Niceville

Niceville so spooked. Reed had stared at his hands for a while and then started up a story about something that was said to have happened at Crater Sink back in the twenties, or maybe earlier, or later, he wasn’t sure, then he seemed to think better of it, ordered two more beers, and managed to change the subject.
    Nick stood in the hall outside Tig’s office for a while, turning the memory over, his mind in neutral, watching the cloud banks get caught on Tallulah’s Wall, spilling their cargo of gray rain down on the town.
    On the far side of the Dome of the Rock, as they called City Hall, because the mayor’s name was Little Rock Mauldar, Nick could see a section of the Tulip River, running mud brown and churning fast aftertwo hours of hard rain. He shook himself loose from the dull gray landscape, the dull gray morning, and walked into Tig Sutter’s office.
    Tig looked up as Nick came in, an up-from-under over the rim of his steel gray reading glasses. He leaned back in his wooden swivel chair, making the thing creak like a cellar door in a horror movie.
    “Nick. How’s the Lovely?”
    “Still with me.”
    “Probably just hanging around to see what the heck you’ll do next. I hear she nailed that Bock asshole.”
    Nick smiled at that.
    “She did.”
    “I always liked Ted Monroe. He’s a damn good judge of character. Kate say how Bock took it?”
    “Poorly.”
    “Screw him.”
    “Metaphorically?”
    “Either way. Take a pew, Nick.”
    Nick plucked a wooden chair from under a picture of the president. The president, his chin cocked just so, his eyes all squinty, a thin-lipped smile like a gunfighter, was staring off into the middle distance, as if he could see some sunny green uplands that he was going to lead you to.
    Nick sat, lightly, on the chair’s forward edge, his forearms on his knees, the plastic cup turning in his long-fingered hands. Tig had some of his, Nick had some of his, and they sat there for a time in a companionable silence. Tig was shifting around in his chair a bit and Nick realized the man was nervous about something.
    “Okay, well, first some hard news. Nick, I got a letter from a Colonel Dale Sievewright, down at Benning. It was about your request to re-up for combat deployment with the Fifth SF again …?”
    Nick looked at him but said nothing.
    Tig shrugged.
    “You were gonna pull out on me?”
    “I was,” said Nick. “No offense, Tig.”
    “None taken. I hired you, I didn’t buy your ugly white ass down at the Wally Mart. I know you miss the action. I was worried a little that maybe you and Kate were having some trouble at home?”
    Nick was quiet for a time. When he spoke there was somethingmoving under the tight skin over his cheekbones, a pale glimmer in his eyes.
    “No. Kate is … Kate. She couldn’t be better. When she comes in the door, she makes my day. It’s just …”
    Tig set the cup down, creaked back in the chair again.
    “Pale?”
    Nick sipped at the cup, said nothing for a time.
    “Yes. That’s a good word. Like all the color went away. I mean, Kate wants me to put a deck on the back. So I go down to Billy Dials, I walk around, look at the cedar, I can’t seem to figure out why in the hell Kate would want a cedar deck. I mean, what’s a cedar deck for?”
    “You know. Beer. Football. Barbecues.”
    “Barbecues,” said Nick, looking into his cup. “Barbecues make me think of Fallujah, those contractors hanging from meat hooks on that bridge.”
    Tig looked out the window at the rain sheeting down. There was thunder rolling around in the distance, getting closer, and lightning flaring up inside the cloud mass. A crappy morning if there ever was one.
    “I have spent considerable time trying to forget that, Nick, so thanks for the reminder. You think Fallujah smelled like barbecue, try watching an Abrams burn up with a whole crew inside. You talk this over with Kate before you sent the letter?”
    Nick shook his head.
    “Okay. Well, no need to spook her with it now. I’m sorry to say this, I really am, although I’m happy not to be losing you, but Sievewright turned you down.”
    Nick nodded, took it in, his face closing up.
    “The Wadi Doan?”
    Tig nodded, his expression kindly.
    “The Wadi Doan. Al Kuribayah. Yemen. That’s not going to go away, Nick. Not your fault, nobody ever thought that. They were okay with JAG, but another combat deployment … I guess not.”
    “The optics.”
    “And that video.”
    Nick said