Until There Was You (Coming Home, #2)

by Jessica Scott

  The door opened. Lieutenant Engle stepped through. “Sir, I know we’re not off to a good start. But we need to learn this. Captain Montoya is right. We need to be prepared for anything.” Engle swallowed, her skin pale. “We’ll stay until we get it right.”

  Silence settled over the training area. Engle paused for a moment, then stepped back outside, closing the door behind her.

  Claire stepped close enough that she could see the tight lines in Evan’s neck. She rested her hand on the heavy body armor protecting his chest. Right above his heart. “You can’t argue with that.”

  She expected him to argue. To lash out.

  Instead, he just turned away.

  * * *

  Claire lowered her hand after knocking on Evan’s door. No answer. She supposed it was for the best, given the backlash from today’s training and all the memories it had stirred up inside her. Shoving her hands into her jacket pockets, she headed down the hall toward the stairs, needing a run to burn off the leftover emotional energy.

  Claire stepped outside into the pitch-black night, sinking into the thick, viscous slush outside the lodge. The only sound came from the humming of the lodge’s overhead lights. Noise was a normal part of life in Iraq and she was long since used to it, so sometimes she had a hard time getting used to the quiet back home here in the States. Real quiet, not the kind brought on by noise-canceling headphones or drug-induced sleep.

  The kind of quiet she found walking through a snow-covered trail in the woods. The farther she walked from the lodge, the deeper the quiet became. Soon the only sound was the crunch of her boots on hard packed snow, the huff of her breath freezing on the air. Feeling edgy and too tightly wound, she dug her thumb and forefinger into her eyes, trying to push aside the frustrated memories that had lashed at her all day.

  Except that she could still hear the screams as the operations center burned around her in Iraq. She could feel the weight of the broken conference room table pressing on her lungs. The smell of burning flesh and sulfur. The smell that had stolen the joy of Fourth of July fireworks from her ever since she’d lain there helpless and screaming. She hadn’t counted on the training exercise to resurrect so much of her experience downrange.

  She stopped, realization prickling over her skin. “Oh, Evan,” she whispered into the dark.

  That was what must have set Evan off. The shoot house. It had to be memories. Otherwise, his reaction just seemed … insane.

  She walked past a few folks hanging in a smoking area, noticing that most were drinking rather than smoking, ignoring the laws on public alcohol. Living up the moment as though tomorrow were just any other day. Funny how war could make you appreciate the time you had. But the longer she spent at home, the more she slipped back into the day-to-day rush of things.

  She walked because she was too tired to go running. She walked to try and find a place to stuff the resurrected memories. Her cheeks burned as she closed her eyes, fighting to keep the sobs from tearing out of her throat. Her arms shook and she rocked silently, digging her fingers into her biceps hard enough to bruise. She frowned, fighting the violent shaking as the adrenaline and the emotion attempted to escape.

  There was no single event that had scarred her. No one tragic death that had created some shell-shocked, burned-out GI. There was simply the war. The constant stress of combat. The strain of not letting herself fail. The thought that tonight could be the night her trailer was bombed and she would die in her sleep.

  No, there was no single event that marked her soul. It was a lifetime of fighting. Her father. Her wars. All of it shaped the person that she showed the world.

  But alone in the dark, on a cold wooded trail, Claire let herself fall apart.

  And wondered where she would find the strength to put herself back together.

  To put her boots back on and do it all again tomorrow.

  * * *

  Evan took a sip of his beer, staring into the darkness at the edge of his room.

  He rubbed his thumb idly on the sweating neck of the bottle and listened as the door to Claire’s room closed. He was shocked by the strength of his reactions today. Old memories, never forgotten, long ignored, had risen like demons. Striking out at him, reminding him of the biting failure, the aching loss. The endless frustration that he should have done more. He’d made mistakes in battle that were almost as bad as the choices Engle had made today. It wasn’t disdain that had made him react the way he did.

  He’d been that platoon leader that lost half his platoon because he’d made a bad call. It hadn’t been bad training that made him stop the exercise. It was the memories of death and dying that had overwhelmed him. The chaos erupting in the shoot house had made him lose his bearings, his sense of time. It had been impossible to distinguish between his bloody memories and what was going on around him and he’d lashed out at the only thing solid in the world at that moment: Claire.

  He slammed back the rest of his beer, then dragged on some clothes to head to the bar. It should still be open for a couple more hours if he was lucky. He needed to drink, to try and forget the burning, twisting pain that Claire’s quiet words had carved into his soul. He paused just outside her door, tempted, so tempted to knock. Just to check on her.

  That was an excuse and he knew it. He didn’t want to be alone. Didn’t want to fight the god-awful memories by himself tonight. Claire, whatever else she might be, had her own demons. And as foolish as it was, the desire to peel back her layers drove him closer when he should have been going the other way.

  He was a fool. Claire Montoya was convinced she didn’t need anyone. That her way was the only way.

  He kept walking.

  Because only a fool would want a woman who would never let him in. He could touch her skin, touch her body, but she’d never trust him enough to let him touch her heart. Not the way he wanted. And he couldn’t do that. Not with her.

  Her terms were unacceptable, her barriers too high.

  Chapter Ten

  The phone. Please, sweet baby Jesus, tell her the phone wasn’t ringing. Claire rolled over, groping for the buzzing object. Vibrating steadily on the floor next to her bed, it paused, only to start up again a moment later. The only reason she’d heard it at all was because it had fallen on top of her uniform belt. The hard plastic vibrating against the metal was obnoxious enough to wake the dead.

  She squinted, then closed one eye until the number came into view. She didn’t recognize it. “Yeah?”

  “Claire?”

  She scowled and blinked, struggling to see the digits on the readout more clearly. She couldn’t have heard that voice right. “Evan?”

  “Wake up, Montoya, I need a ride.”

  Claire dropped her head down onto her forearm and groaned. It wasn’t even two A.M. and they had to be back on the range in less than six hours. She tried to look on the bright side. At least Evan was talking to her again. She remembered what time it was. No, that was not a bright side. It was borderline criminal. “Is someone dying?”

  “Nice.” She heard water running in the background before it abruptly stopped. She had the strongest suspicion that he’d just finished in the bathroom. Honestly, she didn’t know how she felt about that. “I need a ride. Before Iaconelli and I spend the rest of this little boondoggle in jail.”

  What exactly was Evan doing out with Reza anyway? And where were they that they needed her to come and get them? “Are you drunk?”

  Evan sighed hard. “Look, you don’t honestly think I’d call you if it wasn’t important? I’m half-cocked and Iaconelli, ah, Ike’s had a hell of a night. I can’t drive and if I don’t get him out of here in the next hour, the bartender is going to call the cops, which means all of Fort Carson is going to know about this by tomorrow. Later today. Hell, whatever day it is.”

  Claire sat up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, concern motivating her to actually move. She rested her forehead in her hands. “Captain America went out drinking. How ’bout that.”

>   “Are you coming or what?”

  “Yeah, I’m coming,” she grumbled, and disconnected the call.

  Iaconelli could have been in hell and she would have gone in after him. She’d done it plenty of times before. But Evan? Evan was another story.

  But the fact that Captain America had not only gone out with the resident bad boy but had also gotten too drunk to drive roused her curiosity. The firefight at the shoot house must have screwed him up more than she’d guessed.

  She swallowed and dragged her hand through her hair, then started digging through her clothes for a bra. Iaconelli was family, damn it. And while she didn’t know what Evan was to her, she knew couldn’t leave him.

  That much she did know.

  * * *

  Half an hour later, Claire walked into the old railway car that had been converted into a bar by some enterprising soul. She wasn’t entirely sure what she expected from a bar called The Greasy Tube, but it definitely looked greasy and tubelike. The air was cold and thin, the kind of thin that made her lungs hurt from having to work too hard to pull oxygen from it. Even the thick smell of cigarette smoke was thin here, slinking into her hair and lungs like a sneaking thing.

  She peered around the darkness, scanning faces that looked far too old and run down to be in a place that Reza would frequent. He liked energy, this kind of seedy energy. Craved it. This place felt like a funeral. Or a wake.

  The bar, such as it was, crouched at one end of the railway car. A couch that Claire suspected had a good chance of having fleas and several bodily fluids she’d rather not think about sat against one wall beneath barred windows. A stack of what looked like broken chairs and the tattered remnants of a table filled the space between the bar and the couch.

  Reza was passed out, slumped over the arm of the couch, covering his eyes with one hand and snoring quietly. Impressive. It took a lot to drink Reza under the table. Claire flinched as the stench of old beer assaulted her nose and resurrected ancient memories.

  The bartender was a tiny woman who looked like she was every bit of sixty, the kind of sixty that suggested hard drinking and even harder drugs. She was busy reading someone the riot act at the bar.

  Evan. Slumped over the bar and leaning hard on his elbows to stay upright, he looked unsteady on his wobbly stool. She made her way over to him, squeezing past a couple who were swapping heavy doses of spit in a corner. Claire felt scuzzy just from being in this place. She approached Evan carefully and tapped him on the shoulder, careful to step back in case he was too drunk to realize it was her. She’d never been around a truly intoxicated Evan, and she didn’t know what to expect.

  “Hey.” His smile was warm and welcoming. No, Evan wasn’t a violent drunk. Apparently, he was an extra-relaxed, charming drunk. Wasn’t that interesting?

  He shifted and leaned his head on his hand, bracing his elbow against the bar. The movement stretched his T-shirt over his chest. Claire forced herself to look away. She didn’t do drunk sex, even with a charming, slightly intoxicated Evan.

  “You have some serious explaining to do,” she said lightly. There was no judgment in her tone. She was more relieved than anything. She’d been worried when she hadn’t been able to find him after the shoot house. Maybe Evan hadn’t come through the war unscathed, but she hadn’t expected to find him drunk at the bar. Not when he’d been giving her hell about Reza’s drinking. She could not—no, she would not—judge either of them. Something had snapped in Evan today, and she of all people could understand that.

  * * *

  “I think we need to get Iaconelli home.” His voice was thick and harsh, as if he’d spent the night shouting over loud music or mortar fire. He always lost his voice when he spent time on the range. He studied Claire carefully in the smoky light.

  She had come. He was surprised. Maybe he shouldn’t have been. She sat down next to him on a crappy bar stool, looking every inch a warrior goddess. A chair scraped against the beer-soaked wood floor and Claire’s eyes snapped toward the sound, instantly on guard.

  “What happened?” she asked. He was surprised at what he didn’t hear in her voice. Anger. Blame. No, it was more mild curiosity, tinged with … resignation? As though she’d done this a time or two.

  “Some of the local boys decided they didn’t like the way Iaconelli looked. Then they heard me use his name and they were sure he was a terrorist who was here to bomb this shit-hole bar halfway to Wyoming.”

  He watched a myriad of emotions flicker across her face as he spoke. She would be an avenging angel to those who wronged her friends, and there was no doubt that the flagrant racism of the local rednecks pissed her off.

  “So did someone at least end up in the hospital?” she asked. He could see her choosing her words carefully.

  “Hell no,” the bartender rasped through a gap in her front teeth. “That would require Jenkins to talk to the cops. And he’s not really what you might call a fan of the authorities.” She set a glass down on a towel to dry. “But if you don’t get your buddy out of here soon, I’m not going to be able to stop the cops from dragging him off to jail.”

  Evan glanced at Claire, who was scanning the bar for any signs of trouble. Her hair fell forward, dusting along her temple. He reached for it, stroking it behind her ear before she could stop him. She tensed but didn’t pull away. He smiled. Progress, he thought. Maybe she wasn’t still mad at him. He could hope.

  He shifted again and angled his body toward the woman behind the bar. “Thanks for not calling the cops,” he said simply. “I’ll make sure he takes care of the damages.”

  “Well, thanks for your service.” The woman sniffed and focused on wiping down the glass in her hand. Her smile looked like a tear in cracked leather. “Get your friend some help before you bury him. A man shouldn’t be able to drink like that.”

  He fisted one hand on the bar, bracing the other against the worn oak as he prepared to stand. Ignoring the burning questions in Claire’s eyes, he pulled a twenty out of his pocket and dropped it on the counter.

  “Sure.” He pushed the stool closer to the bar and stood. “Ready?”

  The silence between Claire and Evan was awkward and heavy, the kind of silence that sucked the air from his lungs. He hadn’t wanted to call her, but there hadn’t really been a lot of options. He wasn’t even entirely sure how they’d ended up here. He’d gone downstairs to the bar in the lobby. Of course Iaconelli had been there. And Evan had been too wound up to care that he was drinking with his former platoon sergeant. The next thing he knew, he and Iaconelli were pounding shots at The Greasy Tube. Then the local dickheads had succeeded in ruining a perfectly good time. Evan had already started sobering up by the time he called Claire. He wasn’t nearly as drunk as Iaconelli, but he’d never get behind the wheel of a car after drinking. Never again, anyway. He drank because it was a way to deaden the pain, to stop the bleeding. But he’d never drink and drive.

  He was glad she had come. The last thing he wanted to do was try to drag Iaconelli out of here by himself. And regardless of whatever this was between them, she’d never leave Iaconelli. That much he knew with absolute certainty.

  He tried not to be jealous. He failed. He was jealous of their trust, their easy friendship. The way she relaxed around Iaconelli but not with him.

  They managed to get Iaconelli strapped in the backseat of the rented SUV without any significant injuries. He had no idea how much Steel Reserve Reza had pounded before blacking out, but it had been a hell of a ride prior to that.

  “How much was the damage?” Claire asked softly as she started the truck and pulled out onto the main road.

  He slammed the door shut and buckled his seat belt automatically. “Close to a thousand bucks,” he mumbled, dragging a hand over his face.

  “Lovely.” Beside him, Claire maneuvered the big truck out of the parking spot. “Hope he has some deployment money saved up.”

  Evan snorted and slammed his head back against the headrest. “Tell me about it.”<
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  They rode in silence for a long time. Evan wished he could find some pleasure in the moment—in being with Claire, even under these circumstances—but all he felt was a rising sense of doom that the person he’d worked his ass off to become was one thread away from unraveling. It had nothing to do with Iaconelli sleeping off his latest bender in the backseat. It was much more subtle, like a nagging sense of foreboding tickling at the base of his skull that his control was slipping away.

  “So you’re not going to ask what prompted my drunken escapade?”

  “I don’t think you’re nearly as drunk as you want me to think you are.” Claire glanced over at him, then turned her attention back to the road. Her fingers tensed on the steering wheel. “Want to talk about it?” she asked after a long moment.

  He sniffed and stared out the window, scrubbing his hand over his jaw and trying to figure out what to say next. They drove in silence for a few minutes, the neon signs occasionally lighting up the inside of the car as they passed tiny hamlets of civilization. Iaconelli mumbled in the backseat and then promptly began snoring again.

  “Stop the car up here,” he said quietly.

  “We’re in the middle of nowhere. There’s no place to pull off the road.”

  “There’s a turnoff.” One he knew all too well.

  He hadn’t planned this. Hadn’t left the lodge with this in mind. But as much as he’d tried to avoid the pain of coming home, part of him needed this tonight.

  He glanced at her as she pulled into the barely plowed turnoff. The tires crunched through the snow. A hundred feet from the road, bathed in the soft glow of the headlights, stood a gnarled, twisted oak. He heard Claire’s hiss of breath the moment she made the connection.

  Grinding his teeth, he stepped into the bitter cold of his memories.