Jenna turned just a little, helpfully pinning herself between him and the truck. “What are you … going to do now, then?”
He choked back his immediate response. The urge to kiss her, to lift her up and pin her to his new truck, surged through him like a riptide. He drew a hard breath. “Looks like I’ll be heading back to your place, and maybe actually reading that letter.”
She let her head drop back against the doorframe. “That plan really went sideways, didn’t it?”
It could still.“I’ve seen worse.”
Jenna finally hauled herself into the cab. “I can’t decide if that’s reassuring or petrifying, if I’m being honest.”
He only chuckled. There was no sense in giving her nightmares she didn’t need.
Jenna turned her head to watch out the window as he pulled back onto the road, and Jon knew if he let her, she’d only sink further into the fears already consuming her. She cared about what may or may not have been happening to the girl. That was respectable, but he couldn’t stand letting her fall apart over it.
He flexed one fist over the wheel and asked the first unrelated, distracting question that came to mind. “Could you tell me … about the story my old man spread?”
Jenna started and leaned away from the window. “What?”
“I didn’t exactly get it out of him,” Jon said. “It’d just be nice to have an idea what the town thinks happened to me. How long it’s been since he ran his mouth. That kind of thing.” He was of mixed opinions on it, truthfully, but it was never smart to knowingly move forward uninformed.
Jenna drew an audible breath. “It was … while I was away,” she began. “Maybe three or four years after your grandpa passed. My parents still lived in town, and they said one day it was like the whole town was on-edge. Mom said she saw Mrs. Valdez crying in the grocery store and she had no idea why.” Jenna shifted her purse to her lap. “Until Mama J showed up atthe door that night. I guess she smelled like she’d had way too much to drink, so they brought her in rather than let her walk off, and she started wailing about what failures they all were as parents. Her, and mine. She was mad that I hadn’t stopped you from leaving for bootcamp, and mad that my parents hadn’t pressured me to stop you.”
Jon locked his jaw as he turned onto her street. His mother hadn’t exactly lived a sober life when he’d been younger, and she’d been prone to drama, but it was still a bit hard to picture. Not that he doubted Jenna’s words.
“It actually took me a few years to get that part out of my parents,” Jenna said with a small laugh. “They were afraid I’d take it to heart, I think.”
He wanted to ask if she had, but he bit the question back. The accusation itself hadn’t been fair. He could only hope Jenna—the entire Hodge family—knew that. He killed the engine once the truck was parked again at her curb, released his seatbelt, and turned to face her. She still hadn’t gotten to the most crucial part.
Jenna didn’t turn to look at him. “It wasn’t until my parents drove Mama J home that they heard the story themselves,” she said. “George came out, ‘grumpier than usual’ my dad said, and of course they asked him if something had happened.” She trailed off and rolled her lips between her teeth, the memory obviously distressing her.
Jon reached out and curled a finger beneath her chin. “He’s a piece of shit.” He held her stare. “I know whatever the story is, it hurt you, and I’m sorry for that. Sorry for him.” His thumb stroked along her skin, beneath her abused lip. “But I’m right here, Jenna. So, whatever it was, it was bull crap.”
She offered him a small smile and reached up, catching his hand and pulling it into both of hers. “George said they’d gotten a call that morning from the Marines, from some ‘multi-starGeneral’ is how I heard it, informing them that you were gone. The story was that you had stepped onto an old minefield, like we’d heard about back from Vietnam or something, and before anyone even knew what had happened you were”—her hands clenched tighter to his—“in pieces. George claimed they’d been told it wouldn’t be possible for your remains to be returned, but that your tags would be shipped home for funerary services.” She sucked in another deep breath. “Which, obviously, never happened. I heard over time that he followed that story with grumblings about shipping delays, tales of apologetic phone calls, until finally he was cursing about what a poor mail delivery system our country has.”
Jon curled his fingers around Jenna’s hand and held his jaw locked tight as he replayed her story. It was shit, of course, but that was what pissed him off. George couldn’t have just forgotten about him. He’d had to go and tell some cliché, unprovable story to garner himself sympathy and discredit the entire Corps in the process. He could only guess at his father’s reasons, but none were justifiable. It’d been a long time since Jon had had quite such a strong urge to punch the man.
“The thing is,” Jenna said, her strained voice drawing him out of his darkening thoughts, “I think … I think that might also be what killed Mama J.”
Jon’s eyes widened. “What?”
Sadness and guilt danced in Jenna’s expression. “Her drinking got so bad. From everything I’ve heard, it’s like she was just never sober anymore. One day, not even a year after George told everyone that lie, she was apparently stumbling down School House Road and she just collapsed. My parents heard from Mrs. Bell that there was a broken bottle of whiskey next to her, and the county coroner confirmed she died from alcohol poisoning. She wasn’t in great shape in a lot of ways, but that was what did it.”
Jon sank back and dragged a hand down his face, his mind threatening to spiral with all the information.
Information he’d asked for. Information he knew he’d needed. Information he’d never wanted.
His mother had drunk herself to death rather than be trapped with George, because she saw no other way out. Maybe she even blamed herself for his supposed death, because his terrible relationship with his father—with both of them, really—was what had pushed him to bond so closely with his grandfather and, in turn, to join the Marines.
It wasn’t like he’d expected to come home and suddenly have a positive relationship with his parents. He simply hadn’t been prepared for the layers of shit that had grown over his family name while he’d been away. The lies, the hurt, the … whatever the hell that was.
Jon felt himself scowl.Then why did she leave me a letter?
It was time he stopped stalling.
“I’m really sorry you had to hear all of that from me,” Jenna said on a whisper.
He blinked hard, pushing the emotion back, and focused outward again. His focus settled on Jenna’s visibly struggling, guilt-ridden expression.Fuck that.Jon reached over once more, leaning as he moved, and caught the back of her neck with the hand she’d been clinging to seconds earlier. Her eyes widened, flashing up to his, glossy with unshed tears. He didn’t say a word before he sealed his lips over hers.
Even knowing it was a lie, knowing Jon was not only alive but having him beside her, Jenna despised reliving the story of thedeath she’d so long believed. She’d done her best to edit it to only the important and necessary pieces and she wished she could have spared him those, too. But, really, he needed to hear them. Sooner or later, he would.
