“I have a proposition for you,” Turner said when he looked back at Ty.
Ty continued to stare at him, wary of the man no one in the group trusted. He was the very epitome of what they called a Secret Squirrel. Always running dark, always skittering here and there. He ran too many cloak-and-dagger missions, and it was like he’d forgotten how to be straightforward.
“I wish you to meet with me, privately, once or twice a week.”
Ty’s back stiffened. “Is that an order, Captain?”
“Not yet. And I’ll make sure your mail never gets read again. So you can write back to your . . . friend and tell him what’s what.”
“You’re blackmailing me?”
“No. Well, yes. But I’m proposing a mutually beneficial arrangement.”
“Which would be what, exactly?”
Turner leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees. Ty narrowed his eyes. “I keep your secrets. You keep mine. And we both get to blow off a little steam in a way far more interesting than creating scrap metal targets for the rocket launchers.”
Ty glanced around the racks, feeling himself growing warm. He met Turner’s eyes. “You’re blackmailing me to have sex with you?”
“Well, when you put it that way, it sounds so crass.”
“What exactly would you like me to call it?”
“Crass works, I guess.”
They stared at each other as Ty mulled it over, his stomach tumbling end over end. He really didn’t have much choice if he didn’t want to be exposed. Ty clenched his jaw. “Fuck off, Captain.”
Turner clucked his tongue, then grinned. “I was hoping you might react that way.”
Ty tried not to frown, but his confusion was clear.
“You have backbone, I’ll give you that. Not afraid to tell an officer to go f**k himself. Good. I have a real proposition for you now. One I think you’ll want to give consideration to.”
Ty shook his head and stood, growing angry enough to forget the man’s rank. Turner stood with him, both of them in the tight space between the racks.
“Come with me, Corporal. There are matters we need to discuss.” Turner moved away, but Ty remained rooted to the spot. Turner looked over his shoulder. “That’s not a request.”
Ty stood by his rack for another few seconds, stunned. This would probably end with one of them throwing a punch, or at least filing some sort of complaint, but Ty’s survival instincts told him to follow and see what exactly Turner was up to. He stuffed the letter under his pillow and grabbed his shirt to pull it on as he followed Turner across the camp to the officer’s quarters.
Turner glanced around as he ushered him inside, making sure no one had seen Ty go in, then latched the door behind him. Ty struggled not to fidget, feeling off-balance and a little cornered.
“There are benefits to having a private rack,” Turner murmured as he circled Ty and stood to face him.
Ty’s jaw clenched hard, and he had to fight not to turn around and leave.
Turner snorted. “Don’t be like that. Have a seat.” He went to a trunk in the corner.
Ty finally moved to sit in the field chair Turner had indicated, beside a small table made out of a metal water barrel with a bullet hole in it. The rack on the other side served as a second seat.
Ty watched out of the corner of his eye as Turner muttered to himself and rummaged through the trunk. He pulled out a wooden box and set it on the barrel between them. A fan in the corner chugged as it rotated, working to cool off the quarters. It was the only sound.
Turner sat on the end of his rack and met Ty’s eyes. Ty’s shoulders stiffened.
“You play chess?” Turner asked.
Ty looked down at the box. “No.”
Turner pulled the lid off it, unfolding it to reveal a portable chess set. “Thinking man’s checkers. I’ll teach you.”
“You brought me in here to beat me at chess?”
“No, Ty. But I’m not going to force you to have sex with me, either, if that’s what you came in here thinking.” He looked up and raised an eyebrow, smirking.
Ty glared at him. The man played mind games, and Ty had never been anything but a straight shooter. He didn’t like it.
“You see, by the time I’m done with you, you’re going to be making the first move. And after that, we’ll be looking at quite a few sessions of what is no doubt going to be very athletic, very angry sex.”
Ty gaped, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself.
“You see? You’re already intrigued.”
Ty snorted. “Look, we just got back from a five-day hump in the desert, and all I wanted was a cool drink and an hour in my rack to sleep. If you want to play games, there are other intelligence officers around camp to play with.”
“That’s just the thing, Ty,” Turner whispered. He leaned closer. “You offer far more to me than they do.”
Ty sighed hard and ran his hand over his face.
“Why did you join the Marines and leave this David kid behind? He obviously loved you.”
“None of your business.”
“Sense of duty? Adventure? Fear of commitment? Fear of taking it up the ass?”
“Is your plan to make me beg for sex just to shut you up? Because it’s kind of working.”
Turner laughed and shook his head. “I want you. But not just because I want to see what you look like on top of me.” He paused, obviously knowing that the visual had hit home with Ty. Then he continued. “I’m building a team. And I want you on it.”
That brought Ty up short. He met Turner’s eyes for a long minute. “What kind of team?”
“The kind that doesn’t exist.”
“Right.”
“Look, I’ve seen your scores and I’ve seen your evals. You’re smart, you’re fit, you’re loyal and motivated. You’ve got instincts most kids don’t come out here with, you’re already fluent in Farsi, and I understand you’ve been teaching yourself Dari on the side.”
“How the hell do you know that?”
“Because you interest me, Grady. You’re clever, you’re adaptive. You’ve got balls the size of coconuts. Figuratively speaking, of course. And you’re pretty as hell, which actually gets you farther in these kinds of things than you’d think.”
“You’re talking about–”
“I’m talking about making a difference. I’m talking about files so redacted they print them on black paper. I’m talking about things you could never spill to that Boy Scout O’Flaherty unless he’s in on it.”