PART 1
“Take the damn gun, Willa,” Dennis barked, shoving the cold polymer frame of his custom Glock 19 so hard into my chest I had to step back to keep my balance.
The gravel of the makeshift backyard range crunched under my combat boots.
He didn’t back up.
He stood inches from my face, breathing a mix of cheap domestic beer and pure, unadulterated ego.
“Come on, ‘Sergeant,’” he sneered, using mock air quotes.
“Show us what your little Army MP desk job taught you. Or do they only issue you guys pepper spray and a clipboard?”
My name is Willa Sutter.
I’m a Sergeant First Class in the United States Army.
But to Dennis—a man who spent twenty-six years as a city patrol cop and detective before retiring to a life of tactical cargo pants and endless self-glorification—I was just his wife’s disappointing kid who played traffic cop in camo.
For eleven straight years, he had belittled my service.
Today, at his annual Fourth of July range day, surrounded by a peanut gallery of his ex-cop buddies, he wanted to humiliate me.
“Dennis, back off,” my mother pleaded from the picnic table, looking nervously at the holstered weapons on everyone’s hips.
“No, Martha! She’s always talking about her deployments. Let’s see it,” Dennis snapped, jabbing a thick, calloused finger into my shoulder.
“Five rounds. Quick draw from concealment. I just ran a 1.4-second average. Let’s see what a glorified gate guard can do against a real clock.”
I looked down at the yellow shot timer in his other hand.
I didn’t want to do this.
The most important skill I’d learned in the military wasn’t how to pull a trigger, but when not to.
But his hand was still gripping my shoulder, his fingers digging painfully into my collarbone.
“Get your hand off me,” I said, my voice low and dead calm.
He smirked, letting go and stepping back with his arms raised in mock surrender.
“Ooh, the desk clerk has some fire. Line up.”
I stepped to the firing line.
The summer air was thick with humidity and the metallic tang of spent brass.
I cleared my mind, letting the noise of Dennis’s laughing buddies fade into dead static.
I secured the Glock in the holster on my hip.
I didn’t look at the paper silhouette fifteen yards away.
I saw through it.
“Standby,” Dennis mocked, holding the timer right next to my ear to rattle me.
BEEP.
My hand moved before the sound even registered in my brain.
Sweep the garment. Grip. Draw. Press out. Front sight, squeeze.
BANG.
The explosive crack echoed through the dense trees.
I holstered immediately, keeping my eyes locked downrange.
Dennis scoffed, looking down at the timer.
Instantly, his face went entirely blank.
The blood drained from his cheeks.
“What is it, Den?” one of his buddies yelled.
Dennis hit the button again, his thumb shaking slightly.
“Timer glitched. Must have registered an echo off the berm. Run it again.”
“It didn’t glitch,” I said.
“I said run it again!” he roared, slamming his heavy hand onto my back, practically shoving me toward the firing line.
I whipped around, slapping his arm away, my eyes locking onto his.
“Do not touch me while I am operating a firearm. Ever.”
I faced the target again.
BEEP.
Sweep, grip, press, fire.
BANG.
He stared at the digital screen.
“Zero point eight seven,” he whispered, his voice trembling.
“That’s… that’s physically impossible for you.”
“Average of 0.88,” I replied coldly, ejecting the magazine.
“Are we done?”
Suddenly, heavy footsteps crunched on the gravel behind us.
A towering man in a battered denim jacket pushed through Dennis’s crowd of friends.
It was Ray, the owner of the commercial shooting property next door, who had come over to borrow some tools.
Ray didn’t look at Dennis.
He walked straight up to me, his eyes locked onto my holster, then up to my face.
He studied the way I stood, the way my hands naturally rested at the ready.
“I know you,” Ray said, his voice slicing through the tense, heavy silence.
“I know exactly who you are.”
Dennis sneered, stepping aggressively between us.
“Yeah, she’s my stepkid. She’s a military police paper-pusher who just got lucky with a broken clock.”
Ray slowly turned his head to look at Dennis, a look of profound disgust washing over his weathered face.
“Shut your mouth, Dennis. You have absolutely no idea who you’re standing next to, do you?”
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