A Hero to Come Home To (9 page)

“Twenty-five months.” She drew a breath, then went on. “Three weeks and five days.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

“No, I brought him up. It’s nice being able to talk about him. For a long time, I couldn’t. It hurt too much and, especially here, it makes a lot of people uncomfortable. The men have lost too many friends, come too close to dying themselves, and the women look at me and think
If it could happen to her husband…
” She shrugged.

It
was
nice. Dane understood the war part so he was empathetic, but he hadn’t known Jeff so Carly’s particular situation wasn’t personal for him.

“Why did you decide to stay in Tallgrass? Why not go home to Utah?”

She toyed with the straw in her drink. “I did go home for a few months and stayed with my brother Roger and his wife. Lisa and I are pretty close. But I didn’t fit in. I kept calling the grocery store the commissary. When I needed something, I’d say, ‘I’m going to the fort’ before I remembered there
was
no fort. I couldn’t get used to not seeing the base stickers or the people in uniform or the haircuts. I felt even stranger than I had when I’d married into the Army. My job was still open, so I came back. This is where Jeff and I last lived together. It’s home.”

She hesitated. It was clear his marriage wasn’t something he liked to discuss, but he’d touched on a sensitive subject with her, so she felt justified doing the same. If he chose not to answer, she would understand and wouldn’t ask again. “What about your ex-wife? Did she go back to Texas or stay where you were?”

His chuckle sounded startled from him. “God, no. She couldn’t wait to leave.” It seemed he would leave it at that, but unexpectedly he went on. “When your husband’s going to work every day with the guys you’ve been sleeping with, it’s best to put a whole lot of distance between you and all of them.”

All of them.
Carly winced inwardly. One affair was bad enough, but multiple ones must have been so much harder. Or did it work the other way: The first one he’d found out about was such a shock that each subsequent one had less impact?

He left the table, emptying the trash, returning the tray, then came back. When he didn’t sit, she lifted her purse and bag to the tabletop and stood.

“Who knew when I left to buy a hammer and picture hangers, we’d end up having a pizza together?” he remarked.

“Who knew you’d forget the hammer?” She smiled when he looked down as if he clearly expected to see a hammer hanging around somewhere. When he rolled his eyes, it gave him a boyish look that needed only a wicked grin to give her a clear image of the mischievous kid he’d been.

“Guess I’ll head back inside.” He didn’t move, though, not right away. “I’ll see you?”

“Probably.” Four times in less than a week? Very likely. Still…Opening her purse, she pulled out a crumpled receipt and a pen and scrawled her phone number on the back before offering it to him. “Just in case.”

He removed his wallet from his pocket, smoothed the paper and tucked it in with the folding money. “Be careful.”

She watched until he disappeared inside the store again before heading for her car. The answer Jeff had always given to that admonition echoed in her mind.
Always.

She was two blocks from her house when she decided she didn’t want to go there. It took less than five minutes to reach Therese’s. She parked behind the mom van, jogged up the steps, and rang the bell.

The door was jerked open with enough force to make Carly take a step back. Abby Matheson oozed derision from every pore, her lip curled into such a sneer that her cupid’s bow disappeared. “Tuh-
reese
!”

Her shout was still echoing in the foyer when she started stomping up the stairs.

And there was a prime example of why Carly didn’t teach middle school.

As she stepped inside, Therese came down the hall from the kitchen. Tight lines bracketed her mouth and her hair was tousled as if she’d been raking her fingers through it. No need for television in the Matheson home. They had enough family drama on their own.

A bit of the pinching on Therese’s face eased. “Hey, come on in. I’ve got fresh tea and warm chocolate chip cookies. Not homemade, mind you, just freshly baked.”

Everyone in the Tuesday Night Margarita Club knew Abby’s habit of comparing Therese to her mother in every endeavor and finding her lacking. No doubt, tonight it had been,
My mom
always
made cookies from scratch.
She
would never serve this store-bought crap.

Everyone in the margarita club thought Abby needed her bottom paddled except Therese. She tolerated stuff that would have yanked Carly’s own mother out of her oh-so-important lab for disciplinary action. Just once, Carly often thought, someone needed to remind the child that Therese had taken them in after Abby’s mother abandoned her and Jacob, refusing to take them back even after their father had died.

And that always reminded Carly why Abby was so angry and Therese so tolerant.

After closing the door, Carly followed Therese and took a seat at the cozy breakfast table. “Tough evening, huh?”

“Tough week.” Therese brought two glasses of ice, a pitcher of tea, and a plate of cookies to the table, then sat down. “She’s still on detention, she’s still grounded, and I still haven’t given back her phone. She’s…unhappy.”

“I know she is, Therese, but it’s not your fault.”

“Who else does she have to take it out on? Paul? Catherine? Her grandparents?”

Carly reached for a cookie. That had been Abby’s second choice for living arrangements after her father died. All her grandparents had been kind and sympathetic and apologetic, but that hadn’t made their refusals any easier to bear.

“Life sucks, doesn’t it?” she commiserated.

Therese studied her for a moment, then said, “Not always. You look…lighter. One might even say almost giddy. What have you been up to?”

“Nothing. Just shopping at the PX. Having a pizza for dinner.”

Carly wasn’t a big shopper, and she knew Therese knew it. Her friend also knew how much she disliked eating out alone, so she locked in on the second part. “With whom?”

Stuffing the last half of the cookie in her mouth, Carly poured herself a glass of tea, chewed a bit longer, then finally washed down the crumbs with a big gulp. “Dane Clark.”

Therese’s eyebrows practically arched into her hairline. “Dane from the cave? You just happened to run into Dane
again
and had dinner with him?”

“Yeah, I know. Coincidence.”

“Or fate. Or an answer to our prayers.” Therese shrugged when Carly looked at her. “I pray for you. I pray for all of us to be happy and safe and content.” She stared into her tea. “I’m glad God’s listening to
some
of my prayers.”

Even God needed time to deal with Abby.

“So come on, share. Tell me everything.”

That was why she’d come here, Carly realized. She’d wanted to tell
someone
. “I ran into him in the paint section at the PX. He picked out some colors for me to try on the living room walls. I decided this afternoon that I really need to paint, but there were so many choices. The ones he picked are really pretty. Do you want to see—” Automatically she reached for her purse, and Therese playfully slapped her hand away.

“No, I don’t want to see the colors. I want to hear how you went from discussing paint to having dinner together.”

“It wasn’t really dinner. I mean, not like a date or anything.”

“Was it the evening meal?”

“Yes, but—”

“Did you sit at the same table and talk?”

“Yes, but—”

Therese interrupted with an imperious wave, her point made. “Tell me. Everything.”

Carly related parts of the conversation, feeling like a fourteen-year-old girl with her very first crush. She and her best friend had whispered and giggled for days, until something else had caught their attention.

When she was done, Therese sat back and stared at her. “You gave him your phone number.”

Still feeling about fourteen, she shifted awkwardly. “Well, yeah. The way he said it…‘I’ll see you?’ rather than ‘I’ll see you.’ I just thought…I mean, sure, we’ve run into each other four times in less than a week, but—”

“Wait, wait, wait. I only know about three times. The cave, the WTU, and today. When was number four?”

Carly’s cheeks warmed. “Oh. Uh, coming back from the bathroom at dinner the other night. He was in the bar, and we said hello.” And a little bit more.

“And you didn’t mention it to us. Hmm, wonder why.” Therese tapped one fingertip thoughtfully against her chin before raising her brows again. “Maybe because you didn’t want to share him with us? Maybe you wanted to keep him all to yourself.”

Now her face burned, as if she stood in front of a blazing fire. “No, it was just…he seemed…as a group, we’re a little intimidating…”

Therese’s fingers wrapped around hers in a tight squeeze. “Hey, sweetie, I’m glad you like him. I’m glad he likes you. He knows about Jeff?”

She bobbed her head.

“Good. Really, really good.”

Carly hesitated over the question on the tip of her tongue, then gave herself a mental shake. She’d asked a virtual stranger about his ex-wife. Surely she could get a little personal with her best friend. “Have you thought about dating again?”

“I like to think I will, but—”

As perfectly as if it were scripted, something sounded directly overhead with enough force to vibrate the light fixture above the table.

“My life is so chaotic, I can’t even imagine bringing someone else into it. If the kids hate me for trying to fill in for their mother, how desperately would they hate another man trying to fill in for their father?”

There was such sadness in her voice that Carly’s stomach knotted.
“Are we meant to spend the rest of our lives alone?”
Therese had asked last Saturday. Despite having the two kids in her house, she was even more alone than the rest of them. Their hearts had broken in one swift moment. Paul’s children were breaking hers every day.

“I’m sorry.” Carly maneuvered her hand to give Therese a squeeze. “I wish I had the magic to fix it all—the kids, you, all of us.”

“I know. And just knowing helps. Really.” Therese took a deep breath and lightened her tone. “So…show me these colors Cave Guy picked out for your living room.”

By the time Carly left, Therese was feeling a little better. Her head had stopped pounding, and she’d resisted the urge to get weepy. Sometimes crying helped—all those emotions had to escape somewhere—but usually it just made her eyes red and her nose stuffy and kept her from getting any restful sleep at all.

As she finished cleaning the kitchen, she considered the circumstances that had brought Carly and Dane Clark together so often. If it was fate, Therese would be a little jealous. If it was God’s answer to her prayers, well, she would still be a little jealous.

But very happy, too, she hastened to assure herself. Just because her future looked bleak didn’t mean everyone else’s should. Whatever happiness her friends found would give her hope that she would find it, too, someday.

She shut off the kitchen lights and went into the living room. Abby was in her room, apparently having withdrawal symptoms from the thousand and one texts she sent or received each day, and Jacob was in his, probably playing one last round of video games before going to bed.

Switching off all but one lamp, she curled into her favorite chair and picked up the Bible on the table beside it. Usually she read it in the morning, before the kids were up, with a strong cup of coffee and the energy bar she ate for breakfast. That was when she did most of her praying, too, though there were always short prayers during the day and the regular nighttime ones.

For so many years those prayers had ended the same way:
Please keep Paul safe.
He was forever safe now, and she liked to believe his spirit was with her when she needed more strength than she had on her own. If she could just see him, hear his voice one more time…If he could just talk to his children…

Talking with her didn’t help them. She’d lost control of her temper and screamed back at Abby tonight, and that hadn’t helped, either. All she could do was pray, and she was about to do that one more time when one of the cell phones in her pockets began to ring, a happy kid-style song. She’d tried just putting Abby’s phone away until the suspension ended, but her stepdaughter had proven she wasn’t above sneaking in and stealing it back.

Shifting, she pulled the phone out and saw
Mimi M
on the screen. Paul’s mother. She should answer and let her know Abby was fine but without phone privileges, but instead she muted the ring and let it go to voice mail. She wasn’t up for the subtle criticism Eileen always offered regarding her parenting skills.

She moved to set the phone aside, but her hand hesitated over it. Abby’s winning argument for getting the cell had been the ability it would give her to check in with Therese, though she never had. Had she even programmed Therese’s number into the phone? And if she had, what ring tone had she given her? Certainly nothing like Eileen’s.

She knew she should resist, but now that the question had been raised, she couldn’t. She called up the address book, scrolled down to the
T
s. A first quick glance showed no entry for Therese.

A second sharp glance showed she was wrong. She was listed, all right, just under another name.

TheB*tch.

Carefully she set the phone down. She put the Bible beside it, turned off the lamp, drew her knees to her chest, and she wept.

S
aturday morning found Carly running through her usual routine: cleaning, doing laundry, vacuuming. Next she did her grocery shopping for the week, and then the rest of the day was free.

Free
had been so much better when there was someone to share it with.

Today, though, she had plans for the afternoon. She was going to move the furniture away from the main wall in the living room, put down a drop cloth and open those three small cans of paint. It had been too late Thursday by the time she’d come home from Therese’s, or so she’d told herself, and Friday evening she’d had a headache. The smell of paint, she’d convinced herself, would likely have made her sick.

But she’d slept well last night, and today was sunny and warm, and she felt energetic. Who knew? She might even clean out the cabinets and closets when she was done or organize the mess of her desk or even find something to do in the yard.

After she finished putting away the groceries, including two cartons of her favorite Braum’s ice cream—an excellent reason in and of itself for staying in Oklahoma—she ate the fast-food lunch she’d picked up on the way home, then started prepping the living room.

Despite its heft, the couch slid away from the wall easily. The end table, a hand-me-down from Jeff’s grandmother, was easy, too. She reminded herself to switch it to the other end when she put it back, so she could keep her promise to Lisa.

With everything in—or out of—place, she pried open the first can of paint and stirred it. It looked like the richest, most luxurious chocolate before it was poured into molds to set, and it flowed over the dingy white with each stroke.

The hunter green was gorgeous, too, peaceful and serene, and the burnt orange warmed the room with a pop of color.

Done, she sprawled in the chair across the room, slumped down, stared at the three rectangles of beautiful change and wondered, just as she had at the paint counter, how she was supposed to decide. She liked all three. Compared to the bland white, she might even love them.

The ring of the cell phone drew her gaze to it. The people who called often had personalized ring tones—the margarita club’s was “Margaritaville,” of course—but this was the standard ring for not-family, not-close-friends. Still gazing at the wall, she picked it up and absently murmured, “Hello.”

“Hey. Uh, it’s Dane. Is this, uh, a bad time?”

Pleasure coursed through her with a flare of heat, her lips curving into a smile as she sat straighter in the chair. “Depends on what you want to do. It’s not the best weather for sunbathing or building snowmen. It’s too early for planting flowers, too late for breakfast, and you’ve missed trick-or-treating by five months.”

He chuckled. “Let me be more specific. Is this a bad time to talk?”

“No. I’m just contemplating my wall, so it’s a very good time to talk.”

“Have you chosen a color yet?”

“Nope. I like all three of them. It’s a shame I can’t paint the room in stripes.”

“Actually, you could. You just have to—”

“No, no,” she interrupted. “You’re going to say something about rulers and tape and straight lines, aren’t you? And I don’t do straight lines. I don’t even hang a picture unless it’s the only thing on the whole wall. That’s how bad my idea of ‘straight’ is.”

There was a moment’s silence, then in a low voice, Dane said, “Wow. You’re really flawed, aren’t you? Your IQ is below one-eighty, you’re indecisive, and you’re linearly challenged.”

“And I eat chocolate for breakfast,” she added as she turned sideways in the chair, swinging her legs over the arm.

“Yeah, but who doesn’t?”

“I have two nephews whose mother is a postharvest biologist. They’re four and five, and they’ve never had cake or ice cream or a Hershey’s Kiss. Their idea of dessert is yogurt with a few berries stirred in.”

“That’s just sad.”

“Yeah. For most of my family, food is fuel, nothing more. My sister-in-law Lisa and I are the only ones who savor it like gifts from God, and
I’m
the only one who shows it.” Lisa was a perfect size four, while Carly was…well, not.

There was a sound in the background, the distant blare of a horn, followed immediately by the chiming of a car when the door was opened with the key in the ignition. “Are you out and about?”

“Yeah. I had to pick up some uniforms at the cleaners.”

Carly thought of the stiffly starched uniforms hanging in the guest room. Their bedroom closet was so small that only half their clothes fit, so Jeff had volunteered to move his across the hall.
“I’m only doing this,”
he’d teased,
“to keep your clothes from squashing my uniforms.”

They were still there—every uniform item he hadn’t taken to the desert with him, including the dress blue uniform he’d worn at their wedding. Dress shoes polished to a high sheen and scruffy but broken-in boots lined the floor beneath the garments. She thought from time to time about doing something with them, but it always seemed too final an action to take.

“Is that a
no
, or are you thinking about it?”

Dane’s voice in her ear startled her back to the moment. Whatever he’d asked had sailed past her, blocked by thoughts of Jeff. Giving herself a mental shake, she said, “I’m sorry. I missed that. Can you ask again?”

“Yeah, sure.” There was a chagrined sound to his voice. “I was just wondering if you’d like to, um, do something.”

“Yes.” She didn’t hesitate. It didn’t matter what or when or where. The simple truth was yes, she would like to spend more time with Dane.

Jeff understood that. Didn’t he?

“Do you want to meet somewhere?”

She thought back to safety advice she’d been given in college—never meet a guy for the first time alone, never go off without telling someone where and with whom, make sure he wasn’t a psycho stalker before letting him know where she lived—then looked at the colors on the wall and said, “Why don’t you come by? The address is Four-eighteen East Cimarron.”

“Four one eight,” he murmured, and she could easily imagine him typing the numbers into a GPS. Jeff had used his all the time. No having to learn his way around town when the GPS would guide him to the door.

“I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

She said good-bye and clicked off the phone, then stared at the vibrant colors on the wall. That was how she would decide: Let Dane do it when he got here. She would be happy with any of the three shades, so it wouldn’t hurt to let someone else pick.

When he got here.
Dane was coming over. It had been so long since she’d waited for a man to come to pick her up. She’d met Jeff her freshman year in college and, except for one semester, they’d been together since. The idea that a man was on his way over to see her seemed almost impossible. The feelings it invoked were vaguely familiar, long gone but not forgotten. They included anticipation, nervousness, a little guilt, and—

Dane was coming over!

Jumping to her feet, she rushed to the bedroom. Sure, the T-shirt and crop pants she’d thrown on this morning were fine for running errands, but there were lots of things she looked better in hanging in the closet. She’d stripped to her underwear before realizing the blinds were open, twisted them closed, then yanked open the closet door.

Within minutes, she was dressed in khaki trousers and a rusty-colored shirt with chunky shoes that added a few inches to her height, with a suede band holding back her hair. She started to pick up the perfume bottle for a spritz, then put it back. Not Jeff’s favorite fragrance. Not today.

A little twinge of regret sliced through her.

When the doorbell rang, she left the bathroom, then hesitated, remembering that old advice in college. Quickly, feeling overly cautious but obligated, as well as just plain foolish, she scribbled a note on the bedside table:
Out with Dane Clark.
Just in case.

Then she went to open the door.

He stood on the porch, hands in his jacket pockets. His jeans were faded, worn through one knee, and his T-shirt fit snugly across his chest. The jacket was brown leather, scuffed and battered. He looked handsome. Just a little hesitant. A whole lot solid. Strong. Someone a woman could lean on.

“Come on in.” She stepped back and gestured to the cramped room. “Take a seat if you can get to one.”

Instead he stopped in the middle of the room to study the experiment on the wall. She closed the door and stood beside him, near enough to smell his cologne. It was light, simple, no smoky complex fragrances. Just clean. She liked it.

Moving next to the wall, she did a game-show hostess flourish. “What do you think?”

His dark gaze moved from one color to the next, finally landing on her. “You look good.”

Self-consciously she fingered the last of the wooden buttons that kept her shirt secured. It had been so long since a man had given her a simple compliment. Likely the last had come from Jeff before his final deployment. “Thank you. But I meant the colors.”

“The color looks great on you.”

He said it with such seriousness that she couldn’t help but laugh. “Thanks. It’s one of my favorites. Now…what’s your vote? Color number one?” She gestured to the chocolate, waited a minute, then did the same with colors number two and three.

“Why am I picking? I don’t live here.”

“Remember, I’m flawed. I can’t make a decision.”

He snorted as he stepped back to the door and turned on the overhead lights before looking at the colors again. “I narrowed it down from a thousand to three for you.”

“And I like all three.” And she wanted someone else’s opinion. She wasn’t indecisive, not really. She was just tired of making every decision by herself. At home, everything had had to pass muster with her parents. In college, it had been her roommate, and after college, she and Jeff had made every major choice together. “So which one gets two thumbs-up?”

“I should warn you I’m a Longhorns fan.”

Her nose wrinkled automatically. “That’s the big game OU has in Texas, isn’t it?” At his nod, she rolled her eyes. “When we eventually got pregnant, Jeff wanted to do the nursery in black and gold in honor of the University of Colorado. Football nuts.”

After glancing around, Dane picked up a photograph sitting on the shelves beside the TV. It was Jeff, mugging for the camera with a couple of buddies, all of them wearing desert camouflage and dark shades in deference to the bright sun. His hands rested on his thighs, fingers spread wide, his wedding band glinting.

It hurt her heart that he would never pose for another picture, never laugh or make her laugh.

Dane didn’t comment, but carefully set the frame back on the shelf before turning away from it.

“So…” Carly went to stand near him again, shoving her hands into her hip pockets and rocking back on her heels. “Which of these colors is associated with the Longhorns? I can see that the brown might reference something that comes out of a cow, but I’d rather not think about that if it’s going to cover my walls. And the green, I guess, could stand for the grass they eat. But that last one…are longhorns orange?”

He gave her a scowl with no heat. “No, but their school colors are burnt orange and cream. The walls that color, the cream trim …”

“Ooh, it’ll be like a giant pumpkin pie with whipped cream. I like that.” If she’d given herself enough time, she was pretty sure she would have chosen that color, too. It was nice that he’d agreed, even if his reason had been as lame as Jeff’s for wanting a black-and-gold nursery.

“Thanks for your help, Dane. Now…” The question that really mattered. “What do you want to do today?”

Dalton didn’t usually need much excuse for being grouchy, but he had one today. He was having company tomorrow: his mom and dad were stopping by in their RV on their way north. His mother had called this morning, giving him a shopping list for the meals she intended to cook while they were there and informing him that she wanted to sleep in a real bed and use a real bathroom. Her way of saying
Clean the house at least a little.

He’d sent Noah to do the shopping, and he’d started the cleaning. It wasn’t that he was a slob. He just had better things to do, like the ranch work that he, his dad, and Dillon used to do together. The cows and the horses didn’t care whether he vacuumed or dusted, but they sure got upset if he didn’t take care of them.

The house was big, built mostly from trees harvested off the north acreage and with stone quarried on the property. Too big for one person, though here he was. Downstairs was a living room, dining room, kitchen, and utility room, all oversized, with four bedroom upstairs. His parents had had their own, of course, and so had Noah. Dalton and Dillon had shared the biggest room—twins were expected to share a lot—and the fourth had been for guests. When he was a kid, there had been a lot of visits from aunts, uncles, and cousins.

Now, besides Noah, the only people who’d come for a visit in years had been Sandra’s folks, when they’d buried her, and his. It had been one of those odd summer-in-January days that Oklahoma was famous for: eighty-five degrees, only a light breeze blowing across the prairies. The sky had been clear blue, fat clouds drifting slowly to the east. A perfect day for saddling up the horses and riding the trail that snaked along the north edge of the ranch.

Too beautiful a day for a funeral. Even the grayest, dreariest day was too good for that.

Abruptly the vacuum cut off, and he looked around in time to hear Noah’s swearing as he untangled the cord from his feet. He carried the grocery bags into the kitchen, then picked up the cord when he returned. “Well, my part’s done. I think I’m gonna go outside and check on the horses.”

When he plugged the vacuum in again, Dalton switched it off. “Clean sheets for Mom and Dad’s bedroom,” he said with a nod toward the laundry basket at the foot of the stairs.

“Aw, man…I don’t even make my own bed.”

“I’ve noticed.” Dalton switched the machine on again to block out anything else Noah might say. He didn’t make his own bed, either. Not much point when he was getting right back in it in eighteen hours. It had driven Sandra nuts, so they’d reached a compromise of sorts. Whoever got up last had to make the bed. Since his day always started earlier than hers, that meant she’d always had to make it.