Luke pulled her down beside him. “And I’ll be right here whenever you need to be reminded that I’m always going to be in your corner.”
She settled into his arms, and for the first time since she’d made her flight and hotel reservation, she felt at peace.
10
Seth spent a lot of time lying awake, staring at the ceiling after leaving Abby’s. He’d seen her in a totally different light tonight after that council meeting that hadn’t gone her way. He’d detected unanticipated vulnerabilities. He’d also identified in new ways with her desire to make a fresh start in Seaview Key. Wasn’t that exactly why he was here, too? To put the past behind him?
In a way that made the attraction he felt toward her more dangerous than ever. If she became too approachable, too human, how was he supposed to keep his defenses in place? And those defenses—the ones that kept him from acting on his already confessed desire to sleep with her—could be all that stood between him and unbearable pain, a pain he knew all too well.
He thought back to his feelings for Cara Sanchez. She’d been so blasted strong in the face of battle. She’d seen atrocities no woman—or man, for that matter—should ever have to witness, yet there had been a sweetness about her that had spoken to him. She’d been one of the most optimistic people he’d ever known, one of the funniest. To be able to share laughter with someone at the end of a day filled with horrendous crises had been a gift.
When she’d been killed by a suicide bomber while he’d been on a mission to rescue some injured soldiers who’d been ambushed, he’d been devastated. He’d blamed himself for not being there to protect her, though the truth was, had he been there, rather than in the air in a helicopter, he’d have been killed, too. When he’d called Luke to tell him what had happened, berating himself for failing Cara, Luke had tried to hammer it home that what he was feeling was survivor’s guilt, but Seth simply couldn’t accept it. Surely there would have been something he could have done.
After that his emotions had closed down. Even though he hadn’t been there during the attack, he’d seen enough to know the carnage it would have caused. And no matter how he’d pleaded, his commander had refused to let him view Cara’s body. Even now he wasn’t sure which was worse, to have seen what remained of the woman he’d loved, or to have his reality-fueled imagination supply the details.
He broke out in a cold sweat just thinking about that day, about coming back to a base that had been partially shattered by an extremist, a guard who’d turned on the American troops he was supposed to be aiding.
The images in his head brought back the anguish, the fury that had overtaken him when he’d realized Cara was gone. He’d lost his mind for a time, wanted to kill the remaining guards to retaliate for the one who’d betrayed them all. Luke’s calls and emails had kept him sane, reminding him that Cara wouldn’t have sought revenge. She’d known the risks and chosen to be there, had believed the mission to be worthy of the sacrifice. She’d been a hero among many heroes.
With his dream of coming back to the States, marrying Cara and having a family no longer viable, he’d reenlisted and gone back to Afghanistan, where he’d focused a hundred percent on his job, numbed himself to his emotions. Then he’d gotten out of the army and come here.
In an attempt to drive out the memories, Seth got up and made a pot of strong coffee designed to keep him wide awake, because if the images were vivid when he was alert, they were worse when he was sleeping. He’d awakened in a cold sweat more than once, screams echoing in his head.
He took his cup of coffee and went outside. There was a chill in the night air that made him shiver. He gazed up at the stars in the inky sky.
“Are you up there, baby?” he asked, not for the first time. “You’re still in my heart, you know.”
But there was another woman pushing Cara aside these days, another woman whom he sensed had the ability to sneak into his heart and put him at risk for more pain. The excuses he’d dreamed up to keep distance between them—some valid, some perhaps ridiculous—were all that kept his heart whole.
“I’m not sure I can take that chance,” he murmured to himself.
Sure you can.
The voice in his head almost seemed real and so, so familiar. It was Cara’s, sweet and softly accented.
You’re the bravest man I know.
“Not anymore,” he argued with this ghost from the past.
Don’t sell yourself short. I’ll be disappointed if you don’t do enough living for both of us.
With the soft whisper of a sigh against his cheek, she was gone. He knew that when he suddenly felt more at peace than he had in a while.
That didn’t mean he was ready for all the complications that Abby represented, he told himself staunchly, but there was no denying the tiny crack in the shield around his heart. He wondered how long it would be before the crack that Cara had started would widen enough to let Abby in.
* * *
“You sleep okay last night?” Grandma Jenny asked as she piled a plate with food the next morning.
Seth noticed she’d fixed eggs, bacon, biscuits, all of his favorites.
“Sure,” he said.
“Really? Then what were you doing out on the porch for half the night?”
He sighed. Of course she’d caught him. She slept lightly and checked on sounds in the night.
“I was just thinking through a few things,” he said.
“How to keep Abby at arm’s length?” she guessed.
He chewed his food slowly to put off answering, then managed a suitably bemused tone—or so he thought.
