Chapter Twenty-Two
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
I T WAS A hell of a thing to wake up in a woman’s arms. To wake up in Rory’s arms. He had taken her a couple times during the night, and she had taken him, joyously.
Enthusiastically.
He wondered what the hell he had done to deserve this.
To deserve this reprieve from the intensity of the bullshit he’d been enduring these last few years.
But he was sure as hell grateful. Sure as hell grateful that he had been given this even for just a little while.
He got up and put on his jeans. Then he went into the kitchen and opened up his fridge.
He decided to make her breakfast because it almost felt like the least he could do. Of course, it wasn’t like he was paying her back for the sex, but it did seem courteous to make a woman bacon and eggs after she’d had sex with you three times.
He almost wanted to sing. And that didn’t remind him of himself in any life.
But he fired up the pan, got out the eggs and bacon, and started humming to himself.
Rory appeared a few moments later, standing in the doorway wearing nothing more than his white T-shirt. It barely came to the top of her thighs, and if she moved just so, he would be able to see all that glorious treasure between her legs.
He’d always been a man of substantial appetites, but he had never paused to appreciate the details. The beauty of Rory, the way her red hair spilled over her shoulders, the way her freckles dusted her nose. That little bend in her knee, as she rubbed her foot against the side of her ankle, a nervous little gesture that struck him as being ridiculously adorable.
He was all about the details right now. With her.
Maybe he was different.
Or maybe she was.
Maybe he would never know for sure.
It was a funny thing. He’d spent years feeling like he had it all figured out. After all, somebody who was as successful as he had been surely knew something the rest of the world didn’t. He’d had a beautiful wife, a promising career.
He hadn’t known shit.
He hadn’t known what loss was. He hadn’t known what struggle was.
He hadn’t known the kind of darkness a person could endure without actually dying.
He hadn’t known the strange numbness that ensued after a marriage broke apart.
And how bizarrely disorienting it was to realize that maybe you hadn’t loved your wife the way you’d always thought you had.
Yeah, he still carried some guilt.
Over time, it had all unraveled.
But he had to wonder if some of the problem was he simply didn’t like failing.
He wondered if it was more than the loss of her.
Than the feeling of letting her down.
He suspected that what he had loved was his image. Himself.
And it had taken having himself dismantled to see that. To understand it.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Good morning,” she replied.
“Breakfast?”
“Well, that sounds lovely.”
“I’m going to go out to the property today. Do you want to come with me?”
She flushed. “I’d love to.”
“Good. Let’s do that. I want you to see the ranch. You know, the rest of it, not just the boot-camp part.”
“I won’t recognize it when I’m not sweating!”
He didn’t know why he felt so compelled to share it with her. This thing that was going to be his permanent home. She wasn’t staying. But it still felt right. She got dressed, and so did he, and he was regretful they were leaving the bubble, but he supposed he couldn’t be annoyed about that since he was the one who suggested they go out.
They made the drive over in silence, and it wasn’t a bad silence. Not awkward or unhappy.
He had sat in so many silences all on his own.
They felt isolating. They had been the evidence of the fact that he had cut his mother and his sister out of his life, and that Cassidy had cut him out of hers.
They had been the deepest evidence that he had done something wrong. That his life had gone off the rails somewhere back there, and he was never going to be able to figure out how to get it back together.
At the same time, he had needed the silence sometimes. The headaches were less frequent, the fatigue and the forgetfulness a little bit less severe. He still didn’t crave a crowd. Still didn’t crave noise, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been.
Now the silence didn’t feel like isolation. Or like a punishment. Not with Rory. It was like being understood. Like these pieces of himself could be met just as they were, not resisted or changed.
And he thought he ought to say that. But he didn’t want to.
Because he was still examining these new places inside himself, and he didn’t know what the hell he thought of them. He just couldn’t say.
So he kept that to himself because he had betrayed so much of himself last night. In his hunger, his desperation.
Maybe he could just find freedom in that. Because they had a time limit on this. And that was like boundaries.
Boundaries that would keep them safe. That would keep them whole.
Instead, he turned on the radio, and she leaned her head against his shoulder, and he gave thanks for the bench seat in his truck that allowed him to sit touching her while they drove.
They pulled up to the place, and he saw that the owner wasn’t in residence.
“We can just wander around the outside. I want to show you what I’ve got planned apart from making people do rope climbs.”
She nodded and got out of the truck. He took her hand; it was amazing how easily he had gotten used to that.
It was strange what a simple, innocent thing it was, and yet how deep and intense it felt.
It did feel like so much more than just locking hands.
It was like they were getting each other through.
He wasn’t leading her, and she wasn’t leading him. They were walking together, holding each other up.
He knew it was easy for her to see herself as damaged because other people had treated her that way. She wasn’t, though. That was the thing.
She had this whole beautiful fresh life ahead of her.
She could find herself a nice man who lived in the city, who could stand all that noise.
Someone who would treat her exactly like she deserved, for more than three weeks.
Someone who hadn’t already broken his vows. Someone who wasn’t broken in all the ways he was.
And he didn’t deserve a woman as pure and perfect as her. She was brave. In ways he could never be.
He had already transferred more poison to her than he should have. He’d needed that. It had been cathartic. To tell her his story.
There were dark things in that. The survivor’s guilt. The things he didn’t like saying out loud, and he never wanted to burden her with all of that.
It was better to imagine her away from him. Away from here. From all the baggage and the bullshit.
To imagine her happy. But right now, he wanted to walk with her.
They went down a narrow path, through towering pine trees and into a field.
“I want this place to have a little tiny house village. Put a big firepit in the middle. We’ll be able to stage excursions here.”
“It’s funny,” she said. “You’re building a community, whether you recognize it or not. Maybe it isn’t the parades, but it’s bringing people together with a shared objective. Not totally unlike the military, I guess.”
“Well, except without violence.”
“Yes,” she conceded.
“I just am looking forward to being out in nature.”
“You think that’s the only reason you want to do this? I think you still want to connect with people. It’s okay if you don’t recognize that. It’s okay if you can’t. But I think you do.”
“It doesn’t matter what I want or don’t, there are limits. There’s a reason we have a safe word.”
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you. I just think you’re different. Different to how you work. It’s not fair to try and shove you into a box based on who you were thirteen years ago before you saw so much, and experienced so much. We need to stop acting like you’re broken. You aren’t. You’re just different. Changed by what you went through.”
“But that has to be some kind of broken,” he said, the statement welling up from deep inside him. “Because doesn’t it? How could it not be? It’s like everybody changes a little bit in their lives. But maybe just this much.” He held out his hands, his thumb and forefinger spaced apart just enough for him to hold a playing card between them. “You’re not supposed to change completely.”
“Who says? We get one life, yes, but we can stop and decide to live it differently anytime we want to.”
“I didn’t decide, though. We’re different. You deciding to go away to Boston—and I think that’s great, Rory, I do—but it isn’t the same as getting blown to hell and seeing...seeing things you can’t get out of your head.” Fuck. He hadn’t meant to go there.
“I know,” she said. “But what should somebody do when they see those things? Should they stay the same?”
“If there are other people in your life, then I think you should. For them.”
“There is nowhere in wedding vows that says you won’t get sick. That you won’t get poor. You’re supposed to stay together through that. You’re not the one who broke your vows.”
“I changed. She wasn’t obligated to.”
“I think if you love somebody enough, you should. Because I don’t understand how nearly losing your husband doesn’t change you. I’m sorry. I can’t wrap my brain around that. That she came out the other side of that experience entirely the same. Do you think that your mother is the same? I know that Lydia isn’t. When she found out you were injured... Gideon, her world was rocked. She was devastated. She called me sobbing. And all she wanted was to get to your side. I was changed by my father leaving. He didn’t die, he decided to leave. I have been changed by all these little traumas in my life, and she wasn’t changed by her husband getting blown up. I’m sorry. I don’t think that you’re the wrong one. I think changing when you’ve experienced intense trauma just shows that you’re not a sociopath.”
“Cassidy isn’t a sociopath.”
“I don’t have any loyalty to her. All I know is that she hurt you.”
He growled into the back of his throat. “Yes. I guess. But not like you think. Not like you mean.”
“What are you saying?”
“The disturbing thing was finding out that I wasn’t all that in love with her. Once I didn’t want the whole thing, I just didn’t care anymore. I don’t know if that was the drugs or not. I just know I was angry with myself. For being a disappointment. For failing. But that mattered a hell of a lot more than losing her.”
“You didn’t love her.”
“Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe I can’t love her. Maybe I can’t love anybody. What I loved was the image. That’s fucking scary.”
“You’re different now. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter. Because I can’t unknow it. And I shouldn’t. I need to remember. I need to remember. Who I was. Who I am. At the end of all things. Who I fucking am.”
“You’re a man who left part of his heart in Afghanistan. Because not all your men came home. That’s who you are.”
She walked ahead of him, and he was left speechless.
“How do you know that?”
She turned to face him. “Because I know you. Because I know this isn’t about just physical pain. As awful as I know it was. And as real as I know all the injuries that you sustained were. They were your men. Like you said. Why wouldn’t that change you?”
He stopped there and looked up at the sky. This familiar sky that he’d been a boy under, a golden hero under.
And he wanted answers now, but as ever, it was silent. It had been ever since that bomb had gone off.
He lost his connection to everything that day.
“Eight men lost their lives that day.” He very slowly said all their names. Their ages. “And I didn’t get to call their families. Because I was laid up in the hospital. It was my responsibility. Because they were my responsibility. All I thought about was glory. Glory on the other side. Fuck that. I watched twenty-year-old boys... They were there one minute. They were gone the next. Just gone. It’s such a merciless way to go. You can’t even say a proper goodbye. Their bodies don’t come back, because there’s nothing there. Fuck.”
He watched her. Watched her pallor change.
He was supposed to protect her from this. His father-in-law had told him that. It was his job. Protect the civilians from the horrors of war. And listen to him now. He had thought he wasn’t going to burden her with this, and here he was burdening the hell out of her. Great job. Great fucking job.
But she didn’t turn away from him. Instead, she took a step toward him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, conforming herself to him. And she held on to him tight.
“I think we need to change the idea of what a legend is,” she said softly. “It’s not always the guy who has it all together. Sometimes it’s the guy that bears every loss, every burden. Every responsibility. With the deepest, clearest pain. The guy who wanted to make the call. No matter how much it hurt. Sometimes that’s it.”
Her words were a balm for a wound he hadn’t imagined he carried.
“I shouldn’t have said all that to you.”
“Why not? You saw it.”
“Rory, you were a virgin until two days ago. You’ve lived here all your life. You’ve never had to see anything horrible. You’ve never... Shit, honey. I’ve taken all this stuff from you.”
She frowned. “You haven’t taken anything from me. You’re giving me something. You’re treating me like I’m strong enough to bear this. You’re treating me like an equal. How is that hurting me? I asked. Because I want to know. Because I want to be part of your life.”
He could see the moment she heard what she’d said. She looked down. “I mean, we’ll keep in touch after I leave.”
“Yeah. We will,” he said.
He didn’t think they would.
Because there was no way she would be able to keep one foot here and one foot in Boston to quite that degree. He sure as hell wasn’t going to be able to do it. This thing between them had become all-consuming in a matter of a week. How the hell was it going to work for them to stay in touch? Like they were friends. He supposed that was the game. That they were friends.
“When will you actually get to move in?”
“Right about the time you leave.”
“Right.”
She looked away, and he felt something tear in his chest. “You want to come see the obstacle course?”
“Yeah. I think I might want to try to climb the rope again.”
“Have you been doing push-ups?”
“Is sex exercise?”
He laughed.
She wrinkled her nose and looked at him. “It’s a valid question.”
“Sure.”
She trundled over to the rope, and jumped, reaching up, and there was something different about her movements, something lighter and freer.
She made it farther this time. And then she looked down at him. “I don’t think I’m making it to the top yet.”
“You did amazing.”
“And it’s okay that I didn’t go all the way. And I can get myself down.”
He smiled, but there was something that made him a little bit sad about that.
She didn’t need him to catch her.
But he already knew that.
He was a mess. And it was a documented fact. She was coming into her own while he had basically exited his own, wandering off in the twilight years.
He was sitting in a strange spot.
He couldn’t say that he wanted to go back to where he’d come from, but he didn’t think it was something to aspire to, either.
He was in his retirement, essentially.
And Rory was just beginning everything.
There were only a few years between them, but a wealth of experience. A wealth of life.
It was... It was just so different.
She climbed down and ran toward him, wrapping her arms around his neck.
She kissed him, on the cheek. Like he was the one who had accomplished something amazing when it was her.
“Look at you,” he said. “Fearless.”
“Not quite.”
She put her hands on either side of his face. “But I’m getting there. You inspire me. Your bravery. You make me look at myself and wonder what the hell I’m doing. Why I’m holding on to all these things.”
“I told you, it’s not a trauma-dick-measuring contest.”
“Maybe not. But there is a big difference between fatal and nonfatal fear. To see what you’ve been through, to see you standing there, makes me want to do something more. To be stronger. To just find new strength inside myself.”
“Whatever works.”
“It’s more than that. I...” She looked away from him, and his breath caught. “You’re amazing. That’s all.”
“Come back to my place?”
“Yes.”
Because they wouldn’t stay friends. And this wouldn’t continue on past her leaving.
It couldn’t.
But he would keep being with her while she was here. She was the one he wanted to share all this with.
She was some kind of miraculous, and he hadn’t thought he would have any kind of miracle again in his life, at any stage. He was walking off into the sunset. The glory days were long since passed.
Her own were just beginning.
But that didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy this last little bit. Like that sliver of light just before the sun disappeared behind the mountain.
She was that light.
“You going to lie and say that you’re having a sleepover with my sister again?”
She looked at him thoughtfully. “No.”
“Even if your sister asks?”
“I’ll tell her. Unless you have a problem with that. But since Lydia already knows...”
“I don’t have a problem with it.”
“Okay, then. Neither of us has a problem.”
But he did. A big one that went all the way down to his soul.
And that was unfortunate.
But there was no point ruminating on it, not now. His decision was made. And if there was one thing he had learned through all of this trauma and recovery, it was that when he made a decision, he had to stick to it. It was the only way forward.
But right now, there was a little sliver of sunshine left, and he would take it.