Page 1 of Going Dark

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Ace

Suburbia...the hell hole of normal. This is where all things underwhelming go to die. How the hell am I supposed to be okay with this? Sitting out here on the front porch watching the sunset and the shadows dance around the white picket fences like strippers around their poles makes me wonder if it would have been better to be shot down in a burning ball of steel and good intentions. Now my death is going to be from high cholesterol and boredom. Yeah!

I guess I should be thinking about what the hell I'm going to do with my life next. Some men in my position turn to commercial flying but damned if that doesn't leave a bad taste in my mouth. After nearly ten years being in the air and working with men who did impossible missions like they were fucking line dances it would be the equivalent to taking the hottest, sexiest girl and fucking her stupid one night and the next night you had the girl everyone in the barracks had been with and you weren't even the sloppy seconds. Uh, no! And eww!

No commercial flying for me. I shouldn't even have to be asking myself what to do next but some fuck head Senator sold the names of men doing covert missions and shit to the people on the other side of the missions. Bastard. I really hope he's burning in hell right about now. Because of his dumb ass, they shit-canned all of us so we wouldn't get blown up or shot down. I guess they just get rid of the old guys and dial rent-a-spy and order two hundred new one. Two hundred men and women have to find new ways of life because of one greedy, flesh peddling, sawed-off cunt nugget. I'm so glad that fuckers dead.

I pop a new sucker in my mouth and wait. I gave up smoking a few years ago. Turns out if you're ever shot down over Syria and smoke you make a hell of a target for some jackass to shoot at. I tried pen lids for a while but my commanding officer got furious when he couldn't find one that didn't have Ace marks all over it. One good scuffle with Jim and I was taking up suckers. I'm easily an eight to nine sucker a day kind of guy unless they're the big ones then maybe more like five.

The guys in my Special Forces unit like to give me shit about my oral fetish. Bastards. I miss those fuckers. I mean I understand I'll see them again but not like before. When you spend every day with someone for years and live through the hell we've lived through together you grow close. The men in my unit aren't just co-workers or fellow soldiers, they're family. But now I have my other family to think about and take care of, my mom and sister.

It kind of sucks that all I have to go back to is the same room I've had since I was twelve in my mom's house. Not to sound ungrateful. I’m thankful as fuck for my mom and sister but it would have been nice to have had a woman to come home to, a nice warm body to cuddle up with at the end of another routinely boring old day. For now, it's just me and my hand doing the cuddling. Turns out I am not very romantic - I didn't even take me out before I was blowing a load. And that takes me to another problem. How the hell do you get busy with yourself when you're in a house with your mom and sister...ewww.

Maybe I'm thinking about finding a woman now because of my uncle - the fucker. I love the man, after my father he is one of only three men I look up to and admire in the world. I helped him and his girl out recently and saw how much they love one another and it kind of made me want what he had. Not with his girl or anything. No, I couldn't be with someone who thought I was a Russian god the way Kat thinks of Ivan. I want a girl who will knock the fuck out of me if she thinks I am getting sideways or who will keep life interesting with all of her unpredictability. Hell, I make my living flying -I have to have that hint of danger and unexpectedness.

A car pulls in across the street and the timing couldn't be better if I had scripted it. Out pops a cute little redhead in heels with an ass that was made for loving for days. No, I don't just want someone to worship the ground I walk on. I want what's across the street, my next-door neighbor, Evie. Only one problem with that - a few years back I might have been a dick to her when she made it known to me that she wouldn't stop my advances. But god damn it, I did it for her own good.

I'm off the porch and walking across the street before I can stop myself. She's leaned back into the car to reach for something in her floorboard so she's gracing the world with her cute little ass up in the air. I've known Evie for years. Her family lived across the street when my family moved in. I was twelve and she was five. She fell in love with my sister who was just a few years younger than she was and my mom fell in love with her. She would often joke that she was a missing Sokolov, with her red hair and light skin.

When we were all younger it wasn't anything for me to think of her like she was another little sister. She was always hanging around and she and Ana were inseparable. When my Dad died her and her mom slept over for weeks to help my mom. When her mom got sick and Evie had to take a few years off from school my sister took a year off too so she could help her take care of her mom.

I couldn't make it to the funeral when her mom finally passed but Ana and Mom were there with her. I was a world away shooting down bad guys and saving the world. Still didn't make losing her mom hurt any less. Maria Spencer was a good woman who loved kids almost as much as she loved to teach them. Evie spent a few weeks with Mom and Ana after and every time I called I couldn't help making comparisons to when Dad died.

I've always kept tabs on her, asking mom or Ana how she was doing and listening when they talked about her during conversations. Little Evie Spencer from next door is going back to school, little Evie Spencer from next door is going to be a teacher just like her momma. I kept waiting for the 'little Evie Spencer from next door is getting married' but it never came. Little Evie Spencer.

Only Evie wasn't five anymore and she damn sure wasn't my sister and all those years of wondering if she was married or with someone had made me want her like fucking crazy. Hell, I've wanted her since the night she walked her young ass into my bedroom and professed her undying love for me. When I turned her down I did it because I didn't want to leave a wife and kids behind so all they could do was grieve for me. It's hard to raise a kid when you are dead. Me doing what I did for a living wasn't fair to her or to any kids we might have had. But now... here we are, her ass bobbing up and down right in front of me like a red flag waving in front of a rabid bull and me all out of bad guys to kill.

"Hello, Evie." I get a sadistic kick out of seeing her jump in surprise and make a little shocked squeal as she backs out of her car.

"Alex," she is the only person besides my mother that still calls me by my name. Unless my uncle is mad at me and then I get the full name. Everyone else uses my moniker. When we were younger she used to get a kick out of calling me Sasha. It used to piss me off so bad when she did it but now as long as she is talking to me I don't really care what she chooses to call me.

"Hi, you haven't been hanging around very much. Not like you used to." It's not really a question but I want to know why she stopped coming over as often in the last month, which is right around the time I came home. I've heard my mom and Ana comment on it.

"I'm not sure how you would know what's normal for me since you aren't around a lot. But if you just must know I have stuff I have to do. You know like work, school, that sort of stuff. Adult stuff."

She goes back into her car for a bag in the floorboard and comes up with her arms full all while not looking at me.

"Evie, are you not coming around because of what happened five years ago?" I watch as her face morphs into one of shock and disgust, her cute little mouth opened and spread for me.

"Alex," she looks up into my eyes and I see the haunted look in the brown swirls. I don't know if it's because of me and what happened five years ago or if it's her mom's death still affecting her or a mixture of both, "that was a mistake. I've grown up, I lost my mom," her voice breaks and she looks away, "I don't have time to make any more mistakes."

She walks under my arm holding her car door open and to her porch with her keys already out. I slam her door hard enough I worry about the window but it doesn't make her turn back around. Before she goes inside she does do a half turn to look back at me, "I'm glad your back, your mom and sister worried about you and now they don't have to."

Well, fuck me running. She didn't say anything about her missing me or worrying about me. Just my mom and Ana. Still, I have to wonder why she doesn't come around if she's completely over me. If she's over it she shouldn't give two shits if I embarrassed her five years ago. I need to ask these questions and find answers from a true expert on women - my aunt. Surely she knows if there is a hope I haven't killed what lies between me and Evie.

***

Aunt Kat is a romance writer, at least she is now. Before she met my Uncle I have no idea what the hell she did for a living but after she met and fell in love with him she writes romances now. Really kinky shit too. Or so I'm told - no way in hell am I going to read that shit. Not because I wouldn't read a romance, that has absolutely nothing to do with it. No, I just know she gets her inspiration from my Uncle and that is gag-worthy just thinking about it. I couldn't scrub my brain hard enough if I actually read some of the shit they actually do.

But because of her new profession, she is the perfect person to ask about Evie. She picks up right before her voicemail comes on, or at least it feels like it takes that long.

"Hey stranger, how are you?" I hear my Uncle in the background ask her who it is. I guess if I had what he had I'd be jealous as fuck and protective of it too.

"I'm good. How are things with you guys? Everything running smoothly at your place?"

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