Hallowed Ground (Flight & Glory #4)

by Rebecca Yarros

  “No. They’re actually less frequent, less violent. If they weren’t, I’d be worried.” I leaned back against the counter, keeping a respectable distance between us, or I’d have those pajama pants around her ankles in two seconds.

  “Good. That’s good.”

  “I want to take you somewhere.”

  She gave me a wan smile. “Last time that didn’t work out too well for you.”

  “Yeah, well, no bike here. Just us.”

  “Can I shower first?”

  The image of water dripping down her tight little body took over every brain cell.

  “Josh?”

  I blinked. “Yeah, shower. All good.” A week without touching December and I was ready to combust. How the hell had I survived three months of deployment?

  She hadn’t been standing in front of you.

  I waited forty-five minutes while she showered, dried her hair, and dressed. I didn’t go after her, touch her, hell, even so much as peek. It was an incredibly long forty-five minutes.

  “Ready,” she said, coming from the hallway in a baby blue sundress. Her hair was up in some kind of messy knot, with soft tendrils that caressed her cheeks. I clenched the arm of the couch to keep from sending my hands up her skirt. If sex had been my drug of choice, I was sure as hell going through withdrawals.

  “You look…edible,” I said, getting to my feet.

  “As do you,” she said with a smile, gesturing to my khaki shorts and short-sleeve button-down. Luckily it was green, so we weren’t too matchy-matchy.

  “Shall we?” I offered my hand, and she took it. A ten-minute drive in my rental car, and we pulled up to the ski lifts in Breckenridge.

  “What are we doing?”

  I simply smiled and held open her door. “Trust me.”

  She arched her eyebrow, knowing full well that I’d just used her own words against her. We walked, hand in hand, to the gondola station, waited our turn, and after I slipped the attendant a fifty, had a private ride to Peak Eight.

  “This is beautiful,” she said, her nose pressed against the glass as we took to the sky over Breckenridge.

  “Yeah, it is,” I said softly.

  She smiled at me over her shoulder. “I love it here.”

  “Me, too. This whole town makes me think of possibilities, reminds me that the things you want most, sometimes you can actually have.”

  She turned to me and curled up on the seat just under my arm. “Like us.”

  “Like us,” I said, then kissed her lightly, lingering just a moment to savor the way her soft lips clung to mine.

  “I miss you when you’re gone.”

  “You’re never far from my thoughts. I keep a picture of you on my kneeboard.” Which currently is spattered with my blood.

  “Really?” Her eyes lit up. Had I never told her? Never let her know that she was with me on every mission?

  “When we go into a situation where the landing zone isn’t clear, where it’s hot, there’s a moment when we all make sure that we’re in. Everyone agrees, and then we go to extract the wounded.”

  “Because you know what could happen.” She didn’t flinch, just spoke as a matter of fact, and it gave me the courage to keep going.

  “Yes. I always say yes.”

  “I would expect nothing less of you.”

  “Even if it means I don’t come home to you?”

  She took a deep breath and then laid her legs across mine. “I have faith that you’ll come home. It’s all that gets me through each day that you’re gone. I can’t live thinking you won’t. That kind of fear is paralyzing, crippling. So I choose to believe that every choice you make will bring you home to me, and save others.”

  “I always look at your picture before I say yes. I know what I’m choosing in that moment—the possibility of you holding a folded flag—and I do it anyway. I chose to go after Jagger, and I could have left you holding a folded flag. I chose the possibility of saving him over the certainty of coming home to you. How can you love someone who doesn’t choose you?”

  “How could I not love someone who risks his own life to save others? Josh, you didn’t choose Jagger over me. I wasn’t lying wounded and bleeding on the ground in Afghanistan. I was hanging out with Paisley in our home. I was never in danger. Stop blaming yourself. You made the right choice. I know the debt you feel you have to pay. I see the war raging just under your skin.”

  “What else do you see?”

  “Besides the man I love?”

  “Yes.”

  She sat up enough to look at me comfortably. “I see the struggle, the way you watch the news, the look you get when you’re trolling the internet for what’s happening over there. Mostly…” She searched my eyes for a long moment and let out a stuttered breath. “Mostly, I see the moments when you’re not here. Your body is here, but your mind…it’s there. And those moments scare me the most, because I’m terrified that I won’t ever truly have you home again. Not one hundred percent. Does that make sense?”

  “More than you know.” I grazed my thumb over the diamond on her hand as we passed through the first station on our way up. “Do you want the ugliest truth?”

  “Yes. I want everything.” She forced a half smile. “And maybe if you tell me the worst, the rest will be easier.”

  “I feel like I left pieces of myself there, and I don’t just mean the physical ones.” I looped my arm over her thighs, resting my palm on her bare skin, trying to ground myself in her warmth, her light. “Our unit is still there, filling in the gaps from me, Trivette…Carter. I’m not sure I’ll really be myself until they’re all home, everyone we left there. I feel like I’m split between home and Afghanistan, like I don’t really belong here.”

  “Okay,” she said in simple acceptance that meant more than she could ever know.

  “And when I’m with you, that all fades away. You ground me in a different reality, where there’s just you and me. I haven’t used alcohol or drugs, because I’ve used you.”

  “I knew that,” she whispered. “It’s never bothered me. It only got under my skin when you wouldn’t talk to me, like sleeping with me would answer all my questions, explain everything I needed to know. Sometimes it felt like you were distracting me from asking. That, I despised.”

  “No, I was distracting myself. Answering your questions meant examining them, because I’ve never been able to hold back with you. It’s always been full measures or nothing. No halfway bullshit.”

  She ran her fingers through my hair, and I groaned when she scratched her nails lightly over my scalp. God, it felt so damn good.

  “I’ve always loved that about us. We’re all in. Always.”

  “Yes.”

  “But that’s not ugly. Nothing you’ve told me is ugly.”

  My stomach dropped, and we passed through the station on route to Peak Eight. I looked up to the green mountains, their beauty overwhelming, their sheer size distorted because we were too close to accurately gauge their mass.

  “Even knowing everything we have, this incredible love that we share, our beautiful life that we’re building…” I shook my head and looked down at her knees.

  “Josh.” She tipped my chin. “I’m here. No matter what you’re about to say.”

  “Having done that mission, medevaced the wounded… Ember, I’ve found my purpose. I’ll always go when they call. How many deployments can you wait through? How many times can I leave you?”

  Fear streaked through her eyes, but she masked it before I could question her. “As many as it takes. I would rather sit home and wait for you, than spend a lifetime with anyone else. By the time the next deployment comes along, you’ll be healed, and I’ll be stronger.”

  “That’s not the life you wanted. We said I’d get out after my contract, remember?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. I know, and I still want that. And this is the life I wanted, because I have you. Everything else will fall in place.”

  The gondola stopped, and I helped Ember
to her feet. We came out at the base of Peak Eight, and I walked us toward the superlift.

  “Okay, now you have me confused,” she said, her hand tightly in mine. “Everything there is to do is over there.” She pointed toward the alpine slide.

  “Oh, you think I’d sign up to hurl myself down a mountain with nothing but a sled and a tube slide?”

  She scoffed. “Yeah, it’s probably not nearly enough of a rush for you.”

  “You wound me.” I slapped my hand over my chest as we made our way to the base of the superlift.

  “Mr. Walker?” the attendant asked.

  “That’s me, well, us,” I said, gesturing to a very confused Ember.

  “Ms. Patricks will meet you at the top.”

  “Thank you,” I told him as we sat in the middle of the four-person lift chair. It accelerated at the very edge of the platform, and we were airborne, our feet kicking without ground beneath us.

  “Oh my God,” Ember muttered, trying to tuck her dress under her thighs.

  I laughed. “No one can see you, babe. Let it fly free.”

  “No way in hell,” she muttered. “There’s got to be cameras.”

  “Then they can catch this.” I captured her face and turned it toward mine, then kissed the breath out of her. She melted into me, her dress long forgotten. I kept the kiss slow, lazy, savoring every gasp from her lips, every time her breath stuttered. There was no distraction here, no phone ringing, no one in the background. The absolute quiet was perfection.

  She giggled when my hand grazed her thigh. “One-track mind?”

  “When it comes to you? Always.”

  The lift reached the top of the hill and slowed. I helped her dismount and swung her into my arms when she tripped. She looped her arms around my neck, and I couldn’t ever remember feeling as happy as I did in that moment, carrying the woman I loved.

  We made our way through the longer strands of grass, the tiny wildflowers that dotted the terrain, until we reached a large, wooden platform. “Are you going to put me down?” she asked.

  “No,” I answered, climbing the few steps it took to come out onto the stagelike surface. “There’s room for about seventy people up here. At least, that’s what they’re telling me.”

  “Oh?” she asked, not really looking at the platform. Her eyes focused on the view. “Josh, it’s gorgeous.”

  The mountains rose before us in stark contrast to the blue of the sky. They were covered in green to the treeline, the town of Breckenridge appearing tiny beneath us. “It’s perfect.”

  “I’ve never seen a more beautiful view.”

  I set her down, her little sandals plunking against the wood, and then I stood opposite her, taking her hands in mine. “I think this view is as good as my life will get. Except maybe in about a year. This is perfect.”

  “Perfect for what?” she asked, tilting her head.

  “For marrying me.” I watched closely as her eyes widened and her lips parted. Her gaze swept over the platform behind us to the view in front of us and then back to my eyes.

  “We can get married here?”

  “We can. They don’t have an opening until early next summer, so we’d have to wait until June and pray there’s no snow, but yeah. You said a mountaintop in Colorado, and I thought, what better place than where this all started for us—Breckenridge. We can have the ceremony up here, and the reception in the lodge, which I’ve been told is very sought-after. Repeatedly.”

  “We can ride the chairlift?” Her eyes lit up, and I wanted to fist-pump, to shout to the world that I was this woman’s man.

  “We can, dress and all.”

  She laughed, her smile wide and bright, clear of the shadows that had dragged us both down lately.

  “Mr. Walker?” a woman asked, walking over to us with a clipboard. “I’m Mrs. Patricks, the wedding coordinator. What do you two think? Is it what you’re looking for?”

  “Well, Miss Howard, what do you say?” I lifted her hand and kissed her palm.

  She spun, taking everything in one last time while she deliberated. Then she turned back to me, radiating happiness from every line in her body. “I think it’s absolutely perfect.”

  “Yes!” I shouted, scooping her into my arms and lifting her above my head. She braced her hands on my shoulders, and her laugh healed another broken line in me, stitched it together with love and the promise of our future.

  I slowly lowered her until I could kiss her, and then I didn’t give a hot damn if the wedding coordinator was there or not. She tasted like summer and felt like home.

  We broke apart, and I turned to the open Colorado sky and shouted at the top of my lungs. “I’m marrying December Howard!”

  She laughed, and damned if it didn’t put a little more life into my soul. “Louder, babe. I don’t think they heard you in Kansas.”

  I took a deeper breath and yelled even louder, pretty certain the whole world got the message that time.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Ember

  The next month passed in what was my idea of working perfection. We talked, laid everything bare, and accepted each other’s fears, doubts, ugly little truths. The nightmares were down to a couple of times a week, and he managed to sit through an entire movie at the theater without leaving because of the crowds.

  But no matter how much progress we made, I still saw the moments where he wasn’t with me. That vacant look came over his face, his eyes focused in the distance, and I knew he was…there.

  The scars faded to a light pink, his air cast came off after one week longer than he’d originally been told, and he’d even admitted that he’d screwed up by taking it off for the race. He was getting stronger in physical therapy and, two and a half months after the crash, had almost full mobility.

  I took my GRE’s and was waiting on my scores. Waiting to decide if I was really going to Ephesus in a few weeks. I still leaned toward no. After all, we were finally in a great place after surviving a shit storm, and these last couple of months had been the longest we’d ever lived together. I wasn’t exactly in a rush to run off to Turkey, not when it could jeopardize what we’d worked so hard for. But we talked, we loved, we touched. We did easy, simple things like cooking dinner.

  We lived.

  We planned our wedding, which may end up being the single biggest reason we’d never divorce. Hell if I was ever going to go through this crap again. “Ugh. Who seriously needs that much time to book out?” I groaned, nearly throwing my iPad onto the couch as Josh did shirtless pushups on the living room floor. Good God, that man was a marvel of creation.

  “Who now?”

  “Photographer. We need to find a different one. If we want the one that’s recommended on the wedding site, he needs ten months.”

  “Well. We’re. At. Ten. Months.” He spoke between reps, just breathless enough to make me want to slide under his body, sweat and all.

  “And he’s like…two thousand dollars.”

  He paused. “Damn.”

  “For a deposit.”

  He hit the floor. “Okay, well, I don’t plan on getting married more than once, so give the man what he wants and book him.”

  “Between this and the reception…”

  “Yeah, well, I married a girl with good taste. It will be fine.”

  “Mom offered.”

  “No,” he answered, coming to his feet. He stretched his arms above his head, the lines of his abs rippling, and I damn near fell off the couch. “Your mom is still paying for April’s school and supporting Gus. The answer is no.”

  “Maybe I should think twice about grad school,” I muttered. “The money Dad left me for college is dwindling.”

  “You’ll get a scholarship. I’m not stressed.” He headed for our kitchen, grabbing water from the fridge. “And if you don’t, we’ll pay for it.”

  He came over, kissed my forehead, and walked toward the stairs. Even the man’s back was sexy. “Want some company in the shower?”

  “T
hat’s something I could most definitely agree to.”

  There was a knock at the door. Crap. I hopped up and checked the window. “Paisley’s here.” With awful timing.

  “Well, have fun, and don’t forget we have that barbecue tonight.” He disappeared up the stairs.

  “Hey,” I said, opening the door.

  “Morning,” she answered, a small gift bag in her hand. Her eyes were slightly puffy, and her smile forced.

  “Why don’t you come in?”

  She nodded. “Just for a second.”

  I shut the door behind her and turned to see her pacing my living room. “Is everything okay? Jagger? The baby?”

  She paused, startled. “Oh, yes, they’re okay.” Paisley ran her hand over her belly like she could actually caress their son. “Everyone is fine. I just got a box from Will’s mom. I’d taken all his things down to Alabama for her to sort through, but I must have missed this.” She handed over the bag. “It’s for Josh.”

  I took it by the handle, its weight far heavier than the ounces it felt. “Oh.”

  “I don’t know what’s on it—the USB drive—but mine was a video.”

  My heart sank. The videos I’d seen of my father since he died were such a double-edged sword. “Oh, Paisley.”

  She shook her head quickly and blinked back tears. “No, no. It was…good. Good to see him. I watched it before Jagger got up,” she whispered the last.

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t want him to see me cry. I’m better most days, really, I am. And I don’t want him to think that my tears mean I love him less. I just…I miss Will. Even after we broke up, and he was such an ass…” She laughed. “He’s always been a part of my life, and that hole he left, that’s not something that can be filled, you know?”

  My fingers tightened on the small paper handles of the bag. “Yeah, I understand that perfectly.”

  Her lips quirked upward. “It’s funny how they’re the ones that die, but we’re the ones who are changed.”

  “Irrevocably.”

  A look passed between us, just as it had the first time we met and understood each other on a level not many people could. “We on for Sunday night dinner?”