Allison’s chin wobbled, but she nodded firmly.
“You have some wine stashed?” Harper didn’t wait for an answer but opened the fridge to find a bottle of white in the door. Grabbing a glass, she poured and pressed it into Allison’s hands. “Hop in a steamy shower and take your time.”
“But—”
“I’ll handle dinner and the kids. Darren too, if he wakes up. Go.” She used her no-arguments-allowed mommy voice, and Allison complied without another peep of protest.
Once her footsteps faded up the steps, Harper inventoried the pantry. Leave it to Allison to have the fixings available for any type of casserole imaginable. Harper went with a beefy, cheesy noodle concoction that was a favorite of Ben’s and the definition of comfort food.
Allison still wasn’t down when Harper called the kids in for dinner. She herded them into the kitchen and sat down at the table but didn’t fix herself a plate.
“Is Daddy up?” Ryan asked around a mouthful of pasta. He was the spitting image of Darren with his thick, dark eyebrows, wide mouth, and prominent nose. On his eight-year-old face, the combination looked ungainly, but Harper had no doubt he would grow into a handsome man.
“I haven’t heard him stir.” Harper took a sip of iced tea while she debated the friendship ethics of pumping Allison’s kids for information. “Does your dad take lots of naps?”
Libby nodded. “He doesn’t sleep so good at night. Mommy says he has bad dreams.”
Sophie, the youngest at five, piped up. “Sometimes he’s really loud and wakes me up.”
Libby shushed her little sister as if she was aware of the strangeness and the need to keep secrets.
“Everything is going to be okay.” Harper held Libby’s gaze as the hated platitude slipped out of her mouth.
God, the number of times she’d heard the same words after Noah had been killed had made her want to scream or punch the kindhearted soul in the face. At the time, nothing felt like it was ever going to be okay again. Now she understood. You said it when you didn’t know what else to say. The crazy thing was all those people were right. Eventually, everything was okay. Not the same, but okay.
Harper left the kids to finish up their dinner and stood at the bottom of the stairs, listening. Nothing. She climbed, trying not to make a sound, but the steps creaked under her weight.
The kids’ rooms were empty, so she padded to the end of the narrow hallway. The door was cracked, so she toed it open enough to peer inside. Allison had curled herself into a ball on top of the covers next to her husband. Both were asleep.
Harper returned to the kitchen, forced herself to eat a small bowl even though worry had stolen her appetite, then played crazy eights with the kids until bedtime. Libby and Ryan got themselves ready for bed, but after a quick bath Sophie begged for a story, her big blue eyes impossible to deny.
Harper tickled her. “Can we read about a princess? Ben never lets me read those.”
“Princesses are my favorite,” Sophie said between giggles.
Harper snuggled next to Sophie and read until the little girl drifted to sleep. Reaching over to turn the lamp off, Harper dropped her nose into Sophie’s shampoo-perfumed hair. A few months older than Ben, Sophie seemed younger. Was it simply their different personalities or had growing up without the umbrella protection of a father forced Ben to mature faster? Harper prayed Sophie traversed this difficult time without losing her innocence.
Lying next to Sophie in the dark, Harper let her imagination travel down alternate futures. One where Noah hadn’t died. One where they had a daughter with his blond hair and blue eyes. One where Ben had a father and little sister and she had a husband.
She startled awake, blinking up at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling. Had she dreamed the noise? Her heart pounded a steady rhythm in her ears, masking external sounds. What time was it? Her phone was downstairs, but the moon was high, the streets quiet.
As the adrenaline faded, her body loosened, and she closed her eyes, wanting to somehow reinsert herself into her dream. The snick of the front door closing bolted her upright. After a quick check showed Libby and Ryan both in bed, Harper shuffled to Allison and Darren’s room and peeked in. Allison had burrowed under the covers at some point, but Darren’s bulk was missing.
Thankfully still dressed, she made her way down the steps, shoved her feet into her running shoes, and muttered a curse. He was a grown man, but wandering the streets in the middle of the night in February was not normal. Harper had a feeling nothing had been normal since he’d made it home.
She jogged into the middle of the street. No sign of him in either direction. She spent precious seconds waffling over which way to go, finally taking off at a fast walk into the heart of the base. At the next crossroads, she turned in a slow circle on the hunt for any movement.
Yellow and red slides of a playground were lit by weak streetlights. A dark figure hunched in a swing and rocked back and forth. Harper’s heart dropped from her throat back where it belonged.
Darren did nothing but watch as she approached and took the swing next to him. The squeak of the chains broke the silence of the night. She shivered and stared down at his bare feet.
“I’m not crazy.” His voice was graveled with disuse.
“I know.”
He planted his feet and stopped his swing. “They all think something’s wrong with me.”
“Who’s ‘they’?” Harper sensed his defensiveness and deflected.
“I’m not crazy,” he repeated.
“No one thinks you’re crazy, Darren. But … you were injured.”
“Banged up. Not like some of my boys who came home without legs or in body bags.”
Harper was out of her depth, drowning in platitudes. How was she qualified to help exorcise his demons when she still fought her own? “There’s different kinds of injuries. You might be physically healed, but concussions can affect you for months.”
“Fuck that.” He pushed up and stalked off. She scrambled to follow. “I should be able to deal with a head knock.”
He didn’t turn back toward the house, and she kept pace at his side. “Aren’t your feet cold?”
He glanced down, his step stuttering slightly as if he hadn’t realized he was barefoot. His stalk evened out and slowed to an amble. “No.”
“Liar.” She forced tease into her voice and was rewarded with a twitch of his lips.
“Did Allison beg you to come down and save her from the living hell I’m putting her and the kids through?” Resignation sucked any emotion from his voice.
The one thing she’d hated above all else in the weeks after Noah had died was the pity in people’s eyes and voices. “No. She begged me to come down and put my foot up your ass.”
This time he smiled and came to a stop. “Did she really say that?”
“I read between the lines.” Harper shrugged and looked around, trying for nonchalance. “Look, I’m tired and completely turned around, so unless you want to explain my frostbitten body to Allison and the MPs, I need an escort back to your house.”
He huffed something resembling a laugh, which she counted as a small victory, and turned them around. She kept the conversation light and about how great his kids were. Tension seeped out of her shoulders when the house came into view. She wasn’t scared of Darren, but he was a big guy and physically forcing him back inside wasn’t an option.
“I’ll bet Allison keeps stock in hot chocolate. Want a mug?” she asked.
“Why not. No way I’ll be able to go back to sleep.” His expression was flat, just like his voice.
Under the kitchen lights, the toll the injury had taken on Darren became more apparent. His eyes were bloodshot and shadowed. He, too, had lost weight, and his hair was longer than she’d ever seen it.
Sure enough, a dozen packets of Swiss Miss were in a polka-dot bin in the pantry. Darren sprawled in a chair and fiddled with the fringed edges of the place mat. She set down steaming mugs and joined him. Whi
le she’d never been shot at, she was intimately acquainted with death.
“I had nightmares every night for months after Noah died. Still do sometimes,” she said. When he didn’t speak or look up, she continued. “Every night I dreamed another horrible way he was killed. Dreamed he died quick and painless, dreamed he suffered, dreamed he died all alone. There were times Ben was the only thing keeping me sane.”
She refused to push him any further, and the silence stretched taut.
“McIntyre got shot three feet away from me. Then a bomb went off, and I was on my back. He dragged himself toward me, one of his legs a bloody stump.” His words came out choppy, bordering on unemotional even though his eyes said differently. “Over and over and over in my head. I can’t get away from it. From him. Maybe it’s a blessing Noah was killed.”
Anger flared quick and hot in that hollowed-out place in her heart, spreading like wildfire. She popped up and slapped her hands on either side of his mug. The untouched contents sloshed and left a brown stain on the cheery yellow place mat. For the first time, his attention was fixed on her and not turned inward.
“Don’t you ever fucking say that again, you hear me? I would do anything, give up anything, to have him back. I don’t care what kind of shape he was in. And Allison feels the same way about you. She wants to help you. Let her, dammit.”
His brown eyes were wide and his mouth gaping. Her anger died as quickly as it had flared and left her feeling as shocked as he looked.
The stairs creaked and broke the intensity of their gazes. Harper cleared her throat and retrieved a paper towel to dab at the spilled hot chocolate.
Allison shuffled into the kitchen, squinting against the light. “Is everything okay?”
Harper forced a smile. “Fine. Darren and I were chatting over some hot chocolate. Want some?” She didn’t wait but grabbed another mug. With her back to Allison and Darren, Harper dropped the pretense and the smile and took a deep breath. She owed Darren an apology.
She rejoined the couple, and as they spent the next twenty minutes making small talk the tension diminished. Darren leaned closer to Allison, and she reached out to touch his arm or hand, hope erasing a portion of the worry clouding her face.
They said quiet good nights at the foot of the stairs. Halfway up, Darren glanced over his shoulder and their eyes met. Harper couldn’t read his expression, but he kept a hand on Allison’s waist the rest of the climb.
Harper stretched out on the couch but popped back to sitting when footsteps sounded on the stairs again.
Allison appeared with a blanket over her arm and a pillow clutched to her chest. “I can’t believe I forgot to give you these.”
Harper took them and set them at her hip. “No worries. I actually fell asleep with Sophie after reading her ‘Rapunzel.’”
“She’s crazy about fairy tales and loves to play make-believe.” The indulgent smile faded. “Sometimes, I feel like I’m playing make-believe. Pretending, you know?”
“You don’t have to pretend with me.”
“I’ll see you in the morning.” She nodded and paused in the doorway of the den. “Thanks for coming down and getting him home this time.”
This time. Darren’s midnight ramble wasn’t a onetime thing. Harper’s nerves took a swan dive.
Harper lay down, her thoughts jumbled between past and present. Darren and Allison’s struggles peeled back the callus on her memories. The abyss that had almost claimed her after Noah’s death yawned closer than it had in years, and after she fell into a fitful sleep, Noah haunted her dreams.
Chapter 2
Past
After a couple of hours, muscle memory kicked in and Harper didn’t have to remind herself to smile at the unending flow of customers. Apparently, scorching summer days in Kitty Hawk had only one balm—ice cream.
The shop’s AC struggled to keep up with the constant bursts of steamy air as people entered and exited. She was on the scooping rotation for the rest of her shift. The cold air from the ice-cream freezer was offset by the surprisingly strenuous task of scooping. Every few minutes she had to turn and dab at her face with the towel she kept tucked in her Wilbur’s World Famous Ice Cream apron.
She doubted Wilbur Wright or the rest of the world would agree, but it was a good summer job. This was her third—and she hoped last—summer working at Wilbur’s. She’d saved and scrimped and studied hard. Between the scholarships and the money she’d earned, the University of North Carolina was her ticket out of Kitty Hawk.
With her pasted-on smile, she watched the next customer take two measured steps forward. Interest flickered. In board shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt from a band she’d never heard of, the man was good-looking, but if his posture and general air hadn’t given him away, his hair did.
High and tight. The standard military-issue haircut. He was probably on leave from Virginia Beach. As hot as the guy was, she avoided military guys. They prowled the Outer Banks looking for a hookup to pass their few days of R and R, never to be seen again. Not her style.
“What can I get you, sir?” She tacked on the “sir” automatically, even though he didn’t look much older than she did.
“Mint chocolate chip. Two scoops, if you don’t mind.” His accent was slow and sultrier than the weather. She couldn’t place it, but he was from somewhere farther south than Kitty Hawk. Some place where women lounged in rocking chairs on front porches, gossiped about their neighbors, and drank sweet tea.
“I don’t mind a bit, but even if I did, it’s my job.” She tempered the slight bite in her tone with a smile she didn’t have to force. “Waffle or sugar cone?”
“Sugar.” The way he said the word made it sound like an endearment.
The flush started in her chest and made the temperature rise a few more degrees in the packed store. She ducked closer to the tubs of cold ice cream and flapped her shirt a couple of times before fulfilling his order.
In between pulls on the metal scoop, she glanced up at him through the glass. All she could see were his shoulders and chest. Both wide, but a little gangly. They were nice, though. Solid.
Their hands brushed on the exchange, hers sticky, his big, with long fingers and a broad palm. Uncharacteristic nerves zinged through her body, and she wasn’t sure what to do with herself. She rubbed both her hands on her apron and glanced down the line, but things were at a standstill.
She recognized the look in his eyes. It happened often enough that she’d learned evasive tactics. The easiest evasion was the simplest. The overly interested customer paid and left and forgot about her as soon as he crossed glances with the next bikini-clad beach bunny.
She leaned back and checked on the holdup. Sheila, a frazzled expression on her face, slapped the side of their flaky credit card reader a couple of times. Highly satisfying, but generally ineffective. Harper could step over and help. That would break the weird vibes pinging between her and the man staring at her with a charming half smile and cocked eyebrows. Her feet refused to move. Not even a shuffle.
“Are you here for the summer working?” he asked before licking across the top scoop.
“I grew up in Kitty Hawk. A native species. We’re a rare breed.”
“I’ll bet you are.” The admiration in his gaze and the softness of his tone tied her stomach into a Boy Scout–worthy knot.
The line curved out the door now. She really should help Sheila. Harper was the best with numbers and anything technical, including the equipment, yet for once she didn’t care if the line ever started moving again.
“What’s your favorite flavor?” He gestured and took another lick that had her swallowing, almost able to taste the cold minty sweetness.
“First summer I worked here, I ate so much ice cream, I put on fifteen pounds and got sick of the stuff. That said, my favorite used to be … mint chocolate chip.”
Sheila’s, “Thank the Lord,” echoed through the store to a smattering of applause as Sheila tore off the receipt for the customer to s
ign.
He reminded her of the blond hot guy from the Top Gun movie. Iceman. The line moved, and Iceman sidestepped toward the register, his blue eyes still fixed on her. She glanced at the next woman in line only long enough to get her order before her attention returned to Iceman.
She grabbed a waffle cone and scooped butter pecan, all the while glancing in his direction. He paid with cash, sent a last smile in her direction, and disappeared through the line of people out the door.
She let her smile fade as the knots of nervous anticipation dissolved into a hollow wistfulness. Living in a beach town, she was used to seeing people come and go and didn’t get attached to summer dwellers. Yet she had a feeling his crinkled blue eyes and sugared voice would live on in her imagination.
A frazzled mother with two kids pulling at either hand and whining for candy toppings dragged Harper back to her reality. She rallied a smile, even if it felt a little smaller now.
* * *
Harper stuffed her stained, sticky apron into her backpack and swung it over her shoulder. Shift change was at five, and she pushed out the back door of the shop by ten after. The air in the alleyway that ran behind the row of shops was stagnant and smelled of garbage and dead sea life. Everything seemed to move slower, as if the heat had an effect on time itself.
She keyed in the combination on her bike lock, pulled the bike off the rack, and straddled it. The seat was hot against her bottom and thighs as she coasted to the alley opening. A man stepped around the corner. She braked hard and the back end of the bike skidded on the loose stone.
It was her man. No, not hers but Iceman. She dropped her feet on either side of the pedals and waited for his move. The same knots of anticipation retied themselves at warp speed. And something else … relief. Relief she hadn’t seen the last of him.
He held up his hands as if surrendering. “The girls inside said you’d already left but that I might be able to catch you around here. Hope I didn’t scare you.”
The Military Wife Page 2
