by Amelia Wilde
Table of Contents
Epilogue
Prologue
Epilogue
Epilogue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Letter to the Reader
Reckless Kiss
Dirty Rich
Claim Your Free Book
Before She Was Mine
Amelia Wilde
For my husband
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Epilogue
Letter to the Reader
Reckless Kiss
Dirty Rich
Claim Your Free Book
1
Dayton
My missing foot hurts like a bitch.
You’ve probably heard of phantom pain, and I’ll tell you right now—you’re picturing it wrong. It’s not nebulous, an aching vapor in roughly the size and shape of the limb you’ve lost—in my case, my left leg, starting just below the knee.
There is no shin. There is no foot. There are no toes.
They were irreparably mangled at the base of a mountain in Afghanistan, and it’s almost definitely my fault.
But fault has nothing to do with the very real burn at the back of my missing heel, like I shoved my feet into running shoes like a lazy bastard, not bothering to stick a finger between my ankle and the heel tab until I’m several miles in and it’s already too late. Fault has nothing to do with the sharp pebble between my second and third toes, driving into the webbing with every step I take along the filthy snowstreaked steps, or the burning stretch in my arch threatening to root in my heel. If that happens, I’m fucked, because there’s no cure for a bum heel in a foot that doesn’t exist.
The phantom pain rubs shoulders with the real pain where what’s left of my leg—what the doctors call residual limb like it’s the dry end of a party sub—and that pain, at least, I can take full credit for.
Ten steps away from the exit of the 50th Street subway, it’s already throbbing from standing on the train. The stairs are too narrow. It should be better on solid ground. The lady ahead of me on the steps doesn’t know that. The handle of her purse slips down her shoulder, inch by inch, the top partially unzipped. She curls her head toward her shoulder but it doesn’t do anything to pin down the strap. Whatever’s in the cardboard box is either fragile or too heavy to hold with one hand.
“Shit,” she whispers.
I step up beside her, the extra effort of catching up putting more pressure on the missing foot. My arch twists, pulls. It’s the only way to keep going, and I have to keep going. The exit beckons. I want to accept the invitation. I’m not a fucking hero, but I’m not a total asshole, either. I want to ignore her. I don’t.
“Give you a hand with that box?”
She flicks her eyes over to me. “I’m okay.”
“You’re about to lose half your purse.”
One more glance. The dress pants must help my case. “If you’re sure—”
I take the box and she hitches up the purse strap on her shoulder. Without the added weight she springs up the steps, waiting for me at the top. It’s heavy. It’s a good counterbalance for my shitty prosthetic but it makes my stump press into the socket, setting the hot spots on fire.
Out on the sidewalk I tip it back into her hands. “What do you have in there?”
A rueful shake of her head. “Books. I couldn’t let them go.” She turns away and back again. “Thanks.”
It’s three and a half blocks to where I’m going and cold as hell even though it’s sunny. The sidewalks are a mix of sand and slush and petrified dog shit and that pain between my toes. If I didn’t know better, I’d take off my boot and look for that pebble, rub at the arch.
No, I wouldn’t. Not with the buildings huddling together above me, blank windows watching my sorry progress. I should have canceled this meeting.
The foot that isn’t there presses down through a gray layer of slush and jerks sideways. I curse under my breath. I wore work boots today. I shouldn’t have worn work boots, but it’s this kind of weather that makes me glad I stuffed my metal replacement foot into something sturdy, with waterproof canvas. Even the thick treads aren’t a match for the endless winter nightmare in Manhattan.
This is a waste of time. Things were going fine at the factory in Queens. Totally fucking fine, except fo the muscle spasms that knocked me off balance when I lifted the assembled windows onto the racks, or the way my hands swelled for days on end from the chemical baths if I worked Section 12.
If I’d had some painkillers, it would’ve been good, but that asshole O’Connors at the VA had gone so far as to put down his clipboard and look me in the eye at my appointment last week, as if he was a wise old general and not a green doctor younger than I am.
You can’t keep putting your body through this punishment. That’s what he said to me. As if I deserve anything less than a punishing job—than mindless, manual labor.
Shit. Did I miss the building?
I shuffle myself over to a wrought-iron fence planted in the concrete and lean my hip against it. There’s not much slush here. I dig into the pocket of my dress pants, bought new at the last minute.
I have a card.
It reads:
Heroes on the Homefront
Veteran Services
540 W. 50th Street
New York, NY 10019
The sight of it makes both
my feet itch. If I still had both of them, instead of dragging around this titanium-alloy bullshit, I’d run back to the train station right now.
Too late for that. I’m already in front of 540 W. 50th, and there are giant windows up front. They’ve been cleaned recently, so I have a full unobstructed view of the receptionist, who smiles at me and gives me a little wave.
Jesus Christ.
The socket on the temp prosthetic is digging into my leg somehow, sending sharp sparks of pain up into my thigh. The gel liner that’s supposed to protect it is worn down. I reach for the door and my leg resists picking up my foot. I swing it twice to get myself through, and on the second swing my boot catches in a snowdrift a few inches from the door, which throws me off balance.
I’ll never let them see my shame. Heroes on the Homefront—what utter bullshit. I’m not a hero. I can’t even get through the front door without everybody in here—some woman has now joined the receptionist behind the desk, absolutely wonderful—giving me pitying looks.
I let the door swing shut behind me and step fully into the lobby. The receptionist is half out of her seat as if she’s about to rush over and take my arm, and Christ, if she does that, I’m done with this place and every other place, to be honest. She must see it in my face because she sits down, still wearing the encouraging smile that’s making my gut twist, and watches me approach the desk, eyes wide and shining.
“Welcome to Heroes on the Homefront,” she says, big brown eyes practically glistening now, for fuck’s sake. “How can I help you today?”
“Dayton Nash. I have an appointment at eleven.”
She nods as if she’s in the presence of greatness—I’m going to die of disgust—and picks up the handset of her phone. The other woman disappears in a flash of bleach-blonde pixie cut. “Have a seat, Mr. Nash. There’s coffee and tea, if you’re interested.” Ms. Pitying Receptionist lifts her chin toward a coffee cart over by the opposite window. As if I’m going to drag myself all the way across the room while she watches her own personal performance of a hero on the homefront. I take the nearest seat.
And wait.
Five minutes tick by, then ten, then fifteen. It’s ten past now, and too hot in the waiting room. Too boring. The sleek furniture is fine for five minutes but not for twenty, and the music—god, the music, it’s soft country and right now I can’t stand it. I can’t stand the framed photos of the American flag on the walls. I can’t stand the black carpeting, shot through with red and white and blue. And I can’t fucking stand that I’m here in the first place like some asshole who can’t get a job on his own, who thinks he deserves something cushy, something pre-arranged. If only that cow-eyed receptionist knew what I’ve done. What I still could do, if push came to shove. The ends justify the means.
Twenty-two minutes.
It shouldn’t be this hard to do the shit you’re supposed to do. To work a job on the right side of the law. To claw yourself out of the black, numb despair that creeps into your chest at night, that makes you get a cramp in the foot that doesn’t exist, a cramp that won’t release its grip until the sun comes up and you have to be on the factory floor, making windows for buildings you’ll never see.
I’m leaving.
It’s not worth it. It’s not worth this.
I shift my weight forward in this hellish, stylish seat.
“Mr. Nash?”
It’s not the receptionist’s voice. It’s not a voice I’ve heard in a long time, and at the sound of it my toes—real and imagined—curl. Pleasure or shame? I don’t know.
I drag my eyes away from the carpet and shove myself up out of the chair as some other guy makes his way past. I don’t let myself look until I’m upright in case it’s not her, in case it’s a hallucination I’d be better off ignoring.
It’s not a hallucination.
It’s really her.
A different version of her. A gorgeous, grown-up version of her. Not the gritted-teeth version going too fast down Suicide Hill, snow and determination in her eyes, or the tomato-red mortified version standing alone at the corner of the school dance, but I’d know her anywhere.
Anywhere is here. Right in front of me, saying my name.
The strangest desire wraps its fists around my heart and squeezes. I wonder if her hair still smells like Pantene.
My foot doesn’t hurt at all.
2
Summer
His eyes give him away.
He’s backlit by unearthly winter light from the huge front windows, his face in shadow, but those eyes. It doesn’t matter that we’re standing in the sleek, subtly patriotic waiting room at Heroes on the Homefront, where professionalism and empathy are our top priorities. Every inch of me is alive with his presence.
It’s Dayton. My Dayton. Or—Wes’s Dayton, really. He was never mine.
That doesn’t matter. I’d know those eyes anywhere.
I dismissed it when I saw the name on my appointment list. D. Nash could’ve been anyone. No reason to get nervous. No reason to think he’d walk into this office in Midtown, three months after I started my dream job. To keep the workload under control, we don’t do verifications or research until the veterans have attended an intake meeting. About a quarter of the people on my list every day don’t show up.
Dayton showed up.
So did my last appointment, which is why I’m late for Dayton. Gregory DeWitt looked fine, sitting in the waiting room, even flashed me a smile on the way back to my office. I thought it’d be simple. A little brush-up of the resume, a few questions about his general interests, and I could look at listings before my eleven o’clock.
He wasn’t fine.
He’d sweat through his shirt by the time he sat in the chair across from me and said listen, I don’t go out much. By “much” he meant that he hadn’t left his apartment in three weeks, but he was running out of money. The VA was dragging its feet on approving him for disability, one domino falling, then another. I couldn’t kick him out. It wouldn’t have been right.
I had the apology on my lips when I stepped into the waiting room but the words fall to the floor and scatter. I tuck my hands together to stop them from trembling.
Carla, the receptionist, is about to lose her mind. I can tell by the way she’s sitting forward in her ergonomic desk chair, pretending not to notice that the silence between me and one Mr. Nash—Day—has gone on too long not to be awkward.
That’s not good.
I look into those dark eyes, those wells of pain flecked with surprise, and forget to be professional.
He’s different. Even broader than the last time I saw him, more muscled, and peeking out from beneath the collar of his shirt are the black curves of tattoos. The way he’s standing isn’t how I remember it, but he’s been in the service. That changes a man. It’s changed Dayton. The evidence is right in front of me.
Tattoos.
He never had tattoos before, and if I’m right, the lines I’m seeing are the tip of the iceberg. A wild curiosity ignites in the center of my chest, a dry brush going up at the strike of a match, clarifying my strange double vision. I see him as he is. I see him as he used to be. The two versions compete for my focus.
I move before I can stop myself, crossing to the first row of those godawful chairs. They look lovely. Try sitting in one for twenty minutes, though, and you’ll change your opinion.
I shouldn’t do this—it’s against the code of being in the office—but every breath is tinged with a strange excitement, a strange dread. I can’t help myself. I throw my arms around him, right above his waist, and hug the hard, solid mass of his body.
It’s a mistake.
For an instant we’re standing together, right there in the waiting room for everyone to see, and then my freak hug has knocked him off balance. He takes a step onto his left foot. Something’s not right. He goes over, sitting down hard into the chair behind him.
“Shit.”
“Oh—” I can’t get my arms untangled from his waist
fast enough, so I fall along with him, and both of us are tangled up in what has to be the greatest mortification the world has ever known. “I’m sorry, Day, I—” The old nickname swims up from years ago, from back when I could hear his low voice through the wall while he played video games with Wes in the middle of the night, and my face goes molten. I yank my hands from behind his back and straighten up.
Oh, God.
No, of course I’m not the little girl he knew back then. I’m all grown up and perfectly composed. I meant for this to happen.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, feeling the weight of everyone’s eyes against my skin. There are two other veterans in the waiting room, and then there’s Carla. The wheel of her chair squeaks as she shifts her position, no doubt to get a better look.
“It’s fine.” His voice is gruff, and when he glances up I see something in his eyes that I missed before. It’s gone so fast, locked down behind a tightening in his jaw, that maybe I’m wrong.
It looked like shame.
But for the life of me, I can’t imagine what Day could be ashamed of. He’s a hero.
I smooth my hair back into its ponytail. Pretend he’s like anyone else. His coat, navy blue, over a white dress shirt. Tan dress pants, an adult version of the khakis he and Wes used to wear for special occasions.
The pants are hiked up to the socket of a prosthesis.
That explains why he lost his balance when I tackled him like a teenager at a One Direction concert.