“Touch me again, Sergeant, and you’ll regret it,” she warned in the chow line. A Marine tried to humiliate her, but everything changed when the entire base suddenly stood at attention and saluted her in stunned silence.

Evelyn met his gaze, her expression unchanged. If anything, she seemed to settle further into herself, like a person lowering their center of gravity before a storm.

“Respect,” she said quietly, “doesn’t come from volume, Sergeant. You might want to remember that.”

It was a measured statement, but it struck harder than anything louder might have. Reeves’s jaw tightened, the shift immediate and visible.

“Don’t lecture me,” he snapped, and this time there was no mistaking the anger behind it. He reached out, placing his hand firmly against her shoulder as if to guide—or force—her out of line.

That was the moment the room went completely still.