Chapter 47
The porch had become his place.
Not intentionally.
It had just sort of happened.
Somewhere between therapy appointments, restless nights, and slowly learning how to exist inside his own skin again, Chase had found himself gravitating toward the porch whenever things in his head got too loud.
And lately?
Things had been loud.
The old wooden swing creaked softly beneath him as he leaned forward, elbows braced against his knees while the evening settled around the house in slow, familiar layers.
Crickets hummed low somewhere in the distance.
Wind stirred lazily through the trees. The scent of rain still lingered faintly in the air even though the storm from earlier had already passed.
Inside, muffled voices drifted faintly through the kitchen window.
Aria and Parker were talking quietly.
Probably about him.
Honestly... he was used to it now, everybody seemed to be talking about him lately.
His therapy, his memories and now this damn trial.
Emily... the thought of her alone made something tight settle low in his chest.
Because soon, too damn soon.
He was going to have to sit in a courtroom and face the woman who had spent years being his wife while somehow also being the reason he had stayed so damn lost.
His ex wife, the phrase still sounded strange in his head.
Wrong somehow and not because he wanted her.
God no.
Not anymore.
But because at one point, she had been his whole life, or at least what he believed his life was.
And that realization sat ugly inside him.
Because now that he was more himself again, really himself, more Chase than Will had ever been, he could finally see all the cracks.
The imbalance and the manipulation.
The way everything had somehow quietly centered around Emily while he floated through life confused and dependent and desperate to feel grounded.
The thing that made him angriest?
She had known, maybe not everything, definitely not his whole story.
But enough, she had known enough to know he had memory loss, enough to know he was vulnerable and she had known enough to know he had no damn clue who he was... who he really belong to.
And somehow, she had never really tried to to help him find out who the hell he really was, and that alone hurt worse than he liked admitting.
Because this was not the nineteen hundreds.
Hell, it wasn't even hard he now understood, that with fingerprints, dental records, military databases, missing persons files and fucking facial recognition it was almost childs play to get a person back where they belong.
... especially a Southern man with military injuries who mysteriously appeared in New Zealand, yeah that alone should have raised a thousand questions.
And somehow, nobody asked them.
Or worse.
Maybe they had and somebody ignored them while supplying no answers.
His jaw tightened, because Parker had dug, and dug, and kept digging.
And what did he find?
Mission reports altered, recovery efforts ending too quickly, paperwork that made no damn sense, orders sending them somewhere they were never supposed to be in the first place.
Like somebody higher up had made a mistake so catastrophic that burying the men caught in the fallout became easier than accountability.
The word abandonment sat bitter in his mouth.
Because the deeper Parker got...the uglier it looked.
Like he had been sacrificed, forgotten and disposed of.
And Chase...
Jesus Christ.
Chase had spent years chained in hell wondering why nobody came. His hand tightened unconsciously around the beer bottle resting between his palms.
The anger still surprised him sometimes. He had not been an angry man before.
But now? He seemed to be angry a lot but mostly at himself.
Especially himself, because despite everything, despite being furious, despite feeling betrayed, despite the fact that Aria had already filed ethical complaints against Emily and Chase himself had backed her fully... some stupid part of him still felt protective.
And God, he hated that.
He hated not understanding it.
Hated the guilt that showed up every time somebody talked about Emily like she was some villain in a story... because she wasn't and she was at the same time. He knew that in her own way, she had loved him or at least loved the version of him she found.
Will.
The quieter version, the easier version, the confused version.
The version who did not remember the sound of Aria laughing in the kitchen or the way she stole the blankets at night or how she tucked herself into his side without thinking.
The version who forgot himself enough to become somebody smaller.
His jaw flexed.
Because that hurt too. Realizing Will had never really been him.
Not at all, Will was just somebody trying to make sense of an empty room inside his own head.
Emily would have hated Chase. Will was quiet, unimposing, and a golden retriever. Chase was loud, demanding, forceful, confident and Aria's husband one hundred percent.
And somehow, that made him grieve for Emily too.
Because she had not fallen in love with Chase, no, she had fallen in love with a man who never existed.
And now?
Now as Chase he would have to walk into court and stand against her.
Publicly. Legally. Morally.
He would have to sit there while lawyers talked about ethics and manipulation and vulnerability.
Have to acknowledge aloud that what happened between them should have never happened.
Have to hurt someone who, despite everything, once mattered to him.
His chest tightened, he didn't want revenge and he didn't want to punish her.
But he was angry.
So damn angry.
Because somewhere in all of this the simple truth was she had stolen his life.
A life he almost never got back and during that time Aria was forced to endure the loss of him and the uncertainty of his return while his friends and her mourned, while the higher up's assigned him a KIA death certificate and made her bury him.
Yeah, he was pissed but at this moment he was still unable to form the words outside of his own mind as to why.
The door creaked faintly behind him.
He did not turn immediately, he did not have to because he knew her footsteps, he knew the quiet way she moved when she was worried. Knew the soft pause she always took before approaching him when she sensed he was too far inside his own head.
He exhaled slowly.
Chase glanced over his shoulder just enough to see Parker and Aria stepping outside together, both wearing expressions serious enough to immediately make something in his stomach tighten.
Well, that could not be good.
Parker carried a beer in one hand while the other disappeared briefly into the pocket of his jeans.
That never a good sign.
Without saying much, Parker moved toward the empty Adirondack chair and lowered himself into it with the quiet grunt of a man whose knees had seen better years. Aria drifted toward the porch swing.
Her fingers twisted together once in her lap before she looked over at him.
"We need to talk to you," she said quietly.
Definitely not good.
Chase looked between both of them slowly.
"You makin' that sound real ominous."
Parker exhaled through his nose. "Yeah, well..." A pause. "It kinda is."
Chase leaned back slightly, already bracing.
Because lately every serious conversation somehow managed to wreck him a little and he had a feeling that was exactly what was about to happen now, judging by the looks on their faces.
"What is it?" he asked quietly.
Aria reached over instinctively, resting a hand lightly against his forearm.
"Nothing bad," she said quickly. Then hesitated. "I promise, but it is complicated."
"That somehow sounds worse babe."
That got the faintest twitch out of Parker, like he wanted to laugh but could not quite commit to it.
"Before we get into the heavier stuff," Aria said gently, "we wanted to go over the trial."
Chase exhaled slowly.
His stomach immediately twisted again.
Parker leaned forward, forearms resting against his knees. "Lawyer called earlier."
Chase's jaw tightened automatically.
"Emily gets in Friday."
Friday seemed to soon for Chase but he didn't say that out loud.
"She'll be stayin' at a hotel," Parker continued. "Far as we know, she has been told to not come here."
A beat. "Though honestly?" His expression darkened slightly. "I wouldn't put it past. her so watchout."
Chase rubbed a hand slowly over his jaw. "What exactly happens next?"
Aria shifted slightly toward him.
"Well," she said carefully, "because of the divorce proceedings and the ethics complaint, both parties have to appear. The judge is worried about it becoming a media event so there will be a private trial held with only the necessary parties."
His chest tightened.
"You'll both give statements," she continued softly. "They'll ask questions about the relationship. Timeline stuff."
Chase looked away because the porch suddenly felt too small.
"They'll probably ask when you met," Aria added gently. "What role she had in your treatment."
Another pause. "How dependent you were on her after the hospital."
The word dependent sat ugly in his chest.
Because now?
Now he could see it, only too clearly.
Parker's jaw shifted.
"They'll also probably ask whether she made any attempt to help identify you."
They all already knew the answer.
No, definitelynot.
Not nearly enough.
Chase looked out toward the yard. "She's gonna hate me. She hates being the center of public attention... that fine I don't care, I just don't want her to try anything with Aria out of anger."
The words came quieter than intended.
Aria immediately turned toward him. "No."
His mouth twitched humorlessly. "Sweetheart..."
"She'll be hurt," Aria corrected softly. "Probably angry." A pause. "But this?"
Her fingers tightened gently against his arm. "This ain't on you and Parker will make sure she don't get near me."
Parker nodded once. "She made choices, brother." He took a sip of his beer, "Bad ones."
Chase swallowed hard as his throat tightened.
"I didn't wanna hurt her," he admitted quietly. "I'm not sure why, I just don't want this to destroy her."
Neither of them answered immediately, because there was nothing easy to explain what had to be said now. There was also no more avoiding the truth.
Parker sighed. "We know." A pause. "But there's somethin' else."
The tone in his voice made Chase look up immediately.
Parker rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.
That got Chase's attention, because Parker did not get nervous.
"What?" Chase asked carefully.
Parker hesitated, then slowly reached into his back pocket where he pulled out a worn photograph that was folded down the middle and tore slightly at one corner from age.
He held it for a second longer than necessary before finally handing it over.
Chase frowned immediately, he second he looked down, his stomach dropped.
His chest physically tightened. "What the hell?" He looked up immediately. "Why do you have a picture of Emily?"
Parker went still. "That ain't Emily." His voice roughened around the edges. "It's Demi."
Chase frowned harder. "...Demi?"
Parker nodded once. "My wife."
The world seemed to stop as he added quietly: "She's dead."
Complete silence followed that statement, while Chase just stared down at the photograph.
Not Emily, he could see that now as he looked closer, but close enough to make his chest tighten in a way he did not understand.
Because suddenly, something felt weird inside his brain... it was like he had just stepped onto unstable ground.
"...What?"
The photograph trembled slightly in Chase's hand, not enough for anybody else to notice at first.
But enough that he felt it. Enough that something deep inside his chest tightened painfully before his brain even understood why.
His stomach twisted so violently he almost dropped the picture.
Because suddenly, something felt familiar in a way that made his skin crawl.
The porch around him blurred slightly. The sound of crickets faded. Even the wind moving through the trees seemed to dull into nothing.
Aria said his name softly somewhere beside him, but it sounded distant now. Like she was speaking from underwater.
Parker watched him carefully from the other Adirondack chair, his expression tight with something that looked dangerously close to fear.
"Chase?"
And then, it hit.
Not like his other memories those had come in a bit fragmented at first, this memory slammed into ripping his mind apart at the force of it, this one slammed into him violently enough to steal the air from his lungs.
Heat was all around his body now, heat and sand.
The sharp metallic smell of gunfire and burning fuel.
His head throbbed instantly as the world around him disappeared completely.
Then everything calmed down... he was back there, back overseas, and back in the desert heat that felt thick enough to choke on.
Voices crackled through radios nearby while the convoy sat parked along a rough terrain that was all dirt and rock.
Sweat clung to the back of his neck beneath tactical gear while sunlight beat mercilessly overhead.
In that moment, burning under the blazing sun, he was happy, because he had just gotten off the phone with Aria.
He could hear her laugh so clearly it physically hurt. "You better not come home gaunt and skinny again."
Younger Chase laughed softly into the receiver while adjusting the strap of his rifle against his shoulder. "You callin' me pretty, baby?"
"Never because you are too high maintenance." she giggled, on the other end of the line.
"I promise to eat plenty and come back just as sexy as when I left." he joked, hoping to hear her laugh more.
Her sigh had carried that familiar smile behind it. "Just come home to me."
The ache in his chest nearly split him open, because he remembered how badly he wanted that.
How, ready he was to leave the desert and get back home to her and their small house in Tennessee.
He remembered telling her bye from everyone, while some of the guys called him whipped.
He remembered staring out at their convoy spread out across the sand and then he remembered as his eyes had lifted instinctively toward the horizon.
And there, a streak cutting violently through the sky.
For one impossible second, his brain refused to process what he was seeing.
No. No. No. No...
RPG.
Someone screamed nearby while everything erupted at once.
Chaos and shouting came from all around him while his men ran for cover, ran to get as far away as possible or for the nearest weapon...while Chase had frozen.
Just for a second, one single catastrophic second, while disbelief rooted him in place because his mind could not accept what was happening fast enough.
And that second, cost them everything.
The explosion hit hard enough to shake the ground beneath him. Heat blasted across his body while smoke and debris exploded outward in every direction.
His head snapped toward the transport vehicle furthest away from him and toward Demi who stood next to it looking around wildly trying to understand what was happening, her tablet still in hand.
And suddenly, he saw her as her body was thrown violently through the air from the impact of a mortar explosion.
Time stopped.
Everything narrowed instantly until nothing existed except her.
"No!"
The scream tore out of him raw and violent before he even realized it. He ran or he tried to.
Gunfire erupted somewhere nearby while people shouted over radios, but he barely heard any of it.
Because Demi.
Jesus Christ.
Demi.
Then, the second RPG hit.
Closer this time, the blast knocked him sideways into a truck so hard it felt like his entire body shattered on impact.
Pain exploded through his ribs and shoulder while dirt and debris rained down around him.
For a second he could not breathe, could not hear, and could not see anything except smoke.
But still, he forced himself up hands digging into dirt while his body was screaming in protest.
Move.Move.MOVE.
His vision blurred while he stumbled forward half bent over, every breath ragged and wet sounding in his chest.
He looked around for his other men when he saw Parker on the ground.
The sight of his best friend motionless terrified him but as he watched closer Parker's eyes opened.
He watched as Parker moved around until he was crawling toward Demi's body.
He remembered Parker trying to get to her and how at first he had been crawling because the blast had knocked him down too, then stumbling up onto his feet as he continued barely able but walking and finally as he neared her downed body he began running.
The kind of running born from pure terror.
"DEMI!" The sound ripped across the debris field. Parker was wailing.
The kind of sound a person made when they already knew.
Chase had heard grief sound like that before, it was not human sound, just agony.
.. pure and devastating. When he had watched her fly through the air he prayed she would survive.
.. because he was not sure Parker would live if she was gone.
Chase couldn't stomach the thought of Parker killing himself.
He tried to get there, tried to help.
Because Parker... Jesus Christ, Parker would not survive that alone.
But suddenly hands grabbed him hard from behind.
Foreign voices.
Shouting in a foreign language.
Unfamiliar faces.
He fought instinctively, trying to twist free despite the pain ripping through his body.
"No!"
His voice broke apart as he was till trying to look toward Parker.
Toward Demi.
Toward the smoke.
But his strength was fading too fast.
Everything tilted sideways.
His vision darkened at the edges while rough hands dragged him backward through dirt, blood and debris.
He remembered the last thing he saw was Parker collapsing beside Demi's body.
The sound coming out of him haunting enough that Chase knew, even then that was dead... he had failed them and that thought alone would follow him forever.
Then unfamiliar faces leaned over him.
Foreign faces as the darkness began swallowing everything whole.
And suddenly...
The porch came crashing back.
Chase gasped violently like he had been underwater too long, his entire body jerking forward while the photograph slipped from his fingers onto the porch floor.
His breathing came in gasps and hands were shaking.
"No..." The word came out broken.
Because suddenly everything made sense to finally.
Emily laughing.
Emily smiling.
Emily making terrible coffee.
Emily stubbornly insisting she could carry things herself.
Emily rolling her eyes at him when he hovered too much.
All those moments that had felt familiar in ways he could never explain.
It was not because he loved Emily, but because he was trying to take care of Demi, Parkers' girl and the little sister he had taken under his wing.
His chest caved inward beneath the realization.
All this time, all this damn time... some broken part of him had been trying to undo the worst moment of his life.
"I remember... everything now," he whispered hoarsely.
Across from him, Parker went completely still because he knew immediately. He knew exactly which memory had finally brought it all back for Chase.
Chase looked at him then, eyes bloodshot and shattered.
"I froze." The guilt in his voice was unbearable. "For a second, I just..."
His breathing broke apart again. "I saw it comin' and I froze."
Parker's face crumpled instantly and for the first time since Chase came home, both men finally understood the thing that had been haunting them all along.
Demi had died while both men watched, both men had been so close and yet too far away to save her and both of them would have to live with that for the rest of their lives.