“That’s weird,” he murmured.
She searched the packing paper for anything else. When she saw the envelope at the bottom of the box, her heart lurched with a mixture of fear and excitement.
Maybe it would explain what was on the card they couldn’t access.
Zee unfolded the letter, hungry for a clue, for Matt’s voice, for anything that felt like the man she remembered.
Instead she was staring at words that looked like sentences but possessed too many numbers and other details that didn’t look like anything she’d ever received from Matt during any of his deployments.
Those letters were full of sweet talk about missing her and jokes about base food and promises about what they’d do when he got home.
This one didn’t read like a husband writing to his wife.
She pulled her lower lip into her mouth and bit down, shaking the letter. “What does any of this even mean?” Bitterness rang in the words.
“I thought—” She stopped herself, ashamed of how childish she sounded. But she thought her husband would have sent something meaningful toher.
Church held out his hand. “Let me see the letter.”
She hesitated only a second before passing it over, feeling an odd relief that her emotions didn’t match what she had been waiting for.
She had imagined opening this box would tear her open and drown her in grief all over again. Instead there was only confusion and mystery. The pain was there, sure, but it was blunted by the fact thatnoneof it made sense.
Then a chill crept over her. She darted a look at Church’s face.
“What if…”
He looked up from the letter, focusing on her.
“What if this is what they’ve been looking for?”
His expression didn’t change, which was worse than if it had because it meant he was already thinking it. The pit of her stomach felt hollow and cold as Church scanned the letter quickly, his eyes moving down the page. Then he started at the top again and read more slowly, brow furrowing in a way she would think looked sexy as hell if they’d been standing here doing anything else.
He took out his phone and started typing in some of the numbers. After a few tries, he went still.
She peered over his thick bicep. “What is it?”
He turned the screen toward her to reveal coordinates. “Syria.”
Mind reeling, she folded her arms across her middle. The place where Matt died on their last deployment.
Church kept reading the letter, then ran his finger inside the envelope. “There’s more.”
He tipped the envelope and two photographs slid out, cheap copies printed on basic copier paper. Zee took one and looked down at a photo of the team.
Her heart rocked forward with a painful slam. She skimmed the familiar faces of men she’d spent time with on evenings and weekends. In this photo, they were all grit and gear, held together by heat and dust.
“One person is missing.” Church’s voice sounded off.
She gave him a questioning look. He held out his hand, and she gave him the photo.
“Lucian isn’t in the team shot,” he said before she could ask.
The second picture filled the gap. Matt and Lucian stood side by side, both of them looking tired and windburned and alive in a way that punched her in the chest with as much force as seeing Matt’s smile.
At the bottom, typed beneath the image, were the words “Lucian’s 38thbirthday.”
Church gave a small shake of his head. “That doesn’t make sense.”
