American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History by Chris Kyle Read Free Book Online

the night in April of 2001 when I saw Taya standing at a bar in a San Diego club, talking with one of my friends. She had a way of making black leather pants look smokin’ hot and classy. The combination suited me fine.
    I’d just joined Team 3. We hadn’t started training yet, and I was enjoying what amounted to a week of vacation before getting down to the serious business of becoming a SEAL and earning my place on a Team.
    Taya was working for a pharmaceutical company as a drug rep when we met. Originally from Oregon, she’d gone to college in Wisconsin and moved out to the coast a couple years before we met. My first impression was that she was beautiful, even if she looked pissed off about something. When we started talking, I also found out she was smart, and had a good sense of humor. I sensed right away she was someone who could keep up with me.
    But maybe she should tell the story; her version sounds better than mine:
    Taya:
    I remember the night we met—some of it, at least. I wasn’t going to go out. This was all during a low spot in my life. My days were spent in a job I didn’t like. I was fairly new in town and still looking for some solid female friendships. And I was casually dating guys, with not much success. Over the years I’d had some decent relationships and a couple of bad ones, with a few dates in between. I remember literally praying to God before I met Chris to just send me a nice guy. Nothing else mattered, I thought. I just prayed for someone who was inherently good and nice.
    A girlfriend called and wanted to go down to San Diego. I was living in Long Beach at the time, about ninety miles away. I wasn’t going to go but somehow she talked me into it.
    We were walking around that night and we passed a bar named Maloney’s. They were blaring “Land Down Under” by Men at Work. My friend wanted to go in but they had an outrageous cover charge, something like ten or fifteen bucks.
    “I’m not doing that,” I told her. “Not for a bar that’s playing Men at Work.”
    “Oh, shut up,” my girlfriend said. She paid the cover and in we went.
    We were at the bar. I was drinking and irritable. This tall, good-looking guy came over and started talking to me. I’d been talking to one of his friends, who seemed like a jerk. My mood was still pretty bad, though he had a certain air about him. He told me his name—Chris—and I told him mine.
    “What do you do?” I asked.
    “I drive an ice cream truck.”
    “You’re full of shit,” I told him. “Obviously you’re military.”
    “No, no,” he protested. He told me a bunch of other things. SEALs almost never admit to strangers what they really do, and Chris had some of the best BS stories ever. One of the better ones was dolphin waxer: he claimed that dolphins in captivity need to be waxed so their skin didn’t disintegrate. It’s a pretty convincing story—if you’re a young, naive, and tipsy girl.
    Fortunately, he didn’t try that particular one on me—I hope because he could tell I wouldn’t fall for it. He’s also convinced girls that he mans an ATM machine, sitting inside and doling out money when people put their cards in. I wasn’t anywhere near that naive, or drunk, for him to try that story.
    One look at him and I could have told he was military. He was ripped and had short hair, and had an accent that said “not from here.”
    Finally, he admitted he was in the service.
    “So what do you do in the military?” I asked.
    He said a bunch of other things and finally I got the truth: “I just graduated from BUD/S.”
    I was like, okay, so you’re a SEAL.
    “Yeah.”
    “I know all about you guys,” I told him. You see, my sister had just divorced her husband. My brother-in-law had wanted to be a SEAL—he’d gone through some of the training—and so I knew (or thought I did) what SEALs were all about.
    So I told Chris.
    “You’re arrogant, self-centered, and glory-seeking,” I said. “You lie and think you