The Lieutenant

Chapter thirteen 

Simon Riley 

There's nothing strategic about it.

No orders. No mission.

Just a clockwork pull that drags me to her like gravity.

It starts as smoke breaks. That's what we tell the others. What I tell Soap when he raises an eyebrow every time I disappear from briefing five minutes early. What she tells the other medics when they ask why her uniform's always a little wrinkled and her cheeks a little flushed.

But what we do in those stolen minutes?

It's anything but smoke.

⸻

Behind the comms shed. Inside the empty cargo truck. Once, bold as hell, in the dark corner of the armory while a storm hammered the base and no one could hear a thing but thunder and breath.

Lilly meets me like she's been waiting all day, like her hands are starving for skin. She climbs into my lap the second we're alone, presses her mouth to my neck, and sighs like I'm the only damn thing keeping her from falling apart.

And maybe I am. Because she sure as hell is that for me.

"Five minutes," she whispers against my lips.

"We can do a lot in five."

Sometimes it's fast and rough, desperation bleeding through every kiss. Other times it's slower—kisses that linger, touches that mean more than either of us will say out loud.

But it's always real.

Always ours.

⸻

One night, I find her leaning against the back wall of the mess tent, moonlight catching the curve of her jaw. She doesn't say anything when I come up behind her—just takes my hand, laces her fingers with mine, and pulls me into the shadows.

No words. No pretense.

Her body against mine. My mouth on hers.

We kiss like it's the only time we'll ever have. Like we're not surrounded by war. Like the world outside this moment doesn't exist.

When we break apart, breathless and flushed, she grins up at me.

"You know this is dangerous, right?"

I brush a thumb over her bottom lip. "So are you."

⸻

It's reckless. Stupid. A violation of every rule I was trained to follow.

But Lilly Rose doesn't follow rules.

And I don't care about consequences anymore.

Because every time she slips her hand into mine, every time she finds me in the dark, it feels a little less like sneaking…

And a little more like home.