Taming GI Jane (9 page)

“I’ll give you fifty dollars,” Sandra offered in a hushed whisper that was still loud enough for
Jane to hear and understand.

“No way,” Beulah muttered, shaking her head. “Mildred’s already offered seventy-five.”

Sandra gave Mildred an evil look. “Don’t do anything you’ll regret, Milly,” she threatened.

Mildred returned her icy glare
. “You say one word to Vince and I’ll tell George about the ice cream.”

Jane
bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing out loud. She eased another step closer.

Sandra turned her determined attention back to Beulah. “A hundred and that’s my final offer, Beulah. So don’t try to gouge me for more.”

“Sold.” Beulah said as she exchanged lunch rations with Sandra.

Once Sandra had the lunch packet in her hands she quickly shoved it into her knapsack. “Thank you, Beulah,” Sandra said in that honeyed tone of her
s. “I’ll remember your loyalty.”

When Sandra had gathered her things and sauntered away, Beulah looked at Mildred and giggled as quietly as she could. “What a sucker,” she hissed, then quickly looked left to right. “She could have had Crystal’s brownie for free. Crystal’s allergic to chocolate.”

Mildred doubled over with the effort to hold back her laughter. “You’d better not tell Sandra you knew that,” she choked out.

“Get your butts in gear, ladies,”
Jane barked, breaking up their little tête-à-tête.

“Yes, Sergeant
Jane.” Mildred scrambled to her feet and hustled after Sandra.

Beulah swiped her eyes and stood, still smirking over her little coup.

“Beulah.” Jane leaned close to the strapping older woman. “If I find out you took that money from Sandra, I’ll tell Colonel Jackson about Mr. Caldwell’s stolen clothes. I’m sure he won’t find it amusing.”

“What clothes?” Beulah demanded, her gaze narrowed suspiciously.

Jane smiled her triumph. “The ones I found under your mattress.”

Beulah’s expression wilted. “Oh, all right,” she griped. “I won’t take her money.” Beulah snatched up her knapsack, then grinned. “That boy’s got
the cutest rear end I believe I ever did see.”

Flabbergasted,
Jane watched Beulah stride away. No point in arguing with the truth, Jane decided. There were a great number of things about Tom Caldwell that were cute…gorgeous, in fact. She frowned. But she wasn’t supposed to be thinking about him right now. Forcing Tom’s naked image from her mind, Jane gathered up her own belongings and set to the task at hand.

She had all day in the middle of nowhere, with nothing but her wits to entertain twelve spoiled ladies.
Nothing in all her military training had prepared her for this.

Jane
surveyed the good-for-nothing group standing before her. Well, she’d manage them somehow. It was a perfectly beautiful day. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and the forest around them was breathtaking.

At that precise moment the sky darkened and thunder boomed in the distance.

~*~

The downpour lasted just long enough to get everyone and everything good and wet. A great deal of the trail was no
w muddy and slippery. They were supposed to arrive back at Camp Serenity by 1400 hours, but Jane was pretty sure at this point that they wouldn’t make it in on time—if they made it at all.

Sandra Suddath and h
er friends were a pain in the butt under optimum circumstances. But wet and miserable, they were unbearable. Every step they took was accompanied by endless complaints. They were sore; they were tired; they were hungry. They needed a bathroom. They wanted to stop.

Jane
wanted to stop.

“Break time, ladies,”
she called out to her grumpy troops.

“It’s about time,” Beulah complained as she sat down on her bedroll. She began unlacing her shoes. “My dogs are killing me,” she muttered.

“Don’t take your shoes off,” Jane warned. “Your feet will swell and you’ll never get them back on if you do.”

Beulah groaned her acquiescence.

Jane scanned the others to make sure no one else had gotten that bright idea. “Drink some water, please. You don’t want to get dehydrated.” Jane took her own advice and swallowed a long pull from her canteen.

“What are we going to do about food?” Veronica whined.

Jane resisted the urge to remind them that they’d had lunch just over an hour ago. “We’ll be back to camp in plenty of time for dinner,” she said instead. “Maybe Hattie will have whipped us up another of her delicious chocolate cakes.”

A symphony of groans sounded at that suggestion.

Mildred stood and turned slowly around. “We’re not lost, are we, Sergeant Jane? None of this looks familiar to me. I don’t remember seeing any of this yesterday.”

Jane
felt like wringing Mildred’s neck for that remark. Panic rumbled through the rest of them.

“No, we’re not lost. We’re simply taking a different trail back down the mountain, that’s all.” The ladies weren’t convinced. “I thought it would make things more interesting.”

“I’m sure Sergeant Jane knows exactly where she’s going,” Crystal stated above the suspicious chatter.

“Oh, Crystal, I’ll bet you were always the teacher’s pet in school,” Sandra complained churlishly.

Crystal braced her hands on her hips and glared at Sandra. “I was not!”

Sandra stood and matched her stance. “I am in no
mood for your perkiness,” she snapped. Her face flushed a darker red as her irritation obviously mushroomed. “I am wet. I am muddy. My thighs are chafed. My feet are swollen and tender. And I’m damned hungry. So stop being so frigging optimistic!”

Jane
scrubbed a hand over her face. She considered all that Sandra had said and decided that the woman had left out a few things like smeared makeup, a loose false eyelash, and mussed hair.

All hell broke loose then. The women were evenly divided, with half defending Crystal, and half taking up Sandra’s cause. Well,
Jane mused, this little outing had certainly proven effective in teaching self-discipline and teamwork.

“Ladies,”
Jane called loudly.

The battle continued, growing louder by the minute.

“Ladies!”
Jane bellowed in her loudest, deepest drill sergeant’s tone.

Dead silence fell over the group. They all froze in place. Only their gazes moved, seeking out
Jane.

“When you’ve resolved your differences, you may catch up with me.”
Jane adjusted the straps of her knapsack. “Otherwise, I wish you luck in finding your way back to camp.” She turned sharply and marched away.

Several seconds of shocked disbelief passed before
Jane heard the group scrambling down the trail after her. She shook her head in frustration. It would almost be funny if this mission weren’t so important to Jane. She laughed softly. Who was she kidding? It was damned funny and she knew it. These girls could star in their own reality show.

“Wait, Sergeant
Jane, wait,” Sandra wailed. “We’re coming!”

Jane
paused. She turned just in time to see Sandra sliding down a particularly slippery incline. Jane sprinted toward her. Barely a second before Sandra went down, Jane was there, grabbing her arm and slowing her fall. When she had Sandra back on her feet, she breathed a sigh of relief. That was too close for comfort.

“I’m okay,” Sandra assured her breathlessly.

Jane’s heart was pounding so hard that she felt certain it would burst at any moment. “Good,” she managed past the lump of pure fear lodged in her throat.

Sandra adjusted her clothing
and started down the trail once more. Jane waited to make sure that each of the ladies made it past the slippery incline before starting after them. She blew out the breath she’d been holding. If Sandra or one of the others had been hurt, it would have been Jane’s fault. The idea of one of them really suffering because of something she did was scary. Success wasn’t worth one of them getting injured. Jane would just have to make sure that didn’t happen. She double-timed it back to the front of the line. She intended to be the first to encounter anymore risky areas. And this time she would be paying attention.

As
Jane reached the front of the line and fell into a slower gait, the toe of her boot sagged on an exposed root. Before she could catch herself, she tumbled sideways and down the wooded slope to the right of the trail. Jane curled into a ball to protect herself as best she could. Moments later, a tree trunk stopped her rolling, tumbling journey.

Jane
sat up and straightened her leg. The sharp stab of resulting pain wrenched a groan from her. Her shin had taken the brunt of the impact, and she’d twisted her ankle but good on the way down. She shrugged out of her gear and slowly struggled to her feet.

“Sergeant
Jane! Are you all right?” someone shouted from the trail above.

Jane
looked up to find the disgusted dozen clambering down the slope in her direction, their panicked voices echoing through the woods.

“I’m okay,”
Jane said halfheartedly. She tested her weight on her injured ankle. A flash of pain knifed through the joint and then upward. No way would she make the rest of the walk out of here. Nothing felt broken, but there was too big a chance that she might do worse damage. Jane swore under her breath.

Crystal was the first one to reach her.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Her frantic gaze swept over Jane, then locked with hers. “Oh, God, you’re not. I can see the pain in your eyes.” Crystal’s face paled. Eleven more faces looked at Jane, and all talked at once.

Jane
held up her hands to quiet the senseless hysteria. “I’m okay, but I’m not going to be able to walk out of here.”

Gasps punctuated her announcement.

Jane shook her head. She clenched her teeth for a moment until the fresh wave of pain subsided a bit. “It’s no big deal, ladies. You just follow the trail and it’ll take you back to the camp. There’s no way you can get lost. So don’t panic.”

“And what about you?” Beulah,
elbowing her way to the front, demanded.

“You can send Mr. Caldwell and Reg back to get me. I’ll be fine until they get here.”
I’m sure as hell not going anywhere
.

More worried chatter bounced back and forth.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Veronica said with a shake of her head. “What if something happened to you before we could get help?”

Jane
heaved a frustrated sigh. “Nothing is going to happen to me. I’m perfectly safe.”

Sandra’s eyes sud
denly rounded in horror. “What if the men can’t get back to you before dark? What about the coyotes? You don’t have a fire!”

Somehow
Jane had known that would come back to haunt her. “If you leave now, and
hurry
, they can be back here before dark,” she said, effectively skirting the issue.

Crystal  shook her head. “But we don’t know how to tell them where you are.” She shrugged nervously. “I don’t know north from south.”

Jane rubbed her eyes with heels of her hands, then settled them firmly on her hips. “Look, just stay on the trail. Tell Tom I’m on the alternate trail. He’ll know the one you mean. Tell him I’m about two hours walking distance west of Camp Serenity.”

“Spr
ead out, ladies,” Sandra demanded as she shoved Beulah aside and came toe-to-toe with Jane. She glared down at Jane with lead in her gaze and her hands planted on her ample hips. “Sergeant Jane and I need a few minutes alone.”

Nobody moved. “Now,” Sandra bellowed.

Uncertain, but unprepared to defy the queen bee, the ladies scrambled back up the hillside.

Jane
let go a weary breath and leveled her gaze on Sandra’s. “Okay, Mrs. Suddath, what gives?”

“You know what you’ve got, Sergeant Passerella?”

“No, but I’m quite certain you’re going to fill me in.” This was it, the showdown. The general’s wife was about to have her say, and most likely inform Jane of just what she intended to tattle about to her husband.

“Spunk and attitude.” Sandra plopped down on the ground directly across from
Jane and blew out a tired breath. “That’s why the general chose you for this assignment. He wanted to be sure my friends and I would not only be taken care of but motivated into action. He knows how I can be.” She smiled with true southern charm. “After all, we’ve been married for twenty-five years.”

You could have knocked
Jane over with a feather. “I appreciate you being straight with me.”

Sandra sighed. “Oh, I know I’ve given you a hard time, but that’s just me. It’s nothing personal.”

Jane grinned. “I never thought it was.”

“It’s not often that I meet my match,” Sandra admitted with a slight nod of approval.

“It’s not often,” Jane countered, “that I’m challenged to utilize my full potential.”