Home for a Hero

by Heatherly Bell

  Brett groaned. “Can we just go out for breakfast? Walk somewhere?”

  “You bet,” she said, leaning forward to kiss him.

  What started as a light peck became deeper, their lips moving softly, brushing together, before Brett cupped the back of her head so she couldn’t get away, mouth more insistent.

  “It doesn’t seem to matter what I tell myself,” he muttered, breaking the kiss, “I just can’t get enough of you.”

  “Breakfast,” she told him, pushing herself up and dragging the sheet with her so she could escape to the bathroom without him seeing her naked in the bright light. “Before we end up staying in bed all day.”

  It wouldn’t have been a bad thing, but they both needed to get out of the house. There were too many memories in this room that were haunting Brett, and if she were perfectly honest, in the full morning sunshine, there was something not so easy to ignore about being with another man in the room she’d shared for years with her husband. No matter how much she wanted it to feel right, she knew that going out was exactly what they needed to do. A quick shower and a little makeup and she’d be ready to go.

  She’d already been through losing her father, and then as good as losing her alcoholic mom for years at a time. So losing Sam and then losing Brett? Not something she had any intention of letting happen, especially not now that they’d spent the night together.

  * * *

  Brett clipped Bear’s leash on and dropped to his haunches, looking the dog in the eye as he ran his fingers through his fur. He missed his own dog like crazy, was so used to having a constant companion by his side.

  “You’re doing pretty well with everything that’s going on,” he told the canine.

  He received a low whine from Bear in return.

  “It might not be guns and explosives, but it’s still tough, huh?”

  “Are you talking to yourself or the dog?”

  Brett cleared his throat when he realized Jamie had walked into the room. “The dog, of course. Talking to myself would just be weird.”

  “He saying much in response?” she teased.

  Brett looked her up and down, knowing there was no way he’d ever be able to resist her so long as he was staying in the house with her. When he wasn’t with her, he was thinking about her, and when he was with her...damn. No amount of good intentions would ever help him when they were together.

  “Let’s go,” he said, before he had any longer to think about Jamie and the way she was making him feel.

  “Are we going to walk all the way there?”

  He laughed. “You make it sound like it’s a hike.”

  “I’m the girl who always takes a car. You seem to keep forgetting that.”

  “You have a dog now, and a guy with you who likes to feel like he’s earned a cooked breakfast. So Bear and I vote for the walk, that’s you outnumbered.”

  Jamie sighed and took Bear’s leash from him, smiling as their hands collided. “My dog, remember? I’m the one who’s supposed to be up for walking all the time.”

  Bear was looking up at them, studying them each in turn, and he felt sorry for the poor dog, listening to them banter. There was no chance he’d ever figure out what they were saying, and he’d been so used to understanding commands when he’d been on the leash for work.

  “He’s all yours, let’s go.”

  Brett waited for her to shut and lock the door behind them, before walking slow to match her pace. The sun was shining down on them already, another hot Sydney day. He’d spent days and weeks out under the scorching sun, working with his dog and the other guys, patrolling for explosives constantly, but that sun had never been enjoyable. It had drained them all and made them grumpy, made their skin dry and their throats burn. This sun made him feel free. Alive.

  “Brett, I know you don’t want to talk about what happened....”

  He glanced sideways, seeing the frustrated look on Jamie’s face as she clearly tried to figure out how to talk to him about something she was obviously so desperate to know more about. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to talk to her, it was just that dredging up the past wasn’t always worth the pain, or the reality. He’d been in a black hole that could have swallowed him alive, his thoughts so dark they’d almost consumed him, and going back wasn’t good for him or her.

  If he shut his eyes, he could still smell the burned flesh, still feel the searing pain of the fire as it shot up his leg and across his back.

  “I just...” She paused and stopped walking, arms crossed like she didn’t know what to do with them. “I just want to know if it happened fast? If he suffered. I’m sorry.” She blew out a big breath. “I’ve been wanting to ask someone that question for so long, and I think you’re the only one who can answer it because everyone else just wants to fob me off and pretend like it wasn’t anywhere near as horrific as I know it was.”

  Brett started walking again, because if he was going to talk then he needed to keep moving, needed something else to focus on to help him say the words. He’d thought she wanted to know about his experience, what he’d been through, but she wanted to know about Sam and he could hardly hold that back from her. She deserved to know.

  “When we were working that day, it was just like usual,” he began, wondering how the hell he was going to say what he needed to say, but continuing anyway. It wasn’t something he’d ever talked about, but it was a scene that had run though his head constantly ever since it had happened. He could see it as if it were yesterday—shut his eyes and pretend like it was that day all over again. “We were with a unit of SAS guys, providing support, and I was working with Sam. We both got our dogs out and started doing our drill, but we knew there was something off almost immediately.”

  He was staring straight ahead when Jamie slipped her hand into his, and he didn’t resist. Because talking about that day was beyond hard, and it was something he’d never done before. Brett needed her strength.

  “His dog identified the explosive immediately,” he continued, ignoring her because now he’d started talking he needed to get it all out. “His dog went dead still, and for a split second we looked at one another, because we knew it was bad, that we were in a hot spot, that Bear had only frozen like that for one reason. We called out to the guys not to move, and then Teddy indicated another one.” He paused. “You have to understand that sometimes, most of the time, our dogs just raise their tails slightly, move differently, in a way that only their handler would ever notice. But we all knew what Bear had detected that day, and we all knew how badly things could end. That we might never see another day.”

  Brett swallowed down the lump of emotion choking his throat and blinked to force the tears back. He didn’t want to cry, didn’t want to feel again, but the memories were crashing into him like they’d only just happened.

  Jamie was squeezing his hand tight, like she wanted to take some of the pain for him, but he knew she already had enough pain of her own to deal with. He just wanted to tell her like it was, explain to her what had happened so they could both move forward and never have to talk about it again.

  “From that moment, it was like everything moved in slow motion, before becoming such a fast blur that I don’t even remember the details.” He looked at her, saw that Jamie’s eyes were filled with tears, just like his were from going back in time to that day. “All I know is that I was blown back so far my body was slammed down close to the 4x4, and Sam was gone. So was Teddy. To this day, no one can understand how Bear managed to survive the blast, or how either of us didn’t lose limbs. But it was fast, so fast that I don’t know how or why I ended up so far from the bomb.”

  Jamie’s hand in his stopped him from moving as she pulled him to a halt. She had the leash in her other hand, and she let go of Brett’s hand for a second so she could loop her arm around his neck and draw him into an embrace so warm, so loving, that he was powerless to pull a
way. And he didn’t want to pull away. Because no matter how guilty he felt, this felt so right, too. He needed Jamie as much as she needed him. He liked that he could be honest with her when he needed to be, that they understood what the other had gone through, on some level at least.

  “Thank you for telling me,” she murmured, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you, for being honest with me when no one else could.”

  Brett shut his eyes. Sam’s blood covered him, bits of his best friend burning and blasted all around them. There were so many pieces of him, so much flesh that when Brett had woken up, he’d vomited until there was nothing left in his stomach. And his dog, his beautiful dog had been killed on impact, too.

  But they weren’t memories he was ever going to share with her. If he ever needed to get them off his chest, he could tell Logan, a fellow soldier who’d seen enough on his tours to cope with what he’d hear. He’d never let Jamie suffer through those particular memories with him, the blatant truth of that day. There were some things she needed to be protected from, and that was top of the list.

  Jamie pulled back then, looked into his eyes and didn’t break contact even as she kissed him.

  “I need you to know that I want you here, Brett. It might be weird, that we’re together and all that, but all I know is that this is right. That having you in my life seems right and I don’t want to lose you.”

  He nodded, but he still wasn’t convinced that what they were doing was any part of okay or right. It wasn’t that he didn’t have feelings for Jamie, because he did. His problem was that he felt too much for her, and he knew that he’d never, ever want to walk away. That this wasn’t just about comfort or friendship.

  “When you say you want me here, do you mean that we keep this just between us, or...?”

  She ran her hand down his arm before looping it through so they could walk arm in arm. “I think we should tell Logan. I mean, I don’t want to lie to him and I don’t want to come between your friendship. We need to be honest with him.”

  Brett blew out a breath. “Logan is not going to be okay with this.”

  “I know, but we need to tell him. I’ll tell him. I just don’t want this to be any more awkward than it needs to be, and the longer this goes on, the harder telling him will become, because he’ll think we’ve been lying to him all along if we don’t come clean.”

  “Maybe we should text him, tell him to meet us for lunch or something after our walk tomorrow?” Brett suggested. “He might take it better if there’s a lot of people around. You know, so he can’t knock out every tooth in my mouth.” After the way Logan had warned him off the other night...it wasn’t going to be pleasant, no matter how or where they did it. Logan was going to be furious, not with her, but with him.

  Jamie laughed but he shook his head.

  “What?” she asked.

  “I don’t think you know Logan like I do,” he said. “There is nothing about this that’s going to be easy. He’s like a teddy bear around you, acts like he wouldn’t hurt a fly, but the Logan I know isn’t going to deal with this well.”

  “I lost my husband, Brett, and now something has happened between us. I’m not intending on acting like you’ve taken advantage of me, if that’s what you’re worried he’ll think.”

  Logan was going to kill him. Actually kill him.

  * * *

  Jamie couldn’t stop laughing as Bear ran after the stick she’d just thrown like his life depended on it. Having fun with him had changed the dynamic between them, and she was pretty sure her dog was enjoying it as much as she was.

  “I told you, he made the squad based on his determination with balls and sticks,” Brett said, grinning straight back at her.

  “Why did I never realize how much fun he was before?”

  Brett came up and put his arm around her. “Because you were both trying to figure the other out, and everything had become too serious. It was like a child living with you who wasn’t allowed to have fun, so he was bored and didn’t understand what was being asked of him.”

  Jamie gave Bear a hearty pat when he dropped the stick at her feet for the umpteenth time. “Good boy,” she praised, before throwing it again.

  “We used to call Bear the branch manager and my dog the deputy branch manager,” Brett said, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “The two of them used to have a blast when we let them play.”

  Jamie leaned into Brett, enjoying his arm around her and the sun beating down on her shoulders. She moved only when he had to reach into his back pocket to retrieve his mobile.

  “Is it Logan?” she asked.

  Brett tapped a message into his phone before turning his attention back to her. “Yeah. He’s said yes to lunch tomorrow.”

  “What do you say we just grab something to take away this morning?” she asked him, shaking her head at Bear as he faithfully retrieved the stick again. He looked disappointed that their game was over, but it wasn’t like they hadn’t let him have a heap of fun. “I know a place nearby where they do a mean bacon-and-egg sandwich, and we can sit in the sun and relax.”

  Brett’s gaze met hers. “That’s exactly what I need to take my mind off things.”

  “You mean Logan?” she asked, tucking under his arm and pulling him along with an arm around his waist.

  “Yeah.” He hugged her back as they walked. “So where is this amazing food place?”

  “Ah, it’s more like a food shack, but I promise you it’s good. They do great coffee, too.”

  “So it’ll kind of be like our first actual date?” he asked, raising an eyebrow when she looked at him.

  “Yeah, I guess it will be. That okay with you?”

  “Sure is. But I’m guessing we might have to buy for Bear, too. I doubt he’s going to tolerate us eating greasy food in front of him without sharing.”

  * * *

  Brett knew he needed to just shut his mind off, but it was easier said than done. Meeting Logan was seriously playing with his head, and he knew better than Jamie how tomorrow was going to go down. But there was nothing he could do about it right now, so he needed to shake off his worries.

  “My shout. Want the same as me?”

  Brett returned her smile, not wanting to ruin her happiness. “Whatever’s good, but order me two.”

  “Typical boy,” she muttered, spinning around to go in and order.

  He watched as she disappeared then came back with a number on a piece of brown paper.

  “Oh, this is a really classy place, isn’t it? I was thinking of taking you somewhere nice for our first date, not to a takeaway joint.”

  She giggled. Jamie actually giggled, and the noise was infectious enough to make him laugh straight back at her.

  “Trust me, it’s worth overlooking the surroundings for the food. And the coffee. Did I mention the coffee?”

  “I think you’re being paid to do PR for this place,” he said to her, grabbing her hand and pulling her in against his body. “I don’t believe you for a second.”

  “Well, you should,” she whispered, tipping her chin up and brushing her lips against his.

  She jumped away when their number was called. Brett couldn’t take his eyes off her as she walked away—and he couldn’t have forgotten her smile even if he walked away and never returned. Jamie was getting under his skin, and there was nothing he didn’t like about it.

  “Here you go,” Jamie announced as she emerged once again. “Coffee for you, and the food is wrapped up in here. Let’s go find a spot somewhere nice.”

  They walked the five minutes back to the park and sat on the grass, Bear sprawling out beside them. Jamie reached into the bag and pulled out massive sandwiches wrapped in paper, passed one to him, then unwrapped one for Bear and put it on the ground, before taking one for herself.

  “Well, it at least smells good,” he told her, taking his first bite.

/>   She did the same, watching him, like she was expecting a reaction. He took another bite, and ketchup and sauce oozed out down his hand, along with runny egg yolk that tasted incredible.

  “Amazing or what?” she asked, eyebrows raised as she kept eating hers, hands tilted up to keep the sauce from running onto her skin.

  “You win, it’s amazing,” he told her, mouth full as he tried to talk. He kept eating, not able to stop for the juice running out of it.

  When they’d both finished and cleaned up as best they could, using only paper napkins, Brett lay back on the grass beside Jamie, his elbow propping him up. He looked at Jamie, and she at him, both nursing their coffees.

  “Thanks for this,” he said, reaching out to run his hand down her hair, tucking a few loose strands behind her ear.

  “For greasy food and damn good coffee?” she teased.

  “No, for showing me that we can just hang out and enjoy being together. That it’s simple things like this that are important, just...” He didn’t even know what he was trying to tell her. “I guess what I’m really badly attempting to say is that being with you isn’t easy for me, but it’s worth it. It’s worth the pain just to have you with me.”

  Jamie brushed the back of her fingers against her eyes, and it was only then he realized that she was trying to disguise her tears.

  “Don’t cry, Jamie. Please don’t cry,” he murmured, taking her hand and squeezing it tight.

  “Just ignore me, I’m all emotional,” she said, smiling and squeezing his hand back. “I’m happy, Brett, I promise you I’m happy.”

  “Good. If you’re happy, then I’m happy.”

  And it was true. He might be finding being with Jamie hard to wrap his head around, to deal with, but her being happy was what was important.

  Chapter 11

  The sun shone brightly through the window and onto Jamie’s face as she struggled to open her eyes. She reached out a hand and found an empty space beside her again, which was the only reason she forced herself to sit up, to see if Brett was sitting across the room in the chair again.