The Way Home oj-2 Page 4

  “Anyway, ground support called him off over and over, but he didn’t listen. ‘When I have your wounded,’ he told them. Not long after, he was killed by a single bullet.”

  Ty became quiet and reflective for a moment. “Anyway, Kelly’s gone, but ‘Dustoff’ became the call sign for all aero-medical missions in Vietnam. And since then, ‘When I have your wounded’ has become the personal and collective credo of all Dustoff pilots who followed him.”

  While he’d said very little about himself directly, he’d revealed a lot. J.R. used to tell her about the bravery of the medical-evac crews. Because the Army and Navy air ambulance birds have a red cross painted on their sides, the Geneva Convention rules don’t allow them to arm themselves with machine guns or mini-guns. Pilots like Kelly and Ty flew into hot zones with nothing but personal weapons—M-4 rifles and handguns—for protection against RPGs and small-arms fire. This practice was supposed to ensure humanitarian treatment of wounded during war, making aircraft, ships, corpsmen, trucks, facilities, and anything else displaying red crosses off-limits to enemy fire. Big surprise, the Taliban and Al-Qaeda—like the Vietcong in Kelly’s era—were not signatories to the Geneva Convention, so they use the red crosses as targets.

  “My husband held the medical crews in very high regard. He said what you did was the equivalent to tap dancing blindfolded into a minefield.”

  Another throwaway lift of a shoulder. “Everybody’s got a job to do.”

  He looked at her then. “Your husband…”

  “J.R.,” she supplied when he hesitated. “Army. Special Forces.”

  She toyed with her wineglass. Another change of subject seemed in order. “So… you weren’t a career man?”

  A slow shake of his head. “Wanted to be.” Another shrug. “Didn’t work out.”

  The statement begged for a follow-up, but the distant look in his eyes told her it might be best not to go there. That maybe it was a confidence he didn’t want to share and she didn’t need to hear. Not on a date that was not a date.

  Clearly, though, his military career had been cut short. She wondered if he’d been injured in some way—couldn’t tell by looking, although now that she thought about it, she had detected a slight limp when he’d first gotten out of the Jeep. She’d chalked it up to a long plane ride in one of the cramped commuter jets that routinely flew in and out of the small airport in the Falls.

  “So enough about me,” he said with a quick smile. “Why a general store in the middle of Nowhere, Minnesota?”

  It was her turn to shrug. “I grew up here. Kabby, Lake Kabetogama,” she clarified, “it’s home. Crossroads was my mom and dad’s store. When they retired in Arizona a few years ago, it seemed like taking it over was the right thing to do at the right time.”

  “Before that, what did you do?”

  “I was an ER nurse. Last place I worked was Womack, the Army Medical Center near Fort Bragg—it was the last place we were stationed.”

  He looked impressed, and she tried not to let it please her. “You miss it?”

  “Nursing? No. At least, not yet.”

  “Burn out?”

  “Some, yeah,” she admitted. “But it was more than that. After J.R. died… I guess I needed to come home, you know?”

  She could see in his eyes that he did know.

  “Anyway, on any given day, I end up treating anything from sunburn to sunstroke to removing fish hooks embedded in… well, you can imagine some of the places those things get stuck. So I still keep my fingers in the pie, so to speak.”

  “Sort of a local Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman?”

  She grinned. “Closest doctor is twenty, twenty-five minutes from the lake. Everyone knows I’m a nurse. So I’m going to turn them away?”

  “No, I don’t imagine you would. You didn’t turn me away.”

  Not that winter night. Not today. She didn’t regret what she’d done that night. She hoped she wouldn’t regret not sending him on his way today.

  The waitress had brought their salads several minutes ago, and they’d both been halfheartedly working on them when he finally posed the question about something she’d been too chicken to ask.

  “Why haven’t you asked me what took me so long to come back?”

  She looked across the table—and saw in his eyes that the small talk was over.

  Chapter 5

  TY WATCHED JESS CAREFULLY AS she set her half-eaten salad aside to make room for the steak he’d convinced her she needed to order. After several long moments, she finally answered his question.

  “I didn’t figure I needed to ask.”

  That’s not what her eyes said. “You weren’t surprised when you didn’t hear from me?”

  She picked up her steak knife and fork, let them hover over her plate, then set them down again. “A little bit, maybe. Until I got to thinking about it. I mean, seriously. Things were a little intense that night. It was difficult to get a true read on anything but the danger. Besides… I live here. You live half a continent away. We lead very different lives. So a little time, a little distance, a lot of perspective, and you coming back didn’t look like such a good bet on paper. I chalked it up to a passing chance encounter. Hardly something to—”

  He covered her hand with his and stopped her with a soft chuckle. “OK. I got it. Good points. All taken. You can stop rationalizing now.”

  And protesting. Too much, maybe, judging by the sudden flush on her cheeks. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a woman blush. He found it endearing and pretty and sexy as hell. Reluctantly, he pulled his hand away.

  “You weren’t even a little bit disappointed?” It was a shameless fishing expedition, but he didn’t feel guilty about it. He’d thought he’d get a smile out of her. Maybe an admission.

  He got far from it when those big brown eyes met his. “Look, Ty. The fact that you came back… asking me to dinner… it’s all very nice. But nothing’s changed. We both know nothing’s going to come of it. And wow, didn’t that sound presumptive and sadly hopeful?”

  “Whoa. Wait. Presumptive? Hello… I’m here. I think it’s safe to presume I came back for a reason. And when has hopeful ever been sad?”

  Her eyes grew a little wide, a little wet. “When representatives from the Army show up at your door to inform you that your husband was killed in action, and you sadly and futilely hope there’s been a horrible, horrible mistake.”

  She looked mortified, suddenly, by what had come out of her mouth. And there wasn’t even a touch of color in her cheeks now. Her face had gone deathly pale.

  “Excuse me.” She shot out of her chair. “I need to use the ladies’ room.”

  He stood, thought about going after her, but in the end let her go. It wasn’t as if he could follow her in there. And it wasn’t as if he knew what to say if he did.

  She needed a minute to collect herself. For that matter, so did he.

  Maybe this was a bad idea after all. By his calculation, it had been three and a half years since her husband was killed. Should her wounds still be this raw? Or was there something wrong with him that he was ready to move on so soon after losing Maya?

  He’d poured more wine and contemplated downing the whole glass when she came back to the table, composed and apologetic.

  “Sorry I went all weepy widow on you there. I don’t know where that came from. I don’t usually—”

  “I know you don’t,” he interrupted, because he felt both relieved and sensitive to her embarrassment. “You hold up. And you didn’t do anything wrong.”

  He was the one in the wrong. He should have realized he made her nervous. After all, the last time he’d seen her, he’d used her dead husband’s gun to kill a man.

  JESS FELT BEYOND grateful that Ty had the sensitivity to let things go. At that point, she somehow marshaled the wherewithal to shift into “Board of Tourism” mode and change the subject to a lengthy and oh so educational and oh so boring history of the area and the chain of lakes. She told him all
about the Boise Cascade plant that was the region’s biggest employer and about the intriguing NOvA project, the world’s most advanced neutrino experiment, which, if successful, would have profound implications for understanding the structure and evolution of the universe. She talked about anything to keep from talking about something that might lead back to a personal dialogue about her life in general and her husband in particular.

  She was a coward. She knew it. Ty, apparently, accepted it and made every effort to keep her engaged in generalities. Somehow, they made it through a dinner that felt as endless as the ink-black sky that greeted them when they finally left the restaurant to drive the twenty miles back to Kabby.

  She didn’t even remember what she’d babbled about on the half-hour drive; she only knew that she had babbled, and by the time they pulled into the Crossroads parking lot, she felt one-hundred-percent certain that one Tyler Brown would be on the phone first thing in the morning booking a return flight home, as relieved as a caught-and-released walleye to be getting away from the crazy, gibberish-talking widow he’d had the bad sense to think he wanted to get to know.

  She was an uptight, nervous flake who hadn’t even realized until he had shown up and shaken her insulated little world that she still felt so raw and ruled by her feelings about J.R. and his death. She should have moved on by now—or at least be working on it. She hadn’t. She wasn’t. And regardless of the fact that she would not let herself even think about moving on with a man so much like her dead husband, Ty’s ability to shake things up this way proved how badly she needed to get on with the business of living.

  Since embarrassment didn’t even scratch the surface of how she felt about her behavior, he’d barely rolled to a stop when she shoved open the passenger-side door. The overhead lamp wasn’t harsh, but she felt ten times more exposed for the coward she was when light flooded the front seat.

  “Thanks for dinner. I’m sure you’re tired. Long flight and all that. Good night.”

  “Jess.”

  His soft voice stopped her from jumping out of the Jeep.

  “Wait. For God’s sake, wait a second.”

  He sounded frustrated yet infinitely concerned.

  “Shut the door, OK? The bugs are getting in.”

  Although Kayla had closed up and left only a security light on inside the store, a light burned over the giant walleye figure on one side of the road, and the lights from the fuel island burned on the other. The vapor bulbs drew mosquitoes the way the North Pole drew snow.

  She shut the door. Folded her hands on her lap and stared straight ahead.

  “Do I really scare you that much?” he asked, so softly and with so much disquiet that she felt ashamed of her spinelessness. Ashamed enough to admit it.

  “Yes,” she confessed, still not looking at him. “Yes, you do.”

  “How can I make that go away?”

  She pushed out a harsh laugh. “You can’t.”

  TY STARED AT the profile of this woman whom he absolutely could not figure out. Then a belated thought hit him hard and low. “Oh, man. Are you involved with someone?”

  “No,” she said quickly. “No. I’m not involved with anyone.”

  Only curiosity outdistanced his relief. “No one since your husband?”

  She slowly shook her head.

  What? Were the men around here blind or just plain stupid? Or were they maybe not as persistent as they needed to be? This was a woman who clearly knew how to redirect the attention from herself and avoid talking about anything remotely personal. Core-deep, her involuntary reflex was to deflect. But you bottle things up long enough, and eventually, the cork is going to pop. Like at dinner, when her emotions got the best of her.

  “Don’t you think maybe it’s time you changed that?” he asked gently.

  “That’s the problem,” she said to her hands. “I don’t know what I think. Until you showed up this afternoon, I didn’t have to think.”

  Her low groan made it clear that she’d realized something about herself. They were making headway. “Ah. So it’s not me. It’s the idea of change.”

  She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the headrest. “So it would seem.”

  “Well, that’s something I can do something about.”

  She rolled her head to look at him. “What can you do that I haven’t been able to do in three and a half years?”

  Because she looked so lost and defeated, he lifted a hand, let the back of his fingers brush along the ridge of her cheekbone. He told himself the touch was for her. To steady her. But the truth was, he’d been wanting to touch this woman since the first time he’d seen her. “I can give you a reason and enough time to get used to the idea.”

  She shook her head and sent the copper feathers at her ears trembling. “Right now, it doesn’t feel like there’s enough time in the world.”

  “But we both know different, right? How does the Bible verse go? To everything there is a season? A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance. Maybe it’s your time to dance.”

  She glanced at him, confusion creasing her brows. “I don’t get you.”

  “You’re not supposed to. It’s part of my charm.”

  Before she could check herself, she smiled. “Seriously? You want to stick around after that dog-and-pony show I subjected you to tonight?”

  “What? I found the history of the Smokey Bear statue in the middle of the city center riveting.”

  A weak laugh tempered another groan.

  “Hey. You were nervous. My mom is a nervous talker. I get it. And my brother, Mike? Get him in a dicey situation, and he literally can’t keep his mouth shut. It’s a defense mechanism. Me, I get quiet. Makes me think we might work well together. Yin/yang? Black/white? Day/night?”

  She shook her head again. “I’m a mess. And I didn’t even know it until you showed up. You should be running in the opposite direction. Why aren’t you?”

  “Because if I go back that way? I’m going to end up just like you.”

  She shifted in the seat, then searched his eyes. “What are you talking about?”

  He looked down at her hands. Then back at her face. “One more time. Ask me why I didn’t come back until now.”

  Several tense, lengthy seconds passed before her curiosity won out over reluctance. “OK. Why didn’t you come back until now?”

  “Because shortly after I went back to Florida… I lost someone, too.”

  Chapter 6

  IT’S BEEN A LONG TIME since I’ve been out on the lake.” Jess dug deep with her paddle early the next morning as she glided alongside Ty’s matching kayak. The surface of the water glistened, glass-smooth and reflecting a cerulean-blue sky dotted with bridal-white clouds. “You grow up around something—even something as beautiful and unblemished as Lake Kabetogama—and you take it for granted. I’ve really missed being out on the water.”

  Last night, as she’d sat in the Jeep with Ty and realized they had much more in common than she’d ever thought, she hadn’t been capable of telling him no when he’d asked her to spend the day with him.

  “Get Kayla to cover for you again,” he’d said, pressing his advantage. “Spend tomorrow with me. I’ll tell you about Maya. And you can tell me about J.R.”

  Chalk it up to nerves or the fact that she’d been prepared for him to tell her just about anything… anything except that he’d lost someone, too. Or maybe it was the momentary flash of pain she’d seen in his eyes, a pain she’d seen in her own eyes too many times over the past few years when she’d caught sight of her reflection in a mirror.

  Whatever the excuse, she’d said yes. So today, Kayla and two of her high school part-timers were minding the store, and Jess was doing something she hadn’t done in years with a man who, in turns, made her nervous and comfortable and excited and hopeful.

  The hopeful part of the equation worried her most, because one thing would never change. She would not get involved with a warrior again. It didn’
t matter that he was retired. What mattered was the mentality, the reckless disregard for their own safety, the unalterable alpha gene embedded in their DNA. The right cause, the right call, and he’d be gone. He’d be in danger. And he could end up dead.

  In any event, kayaking—in separate kayaks—seemed like a pretty safe bet. The weather forecast had sealed the deal. The temp would climb into the low eighties by noon, but this morning, it was a cool, breezeless sixty-five, the air so crisp and clean it almost burned her lungs with its purity.

  She’d advised Ty to dress in layers, so they both wore long-sleeved shirts and pants. By noon, when she planned to break for a shore lunch, they’d be ready to strip down to shorts. A swim might even be in order. Something else she missed doing.

  “It’s rare to see inland water this clear.” Ty kept an easy pace beside her, expertly handling his paddle.

  “Kabby’s a glacial lake. The lake bed’s as rocky as the shore unless you get into one of the backwater bays, and then you’ll run into some sand and mud flats.”

  Kayaking had always been one of her favorite pastimes. With twenty-five thousand acres of water, almost eighty miles of shoreline, and two hundred islands, there were limitless places to explore.

  They’d borrowed a pair of Shelley and Darrin’s kayaks and left shortly after first light, with an intrigued and smiling Shelley waving good-bye from the dock. Her friend hadn’t asked any questions, but Jess knew the day of reckoning would soon be upon her. One thing had been very clear: Shelley approved.

  In any event, that had been about two hours ago, and they’d paddled steadily and crossed a major stretch of open water. In retrospect, Jess realized that part of the reason she’d agreed to take Ty out on the lake first thing in the morning was that she wanted to avoid the confrontation with J.R.’s brother, Brad, which was certain to be unpleasant. But that had only been part of the reason. Truth was, she wanted to hear the rest of his story.