“Thank you. For being a listener, and a chef, and a laundromat. And also, for giving up so much of your life to protect our country. You’re a hero, Wes. Really.” She comes to where I stand in my open bedroom door, rises up on her toes, and brushes a kiss on my cheek. She turns and walks back to the guest room, closing the door gently behind her.
And I stand there, glued to the spot, the feel of her lips still on my cheek.
26
Wes
Sweat burns my eyes.The child whimpers. The woman is silent, but her terrified eyes scream louder than if she were to open her mouth. I’m on one knee in the middle of the street. The town is free from civilians, except for the unlucky ones the insurgents kept to use as martyrs. My guys stand around me, taking fire, while I work on disarming the bomb strapped to this woman and child.
“Not much time, Hayden,” Milicevic yells.
I don’t answer. All my energy is going toward the explosive. Thirty seconds and counting.
A whizzing crack fills the air, someone beside me slumps to the ground. My eyes stay trained on the woman and child, but the sorrow fills me anyway. I don’t need to see who it was. They are all my brothers.
“Hayden, fall back,” Milicevic commands.
I grunt my answer. No. My fingers work faster, seeking out wires, trying to understand a bomb that is homemade and also high tech, something that was carefully crafted to confuse the opposition—me.
“Now, Hayden. This is an order,” he barks in my face.
He doesn’t wait for me to obey. Arms wrap around my chest from behind and he drags me back.
The child’s tears create paths in the dust caking his cheeks, like a river with muddy banks.
The woman never opens her mouth.
So I scream for her.
“Wes? Wes, wake up.”
My eyes blink open. The muscles in my legs and arms are coiled tight, as if they’ve been in motion. My heart races, blood and adrenaline tearing through me.
My vision adjusts to the darkness and I see the outline of a woman. “Dakota.” My voice is hoarse, with a pleading, almost desperate, edge.
“You were having a nightmare,” she whispers, leaning over my bed. Tentatively she reaches for me, her hand splaying out on my chest. Her fingers curl and uncurl, and I see what she’s doing. She’s not just soothing me. She’s soothing myheart.
I wait for the embarrassment to warm my neck and face, but it never comes. Instead I feel… relief? How can that be? I shouldn’t be turning toward her like this, shouldn’t be closing my eyes and allowing her sweetness to melt into my damaged parts.
“Wes?” My name is a question, and I know what she’s asking.
“No,” I say quickly, even though part of me wants to sayyesand tell her about my dream.
Tell her and be free of some of it. Would the wound begin to heal? Is it even okay if it does? Do I deserve to heal? The more time I spend around Dakota, the more I begin to think that maybe I can have a sliver of the happiness I once wanted for myself.
Dakota climbs onto the bed and sits back on her heels. The outside edge of her bent leg presses against my side. She leans down, lips grazing my cheek, sliding over to the corner of my mouth. “I can take your mind off it,” she whispers, her breath warm on my skin.
It’s not even an offer that needs consideration. The answer isyes, absolutely, of course, I’ve been waiting five years to be with you again.
Desire rushes through me, hot and intense. I need her now. If I am the wound, Dakota is the salve.
I roll her over without warning and she gasps. I cover her body with the length of mine, prop myself up on a forearm, and turn on the nightstand lamp. The yellow light casts a soft glow.
“I need to see you,” I explain, staring down into the depths of the hazel eyes I’ve never forgotten.
“Same,” she chokes out, cupping my cheek.
My head dips low and I skim the tip of my nose over the pink flush on her cheeks. Her fingernails rake through my hair and down my neck, sending a shudder through me.
