And twice in the same afternoon, I found myself standing at the kitchen sink with wet eyes and no explanation for it, which was not something Jackson Reyes did. Ever. Not after the IED that took Martinez’s leg, not after the firefight in Kandahar that left Torres with a scar across his throat, not even after the call from my mother telling me my father had a heart attack while working in the yard.
I didn’t cry. It wasn’t in the job description.
Except apparently my body had missed that memo, because there I was, staring out the kitchen window with tears tracking down my face and no idea why.
The farmhouse felt different now—the silence in the rooms where the team had moved, the single coffee cup back on the counter, the greenhouse visible through the window with the starter trays still under the grow lights.
I’d meant to check them that morning, to see if any new shoots had broken the surface, but Cruz had been packing and I’d been too busy pretending I didn’t care that he was leaving to remember the Belize seeds sitting in their trays.
Now the day was half over, the light already starting to fade, and I hadn’t done a single useful thing except throw up my breakfast and stand at the sink like an idiot with unexplained tears on my face.
Great. Apparently my body’s new hobby is betraying me before nine a.m.
I rinsed my mug and set it in the dish rack, then forced myself to eat a piece of dry toast. It stayed down, which I counted as a victory, then I headed out to the greenhouse to check the seedlings.
The air inside was warm and damp, smelling of soil and the green scent that came from things growing. I moved between the trays with practiced attention, checking each one for new growth, adjusting the grow lights where needed, making notes on the clipboard hanging from the center post.
Thirty seeds planted. Twenty-seven germinated. Not bad for a first attempt with a variety that had never been grown in Montana soil.
I’d meant to share that with Cruz. Had planned to explain how the Belize variety would need a longer growing season than the local climate usually provided, to watch his face as he listened with the same focus he brought to everything I said.
Now he was somewhere over the Atlantic, headed for whatever mission Sterling had called him back for, and I was talking to plants like they’d answer.
The house was too quiet when I went back inside. I turned on the radio to fill the space, then started dinner—chicken and rice, the kind of thing I could make without thinking about it. The kind of meal I’d been making for myself for years, before Cruz sat at my table and asked if I had any hot sauce.
Now the table was set for one again, the second chair pushed neatly against the opposite side, the blue mug back in the cabinet where it belonged.
I ate standing at the counter, then washed the single plate and set it in the dish rack to dry. The evening stretched ahead of me—three hours of darkness before I could reasonably go to bed,a house suddenly too big for one person, a silence that felt like it had weight and texture.
I checked my phone three times in thirty minutes, though I knew there wouldn’t be anything there. Cruz had been clear about the comms blackout—no texts, no calls, no contact until they were established at whatever location Sterling had sent them to.
Two weeks, max, he’d said. I could make it two weeks. Had survived far longer stretches with far less certainty.
I went to bed at ten, set my alarm for five, and lay awake staring at the ceiling until the digital display read 11:47. Then I got up, made another piece of toast I didn’t want, and sat at the kitchen table with the lights off, watching the valley go from dark to black outside the window.
The starter trays were still under the grow lights in the greenhouse, tiny green shoots reaching for a sun that had set hours ago. I’d need to check them in the morning, to see if any new ones had broken the surface overnight.
I’d need to check a lot of things in the morning. To see if my stomach had settled. To see if the hollow feeling in my chest had eased. To see if the house still felt too big and too quiet and too empty for one person who’d spent thirty years telling himself that was exactly how he liked it.
* * * *
On the fourth day, when the nausea hadn’t improved and the exhaustion had somehow gotten worse, I called Jasper. Not Decker, who’d have asked questions I couldn’t answer. Not Rawley, who’d have immediately put the entire property on lockdown. Not any of the people who’d want explanations or action plans or concrete details about what was happening to the man who was supposed to be keeping his shit together.
Just Jasper, who’d been a neonatal nurse before coming to the ranch, who knew how to listen without pushing, and who had never once looked at me like I was a problem that needed solving.
The phone rang three times before he picked up, his voice warm with the note it got when he recognized the caller. “Hey, Jackson. What’s up?”
I sat at the kitchen table, one hand flat on the wood surface, the other holding the phone to my ear. “I need to ask you something,” I said, keeping my voice level. “Medical question, but I’d rather not do it over the phone.”
There was a pause—Jasper registering the request, calculating the implications. “Are you hurt?” he asked, his voice shifting to the careful professional tone I’d heard him use with Danny when Brandon had a fever.
“No,” I said. “Not hurt. Just—“ I stopped, not sure how to finish the sentence. Just throwing up everything I eat? Just too tired to walk to the barn without stopping? Just standing at my kitchen sink with tears on my face and no idea why?
“I can be there in twenty,” Jasper said, not pushing for details. “Do you need me to bring anything?”
I thought about it for a moment. “Just yourself,” I said. “And maybe don’t mention this to anyone? For now?”
Another pause, longer this time. “Sure,” Jasper said, his voice careful. “Twenty minutes. See you then.”
