Ring of Fire (27 page)

“A rough weekend,” he murmured against her soft hair.

She nodded. “Thanks for being there. By the way, I really liked how you handled the Johnsons.” That was the other place they'd visited: the home of the deceased driver's son and daughter-in-law.

“I didn't know if it was a good thing to say, or not. It just kind of came out, when they were doing all that self-flagellation.”

She gave a tiny snort. “Good word for it. Yeah, it was getting to be all about them, not about everyone else who'd suffered. I loved it that you called them on it.”

“Well, you called me on it a while back, when I got too caught up in my own guilt.”

“I didn't. And you weren't.”

Yeah, he had been, and she kind of had, though more diplomatically than he'd done with the Johnsons. Listening to the couple whine, Eric had thought of how much he'd learned. He had told them, rather crisply, “Guilt is a normal reaction. Can you believe that the boy who risked his own life to save the little girl is beating himself up because he couldn't also rescue her mom and your dad?”

When the woman had gasped, Eric went on, “Some guilt feelings are more deserved than others. His aren't.” Brusquely, he'd added, “Yours are, to a certain extent.” Because it was true, and they had to know it and live with it. But he went on, “So are mine. I sent one of my sergeants in ahead of me when we were searching for weapons, and he triggered an IED. He's dead. I'm alive. I'll carry that guilt until the day I die.”

The woman had been weeping by then and the man's face was red—not with anger, but with suppressed tears. Eric had continued, “But something I've learned since then is that there's no going back. Yeah, if you'd had foresight you'd have done things differently. But you can't change things now, and obsessing over it doesn't help anyone. You have to forgive yourself and move forward.” It was something he'd finally started to do himself, thanks to the wisdom of Lark, Karim, and the support group.

He'd gone on to say, “If you did something that got someone hurt, then try to find ways to make up for it. Help others rather than focus on your own guilt and pain.” He had then clapped the man on the shoulder, and touched the woman's arm. “Acknowledge it, but move past it. Believe me, it's the only way.”

Now, in the Cantrell kitchen, Lark's arms tightened around his waist. “They listened to you. What you said resonated.”

He leaned away slightly and used one hand to tip her chin up so he could look into her eyes. “How are you, Lark? Are you holding up okay?” Then, as she started to answer, he said, “No, don't give me the pat ‘you're fine' answer. I know you are, but I also know you have to be hurting. Tell me the truth.”

She gave a tired smile. “I'm hurting, but it's tolerable. This weekend's been okay. Talking to people helped me as well as them. Having you at my side helped.” Her gaze rested on his face for a long moment before she went on, “Talking to Mom, being with Jayden. Going riding this morning. It was nice of Mom to come along so I could ride rather than side walk.”

“Mary would do anything for you.” And so, Eric was coming to think, would he.

“I know.” There was something in Lark's eyes, a question maybe. Whatever it was, he couldn't read it, even though she seemed to be searching his face for an answer.

She spoke again. “You know what I'd like to do this evening?”

“Tell me, and we'll make it happen.”

She smiled at that. “Would you do the dishes while I spend a little time with Jayden? And then I'd like to leave Mom to get him into bed and I want to go to your place with you. I want to make love with you, Eric.”

“I want that, too, Lark.” He had decided not to raise the subject when she was so obviously tired and hurting, but there was nothing he'd rather do than make love with her.

“This weekend started with something awful. I want to finish it with something good.”

He kissed her gently, full of admiration for this amazing woman and flattered that he could give her that “something good.” “Go be with your son and I'll handle the dishes.”

After she left the kitchen, he made quick work of the task. When he went into the family room, Lark was on the couch with Jayden curled up in her arms. The two of them were reading a book aloud, taking turns.

He could have watched them like that for a very long time. But a slight movement caught his attention, drawing his gaze to Mary, who sat in a chair. Her steady gaze was on him. She'd been studying him as he watched Lark and Jayden. He wondered what she'd seen. Did she know how much he cared for her daughter and grandson, even though he and Lark had promised to keep things casual? If so, what did she think? Like her daughter, she believed that the Cantrell women were better off without a man in their lives.

Mary sighed and pressed her eyes closed, in that moment looking older and less sure of herself than he'd ever seen her before. When she opened her eyes again, her shoulders lifted in a shrug and she gave him a smile that seemed more resigned than happy.

He was still figuring out what to make of that shrug and smile when Lark glanced up and said, “Eric, hi. We're just a couple of pages from the end of the chapter.”

He took the other chair and avoided looking at Mary. Instead, he closed his own eyes and listened as the woman's rich voice and the boy's eager, occasionally stumbling one read the tale of girl and boy wizards who were trying to save their kingdom. Even in the short time Eric had known Jayden, he'd heard the boy's speech improve. He didn't slur or run his words together as often as he used to. Who knew what this boy might ultimately achieve? One thing Eric knew: wherever the army took him, he wanted to stay in touch with the Cantrell family.

When the chapter was finished, Lark said, “Night, night, Jayden.” She gave him a big, smoochy kiss. “Granny's going to tuck you in and I'm going to walk Eric home.”

“Are you going to tuck Eric in?” the boy asked.

Lark's dancing eyes met Eric's. “Maybe. If he's a good boy.”

A few minutes later, they were in their jackets, out the door, and walking down the street. He put his arm around her and she wrapped her own arm around his waist. “I'm feeling very lucky,” she said. “My life is so good. Events like the one on Friday are a reminder of that.”

He nodded. “So is listening to the people in the support group. Like, there's a guy who got his arm caught in a piece of farm equipment. They saved the arm, but he never regained proper use of it and he's almost always in pain. Makes me grateful for the terrific job the docs did on my good leg, and also that they took off the bad one. For me, it's not about vanity or being a ‘whole' man. It's about being a fully functioning man.” A man who could return to being a soldier.

She dropped her hand to squeeze his ass. “I can attest to your functionality, Major.”

He liked not only the ass grope, but that she was in good enough spirits to tease. “Yeah? I think maybe we need another fitness test before you can swear to that, Chief.”

“I concur.” She leaned her head on his shoulder. “This is nice. Strolling like this, the streets so peaceful, the air all crisp and Octoberish. Touching you, talking to you, knowing we're going to make love.”

“All of that,” he agreed. Small-town pleasures, yet they were things he'd never experienced before coming to Caribou Crossing. Before meeting Lark.

What would it be like to contemplate a future of nights like this? Of watching a very special woman and an equally special boy read together, and of peaceful walks and passionate lovemaking?

But that wasn't who Eric was. Nor, according to Lark, what she wanted.

With regret for what might have been, had he and she been different people, he opened the door to his apartment building. They took the stairs in silence.

Even when they were inside his place, they didn't speak. He took her hand and led her into the bedroom where he lit the candles, not even wincing at the sharp scent of smoke or the yellow flames. She stood still as, with deft hands, he undressed her item by item. When she was naked, he steered her to the bed, pulled back the covers, and urged her to lie down. When she did, he pulled the covers up to her neck.

She lay watching as he stepped back from the bed, quickly undressed, and took off his prosthesis. Though she still didn't speak, her gaze followed each move. Despite the shadows under her eyes that attested to tiredness and stress, her eyes heated with unmistakable arousal.

Her close attention and her arousal had a predictable effect on him and by the time he was naked, he was also erect.

Lark lifted back the covers in invitation, and he slid into the bed. She turned to face him and he hugged her close and kissed her—first on the forehead, then the cheeks, the tip of her nose, and finally her mouth. By the time he got there, her lips were parted and she responded, tasting his mouth with the same enthusiasm he'd seen her show for chocolate.

Guessing how bone-deep her weariness must be, he caught her hands in his and raised their clasped hands to the pillow on each side of her head. “Lay back, Lark. Let me make love to you.”

Her voice was soft, a little husky, when she responded, “I can do that.”

And she did, not moving when he let go of her hands, trusting her body to him in a way that made him feel both powerful and in awe of her. Wanting to take care of every inch of her, outside and in, he kissed and caressed her, finding and appreciating special spots he hadn't explored before: a pale scar on her knee, a pair of freckles on one hipbone, the ticklish spot on the inside of her elbow. They made her more human and even more perfect.

His sensual touches brought her to climax twice before he entered her and, in tiny motions, drove them both slowly and inexorably to the peak and over.

He couldn't remember ever feeling so totally satisfied.

Eventually, he eased off her. Lying flat on her back, she flung her arms out bonelessly. “Oh, yes. That was exactly what I needed.”

He took advantage of one of those outspread arms, resting on top of it as he lay on his side facing her. She shifted slightly, curving her hand to stroke his upper arm.

“Me, too,” he told her. He'd wanted her to himself, just the two of them creating pleasure in this candlelit room. Forgetting, for the moment, all their concerns.

She gave a deep sigh and then extracted her arm from under him and rolled onto her side, facing him. “Hey, you,” she whispered.

“Hey, you.”

“Friday, when you hugged me and I reeked of smoke, you said that you fought off a flashback. How about this weekend? All the conversations about explosion, fire, injury, loss of life. Guilt. Any flashbacks?”

“No. I think I've got it under control now, Lark. Halloween will be the test.” It was only three days off. “I saw that your department will have fireworks and a big bonfire in the town square.”

“Yes. Halloween's a lot of fun here.” She wasn't smiling, though.

Trying to reassure her, as well as himself, he said, “I really think I'll be okay.”

She gave another sigh. “I think you will, too, Eric. So I guess that means you plan to put your uniform back on, and return to active duty?”

It was what he'd been working toward for more than a year and a half. Yet now the word
yes
stuck in his throat. Still, he forced it out, and then added, “I'll miss you, Lark. And Jayden and Mary. Caribou Crossing. Riding.”

“What about the support group? Will you be all right without it?”

She hadn't said she'd miss him, too. “Uh, probably. If not, the military does have resources I can draw on. Or I'll find another group, wherever I'm posted.”

“Good.”

“Will you miss me?”

Her eyes flared wide in the candlelight, dark chocolate pools with reflected gleams of light. “Yes.” She blinked once, and again. “Do you really have to—I mean, want to—go?”

When he frowned, ready to ask what she was talking about, she held up a hand. “Let me say this, Eric. If I don't do it now, I may never have the courage.” She pushed herself upward, propping pillows behind her back so she could sit. She tugged the covers up to her armpits, securing them there by crossing her arms over her breasts.

He lay back, watching her, wondering what on earth was on her mind.

“I've said things to you before,” she started, “and I think you kind of dismissed them out of hand. But I want you to go away and really think about them. Like whether you love being a soldier. Whether you're doing it for you, or out of a sense of duty, or to please your father.”

His lips tightened. Pleasing his father wasn't on the table any longer.

“If it's because of your dad,” Lark said, “I think you know that you need a better reason. If it's duty, there are so many other ways to serve and protect. You'd be a perfect emergency services coordinator in Caribou Crossing, for example. If you were interested in the position, with your qualifications and background I'm pretty sure we could get the position funded.”

“You want me to give up the army so Caribou Crossing can get an emergency services coordinator?”

“No!” She shook her head. “Don't be any more stupid than you have to be.”

“Uh . . .” He should be insulted, but mostly he was just baffled. Lark was usually so straightforward, but tonight she wasn't making sense.

She glared at him. “I want you to stay because I love you, you dimwit.”

She loved him? Lark Cantrell loved him? His heart jumped and warmth rushed through him. But no, that was crazy. What she was saying made no sense. “But you don't want a man in your life.”