When she reached his side and saw the photographs scattered across the floor, she skidded to a stop. On his knees, Kyle hurried to gather the pictures back into their boxes. He looked up with an embarrassed flush. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
With a shake of her head, she dismissed the rude awakening and knelt at his side to help him pick up the mess. But as she reached for a stack of face down pictures near his knee, he slapped his hand on top of them, warding her off.
Aimee pulled her hand away. Okay. She got the message—but what was he hiding? Careful to give the tidy pile a wide berth, she collected the snapshots from their last summer vacation and dropped them in the box.
“What are you still doing up?”
Kyle shrugged. “Thought I’d clean up before I hit the sack.” He pushed the green scrapbook onto the tabletop near his shoulder, then the red.
“Oh. Well, I can get the rest of this.”
His frown was instantaneous and dark. “I’ll get it. I made the mess, I’ll clean it up.”
“Kyle,” Aimee sighed.
“What? You wouldn’t be here helping if I had two good legs. You’d yell something at me from the bedroom.” Frustration etched his handsome face into hard lines, accenting a scar on his forehead he hadn’t possessed when he’d last been home.
Aimee stuffed her hand against her flannel pajama pants to stop from tracing that thin white line. “Yeah, I would. I’d tell you to come to bed. But you don’t seem to be interested in sleeping.”
He expelled a harsh breath. His shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry.”
Reaching between them, she rested her hand on his. His gaze skittered down to where she touched him. “Go take your shower,” she encouraged in a low voice. “I’ll get this.”
“I can’t. I don’t have a bench.”
Bench… Aimee frowned, his meaning giving her pause. It came to her quickly, however, and she put his bad leg together with shower, realizing her error. He couldn’t handle the shower. He’d need to sit.
She squeezed his hand. “I’m a nurse, Kyle, and I’m certainly no stranger. Why won’t you let me help you?”
Kyle drew his hand back with a muffled hiss. “I don’t want help, Aimee.”
His pride rang loud and clear through the gruff response, and this time, Aimee refused to back down. She stood up, grabbed a towel from the closet. “Did you give your doctors such a hard time?” Stepping around him, she opened the bathroom door and flipped on the light. “I’m starting a bath. You can use the hot water, or you can let it sit overnight. I don’t care. But if you want to get in that tub, I’ll be waiting.”
Without further comment, she went inside and flipped on the taps, taking care to nudge the hot just this side of uncomfortable, the way Kyle preferred. While it ran, she set the towel on the towel heater and sat on the toilet seat, prepared to wait him out.
When the tub was full, she turned off the faucet. Her foot tapped an antsy rhythm on the heated tile floor while her fingers worked the washcloth into a tight twist. Seconds ticked by. Turned into silent minutes where she strained to hear a noise from beyond the partly open door. As far as she could tell, Kyle hadn’t moved from where she’d left him.
Floorboards creaked. Her heartbeat spiked as the door squeaked slowly open. Kyle stood on the other side, looking awkward and uncertain. In six years of marriage, and a full year before that, she’d never seen him so self-conscious.
Hesitantly, he stepped inside and nudged the door shut with the back of his heel. He rested his cane against the sink, turned to stare at the steamy water. Then with a soul-deep sigh of resignation, he pulled his bulky sweatshirt over his head.
The sight of Kyle’s broad shoulders, defined pecs, and sun-bronzed skin sent Aimee’s pulse into overdrive. She struggled for the ability to breathe. Countless times she had seen him naked, and every time he undressed, he cast a spell over her. Hard tight body, strong muscles, trim waist—Kyle Garland defined perfection.
He turned sideways, and the light caught the scar on his left shoulder where he’d been shot seven years ago. Aimee couldn’t contain a wistful smile. They’d met that way. Head held high, he’d walked into the MASH unit in Iraq, too proud to tell anyone he was in pain. He’d dug the bullet out on his own, attempted field stitches as well. But infection had set in, and she’d been tasked with reopening the gash and cleaning it out. For the next several months, Kyle Garland showed up regularly when combat wounded overloaded their resources. Those chance encounters—she always suspected they were more strategic than luck—led to six months of forbidden passion whenever they could get their hands on one another, and her eventual retirement so they didn’t have to worry about getting caught.
Her gaze dipped to his waist, where he fumbled with the button on his jeans. Aimee rose from her perch and pushed his hands away.
“Aimee, I can—”
“I know you can.” She popped the button with a twist of her wrist. “But I want to.”
Kyle sucked in a sharp breath. He stood absolutely still, his breath barely stirring her hair as she lowered the zipper and tucked her fingers into his waistband.
Chapter Four
Holy Mary, Mother of God—Aimee was undressing him. Kyle couldn’t move. His insides felt so tight he feared he might snap in half at any moment. How many times in the last fourteen months had he dreamed of this? Imagined the way her hands would slide over his body. The light fall of her lips against his skin.
As those lips dusted over his shoulder, he closed his eyes and exhaled on a hiss.
Too many damn times to count. Fire arced through his body, his injuries forgotten for the first time since he’d come to in the middle of Saif’s destroyed hut. He slapped an open palm against the wall to brace his unsteady leg and to stop himself from gathering her into his arms. He yearned to, ached to feel that silky skin sliding over his. Hell, she’d barely touched him, and he was hard as a rock.
She bent at the knees, her light breath coming dangerously close to his flagging erection, and pushed his jeans to his ankles. It took all of Kyle’s willpower to find the ability to lift each foot without tangling his left hand into her hair and dragging her full mouth up to where he wanted it. Soft lips. Satin tongue.
A shudder worked its way from his shoulders to the base of his spine.
“Aimee…”
His half-hearted protest trailed away as she stepped back and took his good hand. With a gentle tug, she led him to the water. Kyle stared speechlessly while she shucked her cozy pants and dipped a foot into the water. “Use my knee. I can brace your weight that way.”
For the love of heaven, he wanted to whimper. He couldn’t touch her. Couldn’t lower himself into the tub with a bird’s-eye-view of what lay beneath those lacy white panties.
“Kyle?”
He swallowed hard. Bathtub, not sex. Setting his palm on her thigh, he put his good leg in first, then his right, and eased down into the steamy water. For a heartbeat, he found peace. Heat soaked into his aching knee, spread slowly up his spine to push the tension from his shoulders. He closed his eyes, exhaled long and deep.
When he opened them again, however, where he was and what he was doing crashed into him like a bucket of rocks dumped on his head. Aimee sat on the edge of the tub, both feet in the water, knees just barely touching. He nearly groaned at the sight of that tempting bare skin.
She dipped the washcloth into the water and squeezed it over his shoulders. “Relax, Kyle,” she murmured.
Relax. That was like asking him to forget his name. He could no more relax than he could use a jump rope. The gentle touch of her fingertips against his shoulder, the way her hair brushed the surface of the water when she bent forward to rain water down his back again—this was hell. Absolute damnation.
All he could think about was dragging her off that porcelain ledge and into his lap. He didn’t care if her clothes stayed behind, or if she lost them in the tub. He wanted Aimee every bit as wet, every bit as willing, as he
was…and he wanted her like he’d never imagined he might.
Fourteen months of pretending… Fourteen months of ignoring her.
Kyle squeezed his eyes against the torment of it all.
“Hey,” she whispered at his ear. Her hand trailed down his bicep to his elbow, then up to his shoulder again. “It’s me. Just me. And it’s okay to want me, and not want me, all at once.”
It was the strangest exchange he’d ever had with Aimee, but somehow her odd words made it easier to accept the way she lathered soap over his back. He sagged beneath the gentle caress of her hands, allowed the silence to span between them. The splish of water, the warmth streaming over his skin, carried him to a pleasant place, where sitting in a bathtub with his ex wife bathing him and his cock so stiff he was uncomfortable, felt natural.
His thoughts drifted between fantasies of the way her breasts would bob as he thrust high inside her, and far less graphic realizations of just how soft her fingertips could be. He drifted between heaven and hell, salvation and damnation, and somehow, though he couldn’t begin to explain it, everything was right.
Perfect.
Her hands dipped around his waist, up his chest, down his abdomen. His belly jumped beneath the scrape of the washcloth, his breath catching as she came dangerously close to making contact with his throbbing erection. Then her hands disappeared, plinking into the water…and staying there.
Kyle opened his eyes to find her hands on his thigh, her fingertips kneading at the atrophied muscle. One manicured nail traced the length of his ugly scar to his knee, and her delicate brow puckered with a frown. How he wished he could feel the sweep of her hands, the way her fingers kneaded into his skin—anything but this exasperating sense of pressure.
He pushed her hands away. The magic of the encounter dissolved into the reality of circumstance. “Please don’t.”
She lifted her head, her ale-brown eyes locking with his. “It will help. Your scars don’t bother me, Kyle.”
Staring into her tender gaze, Kyle forgot everything but the woman in front of him, the way she made him feel. He lifted his hand, tucked her hair behind her ear, and cupped the side of her face in his palm. Water dripped down his fingers to trickle over her cheek. Brushing the droplets away with his thumb, he leaned forward and drew her into a gentle kiss.
Time stood still as Aimee parted her lips and her tongue glided over his. He savored the faint taste of peppermint, inhaled the scent of fruit that lingered in her thick hair. Just this once he’d take all he could get, even if he didn’t deserve it. He’d divorced her, a dozen reasons would keep them apart, but this kiss he needed more than he’d needed the doctors in Germany. It balmed something so deep inside him he couldn’t name it. Soothed the demons that kept him awake at night.
He couldn’t hang on to this, but for one brief instant in time, he could forget the last year and a half of his life.
****
Though her eyes were closed, tears gathered beneath Aimee’s lowered lashes. She’d waited so long—too long—for Kyle to give her some small sign he still loved her. If the stroke of his tongue had held more demand, if his mouth had pressed harder, she would have dismissed this tidbit of ecstasy to base desire. But the reverence in his kiss, the slight tremble of his fingertips against her cheek, reminded her of the only other similar moment they’d shared—the kiss he’d given her right after they were pronounced man and wife.
Kyle Garland still loved her, and if she could tap into that emotion, if she could bring it to the surface, they might be able to put the past behind them. But he had to discover that as well. She couldn’t rush him to the truth between them when he’d tried so hard to sever the ties that bound them together.
He eased the kiss to a lingering close and rested his damp forehead against hers. “I’d like to get out now,” he whispered.
Drawing in an unsteady breath, Aimee nodded. She swiveled on the bathtub edge and dried off her legs. Then she stood, straddling the tub as she’d done earlier, her knee bent to offer him support.
He steadied himself with one hand on her thigh and the other on the wall. A sturdy push brought him surging out of the water to his feet. He made no attempt to hide the way his erection bobbed against his abdomen—evidence he not only felt love but the same desire that left her damp and uncomfortable.
She took his elbow, helping him out onto the bathmat, then handed him the towel. “You want me to get your sweats?”
He hesitated a second before giving her a curt nod. “Please.”
A thrill shot down her spine. Finally, he’d accepted her help. No small feat for Kyle.
Giving him a soft smile, she donned her pajama pants and slipped out of the room. The hallway gave her opportunity to pull in deep lungfuls of much-needed air. She’d broken through his protective shell. Now, if she could just get him to open up, to tell her why he’d forced her away, why he’d begun to keep everything to himself.
Aimee forced down building hope. True, she had accomplished a milestone without really intending anything other than genuine assistance. Still, she had mountains to climb, and the odds of making it to the other side weren’t in her favor. As Kyle had proved with the divorce, when he set his mind to something, for better or worse, he didn’t budge.
Not to mention, she still had Christmas to navigate, and Conner’s mother who wanted to see Kyle. None of which would go over well.
She hurried up to their room to grab clean sweats and a loose T-shirt from his dresser. Well past midnight, the house was chilly, and she tossed his heavy robe over her shoulder as well. Though she would make it clear she wouldn’t turn him away if he wanted to share their bed, she doubted he’d accept the offer. He would want the robe on the couch.
Downstairs once more, Aimee found Kyle sitting at the dining room table wearing only the towel around his waist. The scrapbooks she’d slaved over since the first year of their married life were scattered in front of him, boxes of photographs sitting to his left. He accepted his clothes with a faint smile and wasted no time in changing.
Kyle lowered himself back into the chair and tapped an open page. “Remember this?”
Aimee peered over his shoulder. She grinned at a picture of the two of them on the beach in front of a ginormous sand castle. Italy—where she’d met him and his team for a brief period of leave before he returned to Iraq. The castle had been the creative efforts of five Delta Force operatives and one recently retired, veteran nurse. “Yeah I remember that. Shortly after, you tried to drown me.”
He gave her a false scowl. “I did not. I didn’t know you were trying to get out of the surf.”
“Uh huh.” Aimee leaned down and brushed his cheek with a kiss. “That’s what you said then too.” Opening a more recent scrapbook, she slid into the seat beside him. “What prompted this?”
“I haven’t looked at them in forever.”
She glanced up at him through her eyelashes. “You do know it’s going on one, right?”
“Yeah,” he answered quietly. “I don’t sleep so well anymore.”
Because of his injury? Or because of all the things he wouldn’t tell her—like what happened over in Afghanistan?
Aimee dismissed the questions and tapped a photograph of the last military formal they’d attended, where Kyle’s commander had been awarded for his dedicated service. The picture was of all five of Kyle’s team and Major Renfield. They had confirmed her pregnancy the night before, and Kyle celebrated in excess. He’d been so drunk when they got home that he passed out on the stairs, still wearing his dress uniform and shoes. Aimee laughed at the memory. “How about this?”
“That was a fun night.” Kyle grinned, but good humor slowly morphed into faint frown.
“It was.”
He pulled the book beneath his nose, his frown deepening with every page he turned. His silence signaled his retreat into that place he never shared with her, and regret pulled through Aimee’s veins. If she hadn’t said anything, he might still be laughing. Mi
ght still be engaging her in conversation.
She pushed away from the table. “Do you want me to make some coffee?”
“Yeah,” he answered distantly.
Was it the picture of his team? Or the memory of their far more personal loss? Aimee debated the answers as she entered the kitchen. Denton, Parker, and Jones weren’t the first teammates Kyle had buried. Two others—Racine and Starks—fell in Iraq, shortly after she’d met Kyle. She’d had to dig, but he hadn’t totally clammed up inside himself then. While things hadn’t been easy after her miscarriage, he hadn’t cinched himself up tight until significantly later. Once she’d accepted the fact she needed a bit of outside, professional help and had finally stopped grieving.
So what happened? And what happened nine months ago that he wouldn’t speak to Walsh? Conner’s voice echoed in her head as she pulled down coffee and filter. It was bad, Aims. Real bad.
Even Conner refused to offer so much as a hint. When she’d pressed him for more, he had shaken his head and suggested they go get Starbucks—his way of diverting conversation. Entirely strange behavior for Conner.
Going one step beyond that, when she’d hit the end of her rope during the divorce and contacted Major Renfield, he’d given her the party-line of Classified. When the Major could talk, he would.
Something had happened over there. Something unrelated to her divorce that was slowly tearing Kyle apart—she’d stake her life on that.
While the coffee pot brewed, she smoothed her hands down the front of her pajamas. “I’m beat, Kyle. I’m going to bed. If you can manage the stairs, you’re welcome to your side of the bed.”
He didn’t even look up as he replied, “Good night.”
Chapter Five
Aimee awakened to the sound of sleet on the windowpane. The pillow beside hers was empty, as she’d expected it would be. Still, she’d hoped to wake up beside Kyle, and the barren mattress filled her with disappointment. She longingly ran her hand over his untouched pillow.
A Broken Christmas Page 4