I left Josh’s room and met Senator Mansfield in the hallway, who wordlessly led us to the elevator.
Once we were wheels up, gaining altitude out of Germany, the irony struck me—I’d come to Germany twenty-four hours ago to help heal Josh, and instead he’d inadvertently broken me.
Chapter Seventeen
JOSH
Military transports sucked. They sucked even harder when you spent eight and a half hours trying to figure out how to dig yourself out of the huge hole you’d gotten into with your fiancée.
If she still wants to marry you, jackass.
“What’s on your mind, LT?” Rizzo asked, leaning back next to me.
“I’m wondering what color roses say, ‘Forgive me, I didn’t mean what I said.’”
He gave me the you-fucked-up look. “Pissed off the old lady?”
“I may have told her I didn’t want to marry her.”
He whistled low. “Not sure about the color, but I’m pretty sure you’re going to need to buy out all of Nashville’s florists. She give the ring back?”
“What? No.” Not yet. “That’s not what happened. I didn’t mean ever, I meant not in the hospital chapel in some rush ceremony so she could be as uncomfortable on this flight as we are.”
“Does she know that?”
“I think so. Fucking painkillers.”
“Yeah, that’s it. You blame the painkillers and she’ll forgive you. No sweat.”
“Yeah.”
He side-eyed me. “Unless you meant it…even subconsciously.”
“What?” I snapped.
“Listen, after what’s happened, I wouldn’t blame you.” He shook his head. “I’m not marrying. Not while I’m in. I’ve got three years left, and then—when I’m out—I’ll think about it.”
“Why? Afraid you’ll change?”
“Nawh. I couldn’t bring a woman into this. Waiting at home for us to get back, putting shit on hold, moving where the army says, that’s not the life I want for my wife, and that shit’s on the good days.”
Ember already knew the army life. She’d been born into it. She’d accepted that cost the day she’d pinned my lieutenant bars on me. “Right.”
“But it’s the bad shit, you know? Look at us, all torn up, stitched together but never really whole. I keep thinking about Captain Trivette’s kids, her husband. He’s a good guy, a major in the 101st, and now his whole life is just…fucked.”
Fresh pain, the kind that couldn’t be numbed by the drugs, sliced me open, flayed my soul from my bones. “Yeah.”
“More power to you. Marriage is awesome. I’m just not committing myself to a woman until I can give her the life she deserves. Home at five. No deployments.”
“No notifications,” I added.
“Bingo.” He snapped his fingers. “This feeling right here? The shit we’re wading through? This is the stuff that changes you. I’d be an idiot to say who I’ll be once I’m done.”
I nodded, at a loss for words.
“Fuck, I’m an asshole.” Rizzo dropped his head to his unbroken hand for a second before looking back up. “I’m not talking about you. You know that, right? You have a girl who put her ass on a plane to be at your bedside. You keep that one. She’ll stick through the shit. She’s a good one.”
“Yeah, she is.” Too good for me, for this life, but then again, she always had been.
They’d notified her, pulled her world out from under her feet. I’d sworn to be whatever she needed, and instead I’d brought them to the door…again.
I’d make it up to her.
As soon as I figured out how.
“I didn’t know if you’d want me to move an air mattress downstairs,” Ember said as she held the front door open so I could crutch myself in.
“Why?” She hadn’t shown any kind of anger or hurt since she’d picked me up at the airfield—or any emotion really—but fuck if I wasn’t sleeping next to her. I’d hash this shit out with her right now. “Are you kicking me out of our room?”
“What?” She shut the door and twisted the lock. She’d added a deadbolt since I left. Good. I liked her safe. “No, of course not. I just thought you wouldn’t want to negotiate the stairs. I was going to sleep on the air mattress, too,” she finished quietly.
I hobbled the final foot to the couch and collapsed, gently lifting my leg to the coffee table to keep it elevated. Home. We’d only lived here for a month before deployment, but there was no place I more associated with the feeling of home than these eighteen hundred square feet. “I’ll make it up the stairs,” I promised. “You…might have to help me shower.”
Her smile was instant and gorgeous. “Oh, I think I can manage that.”
“Good,” I said, opening my good arm.
“Do you want anything? I can grab you some water, or—”
“I want you. In my arms. Now.”
She nodded and slid into me like a missing puzzle piece, fitting perfectly under my shoulder. “I’m glad you’re home,” she whispered.
“Me, too.”
“What do we do now?” she asked.
“I was thinking of getting you naked—”
She scoffed. “Not what I meant. You? Army stuff? Checkups? Doctors? I mean…can you even actually get me naked?”