Connor sat upbeside her with his back against the headboard. Who had lost his trust? A friend? A lover? “What happened?”
“The woman I was in love with, who I thought loved me, didn’t.”
“I thought you’d never been serious about anyone. That’s your reputation.”
“Rumor is wrong. When I was a combat medic in Afghanistan I fell for another combat medic. Her name was Casey. I loved her. I was crazy over her. We were together for months.” He shook his head. “I wanted to marry her. It would have been a disaster, but I was too young and dumb to realize that.”
“What happened?” Because something obviously had.
“She died.”
“Oh, Connor. That must have been so hard.”
“It was. Before she died she told me she was in love with another man.”
“Oh, no.”
“Yeah. I loved her,” he repeated. “I thought she loved me, that we were on the same page. I’m not sure we ever were. It gets worse. The man she was in love with? My best friend. Ryan Hunter, the field hospital doctor.”
“She told you just like that? Out of the blue?”
“Yep. I knew they were friends, but I had no idea she was in love with him. Maybe not at first but towards the end she was just stringing me along until she could tell Ryan how she felt. She must have thought that she should tell me first.”
“She should have. How did Ryan feel about her?”
“I don’t know.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “I think he never felt more for her than friendship, but he knew I was in love with her. He was—is—a good guy. He wouldn’t have done anything knowing how I felt about her.”
“Did he know how she felt?”
“I don’t think so. She never had the chance to tell him.”
“Because she died before she could.”
He nodded. “The day after she told me. Some soldiers had run into an IED on one of the roads near Kabul. We worked out of a field hospital near there. We took our ambulance to bring them in. When we got there it was a freaking mess. Casey and I were scrambling to get whoever we could into the ambulance. I was trying to stabilize the casualties enough to get them back to the hospital when an RPG hit one of the other Humvees. Casey was close enough to catch part of the blast. She was still alive when I got her to the hospital. Barely hanging on. Ryan did everything he could but she didn’t make it. She died on the table.”
Sierra put her hand over his and squeezed. “I’m so sorry.”
He turned over his hand and laced his fingers with hers. “I’m sorry she died but it would have been bad once she told Ryan how she felt. Ryan and I would never have been the same. We’ve never discussed it. We talked about her dying but not about how she felt about him. We’re still friends, to this day.
“But I’ve never been serious about a woman since then. Until you.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “I never trusted anyone enough. Part of it was who I chose to be with. Not many of them wanted anything serious either. I always told them up front and most of them understood and wanted the same thing I did. Fun. Casual.”
“Like us when we met in Vegas.”
“Right. Except you were different. I might not have realized it at the time but I’ve been in love with you since the moment we met.”
“No you weren’t. That was a one-night stand.”
“That’s what I thought too at first. It was supposed to be one night. I didn’t believe in love at first sight. Then I met you. I couldn’t get you out of my mind. I couldn’t forget that night. When I saw you that first day in the ER I thought it was fate. Which, by the way, I didn’t believe in either. Until you.”
Fate. She wasn’t sure if she believed in fate either. “I have to confess something too,” Sierra said.
“No you don’t.”
“Yes, I think I do. I was angry with you for being jealous of Phil, even though I’d told you I wasn’t getting back with him. I was mad because you didn’t believe me. But honestly, if I’d told him to go back to Dallas when he first got here none of this would have happened.”
