Page 40 of Not Faking it with the Colonel

“You can call me until midnight. Just not before nine in the morning.”

“Should I tell Captain Bryson you won’t be there until lunchtime?”

“No! I will get up for that.Ifwe’re still on.”

“We are. I’m headed home now. I need to get some sleep myself. I’m getting too old for all-nighters. Is everything okay with Piper?”

A warmth spread through her that he’d ask about her daughter despite everything else on his mind. “She sucked it up rather than confront her roommate who apologized and promised it wouldn’t happen again. Fingers crossed on that.”

“Hopefully not. Bringing strangers back to their hotel room is dangerous.”

“I agree. I’ve learned I can’t make her stand up for herself. Unfortunately, she gets the conflict-avoidance gene from me.” Which is why it took so long for her to leave her marriage despite it sucking the joy from her life. While she didn’t seek out conflict, she wouldn’t run from it anymore.

“See you here in the morning. Come a few minutes early if you can. I could use a good long hug.”

“I will.” She hung up feeling wrapped in a hug just from talking with him, as well as relieved and looking forward to tomorrow.

ChapterSeventeen

Erin’s heartskipped a beat as she hurried up Graham’s walk.

He opened the door, barely waiting for her to get inside before he wrapped her in a hug. “Good morning. This is a nice way to start the day.”

“I agree.” She lifted her face and got a coffee-flavored kiss from him. “Is what I’m wearing all right?” She’d gone with a pair of gray leggings, a sage-green t-shirt, and a gray ball cap with the USO patch on it. “You said not to wear camouflage, but I thought I’d try to be inconspicuous.”

“Inconspicuous and quiet are good, but they’re going to know you’re there.”

“I wanted to see if it would be okay to take some pictures and video along with written notes—strictly for research purposes.”

“As long as I have your word that you don’t share them with anyone or post them anywhere. The men on my teams have to keep a low profile.”

“I totally understand. That’s why I had so much trouble getting what I needed. You have my promise.”

He slid a hand lower on her back and kissed her again. “I trust you won’t dump me for one of these young operators.”

“I’m excited to watch them in action for research, but I prefer someone closer to my age for dating.” And she liked how things were going with Graham way too much to mess that up.

Despite the guard at the gate recognizing Graham, he still had to stop and hand over Erin’s ID to get her a visitor’s badge, allowing her on their part of the base. She took a sip from her water bottle since her mouth had gone completely dry, and she had the same nausea as when she’d been pregnant. This was really about to happen.

Graham parked in a small lot near a cinderblock building. She slipped her backpack’s strap over her shoulder and walked alongside him to a clearing where a metal tower stood at least fifty feet high.

When the men saw Graham headed toward them, they assembled to meet him.

“Good morning. I want to introduce you to Erin Downey. She’s a longtime USO volunteer and troop supporter. She’s going to observe your team today for writing research purposes.”

“Thank you, Colonel. I appreciate you all letting me observe. The project I’m working on is for a television series that involves joint missions with a Special Forces team. As you can probably tell, I never served in Special Ops.” Several of the men chuckled. That was a good sign. “Which is why I need to observe what you do on a day-to-day basis. See how you interact with one another to develop believable, engaging characters. If I can’t do that, they’ll assign the writing to someone else. Very possibly a former Navy SEAL, and the Army gets cut out.” The men appeared unfazed.

“Or perhaps somebody in the Air Force,” she tried again.

“Oh, no. No. No.” The protests began.

“I agree. DEV-GRU is one thing, but Chair Force?” Now, the men laughed. “I don’t want that to happen. Ignore me and be yourselves. Don’t worry about watching your language. I taught high school English, so nothing you say will shock me. Be nice to me, and if this series gets picked up, you may inspire a character. And if you’re not nice to me, you may inspire a character you may not like because he’ll lose his girl to some hipster with a man bun.”

Next to her, Graham laughed loudest. “You know how to motivate these guys. Erin, this is Captain John Bryson. He’s the one whose orders you need to follow out here today.”

While Graham was around six foot one, the captain towered several inches over him and the rest of the team. “Nice to meet you. You look familiar. Have you been in the USO recently?”

“No time recently,” the captain said. “But I get that a lot.”

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