Loving Him Off the Field (Santa Fe Bobcats #2)(82)
Fucker.
And yet, if he did, it was one less f*cker Brad had to step over to make it onto the team. He shut the drawer and shrugged. “Probably right.”
Higgs watched him for a minute, then snorted and stood. Most likely disappointed Brad didn’t invite him to stay and paint their toenails and gossip about boys. As Higgs grabbed his bag, he said, “A bunch of the guys who arrived today are heading down to Back Gate.
Back Gate, as anyone knew who had been stationed at Lejeune, was a well-known bar frequented by Marines in their off time. Ironically enough, it was accessed the easiest from the main gate. “Okay then.”
“You coming?”
Training day one started at oh-seven hundred tomorrow morning. And these jokers were heading out to get wasted the night before?
“Oh yeah, I’ll come. I’ll even drive.”
He wouldn’t miss the train wreck for the world.
***
Marianne Cook slid into one of the remaining booths at the Back Gate, and wondered why, God why, had she agreed to meet here for drinks with her mother again?
That’s right, because her mother was boy-crazy. The woman—half her namesake—was nearly sixty, and still got giggly around hot men young enough to be her sons, if she’d had sons. So meeting in a bar where Marines hung out after hours was, quite frankly, Mary Cook’s idea of a perfect night out.
Fortunately, her father was not only aware of Mary’s boy-craziness, but found it amusing. And since her mother would never even consider cheating on her father, Marianne found the entire thing amusing as well.
Until she was an unwilling accomplice.
The server stopped by, a little harried and definitely short on patience, and took Marianne’s simple order of a bottle of light beer and an ice water and left. Knowing her mother, she’d be zooming in about twenty minutes late. The water would make the beer last longer. Only one, since she would be driving home.
A shout, a few jeers and a male insult erupted from the bar area. She glanced over for a moment. Nothing much to see. A group of Marines doing that weird man thing where harassment passes off as bonding time. Add in a few beers and it just cranks the volume up. Nothing she hadn’t seen before. Though she’d missed the sight since she moved down to Wilmington for college, then her first post-grad job.
And, she realized with a smug smile as the server wordlessly delivered her beer and water, nothing she wouldn’t be seeing up close and personal for a few months, at least. She picked up the glass of water when her mother breezed in.
“Sorry, I’m late, I know.” Mary slid in the booth in front of her. Before Marianne could lift the water, her mother snatched it from her hand and took a gulp. “Better.”
“I’m glad,” Marianne said dryly, taking the water from her mother and having a sip for herself. “What held you up this time?”
“Myself, of course. Then I was late leaving, and Western was a parking lot.” Mary patted her hair, a mix of silver and blonde much like Marianne’s just plain blonde. Where her mother kept her hair longer—eschewing tradition of cutting it shorter as she got older—Marianne had chopped hers off to a short bob in college. They shared the same icy blue eyes though. “Had to spruce up a bit, didn’t I?”
“So you could turn all the men’s heads.” Marianne smiled and shook her head while her mother gave her order—a glass of wine—to the server when she buzzed by. “Daddy’s a tolerant man.”
“My favorite kind. As long as I come home to him at the end of the night, he never considered it a big deal to flirt. There’s never harm in flirting with a cute young man.” Mary’s light eyes laughed as she took another sip of water from her daughter’s glass. “I thought I taught you that.”
“Among other things.” Marianne waited for the server to plop her mother’s sub-par wine down and scoot away before saying, “I got all settled into the apartment. Still have a few more boxes to get to, but I should be done with those tonight.”
“I’m so glad you’re back in town.” Her mother took a sip and grimaced. “This is awful.”
“You picked the location,” she reminded her mother, taking a sip of the much safer selection of bottled beer. “And you remember I’m only here for awhile, right? I’m not moving back to Jacksonville permanently.”
“But you’re here for now. And that makes both of us happy.” Mary laid a hand on her daughter’s arm, and Marianne couldn’t help but smile back. She loved her parents, adored them. She knew she was fortunate to have been raised by people who taught her a love of independence tempered by a healthy dose of respect for those who reared you.
“I know. But if this job leads to bigger and better things . . .” She shrugged. No big deal.
Except it was. That was the entire reason she’d left her old job, taken the chance and moved back to Jacksonville. It was the opening to making her dreams come true.
“I think if you—oh!” Mary grabbed for her wine glass as something jarred their table. But her flushed, slightly annoyed look smoothed into sweet cream and dimples when she looked up and found a handsome young Marine standing before their table. And there was no doubt he was a Marine. They were impossible to miss. His dark, almost black hair was in a razor-sharp high and tight, his face baby-smooth, and he was wearing the unofficial off-duty uniform of a clean polo shirt and nice jeans.