Who the fuck am I?
“Baby, can you hear me? Katy?”
“I’m here,” I say, though I’m not sure where here is.
In that moment, my world tilts, as his voice goes hoarse, and I mentally sift through the memories of our life together. I imagine the horror he’s endured since the news of my capture. I imagine him sleeping in our bed while our son cries for his missing mother. I imagine him searching our home for any sign of life from me, and the endless phone calls he’s made to his buddies of a higher rank while in wait. And as I do that, I feel like a fraud, an undeserving wife, because it wasn’t those thoughts that kept me alive. It wasn’t Gavin, and it wasn’t even Noah. As his voice cracks with his final plea, I know for certain I’m lost.
“Just come home.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Briggs
I walk through the small bathroom I’ve been using for the last week, collecting my meager belongings and adding them to my new duffel bag. Today we fly back to the States, and as much as I’m ready to get out of this place, I’m not yet prepared to say goodbye to Scottie. I don’t think I ever will be. We will fly together to my duty station in Fort Bliss, and from there, she flies home to Fort Hood, to be reunited with her husband and son. That means I’m quickly running out of time. She’s going home to her family, and I’m going home with the memory of her.
I find her in the lobby, looking sexier than any soldier has a right to look in desert camo and combat boots. Her blonde curls are wild, just the way I like them, reaching close to her shoulders. Her injured arm is in a cast extending from the thumb of her hand to her forearm. As I approach, awareness spikes in her shoulders, and she turns her head, her eyes fixed on mine. In those ocean blues, I see an apology, and my heart plummets. She regrets it. We’ll never be more than what we were before that phone rang, before her life called her back. She takes a few wary steps toward me and looks past my shoulder to make sure our conversation is private. My throat is raw with impending loss, but I manage to get the words out.
“I have you until that plane lands, do you hear me, Scottie? You’re mine until those wheels touch the ground.”
Her chin wobbles, and she slowly nods out her reply.
“Do me a favor?” I ask.
“Anything.” I swallow back emotion because I know she means it.
“Tell me a joke.”
Her lips turn up slightly. “I don’t know any,” she says as we walk out to the waiting SUV.
“Maybe we should work on that.”
She beams at me from where she stands at the open door, and I’ve earned my first smile in what seems like ages. It’s enough.
We board the plane along with a few other injured soldiers who are also heading home. Scottie follows me to the back, taking the seat beside me. We spend most of the ride talking about anything but the huge elephant in the room. My heart constricts as she talks of more plans I won’t be a part of, more of the life she’ll live without me. The only consolation I feel is that her words seem rehearsed, as if she’s rehashed them in her head a dozen times before she spoke them aloud to me. I wasn’t sure how she’d act after last night, but avoidance is the way she’s chosen to handle it. I considered doing the same but decided that I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t tell her. With less than an hour left in the air, I decide now is as good a time as any.
The cabin is dark, and Scottie’s sleeping face is illuminated by the light from my little TV screen. I study her sleeping form, her long blonde lashes, and the light dusting of freckles that I hadn’t noticed before. Her lips are puckered and twitching just slightly. It takes every ounce of strength I possess not to lean in and press my lips to hers. She looks so peaceful, and I hate to wake her, but I’m almost out of time. I squeeze her fingers, which are still interlocked with mine, and she jerks awake.
“Shhh, it’s okay. You’re safe. It’s just me. Fuck, I’m sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry I dozed off.” Her lips draw up—a tell she’s fighting emotion. She drifted off watching me; I know that much. If I’m reading her right, she didn’t want to miss a minute, and we were on the same page. Swallowing hard, my chest constricts.
“Jesus Christ, is it always this goddamn painful?” I say on a whisper.
“What?” She straightens in her seat, her eyes alert. “What hurts?”
I cover my chest. “This. What I feel. This. Fucking. Hurts.”
Nausea churns in my stomach, and I swallow a few times, trying to dislodge the lump that has formed in my throat.
Her face crumbles as she hangs her head. I lift her chin with the tip of my finger. “I just…I can’t let you go without telling you how I feel, in case there’s even the slightest chance that maybe you feel the same way.”
Her head begins to shake, and I lift my finger, indicating for her to give me a second.
“Don’t. Don’t stop me because then I may never finish, and I can’t live the rest of my life with that regret. This is purely selfish, and I realize that.” I’m trembling with fear. I’ve been to war. I’ve shot people, and I’ve been shot at. I’ve been locked in an underground bunker and tortured within inches of my life, and I have never been as frightened as I am in this moment, because I’ve never had so much to lose.
“I’m not sure exactly when it happened, and I know that it’s wrong, but I’ve never been more certain of anything than I am about the way I feel for you. The timing is bad”—I cough out a sarcastic laugh—“it’s shit, and it won’t ever be right. You’re married…and you have a kid. Christ, I know his name. Noah. I know all of it—everything—because I asked. Because I had to know. And now I’ve become the asshole selfish enough to tell you how I feel, because even if you don’t feel the same and nothing ever comes of it…I need you to know that you are part of me now, the most precious thing in my life.”
She touches her fingers to her trembling lips as her eyes spill.
I squeeze her hand. “Don’t. It’s okay. I just had to know, had to be sure. Now I know.” Cursing my stupidity, I look away from her, and I try to force myself to pull away. I should’ve kept it to myself. I shouldn’t have burdened her with my fucking feelings. It’s wrong. I’m wrong, so why doesn’t it fucking feel wrong? Why can’t I regret it?
Her words spark me back to life.
“I feel it too.”
She gives me a weary look. “And I’m—I’m scared. I’m so scared to go home, feeling what I feel for you, but this has to end here. I do love my husband, and I love my son, more than life, and they don’t deserve this.”
Panic rises as I feel our time start to tick out. Guilt threatens, but I temporarily push it down as I battle the clock, feeling every second. “I may burn in hell for this, but I can’t help what I feel. We’re only given one shot at life, and no matter how much it hurts, I’m glad I took mine. There’s a reason we were thrown into that bunker together. I have to believe that. You were destined to be a part of my life. You’ve changed me. No matter where this journey takes us, when I close my eyes, it will be your face I see. When I breathe my last breath, your name will be on my lips. I need you to know that—for you to know how incredible you really are. In another lifetime, I know we’d have been perfect together, and I’m certain you feel that too. I see it in your eyes, and I felt it. I still feel it. And I have half a mind to beg life to repeat that hell, just to be with you. I’d do anything to keep you with me.”
Her face falls, and she bites her lips and turns to look out the window. I see a lone tear trail down her cheek. “I wanted to know.” She brushes her tears away as she turns to me. “How you felt. I wanted to hear it from you. I’m selfish too. But I can’t say anything more that I can’t take back.”
Every part of me feels like it’s being ripped apart. I hang on for her. I hang on because she’s with me. I’ll allow myself to shatter once she’s gone.
“I’m not sure of anything. But I know this,” she whispers softly. “It only feels this way when it’s real. And the
re’s this whole other side, a side you deserve, a side I can’t give you.”
I nod because I’ve already said too much. She’s handed my heart back to me, and I’m unsure of how I’ll handle its new broken rhythm. As we file out into the airport, the back of our hands touch up the ramp. Outside the gate, I damn the consequences and pull her to me, and she holds me back. “One last favor,” I ask before I lean down and whisper words I know she needs to hear from me. She nods as she grips me tightly to her. “Run far and fast, dance that sexy dance, have that second baby. Smile, Scottie. Lighten up, tell jokes, live a long and happy life, for me.”
“Please don’t hate me.”
“Not a fucking chance.”
I pull away with what’s left of me as she steps back, her hand fisted in her hair and tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Thank you,” she whispers before she turns, and I watch her walk away.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Katy
“This is your captain speaking. We’ll be touching down shortly at Killeen-Fort Hood Regional Airport. Temperature is forty-two degrees with cloudy skies. We hope you’ve enjoyed your flight. Welcome home, Soldiers.”
I’m hoping for cloudy skies.
Mullins.
My head falls back on the seat while I bite my lips to keep my emotions at bay. Miles away from his hold, I close my eyes tightly as the wheels touch down. I’m no longer his, but that’s not how it feels.
As we taxi to the terminal, my pulse begins to race with anticipation. The flight attendant’s instructions are drowned out by the sound of my own heartbeats thundering in my ears. After weeks of thinking I’d never see them again—never hold my baby boy in my arms again—I’m finally here, and it feels too good to be true.
Noah.
Mind swirling, heart aching, I try to focus on my son, but I can’t get Briggs’s confession out of my head. How will I be able to greet my husband properly, feeling the way I do for another man? I’m so confused. I betrayed him, and yet, somehow…I can’t convince myself that it was wrong. I can’t even pretend that I regret it. What Briggs and I shared was beautiful, and I will cherish it for the rest of my life.
“Here, let me help you with that,” the soldier I’ve been seated next to and had ignored the entire flight offers. He grabs my duffel from the overhead compartment and helps me slide it on to my good arm.
“Thank you.”
He eyes me curiously.
“Just getting home?”
Emotion collects in the back of my throat.
“Yeah.”
“Where are you coming from?”
I open my mouth to speak, and I have no idea what to say.
This man has no clue what he’s asking me.
“Iraq.”
His brows shoot up. “Damn. How’s the action over there?”
I take my backpack from him. “Intense.”
“I can’t wait to go over.”
I don’t bother to respond. He has stars and stripes in his eyes, and I’m not about to douse the light in him.
Light.
Briggs had it in abundance.
Maybe this grunt will be the light for someone else in their darkest hours. After a few strides up the jet bridge, I pause, taking deep breaths, and back myself against the wall. Just a few steps away, my husband waits with my son, and I can’t seem to move my feet. I can’t wrap my head around why I’m not rushing toward them.
An injured soldier on crutches eyes me as he waits for his duffel, and I do my best to avoid talking.
“Just get back?”
I nod, unable to meet his gaze.
“You’ll ease into it eventually,” he assures me.
Will I?
I motion toward his casted leg. “Where were you stationed?”
“Syria. Shitshow. You?”
“Baghdad.” The word is a dagger that falls from my lips and rests in my chest.
“First deployment?”
I swallow. “Yeah.”
He grips his delivered rucksack and throws it over his shoulder, giving me a wink. “Give yourself a little time and grace. It will come to you.”
“Thanks.”
“Have a good one.”
“You too.”
I give myself a few heartbeats, my rhythm thrown off by the past two hours. Last night when Gavin called, I swore on my life I would put my relationship with Briggs in perspective. That plan was shot all to hell with his parting words, his plea for me to love him back.
But as much as it pains me, I can’t give him that. My love belongs to the man patiently waiting while I hide here like some coward.
“Did you leave something on the plane?” the attendant asks as she starts her walk toward the terminal, and I quickly shake my head. Taking slow steps behind her, I throw my shoulders back and attempt to put on my game face. It’s now, I know that the battles I’ve just fought are behind me, but the war isn’t over. Far from it.
As soon as I step out of the gate, I’m overcome by sensory overload. Within the sea of bodies, there is one person I search for. It doesn’t take long to find him, either, because I hear my name—my true calling, my life’s purpose—in a word that makes the embedded dagger seem bearable.
“MOMMY!”
Noah comes running at me in a full sprint. I fall to my knees, and when his little body slams into mine, I wrap him up in my arms and breathe in the scent of sunshine. The heaviness in my chest lightens instantly. I’m home. He is my home.
“I missed you, so much,” I chant, kissing his little face over and over again.
“I missed you so much too, Mommy.” He’s lost a tooth, and I missed it. I missed putting on the Band-Aid that covers his elbow. I missed watching him carve the turkey with Gavin.
Gavin.
I jerk my eyes up and see he’s standing right behind Noah, and every emotion I’ve been holding rushes to the surface—sadness, relief, guilt, love.
Rising to my feet as Noah clings to my waist, my gaze flits to my husband’s. His eyes are brimming over with tears as he tenderly cups my face.
“Katy.” His voice is raw as his features lift in disbelief. I nod against his hands as he wraps me in his embrace. Burying my face in his neck, I breathe in a hint of his cologne, the clean cotton of his shirt, and revel in the familiarity. He is home.
I can’t move. I don’t know how I don’t collapse in a heap on the floor, with the way I’m trembling.
Gavin’s frame shakes almost as violently as my own. I’d longed for this moment…prayed to feel his body against mine again. I’d given up hope, and here we are.
“Is this real?” I whisper against his neck.
He nods, and his voice cracks with his reply. “You’re home, baby. You’re safe.”
For the first time since I landed, I feel like I can breathe again.
Gavin holds me for a small eternity while I soak in the relief in his embrace. When we pull away, his watery eyes scour my features while he keeps a stoic face. Ever the captain, he gives me all I need in his hazel stare. I see the man inside, the one who loves me without condition, without pride; it’s pure, and it’s just the nudge I need.
“Let’s go home.” Gavin nods, still a little choked up, and grabs my duffel as Noah begins to ramble on about a party.
I let him chatter but can’t take my eyes off them as we walk to the parking lot, drinking in my fill of their presence. Gavin tosses my bag in the back.
“Grandma and Grandpa too,” Noah says as he climbs in the back of our Jeep.
“Are at home?” I ask Gavin. He winces and climbs into the driver’s seat.
“Sorry, Katy. It was all I could do to keep them from coming to the airport. I was going to give you a few days, but as soon as he knew”—he nods toward the back seat, widening his eyes—“everyone knew.”
I smile and beam at my boy. “Such a tattle,” I tease.
“It’s not tattling if you’re not in trouble.”
I raise a brow at his reto
rt. “Is that so, buddy?”
Gavin grabs my hand, and I flinch.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, baby.”
“No.” I squeeze his hand and muster a smile. “No, this is good. This is just what I need.”
He swallows words I know he wants to say and tests the waters instead. “Are you up for it?”
“Who’s there?”
“Gah, Mommy!” Noah pipes from the back seat. “I already told you.”
“Hey,” Gavin says, turning in his seat to scold him. “Button up that smart mouth, Son. We don’t talk like that to anyone taller than us, remember?”
“But what if they are the short people?”
Gavin and I burst into laughter, and I twist to look back at Noah. He gives us both a toothless smile.
Home.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Katy
We pull up to our colonial-style home, and I stare through the bay window at our kitchen table. I’d insisted on having one when we started our renovations. Gavin and I had a fight about the cost. All I see as I look through it now is money well spent. I don’t want to be anywhere without a window ever again.
“Mommy, we’re home!”
Gavin’s voice cuts through his excitement. “Hey, buddy, why don’t you go inside and let everyone know?”
“’Kay! Mommy, you’re coming, right?”
My chest jerks in recognition of his fear that I’ll disappear on him again.
“Right after you.”
Noah charges up our front steps as Gavin turns to me.
“I’ll send them all home right now. I’ll tell them you need a little time. I tried, baby, I did—but, well…you know your sister.”
I can’t help my grin. “Bet she gave you second thoughts on our wedding day.”
Gavin smiles, and I can’t help but note how handsome he is. His eyes are more on the emerald side than brown today. I reach over and cup his jaw, always freshly shaved.
“I’ve never had a second thought about anything when it comes to you.”
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