“My leg’s okay. Am I going to need stitches?”
“Oh, yeah. I’ll take you as soon as I settle Jess down.”
Even as Claire spoke, they could hear the clatter of Jess’sheavy black shoes on the stairs.
“You okay now, Claire?”
Claire paused a second, closer to him than she’d beensince they’d shared his bed, her hand to his head, her heartstill stuttering with dread and surprise. She searched his eyesfor ghosts and found only that hint of old sadness she knew too well. The reflection of terrible lessons learned early. Shefound, surprisingly enough, that she could smile for whatshe saw there.
“Yeah,” she admitted tentatively. “I think I am. Thankyou, Tony.”
“Anytime.”
“I’m so sorry,” Jess blurted out, careening to a stop in thedoorway, her face still blotchy and wet, her hands filled withthe tackle box Claire kept in the kitchen, her chest heavingwith exertion and stifled tears. “I’m sorry, Tony, really, Ididn’t mean to do it, I didn’t mean to...”
Claire sighed in resignation. Tony grinned, took the towelhimself and climbed all the way to his feet.
“See?” he said. “I really am okay, Jess. You didn’t killme.”
She shuddered with distress. “I looked,” she whispered.
Tony didn’t understand. Claire smiled for her little girlwho had such a big heart and so much to learn.
“He doesn’t mind, Jess. I told you, honey. Those scarsare from when he was injured in Vietnam.”
Jess’s eyes grew even wider. She went, if possible, paler.She let Claire take the tackle box from her with nothingmore than a mere “Oh.”
Tony’s answering smile was as easy as if they’d been talking holidays. “Now you know how good a nurse yourmom really is,” he told her, and Claire was amazed to seeher daughter smile.
She went to him that night. Crept out in the darknesswhen the children couldn’t hear her, when Peaches wasasleep and the owl was quiet, and she walked to his room inthe empty inn where no one could hear her. She walked withdetermination, and she stood in his door in silence, notknowing how to ask for his comfort.
She didn’t have to. Without a word, he simply opened hisarms and she went to him. In the dark, they murmured andwhispered and sighed, and their bodies grew slick with theheat and their own need. In the empty hours of the night,they held off the ghosts and kept away the rage and createda beauty neither had allowed in lives meted out in careful doses.
Claire wanted to talk to him. She wanted to ask him aboutthose nurses he’d talked to who’d been to Vietnam. Shewanted to ask him if he knew any other nurses who mighthave found themselves waiting at the door of a trauma center for wounded who had died twenty years before.
She wanted to ask him to be there with her in the morning. Not so much because she was afraid, but because shewas falling in love.
She didn’t ask him.
She didn’t ask him that night or the night after that. Shedidn’t ask them when they ate together as a family or when she sat down with a glass of wine in her hand while the kidscelebrated with the country as it racked up impressive military victories against a distant warlord. She didn’t ask him when they sat in her office talking about his work or whenthey strolled along the back roads by the James River enjoying the quiet of a country summer.
Feeling fragile as new ice, she took her steps with the mostdelicate of care. Girded herself with those soft, dark nightsfor the moment she would have to take the next step. Hopedwith an emotion she wasn’t used to that each memory sheshared with Tony would ease those old doors open withenough care that she could handle whatever came pouringout. Convinced herself that she could make it throughwithout having to tell Tony the truth.
She felt better. Stronger. More in control. She had someone who could share the good and the bad and make senseof them both. Someone who smiled at her in a way shehadn’t allowed a man to in almost eleven years.
She still drove faster.
She slept less.
She bought her wine and hid her bottles.
“I don’t know what you want me to do.”
Peaches just glared at him. “Not doin’ much now. Shelooks like hell.”
Tony rubbed at his face, exhausted. “She’s beginning totalk to me,” he hedged.
Peaches just snorted and slammed down the dough he waskneading onto the counter. “She’s drinking.”
