Soldier's Heart: a Wounded Love novel
Page 14
The hostess, Tiffany, smiles at me when I greet her and looks Emma up and down. She grabs two menus and turns on her heel, throwing a “follow me” over her shoulder. Emma snickers as we walk to our table and slide into the booth. As soon as Tiffany walks off, her stifled giggle turns into a full on laugh.
“What’s so funny?” I ask, unable to keep the smile from my lips, even though I have no clue what we’re laughing at.
“You. Her.” The corner of her mouth lifts in a sarcastic smile, and she glances over my shoulder. “She’s shooting daggers at me. It’s kind of…sweet.”
“Her who?” I turn and follow the path of her gaze until my eyes land on Tiffany, who is, in fact, still watching the two of us with a strange look on her face.
“You know who,” Emma responds pointedly. Turning back to her, I’m greeted by a snide look and arms crossed tightly across her chest as she eyes me, her lips pursed into a thin line. On any other woman, the look would come across as annoyance, but the glint in her eyes defies her chilly demeanor. She finds this whole situation entirely too amusing.
“Tiffany?” I ask dumbly. She nods, not dropping her “jealous girlfriend” act. “She’s like, a toddler.”
Emma scoffs. “Oh please. That girl is at least eighteen and drop dead gorgeous. Not to mention, totally twitterpated over you. Don’t even act like you haven’t noticed.”
Honestly, I haven’t. I glance over my shoulder. Tiffany gives me a little wave this time now that Emma is no longer looking at her. Her short brown hair is curled into soft waves. And yes, I guess you can say she’s pretty. For an overly made-up teenager. I prefer my women a little more natural looking. A little more real. A little more mature. And a little more blonde.
Who am I kidding? I prefer my women a little more Emma Nicholls.
I turn back to Emma. “You’re crazy.” But I make a note to talk with Kevin about it. I’m sure it’s nothing, but I’m way too damn old for her. I don’t want this to turn into a problem later on down the road. We’ll have to figure out how to nip this in the bud now. Emma picks up her menu, asking me to recommend a few things. I’m glad for the subject change. We spend the next few minutes discussing the different menu items before she settles on the grilled fresh salmon, and I go with my old standby, the twelve ounce New York strip steak. I look around after we’ve made our decision, surprised we haven’t seen any trace of our waitress.
My eyes lock with my brother’s behind the bar. He grins and lifts a finger as he finishes pouring a drink for a customer. A moment later, he appears at our side. Pulling a chair from a nearby table, he takes a seat, grinning at me the whole time.
After a few moments of awkward silence, he finally speaks. “Well, aren’t you going to introduce me, bro?”
I sigh. “Emma, this is my brother Kevin. Kevin, this is Emma.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Emma. How long have you been doing charity?”
Emma opens her mouth to respond, but instantly closes it, a puzzled look on her face. “Charity?” she finally asks.
“Yeah. I have to assume there’s a reason a beautiful girl like you is out with this ugly asshole. You dying, bro? Is this like the grown up Make-A-Wish foundation? Or did you have to bribe her? Oh shit, let me guess, she accidentally hit your car, and instead of calling the cops, you decided to blackmail her into spending an evening out with you.” He turns back to Emma. “What’s the damage, honey? I’ll help you out. Nobody should have to endure this type of torture. Dinner with Isaiah is about as bad as it gets. You may not survive the hours and hours of mundane discussion and boredom.”
I’m about to smack my good for nothing brother upside the head when Emma speaks. “As opposed to an evening with you, I’m sure. I’m sure by the end of that date, I’d be completely dazzled by your keen intellect and sparkling personality. Am I right?”
Kevin grins. “Hey, I can’t deny the truth. Unfortunately for you and millions of other women, I’m married. So as much as I wish I could save you from this dullard by taking you out myself, it won’t be possible. I like my balls right where they are, thank you very much. The jar my wife keeps in the pantry, in case of the event of my infidelity, is far too tiny. I don’t want my boys to be squished in there. They need to breathe.”
I groan and rub my hands over my face, certain Emma is going to run screaming from the building at any moment. What in the hell was I thinking bringing her here? I’m debating the best way to hide my brother’s body after I murder him when I hear her laugh. I drop my hands from my eyes, and instead of seeing complete revulsion, Emma is doubled over, laughing into her napkin as Kevin continues his monologue about his balls. This girl is seriously too good to be true. I always forget how abrasive my brother can be. He’s never understood the concept of a filter and has been known to scare people off within moments of meeting them. I think he’s funny as hell. But apparently, his sense of humor isn’t for everyone.
Luckily, he and Emma seem to have really hit it off. He sits with us for a few more minutes, cracking jokes and making us both laugh now that I’m at ease. When he sees a customer approach the bar, he stands.
“It was great to meet you, Emma. Don’t be a stranger.” He gives her shoulder a squeeze before turning to me. “I’ll send Sara out now. I forbade her from coming over until I had a chance to come chat with you guys, so don’t stiff her on the tip. It was my fault she wasn’t out here the second you sat down.”
I nod and watch him as he makes his way back to the bar. After Sara arrives and takes our orders, I turn back to Emma to find her grinning at me.
“What?” I ask, wondering if I have something on my face. I bring my hand to my cheek, feeling around for a smudge or crumb or something. She shakes her head.
“Nothing. I just like you, that’s all. And your crazy brother.”
I laugh. “Yeah, sorry about that. I should’ve warned you ahead of time. For some reason, I thought he might be on good behavior since he’s working and had never met you, but I should’ve known better. Good behavior isn’t in his skill set. Ever.”
She smiles. “I like him. He’s funny. And blunt. He kind of reminds me of…” She doesn’t finish the sentence, her eyes lowering to the table. When they meet mine again, they’re filled with uncertainty.
“Chris?” I ask. She releases a breath at my use of his name and nods.
“Yeah. I wasn’t sure you’d be okay with me bringing him up. Especially on our first date.”
I settle my hand over hers. “He was part of your life. A large part from the sound of it. I don’t want you to ever feel like you can’t talk about him. Or remember him. The way I see it, he helped make you into the wonderful person you are today. So don’t ever worry about me being jealous or upset. I’m grateful to him for treating you the way you deserved to be treated.”
Emma’s eyes glisten as she smiles at me, her fingers lacing with mine as she gives my hand a soft squeeze. “Thank you.”
I can’t help it. I lean across the table and kiss the corner of her mouth. She blushes, looking at me as I sit back in my chair and then looking at Kevin. I know he saw. I can feel his eyes boring holes in my skull. And from the look on Emma’s face, he must look stunned.
“I take it Kevin doesn’t see you with women often? He looks a bit shell shocked at the fact that you kissed me.”
I steal a quick glance at him, and sure enough, his mouth is gaping. When our eyes meet though, the shock disintegrates, and he lifts his hand, pointing at me. “You shit. Wait until I tell Mom.”
I laugh and shout back at him. “Language, brother. Don’t make me fire you.”
He waves me off dismissively and moves back to helping his customers, an added bounce in his step and an extra helping of smart-ass in his demeanor. I like seeing it. I like that my happiness makes him happy. Maybe I won’t murder him after all. The son of a bitch can be a good brother when he feels like it.
“You two seem close,” Emma says, bringing me out of my thoughts. I nod.
&
nbsp; “We are. It was just the two of us growing up. Well, and our parents, but they had the restaurant to run so we learned to entertain ourselves a lot. When we were young and couldn’t be home alone, we’d spend hours in the back office here. We’ve even still got the bunk beds in there we’d slept on all those late nights. Kev will bring his kids in sometimes and let them play in there. Luckily, the place has grown a lot since those days. He doesn’t have to spend nearly as much time here as our parents did.”
“But you’re part owner too, right? I heard you tell Kevin not to make you fire him.”
I nod again. “Yeah, my parents retired and transferred full ownership over to the two of us. I told them I really had no interest in running a restaurant. I had no plans to ever leave the military, but Kevin was insistent. He wouldn’t let me turn it down. So to make him happy, I signed the papers too, and until a few months ago, I was a sort of silent partner in that I had no involvement with the business whatsoever. Kevin would deposit my share of the profits each month into an account he’d set up for me, but I never touched any of it. It wasn’t until I returned from Iraq and was forced to retire that I got involved.”
Emma props her elbows on the table, cradling her chin in her hands. This story isn’t exactly riveting, but she’s still giving me her undivided attention. “So you came home and started working here?”
I meet her eyes, trying to decide how much I want to tell her tonight. But she already knows what happened that day. She might as well know all the ugly details afterward. It’s only fair she knows everything before she really gets involved here.
“No. I came home and got shit faced for about three solid months. I didn’t answer my family’s calls. Refused to meet with anyone. I didn’t sleep. Barely ate. Spent all day locked in my bedroom with only booze and pills to keep me company. They were the only things that could help dull the memories. The pain. If I went too long without a drink, it would all come flooding back. If the pain meds wore off, I couldn’t run from the screams. So instead of risking it, I decided staying hammered all day was better. Until one day it wasn’t. No matter how much I drank or how many pills I took, I couldn’t get the pain to go away.”
Emma’s brows furrow in concern, but she doesn’t speak. Instead, she waits for me to continue.
“I went to see Beth at my captain’s insistence. He’d left a message on my voice mail, threatening to have me discharged if I didn’t get my shit together. And that was one thing I couldn’t bear. So I went, and she gave me new pills. Pills to help my anxiety and depression. Pills that, when I took them with my beloved friend, Jack, would help me forget. I was only supposed to take one or two a day, as needed for when my thoughts became too much, but that didn’t work for me. So instead, I was popping them like they were fucking Skittles and downing an entire bottle of whiskey in a single day.
“Kev showed up one day after he’d tried calling me. My phone had gone dead, so it was going straight to voice mail. I was so far gone when he got there I didn’t even hear him. After a few attempts at knocking, he barreled through the door and found me passed out face down in front of the sofa. He called 911, and several hours and a stomach pump later, I was in a hospital.”
I think back to that day, when I was finally able to pry my eyes open and see the look on my brother’s face.
“You’re going to get your shit together, you hear me?”
I closed my eyes again, not wanting to discuss this with him right now.
The next thing I knew, a shadow fell over me, and Kevin’s hand was on my forehead, his fingers forcing my eyes open again.
“I don’t think so. After what I just went through, you’re going to listen to me. Because I am not doing that again. Got it?”
Blinking back to the present, I continue telling Emma what happened next. “After that, I lived with Kevin and his family for a little while. Kev would drive me to all my therapy appointments, and when I finally moved back to my own place, he insisted I call him twice a day and once more before I went to bed, just to check in. And if I didn’t answer when he called, he’d show up on my doorstep within minutes. I swear he figured out teleportation or something with how fast he was able to get to my house. We aren’t exactly neighbors. It was annoying and overbearing and exactly what I fucking needed. He saved my life.”
I leave out the part that until these last few months, I’d resented that fact. I hadn’t wanted to live, but I was too freaking cowardly to end my own life. So instead, I hoped some combination of booze and pills would do the trick. I’d been pissed Kevin had interfered. Beth had hooked me up with the name of the facility Jim was in, so that gave me a small purpose temporarily, but until I’d met Emma, the idea of possibly ending my life once Jim was better had never left. That is definitely too heavy of subject matter for a first date though.
“What about your parents?” she asks. “Where were they when all this was going on?”
I shake my head. “Like I said, they moved to Florida after they retired. We’ve never been what you would call close. They came up briefly when I first got back, but they didn’t understand. They both were raised in very religious families, and while they sort of fell away from it while we were growing up because of their busy hours here, they’ve always held onto their faith. Now that they’re retired, they’ve become very involved with their church. So in their eyes, nothing I’m going through can’t be solved with a prayer and a few Hail Marys. Speaking with them always ends in a blowout, so it’s better for everyone if we all keep our distance.”
I smile now, trying to ease the melancholy settled around us.
“So now I work here a few evenings a week to give Kevin a chance to be with his family. Don’t let him fool you. He likes to joke around, but there’s no way in hell he’d ever cheat on his wife. He adores that woman and their two girls. So I hang out here at night while he plays daddy. And during the day, I hang out with you. Not a bad gig, if you ask me.”
“I’m glad.” Emma smiles in response. “And I’d have to agree. Hanging out with you all day doesn’t suck.” She winks.
I grin at her, my eyes tracing over every inch of her face. She blushes under my scrutiny.
“What?” she finally asks as I continue to stare at her.
“Nothing. I just like you,” I say, mimicking her earlier words.
She throws her head back and laughs.
“Good, because I’m pretty sure Jasper isn’t letting you go anywhere anytime soon.”
I open my mouth to argue it isn’t just Jasper who won’t want me to leave when Kevin approaches our table. “Hey, forgot to give you this before. It came with the mail today. Weird though. No stamp or return address.”
He tosses an envelope on the table, and the familiar script causes my breath to catch. I reach for it, but I already know what I’m going to find. I look up, making sure Emma and Kevin are distracted enough with each other they won’t see what I’m doing. I hide the envelope under the table, sliding the slip of paper out from under the flap.
My blood runs cold.
The sun beats down on my bare shoulders, causing a light sheen of sweat to break out across my neck. It’s not even eight in the morning yet, but already the hot August temps have me yearning for fall’s arrival. I pull the work glove off my right hand, grabbing a towel to dab the wetness off my skin. Tossing it on the work bench, I turn and look at Joey. He’s over under the willow tree with the dogs. All six of them are laying on the cool grass, tongues lolling and breath panting. Isaiah is due here at any minute, but suddenly, I don’t feel like training today. Coming to a decision, I set off across the yard, my smile growing with every step.
Joey’s brow furrows questioningly as I bypass him and the dogs and head into the garage. A few little heads pop up at my movement, but none of the puppies move to follow me. This only confirms I’ve made the right decision. If a bunch of rambunctious puppies think it’s too hot to investigate, then you know it’s encroaching on the seventh circle of hell out here.
Joey’s shout and a chorus of happy barks lets me know my mission was accomplished. Swinging the sprinkling system door shut, I dash out of the garage to join in the fun. Joey is scrambling to grab all the dogs and get them out of the spray. I run straight out into it, leaping over several sprinkler heads with my arms thrown out wide. Loki quickly picks up on my plan and charges toward me. He circles my legs, jumping and playing in the shower of water. Joey stares at me like I’ve lost my mind for a moment before shrugging and dropping the remaining dogs’ leashes. Within moments, I’m surrounded by grinning, sopping wet dogs.
Maggie playfully bites at my ankles, and I take off running. This used to be a common game for us. She’d chase me all around the house, yard, park…wherever we happened to be. I feel a slight pang of regret when I realize how long it’s been since we’ve played like this. While she’s still a huge part of my life, I’ve been so busy with the house and the business I’ve forgotten to make time for just the two of us. Looking back at her over my shoulder, I see the huge canine grin on her face, her eyes crinkled, her tongue hanging out of the side of her mouth as she pants, and decide from here on out, Maggie and I are having some girl time every week. Just the two of us.