by Jillian Hart
“I hope you haven’t eaten yet.” He gestured with his hands, and she realized he held two restaurant food sacks. “I brought supper from the diner, thanks to Rachel and Paige. Are you gonna let me in?”
“I’m thinking of barring the door against you,” she quipped, “but I’m betting that they trained you how to get through a locked door in the military.”
“Not only am I trained to pick your lock, I can break it, shoot it, grenade it, explode it and call in an air strike.”
“Wow. You’re handy.” Knowing she’d regret it if she let him in—and regret it more if she didn’t—she held the door open wide. “Come in. You never told me what you did in the military.”
“I did a lot of things. Rescued downed pilots and hostages and rendered medical aid or military might, depending. I was often dispatched with SEAL teams or on Delta missions—counterterrorism stuff. Most of it is classified.” He ambled in without any crutches, but he had a serious limp. “This is a nice place you have.”
“It’s home.”
A modest answer—he should have expected it. In fact, he’d expected a small place, considering her bankruptcy and all. But it was nice—sunny and feminine, something Rachel would have liked. With frilly curtains at the windows and flowery pillows on the couch. Vases of fake flowers and porcelain figurines in a lighted glass case next to the decades-old TV. He thought of his big screen and satellite dish he was never home on the base to watch.
He’d thought about a lot of things he had and she didn’t, and many things he should have done and hadn’t.
“No gold medals on display?”
“They’re in my safe deposit box. The kitchen’s this way.” She snatched one of the sacks from him. It was heavy—milkshakes? she wondered, and unrolled the top. The sight of the paper cups and plastic lids—and the chocolate shakes beneath—answered her question. “You still want to be friendly?”
“Why not?” He set his sack on the edge of the round farmhouse-style table, his gaze meeting hers.
He felt an undeniable catch in his chest. He couldn’t chalk it up to indigestion, arrhythmia or some physical malady, and he wasn’t about to consider anything as ridiculous as love. That was impossible.
He knew only that he needed these ends tied up. “You were right. I agree with what you said about us. We can’t go back. But we can go forward.”
“Forward?”
He reached into the sack and handed her the bacon cheeseburger—just the way she used to like it—then took out one for himself. “Friends. I wish I’d had the guts to tell you last time we talked. I like who you were and I like who you are now. In case you haven’t noticed, I don’t have a lot of friends around here. Unless you count my sisters, and they have to like me.”
“Friends, huh?” She kept her head turned away from him as she padded around the counter into the small U-shaped kitchen, where cute canisters lined up from small to large sat on the beige counter.
Tidy place. A cookie jar in the shape of a cartoon whale centered the small space between the stove and the sink. Frilly hand towels and hot pads hung from various spots. She was settled here; she was at home here. And he didn’t know why he felt as if he’d been punched in the chest.
It wasn’t regrets over the past that bugged him. It was what could happen between them in the future.
And how impossible was that?
Cadence grabbed a plain white roll of paper towels and carried it with her on her way back from the corner cupboard. She set two flower-edged plates on the table and slid one across the lace cloth in his direction.
He hadn’t had a home since his mom and dad died, and that was too long. Pain radiated through his lungs and he managed to drag in a wheezy breath, reminiscent of his boyhood days of asthma. But like his grief, he’d grown out of it.
“I’ve been living out of a rucksack since I left for boot camp,” he found himself saying as he set the tub of fries in the middle of the table and hauled out two large containers of tartar sauce and ketchup. He nudged the ketchup in her direction.
“I’m usually deployed nine months of the year—until we went to Afghanistan, and then it’s been 24/7 for the last few years. And now—” he glanced down at his scarred leg with frustration “—pins and plates and two surgeries later, here I am in Montana.”
“But you’re off your crutches.”
“Yep. I bet you know something about that.”
“Crutches?” Her stomach dropped, and to hide her surprise she ripped the paper off her straw and inserted it into the top of the plastic cup lid. “How did you know?”
“I watch the sports channels. I read sports sections. I know you dived injured in Atlanta.”
“And why I was lucky to get the bronze.” She didn’t know why it mattered, why she attributed it to thoughtfulness on his part when he’d probably only stumbled across news of her career in the newspaper. It moved her nonetheless.
Her throat ached and she didn’t trust her voice, so she took a pull on the straw. Rich, creamy chocolate shake made the old-fashioned way caressed her tongue, but it didn’t smooth away the emotion. “I was six months out of a hip replacement.”
She closed her eyes against the remembered images of the training accident—she’d been practicing her initial new dives on a trampoline, which was commonplace enough in her training routine. She’d been wearing her safety harness and the safety nets were up and in place, but she’d gotten hurt anyway, which she did a lot in her sport. “It was almost as painful as when I cracked my skull when I didn’t leap out far enough and did a backward flip onto the platform.”
“And I thought getting hit with shrapnel from a grenade was harrowing.” He folded his hands. “Do you want to say grace?”
“You’re the guest, so go ahead.”
When he spoke, it was as if the timbre of his voice moved through her like a morning breeze. As if a light went on inside her soul like the gentle touch of dawn. His simple blessing was brief and she could barely manage to clear away the tangle of raw emotions in her throat in time to say amen.
Did he feel this, too? she wondered, her heart filling, even as she bid it not to. Even as she tried to hold back the tide of affection she did not want to feel. New emotions for Ben—respect, admiration, awe—left her too confused to speak as he told her about Amy’s fiancé, who’d lost his wife and son in a house fire. Heath had walked away from his life and from living—until he’d happened into their family’s diner and fell in love with Amy.
To fill the silence between them, Ben told how Rachel was still waiting for Mr. Right. How Paige’s son was busy looking at colleges and studying for the SAT, hoping to score high enough to land a full scholarship.
He talked and she listened, struggling against the rising tides of her heart. He made her laugh, made her wish that there could have been a happily ever after for the two of them. Together and not apart.
She knew how wonderful Ben’s tenderness had been so long ago. He’d always been gentle with her and treated her like a lady, always with respect.
How much more wonderful would the mature Ben be?
Was it hopeless to wish that she could find out? It had been long hard years she’d spent alone, while either most of her friends had married or her married friends had had babies. She was over thirty. She wanted a husband and a family. But not just any husband.
She knew without having to ask that Ben was not, even now, husband material.
“Is that all you’re gonna eat?” he asked in the low, intimate rumble of his, the one that stirred her soul and nourished her dreams. She nodded and he said, “Yeah? Then come walk with me.”
He held out his big capable hand, palm up, his gaze tender and his heart in his eyes. How was she going to say no to that? Helpless and knowing better, she laid her fingers on his wide callused palm and said the only, inevitable answer. “Yes.”
Chapter Ten
“Tell me about this fiancé. The one who left you when you ran into hard times.”
Cadence shot Ben a sideways glance. With the sun in her eyes it was hard to make out exactly what emotion was on his face. Curiosity? Or was there more to his sudden question, she wondered as they walked side by side through the expansive parklike common area of her town house complex.
They weren’t the only ones out enjoying the bright late-summer evening. Couples strolled hand in hand along the concrete path that circled the grounds, heading toward the grove of trees and a wetland pond.
“Do I have to tell you about Tom?”
“Nope. But then I won’t tell you about Kit.”
“Ooh, now you have me wondering. Who’s Kit?”
“Spill your guts, and then I’ll tell you.” His voice dipped with sincerity.
How did he do it? she wondered. How could he radiate caring even as he teased? Her spirit rose even as she tried to keep her senses. Do not fall in love with him again, she commanded, although she feared it was already too late. She fought to keep her hopes down, because there were so many reasons she had to be sensible.
And only one reason that she should not.
Ben reached for her hand and tucked it into his much bigger one, holding her securely—not tight, but just right. Companionably. A perfect fit.
Don’t even start wishing, Cadence.
She took a shivery breath, trying to ground herself when she saw several couples ahead of them stopping to feed the ducks that had taken up residence in the marshy waters. There was no mistaking the comfortable togetherness of the couples, their wedding rings glinting in the light.
What would it be like to be married, to have someone always at her back? To always have someone rooting for her, caring. Someone who would love her unconditionally. She’d never known. Before, with Ben, they’d both been too young to hold a mature love in their hearts. And with Tom—
“I was fooled by Tom.” Embarrassment bit her like a Doberman and hung on. She couldn’t shake it loose. She probably never would.
“Do I have to hunt this Tom down and punch him for you?”
“No, but it’s the thought that counts.”
“Not that I’d punch a civilian. But that’s how I feel about anyone who would hurt you like that. I left you for two reasons. So you could follow your gold, and because I wasn’t good for you.” He cleared his throat, as if there was something he wasn’t ready to say. “This Tom fellow. How long were you engaged?”
“We were planning the wedding after a year. That’s an appropriate time to wait, you know.” She stopped so she could watch the duck family paddle close to beg for more food. Couples complied by opening the plastic bags of bread crumbs or crackers they’d brought.
“The wedding was going to be after the Atlanta Games, and, well, there was no money, no guests and no groom. He told me that he hadn’t signed on for this, meaning the bankruptcy, and I had reinjured my hip competing, so I had decided to retire. And here I had thought it was true love.”
“He was a weak man. He didn’t have what it takes to stick.”
“He was a greedy man. I had some serious money in the bank. He just wanted to be a millionaire. That’s what he said. After that I had to revise my theory of true love.”
“You have a theory of true love?”
“Yes. True love is only real when it goes both ways. I had loved him deeply. But he didn’t love me enough. See?”
He nodded and fell silent, as if thinking over her words.
The bird family had clustered together, the daddy duck looking dapper in his shimmering green accent feathers, working with the plainer brown mama duck to watch over their brood. They had ten ducklings, each looking as if they could fit in Cadence’s palm. Their fluffy yellow-brown feathers made them look adorable as they snapped up bits of floating bread with their shiny bills.
“I am sorry that you were hurt, Cadence.” His fingers squeezed hers just right, in a way that made her wishes rise higher. Like a helium balloon held back against a wind, it tugged at her.
“Tell me about Kit.”
“Kit. Let’s see.” He gazed off at the horizon, where thunderheads gathered along the peaks of the nearby Bridger Mountains. “Not many men with my job marry. It’s hard to keep a relationship going, and she was my biggest lesson why I shouldn’t even try.”
“Did you almost marry her?”
“Nope. I was about twenty-four. I’d been in the air force for about five years. Felt like maybe I was old enough to settle down. A lot of my buddies had gotten married. Not a lot of men in my squad, but it was tempting. To have someone to come home to. To have someone to share meals with. Someone to…turn to, I guess.”
“You mean love.”
“Yeah.”
He stopped, waiting as another man and woman strolled hand in hand toward the pond. Their young grade-school children ran out from behind them. A little girl with golden curls bouncing every which way looked cute in a matching pink shirt-and-shorts set. Little pink sandals adorned her feet.
Her brother was older, black haired and blue-eyed, a charmer with dimples who outran his sister and shouted, “Mom! Mom! I get to feed ’em first!”
Then Ben spoke. “Sometimes a man thinks about kids. That it could be nice. But then there’s the reality of the job. On date number eight, Kit started complaining that she missed me, that I was gone too much. On date, what, number twelve or so, she started saying how much she wanted to love me but how could she when I was gone so much.”
“That’s a lot to ask, considering your relationship was young.”
“Yeah, but around date twenty I called it quits. She wanted me to look for another job in the military.”
“That was one woman.” She knew he was gunshy. She knew that he’d been adrift since he’d lost his parents as a child.
“Not when I watched buddy after buddy of mine bail out of the PJs. I had to make a choice. Keep doing the job I think matters, the job God made me to do. Or give it up for a woman who isn’t my true love.”
“And a man like you believes in true love?”
“I do.” He tugged her gently away from the pond, leading her through the lush grass. “I’ve learned that there’s only one of those in a lifetime, and I’d already missed the chance at mine.”
Had she heard him right? Cadence didn’t dare breathe as her mind went over his words. Did he feel this, too, this vibrant shimmering emotion that was too new for love and too strong for friendship?
It was as if a long-dormant place within her soul, dark for so long, had begun to shine. How could she not fall irrevocably in love with him now?
“I start thinking about what I missed by making the choices I did,” he went on, thoughtful. “I was just a kid. I’d turned eighteen and thought I knew everything. Thought I was indestructible. I was angry that life wasn’t fair.”
“I remember.”
“But the decisions we make, even at that age—no, especially at that age—have far-reaching consequences.”
“You chose defending this country instead of a quiet Montana life with me.”
“I chose a solitary life, and I won’t lie. There are times when I regret the aloneness.”
Her eyes widened, growing bigger in her lovely face. Her hair was down and playing across her face. Her lovely, dear face that had filled his dreams and memories for most of his life.
What are you doing, man? he asked. His free hand, as if of its own free will, cupped the soft curve of her jaw and cheek, leaving his thumb free to caress the hint of a dimple in her dainty chin.
It started like a hard pain in his chest directly behind his sternum and exploded like a well-hidden land mine, flaring outward with a force of heat and energy that tore him apart. Love so shocking and powerful he could not stop the flow of it through the pieces of him. Sweet like honey, as devastating as molten lava, it filled his body and his soul, mending him and making him whole.
Don’t let yourself love her, he commanded with all the strength of his will, but for the first time in his life, it wasn’t enough. He
couldn’t stop this. Nothing could stop the emotion that was love, but the power of what he felt made the word pale in comparison. It was a fierce need to protect and provide for, a soul-engrossing devotion, tenderness so true and overwhelming that it made every fiber of his being hurt. Not from its pain, but from its brightness.
You’re walking on dangerous ground, McKaslin. Drop her hand and walk away before both of you get hurt.
It was the only way he knew how to protect her. He took one long last glance at the people clustered around the marshy pond, feeding ducks. The sharp rising lilt of kids talking excitedly, the nasal, flat-noted quack of the ducks, the ripple of wind across water filled his senses. He couldn’t ignore the happy-looking married couples holding hands or standing shoulder to shoulder, so close that their shadows joined as one.
An odd tingling skidded down his neck, and he looked down at his feet. At the shadows he and Cadence made on the lawn before them—shadows joined as one.
He took a step away, separating their images, but the emotion within did not cool or fade. It seemed to gain strength as he kept her hand snug in his and led her back to her building.
Back to their separate lives.
“Uncle Ben?”
“Yeah, buddy?” Ben ignored the scalding pain in his lower leg as he secured the final end pole and tugged the rope. His old pup tent rose like a shadow in the long white fingers of moonlight from the half-moon.
“Wow,” Westin breathed, raspy with excitement. “That’s cool! How long are you gonna stay?”
“Until my leg gets better.” Ben pushed aside the sting of emotion as he whipped a knot in the rope, secure and low against the small metal stake he’d driven into the ground earlier. “I’ve got to be able to run really good on it.”
“You can walk on it now.” The kid sounded worried. Sad, because their time together was limited.
Yeah, buddy, I know how you feel. He held out his hands. “All done. You get the sleeping bags.”
“Yeah! The one you bought me!” Westin, who’d chosen the stars-and-galaxy-themed sleeping bag, was distracted away from his earlier question as he raced to the patio where they’d stacked their overnight camping supplies.