Page 14 of Bad Girls Don't Marry Marines (Rock Canyon, Idaho 3)

“Valerie!” Ellie shouted from the spare room. Jarred from her musings, Val set off to take care of her sister.

Walking into the room, she saw the vomit on the floor and grimaced. “Damn it.”

“Val, I’m so sick . . .” Ellie whined, just like when she got the flu or even a cold.

Scowling, Val went to grab some rags and a trash bag and came back to find Ellie gearing up for round two.

“If you’re going to puke, puke in here,” Val said, shoving the bucket she had left beside the bed in front of Ellie’s face. “Hold onto it while I clean this up.”

“I’m so sorry, Val.”

Val got down on the floor to clean and looked up into her sister’s pale, beautiful face. “You should be. I warned you to be careful, but you got so loaded that you could have—”

She snapped her mouth closed when her sister proceeded to bury her face in the bucket and retch. Val tried to slow her breathing and cool her anger as she reached out to rub her sister’s back, supporting the bucket with her other hand. It wouldn’t do any good to lecture and yell at Ellie when she probably wouldn’t remember. Still, when Val thought about what had happened to her friend Natalie when she’d gotten too drunk in college, she worried about her sister.

Once the floor was cleaned up, Val grabbed a washcloth from the bathroom and sat on the bed next to Ellie, wiping her face clean. Ellie tried to push her hands away and Val snapped, “Do you want to sleep with vomit on your face?”

Ellie stilled and grumbled, “No.”

Before she was done, Ellie’s breathing was deep and even. Brushing her hair back, Val remembered the first time she’d drunk too much and been sick afterward. She’d been eighteen. It had been at a huge graduation party one of her schoolmate’s parents had thrown. The parents had figured the kids would be safe under their roof if they were there, and looking back, Val thought they’d been idiots. She’d passed out in their driveway before puking her way to her car, where she’d slept off the rest. She’d remembered her limits after that.

But Ellie didn’t seem to want to learn from her mistakes, and it left Val wondering what was going on with her sister.

Chapter Four

* * *

SATURDAY MORNING WAS beautiful. Val looked out of her window and saw the sun gleaming off the snow, and despite her restless night, she didn’t feel tired. Holding a mug of coffee up to her mouth, she felt elated and shiny as the aroma tickled her nose and the rim rested against her smiling lips.

It had been a long time since she’d been kissed, and she couldn’t stop smiling, even though she knew she couldn’t let it happen again.

Val had imagined what it would be like to meet someone new, but Cole’s reaction to her adoption suggestion had replayed in her mind too many times not to let it affect how she might approach the subject with a new man.

So, I have this condition that makes it hard to have kids. How do you feel about that?

In one of his lowest moments, Cole had ripped into her, tearing the last shred of hope from her body with each cutting word: “Men want children of their own. If a man finds out beforehand how broken you actually are, he’ll drop you so fast your head will spin. You just wait.”

She’d known he was just being hateful, but he wasn’t entirely wrong. Usually when couples found out about infertility, they’d been together for years and loved each other deeply. It was hard to imagine a man she’d just started dating sticking around once he found out, and she had too much integrity to keep something like that a secret before they got in too deep.

She knew there were men out there who didn’t want kids or already had kids from a previous marriage, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to deal with the drama of an ex-spouse and coparenting. There was always a chance she’d meet a nice widower with children, but remembering the loss of her own mother and how angry she’d been . . .

Val’s cell phone rang and she looked at the caller ID. Caroline’s smiling face popped up, and she hit the answer button on the screen. “Hey, sis.”

“Hi, honey. How are you?”

Caroline sounded tired, and Val was instantly worried. Her big sister had been through so much since leaving home but had finally found her calling. Caroline enjoyed buying struggling bars and turning them into successful businesses. Once they were proven moneymakers, she’d sell them and move on. Drifting from city to city, her vagabond lifestyle made Val nervous, but Caroline was a free spirit and knew how to take care of herself.

Unlike Ellie.

“Same old. I’m a little worried about Ellie. She’s making some really bad calls and doesn’t listen.”

“She’s a kid. You remember what that’s like, especially still living under the old man’s thumb,” Caroline said, and Val heard clanking in the background.

“Yeah, I guess. Are you okay? You sound tired.”

“I’m exhausted. I bought this place in California and had to fire two bartenders. I still can’t find anyone to replace them. At least, not anyone with even a basic work ethic.”

Val smiled. “Crack that whip, baby.”

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