“But your family doesn’t live there now.”
“Not all of us.”
Lines of confusion creased Reese’s forehead when he frowned. “Are you saying your mother still lives there?”
Cherie emitted an unladylike snort. “My mother wouldn’t leave even if she won the Powerball.”
“I’ve known a lot of folks who don’t like change, Cherie.”
“And my mother is one of those. But she did promise to come down and visit with me whenever she gets some vacation time.”
“I’m willing to bet that, once she sees your home and how nice it is to live on Coates Island, she’ll change her mind.”
“That’s what I’m hoping.”
“If she’s anything like her daughter, she’ll go back to Connecticut and begin packing up to relocate. I don’t know what it is about this place, but once I left the military I knew I wanted to come back and spend the rest of my life here.”
Cherie leaned forward. “It’s because you have roots here, Reese. Bettina told me you grew up on the mainland and that you enlisted in the army after graduating high school.”
“Bettina got her facts wrong. I enrolled in the ROTC in college, and when I graduated, it was as a second lieutenant. I waited a couple of years before applying to Ranger school. It was the most grueling thing I’d ever encountered, but luckily I made it through and earned my Ranger tab. I served for twenty years, while achieving the rank of captain.”
“Why did you leave?”
“There’s a lot of truth to the saying that war is hell. I’d lost count of the number of military funerals I attended, and then there were my buddies who had returned home maimed and suffering from PTSD. I felt that if I signed up for one more deployment, my luck would run out. It was like putting one bullet into a revolver and playing Russian roulette. You’d never know when you pulled the trigger whether the live round would come up in the chamber and it was suddenly lights out. I know I shouldn’t be telling you this when your brothers are on active duty.”
Cherie’s eyelids fluttered as she forced a smile. “It’s what they signed up for, Reese, although it’s not something I wanted for them. Whenever I pray, it’s for them to be safe.”
Reaching across the table, Reese held her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “They’ll be all right.”
“That’s something I’ve come to believe. That life wouldn’t be so cruel that I would lose another brother.”
Reese felt as if he’d been punched in the gut. When Cherie talked about her brothers, he’d assumed she was referring only to the twins. Releasing her hand, he rounded the table and eased her up, and then sat on her chair and settled her on his lap. He cradled her head against his shoulder.
“Talk to me, bae.”
He listened intently when Cherie revealed the circumstances surrounding her older brother’s murder. Her voice was void of emotion as she talked about how his death had changed her and that her sole focus was shielding her younger brothers from the same fate; after she’d moved out of her old neighborhood, she insisted they stay with her whenever they weren’t in school.
“I’d made it out, Reese, and at that time, I was willing to do anything to get them out.”
“You were successful, Cherie, because they did make it out. Do they realize the sacrifice you made to get them to where they are today?”
Cherie nodded. Unburdening herself to Reese was different from when she’d told Kayana about losing Jamal. Having him hold her, feeling his warmth and strength, was like eating after a self-imposed fast. And he was right when he said she’d made sacrifices to help Daniel and David achieve their goals. She’d made the decision to continue to sleep with Weylin after he’d become a member of Congress because she realized she needed his recommendation to get her brothers into the military academies. She’d also sacrificed having a normal relationship because she’d found herself in too deep when she continued to sleep with a married man.
“I believe they do,” she said after a comfortable silence.
“Do you realize how remarkable you are?” Reese asked.
“I’m anything but remarkable. I did what I had to do to shield my brothers from street violence. Where I lived is no different from other neighborhoods, regardless of race or income, when it comes to violence. There seems to be an epidemic of murder and shootings, whether it occurs in classrooms or at shopping malls.”
Reese’s fingers played in her hair. “Is that why you didn’t have any children? That you’re afraid of losing them to gun violence?”
She didn’t want to tell him she’d lost a child, not to violence but to greed. She traded her baby for a lifestyle that had evaded her, and in the end, she wasn’t the winner but a loser. She’d lost her baby and the man she’d loved unconditionally—for a price.
“No. If I fell in love and married, I’d definitely have a child.”
“Would you have to be married?” he asked quietly.
Her head came up, and she gave Reese a direct stare. “Yes.”
