inside. I didn't want her giving that Dalton kid, or Castillo for
that matter, another fucking thought, and by brazenly taking her and showing
her that I meant business, I was pretty confident that I would accomplish my
goal.

Chapter 8

Cassie

Sgt. Cruz must have thought I was a fucking idiot.

As much as
Angelica infuriated me, she hadn’t been lying when she said she'd seen them
together having dinner. Why would I have thought any differently? The way he’d
come on to me at Coyotes could only mean he was aggressive in his confidence,
and while he was intoxicatingly good looking, that confidence led me to believe
that he had bedded plenty of women, so why would I be any different? He wanted
in my pants from the moment he saw me. That wasn't the characteristic of a guy
who wants to have a relationship.

The best part of
all of this was that we hadn't gone too far, so my disgust with him would make
it easier to avoid any more compromising situations. My focus should have been
on passing this course and getting out and into a unit, not worrying about my
instructor trying to fuck me, then turning around and fucking his co-worker. I
don't know where I’d let my mind go, but it was time to reign it back in. Thinking
about Cruz nonstop was taking its toll on me. My studies were being neglected,
and it had showed in today's test. I couldn't think straight. My mind was all
over the place, except for where it needed to be.

At one point,
I’d even sat at my desk with his eyes burning into me from behind. Instead of
focusing on radio signals and frequencies, my mind drifted to the kinetic
energy that I wanted to create with him. His lips, besides other things that
I've had the pleasure of feeling, were probably his best
asset
.
Those lips had devoured me and sent chills up and down my spine with just the
mere brush of them. Plump, moist, and soft, the next place I wanted them was in
between my legs, sucking the life out of me. His tongue, the thick, moistness
of it, held the same aggressive nature that he as a person, held. The way he
used it, overpowering and inhibiting me, forced thoughts of it inside of me,
licking and teasing my clit until I exploded all over him. These thoughts were
consuming me, and in every way that counted, they were also destroying me.

He’d told me to
stay in tonight, but after internally debating with myself and trying to
channel my frustrations with him, there was no way that was going to happen. I
would not allow myself to become my mother, waiting on the sidelines for a man
while he was out exploring every piece of ass that walked his way. No fucking
way. This had my mother written all over it. I didn't want to be anything like
her, and my first step to distancing myself from her was joining the Marine
Corps, even when she repeatedly belittled me, telling me how much of a failure
I would be.

Those words were
banging loud and clear. For the first time in a long time, something she had
said to me was actually welcomed. Not in the sense that she was right, but her
words were my reality check. Failure was not an option for me, but while I
didn't have nearly as much to lose as Cruz, I did stand to lose something that
I valued--my burgeoning career. As much I told myself that my career came
first, I couldn't deny the pull that Cruz had on
me and my
body
. When he spoke so brashly, my body responded, pleading with me to
cure the ache and just let him ravish it. I had to work double time to stop the
thoughts, to stop the feelings, and as difficult as it was proving to be, I was
determined to get it done.

"Hey
dreamer. You about ready?" Dalton asked, standing in the doorway of my
room. He looked so much different out of uniform with his skinny jeans, black
t-shirt, plain black slide-on Vans, and nerdy glasses. I couldn't help but
smile at him.

"Yeah, I'm
ready. Just let me lock up my locker."

"Shit. I
heard about that. Sorry. Newsome can be kind of fucking crazy."

I laughed while
locking up the locker and
double checking
to be sure
that I wouldn't have another repeat of Field Day night.

"You're
telling me. I thought he was going to put me through these brick walls in
here."

"Well, his
buddy isn't much better. Sergeant Smith chucked an apple at some Private's head
today in class,
then
was on him like a bad rash after
that, screaming in his face because he had dozed off. I thought he was going to
pop a blood vessel."

My mind drifted
to Cruz who had fallen asleep in class today. I couldn't be sure that anyone
else had noticed, but I had, only because I kept stealing glances at him.

"So anyway,
what about Sgt. Cruz?"

"What about
him?" I asked, my voice stiff and defensive.

"He looked
like he was going to smash my face in earlier today. What's his deal?"

I sighed. The
last thing I wanted was for anyone to definitively find out that something had
been going on between us.

"He's just
intense. He's always telling us how our first priority is passing this course
so that we can get to the fleet. That's all."

Dalton didn't
look like he was buying a word of my lie. His eyebrows shot up, and a faint
smile traced his lips, but I didn't feed it. As far as I was concerned, I was
going to have nothing more to do with Sgt. Cruz than to listen to him teach me
about radio communications so that I could get to a unit and do my job.

"Anyway. Transformers.
What is this about?"

Dalton stopped
walking and held his chest, breathing hard and pretending to be in shock.

"You're
fucking kidding, right?"

"No. I
don't know anything about it."

He took my hand
and placed it on his chest. His heart wasn't beating any faster than normal,
but he was playing up the part, trying to hit home the fact that I was
desperately out of the loop.

"They were
only my favorite action figures as a kid. I had every single Transformers toy
ever made."

"Okay. So
what is this movie about?"

"Robots,
good and bad, caught in a battle for Earth." I looked half amused. "Trust
me,
it's
kick ass. I've seen it twice already."

"Then why
would you want to see it again?" I asked, laughing.

"Because of
the pure awesomeness of it. You're going to love it too, rock girl."

"Rock
girl?" I asked, confused by the nickname.

"Yeah, rock
girl. You must have lived under a rock to not know what Transformers are."

I blushed,
then
awkwardly laughed. I had been living under a figurative
rock with my mom, and not one that I'd wanted to come out from under either.

"Thanks to
your depravity as a child, I'm treating you tonight.
Movie,
popcorn, aaannnddd a drink.
Don't thank me, it's the least I can
do."

I hit his
shoulder and laughed again. "Don't splurge on me or anything,
Dalton."

He folded and
stiffened his arm, holding it out for me with a goofy grin on his face. I took
it, then walked down the walkway, passing the duty room in the process. Looking
in, Cruz was sitting at his desk speaking to another Marine. For that brief
second that I was able to look into the room, our eyes locked, and I felt time
stand still. His hazel eyes burned into me. His lips puckered ever so slightly,
and he swallowed… hard, that clit stimulating Adam's apple protruding with the
movement of his throat.

I turned away
and continued down the walkway with Dalton. If I looked at him any longer, my
weakness would prevail, and I would find some reason to stay in my room in
hopes that he would make his way up and fuck me until I couldn't see straight. That
wasn't going to happen, so rather than set myself up for disappointment, I
tried as best I could to block any more thoughts of him from my mind. I needed
to be able to see him and not think or feel any salacious thoughts and
feelings. I needed to go back to being able to see him the way I had when I
first saw him at Coyotes.

Who the fuck was
I kidding? From the second I laid eyes on him at that bar, my thoughts wandered
aimlessly to what I wanted him to do to me. I was hooked from the onset, so
trying to find my way out of that hole was going to be a monumental task.

I was doing a
piss poor job of listening to Dalton as we walked over to the movie theater. He
had been talking a mile a minute, and unfortunately, I hadn't heard a lick of
it.

"…
yeah
, and an axe murderer is going to come and chop us all
up tonight, right?"

"Yeah,"
I quickly answered, trying to break free from the thoughts that were cruelly
shackling my mind while simultaneously breaking me down."

"I knew you
weren't listening to a word I said."

"Huh?"

"I just
told you an axe murderer was going to come and chop us all up, and you
agreed."

"Oh, shit. I'm
sorry."

"You
okay?"

"Yeah, I'm
fine. Just have a lot on my mind."

"I can
tell." He paused as we were approaching the movie theater. "You sure
you want to stay for this? Your mind seems to be elsewhere and, well, jackass
of the year is here too." He nodded his head in the direction of the
ticket window where Allen was standing with a couple of his buddies. All of
them looked like meatheads with the behavior to match. They were yelling out,
"I am Optimus Prime!" and other things that I was sure were in
reference to the movie.

"I'm fine. He's
loud and obnoxious, but I'm not letting him ruin my night."

"Alright.
Sweet." He flashed a
school boy
grin, my facial
muscles forming into a tight smile, trying hard to reciprocate the gesture.

We strolled up
to the ticket window, standing in line when we caught Allen's attention. He
made his way over to where we stood and I rolled my eyes, not in the mood to
deal with him or any of his antics.

"You two on
a date?" He looked us over, and I could see why he thought that. I was
still holding on to Dalton's arm.

"Nope. Just
enjoying a night away from the barracks with a friend," Dalton calmly
answered.

"Well,
good, because I think you should totally go out with me, Bennett. I'll show you
what a real man is like, and I'll turn you into the lady that you need to
be." He smiled, but there was no sincerity behind the smile. Only malice.

"That's
okay. If I want to go out with a real man, I'll just have to keep looking. I
don't think you're it." I smiled back, wiping the smug look of asshole
right off of his face. He lowered his eyes then cracked his neck before Dalton
pulled me up to the ticket counter with him.

Allen reminded
me of the chauvinistic pricks who my mom often dated, and I couldn't find one
single appealing thing about the guy.

"He's got
some serious issues," I told Dalton as we walked into the lobby of the
theater, making our way to the concession stand line.

"Yeah. He's
just a prick. He's harmless, though. I'm telling you, he just has an issue with
women in the Corps, but he doesn't hate women."

"Well, he
might as well. I'm in the Corps. I'm not going anywhere."

"True. Just
avoid him."

"I try. He
hates me. There are other females around here, why me?"

"I assume
because you don't back down, and you're top notch. He probably sees you as a
challenge or something." He stopped and placed our food order. "Look,
I don't want to get into his head. It's too fucked up, from what I can see. Just
don't talk to him."