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  Love from the Ashes Book One

  Captain O’Reilly’s Woman

  by Gwen Campbell

  This book was published by

  Shadowfire Press LLC

  P.O. Box 385

  Broomfield, CO 80038-0385

  Captain O’Reilly’s Woman

  Love from the Ashes, Book One

  Copyright © 2011 Gwen Campbell

  Cover art by Coyote Shadow Studio

  Edited by Helen Ravell

  Copy Edited and Proof Read by Michael Barnette

  Book layout and Design by Coyote

  All rights reserved. Except for brief excerpts for the purpose of reviews, the reproduction of this book by any means known or devised in the future, are prohibited.

  Scanning, uploading, posting to the internet on any download or sharing site, making available via peer-to-peer sharing, creating print, audio or electronic versions of the book, or offering this book for distribution by any other means is illegal and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. If you obtained this book from a source other than a book seller he author did not receive payment for the book. Our authors deserve to be paid for their work. You wouldn’t work for free and our authors should not be expected to work for free either.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, events and all characters are the creation of the author’s imagination. Any similarities to actual events, or persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

  The mention of, or reference to any product or service within this book is not intended to be a challenge to the trademarks or copyrights of those products or services.

  Chapter One

  “Get a move on, Cooper!”

  “They’re not going to run out of beer before we get there. So quit your bitching and get over here and help me unload these supplies.” Corporal Samantha Cooper hoisted another box of medical supplies out of the back of the delivery truck.

  “What is this crap anyway?” Private JT Winters complained but helped Samantha unload the truck.

  “Syringes in that one,” Samantha answered, glancing at the boxes. “Antiseptic cream. Antibiotics in the coolers. Shall I continue?”

  JT frowned down his freckle-covered nose at his platoon mate. “No, I mean who is it for?” Samantha was their medic. They’d gone through basic training together but she now held a higher rank because of her specialized training.

  “For the clinic in town,” Samantha answered. She hauled the last box out of the truck, initialed the packing slip the driver handed her, returned his salute then slapped the back of the truck after closing it up. The driver pulled away from the infirmary.

  They were standing in the middle of what used to be a stock car race track in what used to be Central Canada. The stands had been demolished by the crusher-tanks that had rolled through the area twenty-one years ago. What remained had long ago been picked over for firewood by the survivors. A forest, directly to the north, was now nothing more than a ghostly jumble of charred stubs. But the ground at the base of the stumps was green. Vegetation, even young trees, had started to come back.

  Just like the world’s population.

  JT tipped his head to one side and looked at her ass when she bent over to pile boxes onto the trolley she’d wheeled out to the loading dock. “New underwear or no underwear?” he asked matter-of-factly.

  She shot him a look and didn’t answer. They’d both joined the Army as soon as they were eligible—at seventeen. In fact, their birthdays were only a month apart. In a lot of ways, Samantha and JT had grown up together, although JT still had a ways to go in that department. “You know, JT, if anybody other than you said that to me—a female soldier, let alone one with a higher rank—you’d find yourself busted down to radiation-reclamation status.”

  The Great War had ended twenty-one years ago but parts of Earth were still uninhabitable. Criminals were pressed into duty cleaning them up. In one, cataclysmic year, ninety percent of the Earth’s population had vanished. Either vaporized into nuclear dust or dead soon after from radiation poisoning. Plagues had ravaged the survivors as bodies went unburied. But the world was starting to recover, parts of it anyway. Populations remained sparse and isolated.

  That’s where the Army came in. After so many deaths, there was an abundance of personal wealth. Which was great except there was nothing to spend it on. So the Army had been recruiting aggressively since the year Two GW. Grunts like JT and Samantha defended the borders and the peace, but they had evolved primarily into peacekeepers. Moving from community to community, helping with rebuilding projects, establishing communal farming cooperatives. Medics like Samantha brought health care to communities that had been without anything more than bandages and butterfly kisses for twenty-one years. She brought supplies but she also taught people how to use them and set up their diagnostic computers. Thank the stars the Internet hadn’t died along with nine-tenths of the population.

  Her training and the tasks she was expected to perform were far beyond her years. But it was 21 GW. Humanity needed far more from its youth than it ever had before.

  “Yeah I know,” JT grumbled. “But it’s a nice ass. The only nice ass, other than Peterson’s and he hates it when I look at his, in the unit.”

  Despite herself, Samantha chuckled. Sure JT liked to look at her ass, but from a purely objective point of view. Not that he was gay or anything—no way. But they saw each other as brother and sister. Not man and woman. JT liked to stack up any women he did meet to Samantha. He used her as a base reading, she being the only straight female in their platoon. It was his rudimentary way of honing his dating skills for the day when he’d actually meet an eligible woman. One who’d jump at a chance for happiness with a low-level grunt with livid red hair, orange freckles and skin so pale it was pink. But even Samantha had noticed that, in the past year, JT had started to fill out. The physical requirements of the job were starting to show now that his teenage metabolism had ramped back enough for him to actually pack on some pounds. What he had managed to pack on was in the form of lean muscle. Tall and sinewy, JT had grown three shirt sizes and one pant size in the past months. Another couple of years and he’d be a hottie.

  Samantha rolled the trolley into the infirmary, emptied the coolers into the fridge and set everything else aside to be sorted in the morning. She glanced at her watch.

  “Seventeen-hundred,” she said happily and clapped JT on the back. “Work day is officially over and it’s Miller time.”

  They locked up the storage closet then headed down the paved sidewalk to the Enlisted Club.

  * * *

  “Greetings fellow gruntsters.” Corporal Peterson was the first to greet them as they entered. Most of their platoon was there already. They had time for a beer, maybe two, before chow. Then a hand of cards or darts before lights out. It was a simple existence, especially when they were near the end of a stint in a community. The hard work had been done. The local government was stabilized. Crooks were in jail and there was a chicken in every pot—so to speak.

  “Oh, before I forget.” Peterson rummaged through the inside pockets of his fatigue jacket, brought out a sealed, pale-blue envelope and handed it to Samantha. He nodded then stepped away.

  One of Peterson’s duties was post master on base. He made a point of getting mail to his friends rather than making them come to the postal depot to pick it up. Especially if that mail came in a pale-blue envelope. That was official government correspondence, usually orders, transfers or promotion announcements.

  “Shit,” JT grumbled and set his beer down on the counter. “If you’ve got another promotion before I even get one...listen, Sammy, do me a
favor, huh? Open it later.”

  She put the letter away without protest. JT dealt with news better in the morning. He liked his evenings to be stress-free and relaxing. Finding out your best friend was getting promoted again or, worse, being shipped out, didn’t qualify as relaxing. Samantha knocked her shoulder into JT’s, picked up her beer and walked with him to join the other members of their platoon.

  * * *

  That night, sitting on the edge of her bunk, Corporal Samantha Cooper sliced open the pale-blue envelope she’d been carrying around all evening. She’d turned nineteen two weeks ago. JT wouldn’t be nineteen for another two. She knew he’d get a promotion then, unless he managed to screw the pooch sometime in the next little while, which wasn’t likely. JT was no rocket scientist but he was reliable, adaptable and easy-going.

  Samantha’s slender fingers reached into the envelope and pulled out the slip of paper inside. She was a small woman. Five foot three, barely tall enough to meet minimum height requirements—in the new post-GW era, anyway. She was also strong with nicely muscled shoulders and legs. But five three was only five three and when she’d shown aptitude, she’d quickly been assigned to medic duties, and had found her calling. She’d applied for medical school and when she made sergeant, she was pretty sure she’d get in. There was a critical shortage of doctors and the Army would be more than willing to send her to their training school. She wasn’t expecting an acceptance letter for another year at least. A grunt still had to put in his, or her, time before qualifying for goodies like a free education.

  She unfolded the slip of paper and started to read. Her face fell.

  * * *

  “Hey, Corporal.” The Captain’s ADC greeted her warmly. They’d been platoon mates the first few months of Samantha’s enlistment. That had been back when the Captain had been just that—their platoon’s captain. He’d been promoted to squad commander and taking his favorite pencil-pusher with him.

  “Sergeant,” Samantha smiled at the older man warmly. Well, if you could call twenty-five older. “How’s the assignment treating you?” she asked perfunctorily. If he was unhappy, he wasn’t likely to share it with a nineteen year old kid. But it was polite to ask anyway.

  “Good,” he answered with enthusiasm. “Let me check if he’s ready for you. The Captain had some calls this afternoon but I think he’s finished now.” He disappeared through a doorway.

  After reading her new orders from HQ, Samantha had requested an appointment with the squad commander. He’d been her first CO and whenever she thought of a mentor, it was him. Right now, she needed somebody to talk to who didn’t smell like zit cream.

  The Sergeant reappeared and beckoned her through the doorway. “He’ll see you now,” he told her brightly, gave her the usual friendly nod and wink he gave everybody then returned to his desk.

  Samantha walked down the depressingly sterile hallway. No pictures. Just polished linoleum on the floor and olive-drab paint on the moveable walls and ceiling. Nothing on base was ever permanent—a fact that little blue letter in Samantha’s pocket reminded her of.

  She took off her cap and stood smartly at attention just inside the Captain’s office door.

  Captain David O’Reilly smiled inwardly. Cooper had always been one of his favorites, and the one recruit who had never ceased to unnerve him. Now thirty-one, David had been in the Army since he’d been sixteen. He’d grown up during the Great War and it had had a bitter hand in shaping his life. But David was strong, even as a kid, and intelligent. He’d lost his family to dysentery but had found a new one with the Army. Before he acknowledged her presence, David allowed himself a quick, covert perusal of the Corporal. She was, without a doubt, one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen. He’d thought so even when he’d first seen her climb off that recruiter’s bus two years ago, only just seventeen and nervous as hell.

  Her beauty was artless and she seemed completely unaware of it. Her lightly tanned skin glowed with health. Her hair, a reddish brown that shone like fire in the sunlight, fell in heavy waves down her back. The few times he’d seen it unbound, of course. Even though it had been some time, he remembered it clearly. Remembered how he’d ached to run his fingers through the heavy, silky mass. Ached to touch the back of her neck and the warmth of her scalp. She was small but had a body that haunted his dreams. Full, lush breasts, a tiny waist and the sweetest curve of a behind it had ever been his privilege to set eyes on.

  As if that wasn’t enough, she was sweet too. With a great sense of humor, a never-say-die attitude and friendly with everybody. If her intelligence made her a good medic, her personality made her a terrific one.

  But what unnerved him most was that Samantha Cooper was the only person to serve under him he’d ever been sexually attracted to. Hell, there was a time he would have sworn he was addicted to her. Making excuses to supervise training exercises she was participating in. Surprise checks down at the infirmary. Anything to hear the sound of her laughter or catch a glimpse of her profile during the day. To the point where he seriously considered having her transferred to another squadron. His promotion to squadron commander had solved the problem for him. He no longer had excuses for such personal indulgences and he was grateful he’d been able to quit obsessing over her. He hadn’t exactly moved on, he realized as he caught himself grinning foolishly at her, but his obsession was under control. Mostly.

  She saluted smartly and waited. To his discredit, he made her hold the salute for just a second longer than necessary. He just couldn’t make himself stop looking at the way her raised arm made her breast swell against her precisely ironed shirt. He cursed himself and made himself look away. “At ease, Corporal,” he greeted her warmly and leaned back from his desk. “Please, have a seat.”

  Samantha returned his smile and he felt a little piece of himself melt. She sat down like she did everything else—with an effortless grace that made him think of summer picnics, dancing and so many simple pleasures they’d lost in the wake of the Great War.

  When he’d heard yesterday that she’d asked to meet with him, his heart had leapt at the chance to spend time with her. Now, in the face of her guileless smile, her warm, cinnamon eyes and that mouth he ached to feel against his own, he didn’t think it was such a good idea. But he’d never let her see that. He’d never burden her with his desire. He was her CO and thirteen years older than her. Hiding his emotions, he kept smiling, leaned his forearms on his desk, clasped his hands lightly and said, “It’s good to see you again, Corporal. How can I help you?”

  By way of answer, she drew a pale-blue envelope out of her breast pocket. He watched its progress with an envy that stabbed him in the gut. Once again he disciplined his features when she laid the envelope on the edge of his desk and looked up at him. He felt his head tip to one side. She wasn’t being transferred or promoted. As squadron CO, he okayed those moves. She wouldn’t be accepted into medical school for another twelve months.

  Samantha drew in a breath then, slowly, let it out. She schooled her emotions. As she did, she looked at Captain O’Reilly. He was tall, almost a foot taller than her and one of the most muscular men she’d ever seen. She’d always liked that about him. He was a good leader and smart and he just felt like a rock to her. Especially her first few months in the Corps. A scared kid, a thousand kilometers from home, wanting desperately to please and be accepted, he’d taught her those were secondary concerns and not to worry about them. They’d come in their own time. He’d taught her to focus on the safety and welfare of her platoon and the population at large. To learn. To be a human sponge and to work hard. She had and his teachings had made all the difference.

  The Captain wasn’t handsome in the traditional sense. But the muscles in his jaw were pronounced, giving his face a sculpted, rugged look. His nose was nice and, beneath his short, dark brown hair and straight brows, he had the most arresting, sky blue eyes she’d ever seen. They were framed perfectly by fringes of luxuriant, dark lashes that any woman would kill
for. His mouth was firm but full with square corners that expressed more emotion with the single flick of a muscle than most people could in a hundred lines of poetry.

  She looked down at his hands for a moment. Compared to hers, they were massive. Powerful. Sculpted. Like the rest of him. His long fingers showed obvious signs of rough use. Unlike her, he’d grown up during the Great War. He’d survived. Not only that, he’d thrived. He was the smartest, most discerning person she knew, and the only person she’d thought of when she needed someone to talk to about her new orders.

  Samantha looked him directly in the eye and her voice was even and quiet. “I’ve been given new orders. RI.”

  Repopulation Imperative. David sat back hard in his chair. In the years following the Great War, young, child-bearing women were few and far between. Fallout had seen to that. But humans were resilient and the population was starting to come back. Except that some geneticists had found that certain genes had become scarce. Mostly ones carried through the maternal line. Governments the world over had adopted Repopulation Imperative initiatives. Carriers of key genes were identified and, when they turned nineteen, were asked to have kids. Some were asked more firmly than others and a few Eastern European governments had been overthrown because they’d orchestrated forced breeding programs. Here, in New North America, it was always the woman’s choice to have children.

  Except for those in the military. When you signed on, you agreed to work in hazardous conditions. To give up your life for the greater good of your country. In short, your ass was theirs. And in her case, Samantha’s womb was theirs as well.

  David admired the fact that Samantha didn’t flinch when he stared at her, his mind whirling. RI orders meant that, over the next ten years, she would be required to give birth to four children. Hopefully live ones. It would play hell with her medical training. Then a sudden thought brought all the others in his head to a screeching halt.