A Hero to Come Home To (21 page)

Jacob shuffled his feet, his gaze locked somewhere between them, and muttered, “I do, too.” Then, before she could say anything, he rushed on: “You should go.”

She should. She was rarely late, a quality well suited to the regimentation of school and Army life. She stood and walked to the doorway, pausing there long enough to look up at him.
Up
.
He was so tall, no longer the little boy whose head hadn’t even topped her shoulder when they’d met.

“I’ll be back around the usual time. If you need anything, you can call Liam’s mother or—or me.”

He nodded, then went into the living room and sprawled on the couch, turning on the TV with the remote. When she passed by the room after retrieving her jacket and bag from the kitchen, he gave no sign that he heard her good-bye.

H
uman contact,” Lucy announced. “That’s what I miss most.”

“Intimate contact,” Marti added, and Lucy nodded.

“Not just the wild monkey sex, but a hug. Holding hands. Warm legs to put my feet on in winter. Snoring.”

“Does Caveman snore?” Marti asked.

All eyes turned Carly’s way, and she blushed. “I have no idea.” When they feigned disappointment, she teasingly added, “But he’s a great kisser.”

He’d kissed her again Saturday night, after they’d dropped Justin off at his quarters, then unloaded her new stuff at her house, and on Sunday night. She hadn’t seen him Monday or so far today, but she was cooking dinner for him tomorrow. A turkey breast in the slow-cooker and all the traditional side dishes. She was nearly giddy with anticipation.

“At least you’re getting that much,” Jessy said, drawing one fingertip around the rim of her empty margarita glass. “The only intimacy in my life is with my gynecologist.”

“And not being preggers like Ilena here, you can only see him every so often.” With a shiver, Marti drew on her jacket. Cold? Or remembering what it was like when Joshua was alive?

“I miss having someone who knows what buttons to push to make my blood pressure redline.” Fia sighed. “I never thought I’d wish for a fart joke or cans of flat pop in the refrigerator or huge lint balls in the dryer because Scott never remembered to clean the trap.”

Lucy’s snort jiggled her round cheeks. “Mike never put a load of wet clothes in the dryer. It could mildew in the washer for all he cared.”

As the others joked about their husbands’ faults, Carly stirred the melted contents of her weekly drink. Jeff had liked jokes about bodily functions, too, and he’d been perfectly happy to put one shirt or pair of pants in the dryer while leaving the washer full of wet clothes. It was a guy thing, she supposed, and they’d all been married to such
guys
.

The conversation faltered after a moment, silence settling at the table like a soft quilt on a cold night. Jessy broke it by reaching across and taking the glass from under Carly’s straw. “Every week you come in here and waste perfectly good tequila. Being environmentally conscious, I’m going to put it to good use.”

“Environmentally conscious?” Marti snickered. “You use paper napkins, eat off foam plates
all the time
, and drink from plastic cups. You don’t recycle, you don’t reduce, and you don’t reuse.”

Jessy tossed back the drink, then smirked. “Then how about fiscally frugal? Try saying that three times fast with three and a half margaritas in you. But who’s counting?”

No one pointed out that she’d had four and a half. But they weren’t counting, right? And Jessy could handle liquor way better than Carly.
She
would be unconscious before she could drink that much in one evening.

Life was too precious to lose even one evening to unconsciousness.

“So.” Ilena rested her hands on her stomach and fixed a curious gaze on Carly. “Where exactly do things stand with you and Dane?”

Six expectant faces looked her way. “Well…I guess we’re dating.”

“We know that, sweetie.” That, along with a shoulder nudge, came from Therese. “We want to know how serious it is. How often do you see each other? Are you the only woman he’s seeing? What do you talk about? What do you do?”

“Has he copped a feel yet?” Lucy’s words were followed immediately by a blush. “Oh, great, now I’m sounding rude like Jessy.”

“I’m not rude,” Jessy protested. “I just cut through the bull—”

Ilena clamped her hand over Jessy’s mouth. “Not in front of Hector Junior, please. Besides, we’re putting Carly under the microscope now, not you.”

“Thank God for small miracles.”

Carly looked from one woman to the next, ending with Therese, then quietly said, “I like him. A lot. He’s…special. And I think he likes me, too. A lot. I think.” Growing warm under their gazes, she twisted her wedding ring in slow circles. “It’s all pretty new, you guys. I don’t know where we’ll be in a month or six months or even next week. It’s kind of scary to look that far ahead. When I married Jeff, I thought it was for the rest of eternity. I didn’t know ‘forever’ was going to be four years.”

Four years was no eternity. She’d been anticipating sixty or more.

At least, however pitifully few, their years had been happy. They’d had fights, of course, and there’d been a few times when they’d gone to bed mad, but oh, the making up had been sweet.

Blinking back the moisture that stung her eyes, she deflected the conversation away from herself. “Ilena, you’re not really going to call that child Hector, are you?”

The blond faked offense. “I am, after his father.”

“But his father went by Juan,” Fia pointed out.

“Well…I
am
naming him Hector. Hector Juan Lewis Gomez. For his father, his father’s father and my father. But his daddy insisted we would call him John.”

His daddy who’d never known of his existence. She and Dane had talked about so much, but she had no clue how he felt about kids. Did he like them? Want them? Was it too early for her to even be wondering?

As she’d said earlier, it was all so new. She could be investing way too much hope in this relationship…but that was the way her heart worked.

Please, God, don’t let it get broken again.

It was Therese who moved to leave first. “Wish I could stay longer, but kids at home and school tomorrow.”

Carly gathered her things, then hooked her arm through Jessy’s as they strolled to the door, a few steps behind the rest. “You okay?”

Jessy gave her a sidelong look. “Sure. Why do you ask?”

Should she mention the drinking? It wasn’t as if she’d ever seen the redhead tipsy or stumbling. She never slurred her words, didn’t miss work, didn’t drive after having a drink or two.

Was it up to Carly to even decide what was too many? She readily admitted she wasn’t a drinker. Even Mia imbibed more than she did. Heavens, her own mother enjoyed a glass or two of wine with dinner on a regular basis.

She chose to let it slide. “Just wondering. Can I give you a ride home?”

Outside the door, Jessy paused, face tilted to the night sky, eyes closed. She took a few deep breaths, then looked at Carly, her gaze as clear as could be. “Thanks, but I like the walk.”

“I’m not brave enough to walk alone at night.”

“Night? See all these lights? And there are restaurants or clubs on every block. If I screamed once, a whole company of soldiers would come racing to my rescue.” Jessy’s grin was quick and lascivious. “Hey, that’s not a bad idea.”

Carly laughed. She’d never had a bit of the other woman’s boldness and never would.

“Go home, kiddo,” Jessy said, tugging her into a hug. “Call soldier boy and tell him good night. Better yet, invite him over and show him a good night. Then tell me all about it, would you?”

Carly watched her head off west on Main Street before turning to the eastside parking lot and her car. Calling Dane and telling him good night…Hey, that wasn’t a bad idea.

She drove home, letting herself in, then stopping abruptly in the doorway to the living room. Therese and Jacob had helped her and Dane put all the furniture back in place Sunday afternoon, along with laying the rug. It still surprised her every time she saw the new room, as if the turn in the very familiar hallway had taken her to a very unfamiliar place.

She liked it.

She was ready for bed, warming a cup of milk in the microwave and debating what changes to make next, when the cell phone rang. Recognizing the number on the display, she answered with a smile. “Hello.”

“Do you ever get tired of Mexican every Tuesday night?”

Tilting her head to hold the phone, she stirred chocolate sauce into the milk, then licked the leftover bit on the spoon. “No. I’m just a routine sort of person, I guess. I find it comforting to know that a few things in my life are carved in stone.”

Dane’s voice was thoughtful when he replied. “Yeah, I can see that. How are the margarita girls?”

Taking her milk and a magazine from the day’s mail, she padded down the hall to the bedroom. Maybe the dimly lit corridor should be her next project. Sunshiny yellow or pure bright white. She’d have to ask Dane’s opinion.

She settled in bed, sliding her feet under the covers, and gave him a quick update on the six regulars.

“And how about you?”

“Good.” It wasn’t her usual automatic response, the one that had become standard after Jeff’s death, the answer most people hadn’t really wanted to hear to a question they felt obligated to ask.
I’m fine. I’m doing okay. I’m all right.
People showed they cared by asking, and she acknowledged it by not burdening them with the truth.

Tonight she really was good.

“What are you up to?” she asked.

“Seeing how long I can lie on the couch flipping through the TV channels and eating potato chips.”

She laughed at the image. “Wow, strenuous work. What’s your record?”

“Forty-seven hours if you don’t count bathroom breaks and switching to cookies when the potato chips ran out. That was in Italy.”

“After the divorce?” She couldn’t imagine the woman who’d chosen affairs over him, especially being so indiscreet. If Carly ever had an affair, it would have to be the most closely guarded secret in America and she would have to be certifiably nuts. She didn’t
believe
in breaking vows.

“Yeah, but that wasn’t why. We’d just gotten back from three weeks’ training in Germany and had a long weekend off. That was how I spent half of it.”

She echoed his words back to him. “Yeah, I can see that. I’d certainly need forty-seven hours vegging out on the couch after three weeks in Germany.”

“Hey, it was work. Mostly.” His yawn came through the phone. “Want me to bring anything tomorrow night?”

Just yourself.
“Um, no, I’ve got it covered.” Mia’s recipe for the turkey, Lisa’s for the dressing, Therese’s foolproof gravy. She’d figured out the sweet potatoes and the pecan pie on her own.

“Okay.” This time his yawn triggered the same in her. “I’ll see you around six.”

“Good night.”

The instant she laid the phone down, she missed him. It had been that way with Jeff. He could have been 7,500 miles away, but while they were on the phone, it was as if he were right next to her, and when he hung up, she felt so alone.

This time there was a certain comfort, though, in the fact that the solitude wouldn’t last long. She would see Dane in about eighteen hours, and instead of dwelling on the time apart, she was anticipating tomorrow’s dinner. As she settled pillows behind her back and opened the magazine, her brain warned that she was expecting too much too soon.

But her heart didn’t care, and it hadn’t led her wrong yet.

The last thing on Dane’s schedule before leaving work Wednesday was meeting with the first sergeant, his cadre squad leader, about his upcoming thirty-day assessment.

“You haven’t decided yet what you want to do,” First Sergeant Chen remarked. “You know, this is just a preliminary report. No one expects you to be a hundred percent about anything yet. Are you leaning one way or the other?”

Dane shifted in his chair. “Depends on when you ask. After physical or occupational therapy, I’m pretty sure the answer is transition out. Some days I think I might as well stay, and others I wonder…” He gazed at the framed commendations on the wall, thinking of his own collection on his own wall. “I always thought I’d make a career in the Army, in Airborne. I wasn’t prepared to put in twelve years, then not be able to jump anymore, not be combat-ready anymore.”

And there was one more thing to factor into his decision now: Carly. Obviously she didn’t mind dating a soldier, but how would she feel about getting serious with one? A lot of women were like Army groupies, going from one soldier to the next, but Carly wasn’t that kind. She’d been through the training, the deployments, the separations. Worse, she’d had to deal with Jeff’s death: the casualty notification; the days waiting for his body to return; the dignified transfer home to Colorado; the funeral arrangements; the funeral itself; living without him.

If Dane stayed in, he wouldn’t likely be sent back into combat, but he was still deployable. There would still be separations, and there were still hazards inherent to the job. Would she
want
to be with another soldier, not just dating but on a permanent basis? Would she want even the slightest risk of being an Army widow not once but twice?

God, was he really thinking about getting married again? Falling in love again?

Not so much thinking about it, he was afraid, as verging on doing it. Getting involved. Caring. Wanting a lot from a woman who still didn’t know exactly the man she was dealing with.

“You know, there’s a lot you can do besides Airborne,” Chen said. “You’re an Eleven-Charlie. You could reclassify without too much trouble and teach at the artillery school at Fort Sill. You could be an instructor at TRADOC at Fort Polk, getting units ready to deploy. If you have any interest in medicine, you could go to Fort Sam.” A wicked grin spread across his face. “If you want to go back home, you could do recruiting.”

Dane snorted. “Yeah, I’d be a great one to sign up new recruits.
Join the Army, get shot at, and get your leg blown off.
No, thanks, First Sergeant. Recruiting’s tough duty.”

And the worst place he could possibly be stationed was back home, where he would almost certainly run into his ex-wife and her happy family, where his mother would make sure not a soul in the county was unaware of her poor crippled son.
I told him not to join the Army, but no, he wouldn’t listen. And there he is, not even a whole man anymore. Good thing his wife left him before this happened. Can you imagine how hard this would have been for her?

“You got any particular reason for getting out or staying in?”

“Besides the body parts I lost?” Dane asked drily.

Chen laughed. “Yeah, but lucky for you, the Army had replacement parts in stock.”