I enjoyed these one shots so much.

I love these one shots. It's great to be able to see/hear things that weren't part of the main story. Loved the details they added.

Really miss this story.

If they are ex-military, they are inoculated against yellow fever, it is part of the rikky cruds - the comprehensive vaccination policy first couple days of boot camp. [I showed up needing a tet booster at the ER when Rob was doing his ER rotation at the hospital on the Navy Base in Portsmouth so they used me as a shot training dummy and I got both the rikky cruds and the overseas package, so I even have been inoculated against bubonic plague. yay. Ship my ass to the middle ages! ]

Bad lawyer - he needs to countersue the ex for causing the whole issue by stalking Rosa and forcing the issue by showing up armed with a second person also armed. Yes he should have shut the door on the ex, but she also should not have showed up armed. That is in general why military are not allowed to take personal weapons on base, or issue weapons off base. If they own a personal weapon, they have to house it in the armory and call the base armorer to meet them at the gate to pick up or drop off the weapon, or they have to live off base [and not in assigned housing outside the gates] and keep the weapon entirely off government property. [my Texas buddy houses all his stuff in the armory and lives in assigned quarters on base which is how I know this crap ) We have always lived off base here in CT so we never had to worry though when I worked as an armed guard in Virginia and lived in base housing I had to keep my sidearm in the gun locker at the office and draw it out and return it before and after every shift.]

I always thought it unfair that the assorted cops and Steph bashers never realized that Steph attracts the loonies and attacks because she dos have an amazing capture rate. As many have pointed out, people resist being dragged to jail, and their families and friends are pissed off as well. Once the skip is in the slammer, there is still the whole family/friend bunch to be considered. Much of the destruction around her really isn't her fault, per se - it is revenge by others towards her that is the problem. There isn't really a solution to escaping the revenge attacks other than by learning to move around invisibly, live undetectably [get your bills sent to a PO box, use a fake address, rent your apartment through someone else so your name isn't on anything. It was always an exit strategy I advised to the women in the shelters I volunteered at. Always be the unlisted roommate. Hide, change your habits, don't do anything to attract attention. I got found by having a picture in a newspaper as one of a bunch of volunteers at a soup kitchen. Ranger and the Core team learned to hide in plain sight, Steph never learned to.]

As a military spouse, and a military brat, I fully understand why Ric needed to cut Rachel loose - there is nothing like being somewhere without your husband being there if you can't get along with the other women in the unit wives club. Most women are not taught to deal without a support group, and most women are not raised in a family with an absentee husband/father, so Rachel would be screwing around on Ric fairly fast looking for the affection and physical company she needs. There is a very real reason for the high divorce rate in the military. What would you want for Ric, to get a divorce and later look for proper love and spouse, or to come home to a jody climbing out the back window as he walks in the front door? I guarantee that Rachel would have an affair within 3 years [the rough average time before a military wife starts screwing around.]

Ramierez wasn't murder. Abruzzi was murder.

Homicide is the killing of one person by another. Murder is a form of criminal homicide, where the perpetrator intended to kill the other person, sometimes with premeditation (a plan to kill). Manslaughter is another type of criminal homicide. Homicides are criminal, excusable, or justifiable. Benito was justifiable as self defense, he was breaking into her apartment [in canon he was captured and not killed in the first book but when he broke in in the 5th book while she was fighting Shempsky so he was sort of collateral damage.] The devil of a defense action is in the details.

[you can research online, I have a LexisNexis account, but there is a searchable Blacks Law Dictionary - and one that you can put onto your phone/tablet as well - thelawdictionary dot org ]

Good side story - *never* underestimate the power of networking church women [my mom was one, she had as much influence in the town on the side as my dad did going up front of things.]

*snicker* My dad was career Army [30 years, 39-69] and one time when I was calling to see if I could bring my SEAL boyfriend up for Thanksgiving and Mom asked what he did for a living and I told her he was in the Navy she sounded pretty unsure how Dad would react to a 'squid' visiting for the weekend. When I married a Navy submariner he and my dad had a genial rivalry going over the Army-Navy game, and at one point Rob slipped a 'Go Navy' bumpersticker onto Dad's car )

When my Dad died, my husband showed up with the Navy's Funeral Honor Guard from our duty station here in New London CT [My Dad opted for the family plot in western NY instead of Arlington]

After I got so far behind last year and didn't know what order to read the chapters in, I kept promising myself I'd catch up. I still have so much after Steph went to Texas and saw Ric acting so different and was so confused. That's about where I left off, aside from reading a few newer chapters on my phone.

This one, THIS one tore my heart out, although at the same time, I was cheering for the men, saying THAT'S what happens when you treat a good man like crap. These good men who loved and honored and were knocked back, only to work their way back, only to have their children used against them, the families they'd give their lives for, was heartbreaking. Seeing the mistakes these women made, the pride and anger of their upbringing and the mistakes they'd sworn they would never make themselves...

Alicia (I haven't read what her husband said to make her break Yala, yet) but remembering how Mack looked into his Daddy's face when Madero told him that the men in prison came back and talked about banging his wife, how that made him feel.

Yolanda, so insecure, not trusting Mack's love and believing in him, letting her anger at HER own upbringing and the hard times that she was going through, then having Mack constantly working and not trusting his fidelity, causing her insecurity to push her to cheat, and losing Mack. He probably would have married her all over again if she'd got her anger under control and he could trust her, but she left him to the wolves when she KNEW they were asking about him.

Tatiana- I haven't caught up on what all happened since the social worker found out that Annie was saying "Bratva" and had Jorge call Les...what they worked out, but her pride, her greed and her not being able to escape her father and trust Jorge, left her nothing in the end, not even her daughter.

So sad. So much humanity ruined by anger, pride, greed, insecurity, and not trusting those they loved to make it through the hard times. Powerful chapter. Really pulls the reader in so many directions. It will be interesting when I catch up and find the corresponding chapters in the main story.
Outstanding writing. Absolutely outstanding.
Maggie M.

Had to drop u a line to say how much I am loving your stories
I am reading all three at a time and they are wonderful
I have laughed, cried and stayed up way to late reading

Excellent take on these mom's points of view. Excellent writing as usual. I am completely caught up with all of the "in the wind" stories now. Waiting for more but I know you are busy.

awesome chapter...it took me a few breaks to completly ready...but it was great :D

well done, nicely died up with a bow...but why do i have the feeling there is more to come?!

OK, so I waited a while and really thought about what I wanted to say. As usually, I loved this one-shot and I thought it was heartbreaking and challenging and while everyone else calls them selfish and stupid, I call them STRONG. Yes, STRONG!

Plus, I love that, as usual, veiland had us hating Yala, especially, but now that we see her life, from her side, in her words, I see what MACK is throwing away. I don’t really see much in Andrea to admire yet, but I see a lot in Yala to admire. Even more, you can see Stephanie in Yala, that sense of entitlement and being spoiled. Les saw Ranger in Mack? I see Stephanie in Yala. Mack spoiled Yala, gave her his best, backed and supported her, and she didn’t trust him because of her own demons. She didn’t trust him because of her own experiences and the things that happened to her. Who does that sound like? Huh? Only Stephanie always manages to find someone to save her ass. Yala had no one except Mack and he threw her away. He'll regret that someday.

Anyway, what I loved most about the story is that, while it was obviously about choices, it was also a story about mothers and daughters. While so many of you talk about how Stephanie has an abusive mother (complete bullshit), we have another bunch of mothers and daughters to look at and see their relationships and how women make all kinds of choices and how those relationships affect their relationships with men and each other.

Each woman had an older version of herself to show her what her life could and would be like and they didn't heed that lesson until too late. Ana and her mother were the obvious example. Ana grew up in an abusive household and, instead of running far away as quickly as possible, she stayed to protect her mother (which I admired. Her first thought, when she thought about her father coming home drunk, was to not go clubbing and stay home to protect her mother). She gave up her daughter, her dreams, and her fiancée, in order to protect her mother. OK, so maybe I wouldn't have made the same choices but I admire her choice. I only wish it had not cost her everything. I wish she'd had the strength to stand up for herself. I wish her mother had encouraged her to do that before now. I wish Ana had not dumped Jorge but what's done is done. Like Ana's mother said, What is there to cry about?

I literally cried, like a baby, when she finally made the choice to allow Jorge to take her daughter. Knowing that she would only get once a month visits for her daughter just broke my heart, but it was a moment for me to be very thankful for the time in which we live. The fact that she'll be able to *possibly* communicate with her daughter via twitter and instagram (I hope that's what they were referring to) was the bright spot in that horrible moment. The other thing is, ever since the sexism story arc, I've been trying to work on my own sexism and I recognized that, while a few months ago I would not have shed tears over the idea of a man only getting once a month visits with his daughter, I now realize how harmful and damaging it is. A woman being pulled from her children is considered a tragedy. Why isn't a man being pulled away from his daughter considered a tragedy? I would have cried if Jorge, after fighting so hard, had been stripped of his daughter. Again, like Ana's mother said, King Solomon would find splitting a modern baby impossible.

Accepting that her former love would definitely protect her daughter from whatever drama their family had been dragged into because of Pytr was definitely a moment where I was happy for Ana. And the fact that Pytr was killed? I was v. happy.

Yala and Alicia was a little harder. First, I really appreciated the fact that Alicia called Mack and Dero on their bullshit. Let me say this now: MACK WAS A DRUG DEALER! Yeah, he’s a nice guy but when he was on the streets, he had to be ruthless to be that successful and veiland’s being nice about whitewashing his past, but the man sold DRUGS. His father sold drugs. Let’s not forget that. The ‘bug’, the CO, called it right: Yala’s biggest mistake was getting involved with Mack. If she really wanted to escape what she’d grown up with, she should have steered well clear of Mack. She was smart. She made a success of her life. Mack was HER downfall. Now Mack’s a success and he’s leaving her behind. Alicia was right: Mack’s not giving Yala what she gave him.

Second, I liked that Alicia recognized that she was having problems doing this. There were a lot of things she said that I admired, but my favorite was when she said:
Mack and Dero don’t understand what that’s like, to work hard for your kids and do your best for them while trying to support someone who needs you but can’t do shit for you. Someone who needs money for commissary and needs socks and visits and news from the block, but can’t hold you when the pressure is overwhelming. They don’t respect the strength it takes to hold down someone in prison while still keeping yourself and your babies alive. They don’t understand what it’s like to have all the pressure on you and crack under it.

AMEN! I understood her there and I can’t think of a woman I know who doesn’t. Men don’t understand that! Even Mack doesn't because he has his family behind him! Yala had no one, just Alicia and she stayed strong for him!

I love that Alicia understands and respects that. I love that Alicia was really Yala's only family and, even after the divorce, Alicia continued to help her former DIL. Yala is the mother of her grandchildren and it's in her best interest to stay close to them and their mother. Even now, now that everyone's abandoned Yala, Alicia was still visiting, still trying to support her and that is wonderful. It's a testament to how STRONG both of these women are that they recognize they have a bond that nothing can break, not even men. I only wish Alicia didn't feel as if she were betraying Yala by asking her to sign over custody to Mack. I mean, the truth of the situation is that Yala is going to prison and someone has to be able to take care of the boys. Their father is the most appropriate choice and the right one.

Then we get the full story, from Yala's POV, of her and Mack in the beginning and I see the woman Mack fell in love with. Yala was strong, smart, and she was clear about what she wanted. Plus, she was very clear about what she was afraid of. Mack didn't really respect her fears. He saw it as her being silly, but when I think back to all the Mack stories, everyone's said the same thing: Yala's greatest fear was being left. She depended on Mack and he left her and everyone in her life left her and Mack turned out to be like everyone else. I wish Yala had been able to clearly tell him, 'Look, I wish you would stay home a little more. You don't have to work double shifts. We can cut our budget. We'll save money. We'll do something, but I need more time with you, Mack. I need you to be home at night. I need you to spend time with me because you just spent 30 months in prison and now you're never home! It's like you're still in prison!"

Again, it’s Stephanie and her complete LACK OF COMMUNICATION! The only difference is Ranger got pissed off and yelled back at her and that snapped her out of it. There’s no indication that Mack did. He just seemed to take it, to wilt under the force of Yala’s anger. Anyway, imagine Steph’s life without Ranger to save her ass every twenty seconds. BLT has already said they won’t do it (or if they do, they’ll bill her). Imagine if Ranger was added to the list of people who said, since you can’t use your WORDS, I’m done with you. Ta-da! Yala’s predicament.

A little communication and they could have stayed married... and that's what's so sad to me. Stephanie won't open her mouth to communicate with Ranger and Yala's situation? That could easily be her future. All it takes is one mistake. Orange is the New Black (for you Netflix people) is proof that all it takes is one mistake. She's moving to a town where her antics won't be so cute. Her grandmother's already been arrested once. I hope Steph gets arrested. I hope Steph gets arrested and Bobby does end up being the one to bail her out. I'm sure he'd never let her forget it and he shouldn't!

Honestly, I think this might be one of your best, V. Stop writing for Stephanie because she's a pain in the ass and write your own characters. Stephanie and Ranger? Stephanie's a ho and Ranger's so beyond this. You’re beyond writing for a 30 year old child and Ranger's matured beyond this. He has his shit together and you're trying to combine a square peg and round hole. As I said in my review of Red Meat and Dairy, Steph will never learn.

We love your original characters more than Steph and Ranger at this point and you should leave this behind and move on. Write your own books!

Jocelyn

I feel very sorry for these women. They have lived terrible lives and have made such crapph choices and ruined what could've been. Sad really.