Stars & Stripes (Cut & Run 6)

Zane patted his thigh. “You’ll do fine.” Then he moved to his own horse and swung fluidly into the saddle. Ty wasn’t afraid to admire him. “Goddamn, Zane.”

“What?”

“How is Texas making you so freaking hot?”

Zane laughed heartily. “Must be the horse smell.”

Ty grunted. Zane winked at him. “Here we go—the rocky expanse, salt flats, and rattlesnakes, dead ahead.”

Ty urged his horse to follow Zane’s. “What could I have possibly been thinking, never visiting Texas before now?”

“The stars at night are big and bright, deep in the heart of Texas,” Zane sang.

“I will knock you off that glue stick.”

Zane chuckled, then sang under his breath, “I’ve been through the desert on a horse with no name . . .”

“Garrett,” Ty growled.

Zane smiled fondly. “You should sing for us. I can teach you a trail song.”

“I wouldn’t mind doing that if I were riding an ATV.” Ty shifted in the saddle. It was an odd feeling, and a precarious one, not being able to guide or hold on with both hands. But he didn’t trust his hurt fingers to have any strength in them. So he was forced to use his knees, which he thought was the way it was done anyway. Still, he was not liking it.

His horse sidestepped and snorted. “Yeah? Well, the feeling’s mutual,” Ty said loudly.

“The horse doesn’t like you because you won’t relax.”

“You know why it doesn’t like me? Because horses never like me.” Ty took his hat off and set it on the horn, then pulled a red buff out of his back pocket and fixed it onto his head, arranging it like a balaclava to protect his neck and face from the elements. Then he set his hat on top of it, pulling at the brim with the tips of his sore fingers so it would shade more of his face.

He almost lost his balance before he was able to grab the horn again. The horse tossed his head, whinnying.

“He’s laughing at me, Zane.”

“He’s not the only one.”

“Shut up.” Ty nodded at the riders ahead of them. “You want to catch up to them?”

“Yeah, we should. Jamie will rag the hell out of me if he thinks I can’t ride anymore.”

“Blame it on me,” Ty offered. He clucked his tongue at the horse and urged it into a canter.

“I blame everything on you.”

Their horses slowed as they came alongside the others, and Harrison turned to look over his shoulder at them. “You okay back there, Ty?”

“Yes, sir,” Ty said, withholding the smart-ass remark he’d been about to add. He grumbled and pushed his broken hand farther under his shirt as he fought the urge to use it.

Zane grinned crookedly at him.

“You don’t look too happy to be here,” Cody said, leaning to catch Ty’s attention.

“I can think of at least ten things I’d rather die doing.”

Cody grinned.

“You really as good a tracker as Zane thinks?” Ronnie asked from Ty’s other side.

“I guess we’ll see.” Ty loved that Zane had bragged about his skills, but he also hated it. He would much rather be underestimated. He pushed his sunglasses back up his nose. “Come on, Elmer,” he said to his horse. “Let’s find a nice prickly cactus you can toss me into.”

The group rode an hour through the flats and dry hills, admiring the scenery and talking. Zane sensed an undercurrent of tension, though. Everyone had a rifle strapped to their saddle, and Zane and Ty weren’t the only ones carrying knives and pistols.

When Harrison called a halt for a brief lunch, Zane was more relieved than he would’ve cared to admit. It had been too long since he’d ridden. He dismounted and watched Joe, Cody, and Ty bring up the rear to join them. Ty’s horse was shying to the side, and Ty was cursing emphatically. For years Zane had dreaded coming to Texas so much that he’d forgotten all the things he loved about it. Ty was somehow reminding him with every word of complaint and unfortunate accident.

He walked over and caught the reins on Ty’s horse. “You doing okay?”

Ty leaned over the horn, wincing and shaking his head.

Zane offered his hand, trying not to laugh. “Need help?”

“Kiss my ass, Garrett.”

The dust wafted up around them when Ty’s feet hit the ground. Even behind the sunglasses, Zane knew Ty was glaring at him. He would have given anything to be able to drag Ty behind a tree.

Instead, he slid his hand over Ty’s hip and into his back pocket, pulling him closer. He had to take his hat off to steal a kiss.

Ty smiled against his lips, though when he pulled away, Ty was glaring at him over the top of his sunglasses. “My ass hurts, Garrett.”

“Didn’t we have this conversation when we first met?”

“Have we had the ‘I hate you’ conversation lately? I’d like to have that one again. Real soon.”

“Play nice, boys,” Harrison said as he stopped by to take the reins.

“We’re not fighting,” Zane said.

“Yes, we are,” Ty sing-songed.

“I swear, you two . . .” Harrison pulled the soft cooler off the side of the saddle. “Here you go, son. Don’t want to forget your lunch.”

“Yeah,” Zane said darkly, eyes on Ty. “Don’t want you swooning from hunger later.”

“I’ll show you swooning.”

Harrison took the reins and led the horses away. Zane brushed against Ty’s arm, pausing to whisper, “My ass hurts, too.”

“Good.”

Zane popped him in the chest with his knuckles and kept walking, cooler dangling from his hand. At least Ty seemed in decent humor. But then, Zane had noticed that Ty was often in his best moods in the face of adversity, whether physical discomfort or outright danger. He complained, sure, but often in a way that was amusing and managed to keep up the morale of others. No wonder he had thrived on a Recon team.

As Ty strolled away, the backdrop of the Hill Country offered a glimpse of Afghanistan behind a Marine. Zane’s active imagination could see it, and it brought up questions he’d been spending the last few months trying not to ask.

Why had Ty left the Marines? He’d admitted to receiving a substantial payoff, but he hadn’t offered to explain and Zane had decided it wasn’t worth the fight to find out then. Every time he’d thought about asking since, he’d found himself thinking of Ty in his dress blues, the hint of melancholy behind his eyes when he wore them, and he let it go.