Badged and Broken

A Judgemental Silence

The first thing Keira Vance felt was the dry, recycled air of the Corimec container, tasting of stale copper and sand. The second thing she felt was the eyes.

She blinked, her vision clearing in the dim, pre-dawn light of the Special Forces Village. There, on the small bedside locker less than a foot from her face, sat a silver-framed photograph. A blonde woman with a kind, unsuspecting smile stood on a manicured lawn in Hereford, her arms wrapped around two young girls in primary school cardigans. They looked happy. They looked wholesome. They looked like the life a man like Kit Fane was supposed to be protecting, not betraying in a darkened box in the middle of the Helmand desert.

Keira lay naked atop the scratchy military-issue wool blanket, her skin still humming from the heat of the night. Every time she woke up here, she promised herself it would be the last time. The affair was “sleazy”—a functional, desperate release that Kit justified as combat stress relief. He was the “Old Sweat,” a Staff Sergeant in 22 SAS who had mentored her during her rise from the Royal Military Police, but in the quiet of the morning, he just felt like a weight she couldn’t drop.

As she moved to sit up, a heavy, calloused arm slid around her waist. Kit pulled her back against him, his chest hair abrasive against her spine. She felt him instantly—the blunt pressure of an erection pressing into her backside.

“Come back to bed, baby,” Kit whispered, his voice thick with sleep and the rasp of a pack-a-day habit. He kissed the curve of her neck, his teeth grazing her skin. “We’ve got an hour until briefing.”

Keira closed her eyes, trying to summon the “stone-cold operator” she was trained to be. She was an SRR Specialist, a woman who had survived the grueling physical phase of Selection in the Brecon Beacons. She was trained in the “Black Arts”—covert entry, elicitation, and the ability to look completely ordinary while carrying a suppressed Glock 19. But Kit knew her “Trade” better than anyone; he had been the one to convince her she was too good for the regular army and push her toward the Regiment.

His hand slid down, fingers finding her slick and wet. Kit groaned low in his throat, a sound of pure, possessive arousal. He didn’t wait for an answer. He rolled her onto her back, pinning her shoulders against the bunk as his mouth collided with hers. He tasted of cheap cigarettes and gun oil, a flavor that had become the unofficial scent of her life in the “Grey Space.”

Her body betrayed her instantly. Despite the crushing guilt radiating from the photo on the locker, her breath hitched. Kit moved with a calculated intensity, sliding his fingers inside her first, finding the rhythm he knew she couldn’t resist. When she orgasmed hard against his hand, her cry was muffled by his kiss.

He moved between her legs then, his length stretching her, hitting the spots he’d memorized over years of clandestine meetings in Snatch Land Rovers and Baghdad safehouses. He moved slowly at first, letting the friction build, his hand reaching up to roll her nipple between his thumb and finger. He broke the kiss only to suck the other, causing Keira to moan into the empty air of the container.

The pace changed. The “Old Sweat” took over, slamming into her with a rhythmic, desperate speed. Keira gripped the edges of the narrow bunk, her nails digging into the frame. She willed herself not to come, willed herself to stay detached, but the pleasure eclipsed the shame. She came with a sharp cry of his name, her climax triggering his own.

He stayed heavy on top of her for a moment, cupping her face with hands that had likely dug more holes for bodies than she wanted to count.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he whispered, kissing her forehead with a tenderness that felt like another lie. “How did I get so lucky?”

The Scent of the Desert

Keira didn’t stay to cuddle. The professional mask was already sliding back into place. She dressed quickly, pulling on her moisture-wicking sand-coloured t-shirt and her “salty” Lowa boots, caked in fine Helmand dust.

Kit was already sitting up, leaning against the wall of the Corimec and lighting a cigarette. The smoke swirled around the photo of his family. Keira reached out, plucked the cigarette from his lips, and took a long drag.

“Oi!” he laughed, watching her with calculating eyes that never truly stopped scanning for threats, even in his own bed.

“Briefing starts in forty, Kit. Don’t be late,” she said, leaving the container with the cigarette still between her lips.

Stepping out into the SF Village was like stepping into a high-security vacuum. Surrounded by Hesco bastions and razor wire, it was a “compound within a compound” where the rules of the regular army didn’t apply. She walked with the lithe, athletic gait of someone who could carry sixty pounds for forty miles, her dark eyes reading the camp in seconds.

She automatically veered toward the SBS section. While she lived and worked with the SAS, she found her peace with the “swimmer-canoeists.”

“Ki!”

A shout came from a cluster of men near a makeshift outdoor kitchen. It was Baz, a rugged operator who looked like he’d been carved out of a cliffside.

“Alright darlin’, coming for breakie?”

“You know me so well, Baz,” Keira replied, flicking the ash from Kit’s cigarette. “Is the old man up yet?”

“Fuck off with the old man shit, mun!”

Rhys Bevan stepped out from behind a stack of gear crates, his Welsh lilt cutting through the morning air. He was shirtless, his thick-set, powerhouse physique on full display. He was built for endurance, with shoulders like a bull and skin that always seemed to carry the faint, brackish scent of the Helmand River.

Keira bit her lip before she could stop herself. She’d seen Rhys shirtless hundreds of times since their days in the RMP, but the sight of him still sent a knot into her stomach. He was her “Silent Partner,” the man who inserted her into target compounds via Rigid Raider at three in the morning. He was the only one who didn’t judge, didn’t push, and didn’t lie.

“Morning, Taff,” she teased, falling into step with him as they headed toward the mess.

Rhys glanced at her, his eyes taking in the slightly disheveled state of her hair and the lingering shadow in her gaze. He’d known her since she was a red-capped RMP girl who had let him off a disciplinary charge because he’d been relentlessly flirty and “cute.” They’d been fuck buddies even longer than she’d been “badged.”

“Been fucking Kit again, I see,” Rhys said matter-of-factly.

“Aye,” Keira sighed, the nicotine finally hitting her system. “Somehow he always seems to know exactly what to say to keep the hooks in.”

Rhys didn’t offer a lecture. He just walked beside her, his presence grounding and solid. “You’re a glutton for punishment, Vance. The man’s a walking sleaze-bag.”

“And you?” she countered, trying to deflect. “You still nobbing that medic from the field hospital?”

Rhys let out a dark, “Herrick-humour” chuckle. “Nah, she shacked up with some septic from Leatherneck. Left me with blue balls so big I’ve got gravel rash.”

Keira laughed, a genuine, throat-clearing sound that felt like the first honest thing she’d done all day. She nudged him with her shoulder, leaning into the easy familiarity that Kit could never provide.

“Well, you know where my bunk is,” she teased, blowing him a mock kiss.

“Aye, I do,” Rhys replied, his voice dropping an octave as his eyes met hers. “But unlike Fane, I’ll actually let you sleep afterward.”

They shared a look—one of shared secrets and a decade of history—before the dust of a passing Land Rover forced them to turn their faces away, back toward the war.