A Soldier's Promise Page 10

  “So I gathered.”

  Tension crackled between them for several seconds before Levi asked, not looking at her, “Did Tommy say much else? About his experiences, I mean.”

  She shook her head. “When he wasn’t there, he really wasn’t there. He didn’t want to think about it, let alone talk about it.”

  “Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.”

  “But that’s not really possible, is it? To not think about it?”

  Another several seconds passed before Levi said, very softly, “I ran into Charley Maestas last night.”

  In other words, Do not go there.

  So much for honesty.

  Chapter Seven

  Judging from how Val’s eyes narrowed, Levi guessed his attempt at switching the subject hadn’t gone over too well. But all she did was take a bite of her stew and say, “You did? Where?”

  “In town. When I was out for a walk.” He paused. “Does anyone actually look out for him?”

  “I think we all do,” she said, leaning back in her chair and fidgeting with her ponytail, which had slipped over her shoulder. One of her few nervous habits, Levi had noticed. Just like he’d noticed how she still wore that ratty old friendship bracelet Tommy’d given her way back when. “But we have to be sneaky about how we help him so we don’t wound his pride. Like the way Annie and I pretend he’s doing us a favor by eating the ‘leftovers.’” Her mouth pulled flat for a moment before she sat up again, spooned in more stew. “The poor guy’s already lost so much—his dignity is all he has left.”

  Something she could probably say about herself, Levi thought.

  “I remember when he came back from Iraq that last time.”

  Val hesitated, then said, very softly, “And yet you enlisted, anyway.”

  Levi felt one side of his mouth kick up. “Weirdly, it was partly because of Charley that I did. I almost felt... I don’t know. Like I wanted to pay homage to him. To finish what he started, maybe. Although there’s no finishing any of it, is there? Not really. But what did I know back then?”

  “And why else did you join?” When he frowned, she said, “You said partly because of Charley.”

  Levi paused, realizing that, once again, he didn’t dare be entirely honest. “Because... I felt like I needed answers?” At her silence, he released a sigh. “I was doing okay, working with that cabinetmaker up in Questa, but... I can’t explain it. Except that I felt incomplete.”

  “And did you find those answers?”

  Too late, he realized she’d snagged his gaze in hers, the spoon in a death grip in her fingers. She was the one still looking for answers, about why her husband had voluntarily left her and their daughter to go fight a war she obviously believed wasn’t his to fight. Answers he couldn’t give her.

  “Not really, no,” he said. “Doesn’t mean other people don’t, though. Everybody has their own reason for enlisting. For serving. Take Charley,” he said, gently steering the conversation back into more neutral territory. He hoped. “He didn’t have to volunteer to deploy, especially at his age. But the Guard helped get a lot of our people home, you know.”

  “True. But—”

  “And I’ll bet Charley would say, if he was one of the drivers who helped get our soldiers safely out of there, his sacrifice was worth it. I knew Charley pretty well, remember. And I’m sure glory was the last thing on his mind. Getting the job done, however, probably wasn’t.”

  Her gaze bored into his again. “Just like Tommy?”

  “Just like Tommy,” Levi said, as the stew bubbled in his gut. “Word was that he was damned good at what he did. Bomb disposal takes more than nerves of steel. It takes extraordinary skill—”

  “Well aware of that, Levi.”

  He leaned closer to wrap his hand around hers, his heart aching at the pain in her eyes. “His work saved a helluva lot of lives, Val.”

  “Except his,” she said, then puffed out a sigh. “I think about him every time I see Charley, you know. And I wonder, was any of it worth...that.”

  Another question he couldn’t answer. If she’d even listen to him, anyway. Or anyone. So all he said was, “I know. Believe me.”

  Val looked at their linked hands. “Do you?” she said, then grimaced, her free hand fisting beside her bowl. “Of course you do, you were there, too... I’m sorry. I’m not always very rational these days.”

  “Understandable,” Levi said, then let go. He bit off another chunk of tortilla. “So, I take it Charley lives alone? Or would you rather we not talk about him?”

  “No, that’s fine. And it’s not like I can exactly escape the reminders, is it? Tommy’s parents, the town...”

  “Me,” Levi said, and she pushed out a short laugh.

  “Especially you. But the benefits of being home far outweigh, well, the other stuff. Family...it’s something I never really had until Tommy came into my life. And I’d put out my right eye rather than take that away from the girls. I think it’s the same for Charley. Yes, he lives alone. But he’s not totally isolated. His neighbors ask him to help with little things, like keeping an eye out for the mail, stuff like that. So they can keep an eye on him.”

  “The memory thing, though.” Levi shook his head. Like Val said, was it worth it? Lost limbs, memories, lives...

  “I know. Breaks my heart. But apparently it hasn’t gotten worse over the last few years. At least that.” She sat back again, stretching out her arms on either side of her bowl, her fingers splaying as she frowned. Her wedding ring—a slim silver-and-turquoise band—was clearly too big, now. Levi wondered how she kept it on. “There might be services that would help, maybe in Santa Fe or Albuquerque. But since he couldn’t possibly live there...” She shrugged, then folded her arms across her ribs, tucking her hands away. “Frankly, I think he’s better off here, where at least he’s with people who care. Where nobody will let him go homeless.”

  His chest aching, Levi thought about the women he’d dated, to use the term loosely. Before he joined the army he’d never really had a serious girlfriend. Because, for one thing, slim pickings. And for another... Well, that reason was sitting three feet away from him. And to be honest while he was in the service “dating” was more about occasional stress relief than working toward anything even remotely resembling forever. Not something he was particularly proud of, especially considering his parents’ example. But at least he’d always been up front with any girl he took to bed, and if anyone ever had an issue with it, they never said anything. Not to him, anyway.

  Except the life you choose when you’re in your early twenties and not sure you’re going to see your early thirties—and Levi had never been blind to the fact that going into a war zone could very well mean not coming out—wasn’t necessarily the life you wanted when adulthood finally grabbed you by the throat and said, You. Now. Back then, he wasn’t looking for compassion, or kindness, or anything much beyond looking and smelling good. But listening to Val now, hearing her voice shake as she talked about Charley, watching her eyes fill...

  If only, he thought with a spurt of irritation that actually hurt.

  “What about you?” he said, and puzzled eyes met his. “There’s, you know, programs to help, um, surviving spouses?”

  “Oh. Yeah. I was in one, for a while. Online.” She shrugged. “I’m sure they’re lifesavers for a lot of people, but some stuff I think a person has to work through alone, you know?”

  Yeah. He did.

  He got up from the table, holding out his hand for her bowl.

  “You done?”

  She nodded. “Thanks.”

  He carried their bowls over to the chewed-up ceramic sink, washed them out and set them into the drainer set over a towel on the counter.

  “We are so getting you a dishwasher,” he muttered, drying his hands on another towel, and she softly laughed.

  “I never had one growing up. And the one in our apartment near the base kept going on the fritz. So no big deal?”

  Something in he
r voice—a flatness, maybe—made him turn. Made him even madder, as though he couldn’t figure out how to come up with a conversational topic that wouldn’t upset her. Still seated, she was frowning slightly at her hands, folded in front of her on the table. A good, solid table Levi would love to get his hands on, bring it back to life.

  Same as he’d like to do with her. With both him and her, frankly.

  As if he had any idea how to do that.

  “Val?”

  She inhaled sharply, then gave him a bright smile. “Sorry. Slipped away for a moment. What were we talking about?”

  “Dishwashers. As in, you’re getting one whether you want it or not.”

  “Except...it wouldn’t be for me, would it?” She got up as well, stretching her arms over her head before folding them across her stomach as she walked to the patio door. “I’m only borrowing the place, after all.”

  Like I’ve done with everything else.

  The thought slugged Levi in the gut as hard as if she’d said the words out loud...that everything good in her life had been transient, a blip of happiness punctuating a long, long stretch of simply struggling not to go under. Not that he could hear a trace of self-pity in her voice, but he did hear resignation, that this was simply her lot in life. And on the heels of that thought came another—that, with the possible exception of his mother, Val was the strongest woman he’d ever met.

  They heard the front door open, the pounding footsteps of an excited seven-year-old. A second later a grinning Josie burst into the kitchen with no less than three stuffed Walmart bags.

  A second before Levi might’ve pulled Val into his arms. So, whew. Because for damn sure it wasn’t Levi’s arms Val wanted wrapped around her. Sure, he could build fences and replacing rotting porch floorboards and replace dying bushes...but he couldn’t replace the only thing that mattered.

  And he’d best remember that.

  * * *

  Honestly. There were enough pink and purple and turquoise duds piled on the kitchen table to outfit every second-grader in the state.

  “You didn’t have to do this, Connie,” Val said, even as, on the other side of the open patio door, she heard her oldest daughter jibber-jabbing away to Levi as he worked, as though unable to get her thoughts out of her head fast enough. “Really.”

  “Hey. I’ve been waiting a long time to buy little-girl clothes.” On her lap, Risa let out a squeal, just because, then gave Val a slobbery grin. “So let an old woman live. Right, reynita?”

  “Bah?” Risa said, pointing out the door. Her only “word” so far, but an amazingly versatile one.

  “That’s right, that’s Uncle Levi,” Connie said, her dark gaze sliding to Val. Full of meaning. Which was absurd since it wasn’t as if her mother-in-law had caught them doing anything. “And somebody needs her diaper changed. Don’t you, sweetie?”

  Val stood, arms outstretched, but Connie shook her head, hefting herself—and the stinky, grinning baby—to her feet. “Nope, I’ve got this. You just sit here and admire the view.”

  “Really, Connie?”

  Chuckling, her mother-in-law shuffled out of the room, and Val sighed. Because the woman was nothing if not perceptive. Meaning Val guessed she’d definitely picked up on something when she’d come in earlier.

  A moment, Val was guessing.

  A moment where she’d let down her guard, letting in verboten thoughts that kept creeping up on her no matter how often she told them to take a hike...a moment where she could feel Levi’s mental pull like an actual physical thing. Or that could have been the loneliness talking. Hers, anyway. What was really going on inside his head, she had no idea. Partly because he clearly wasn’t about to tell her, partly because she didn’t want to know. Because if she knew, if he ever did open up to her...

  The words really, really bad came to mind.

  “There ya go, one much sweeter-smelling little girl,” Connie said, returning to set Risa down on the not-exactly-pristine kitchen floor. Instantly the kid was on her hands and knees, flashing her frilled booty as she made fast tracks toward the only cupboard without a lock, where Val kept an assortment of things the kid could clang and bang to her heart’s delight.

  “So,” Connie said, gathering her purse. “I assume you and the girls are going to the big doin’s up at the ranch on the Fourth?”

  “You’re the second person to ask me that today.” A half-dozen plastic containers tumbled onto the floor. Risa squealed and clapped her hands. “And the answer is I don’t know.”

  “And you do not want the girls to be the only children in town who aren’t there.”

  “So why don’t you and Pete take them?”

  “I think you know the answer to that.”

  Her eyes suddenly stinging, Val faced the open door, watching a giggling Josie with Levi, who was laughing, as well. Not from a strained politeness, the way a lot of adults might, but the kind of laugh guaranteed to get everybody around him laughing, too.

  She remembered that laugh. Remembered, too, how often it led to shenanigans. Shenanigans that—in the early days, at least—had often involved Tommy. A laugh that still spelled trouble, but these days of an entirely different variety.

  “And eight years ago, on the Fourth,” Val said softly, “your son asked me to marry him, right before they started the fireworks.”

  “I remember.”

  Val sighed. “You know, I made a conscious decision to come back to Whispering Pines. It’s where the girls belong, close to you and Pete. That doesn’t mean I didn’t have a lot of mixed feelings about it. Still do, even though I’m glad I’m here. The memories...”

  Her mouth tight, she shook her head. “Mostly I can deal with them. But the ranch, on the Fourth.” Her eyes burned.

  On a soft moan, Connie wrapped her arm around Val’s waist. “Which is exactly why you need to go. Not only for the girls’ sake, but for yours—”

  “I know, but—”

  “Tommy’s not coming back, honey,” she said gently. “And no amount of wishing or praying or grieving’s gonna change that... Oh, dear Lord,” Connie said when Levi broke into some bizarre by-the-light-of-the-moon dance with the posthole digger, making Josie shriek with laughter and Connie chuckle. “That’s exactly what he did with Tommy, you know.”

  “Levi danced for him?”

  Her mother-in-law laughed again. “No. Brought him out of himself. Made Tommy more than he thought he could be.” She paused. “And I’m thinking you need to let him dance for you, too.”

  “Connie, do not go there—”

  “And where would that be? To maybe someplace where a young man might keep a young woman warm at night? From being lonely?”

  “I can’t believe you said that,” Val said, pushing out a stingy little laugh. “And anyway, you do realize Levi’s only here because of some dumb-ass promise he made to Tommy? Do I think he’s changed? Maybe. But that doesn’t mean...” She blew out a breath. “Jeez, Connie—it hasn’t even been a year yet—”

  “And opportunities don’t always happen when we think we’re ready, but when we are ready.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.”

  “Little about life does. And I’m giving notice—if you don’t show up at the ranch? I will personally come and drag your skinny little ass there myself. Yeah, chew on that for a minute, missy.”

  Then her mother-in-law hustled her own not-so-skinny ass out of there, and Val blew out a long, long breath. Because Val wouldn’t put it past Connie to make good on her threat.

  All in the name of love, of course.

  * * *

  “Josie? Come on in, honey, before you talk the poor man’s ear off!”

  Levi glanced up as Josie let out a groaned “Aww...” before slogging off to obey her mama’s call. And something to the set of Val’s mouth, her posture, set off all kinds of alarms. His work done, anyway, Levi returned the digger to the shed, the dog keeping tabs to make sure he did it properly. Then, mopping off sweat with an old towel,
he trekked back to the porch, where Val held Risa on her hip, her gaze fixed on him the way a woman does when she’s trying to figure you out. Figure something out, anyway.

  She gave the girl a quick one-armed hug, then said, “Take all those clothes Grandma bought to your room. We’ll sort ’em out together after dinner.”

  “Did she show you what I wanna wear to the fireworks show?”

  Levi saw Val’s gaze shoot to the girl’s. “No. But later, okay? Now git—go do what I said.”

  “She wasn’t bothering me, Val,” Levi said quietly after Josie huffed into the house. “Really.” Frankly, he was getting pretty tired of repeating himself. In fact, the more he was around the kid, the more he liked being around her. Josie was the funniest thing going—although no surprise there, considering her dad’s vehicle of choice. So he wished Val would get over whatever her issues were with him and her daughter, and simply let things be whatever they were going to be.

  And he could only imagine the hell there’d be to pay if he actually said that out loud.

  Val’s mouth pulled flat. “And I said—”

  “I know what you said. Although something tells me if she was thinking of terms of me being more than Uncle Levi, I’d know it. Josie doesn’t strike me as somebody who plays her cards close to her chest.”

  At that, the tightness seemed to ease a little. “This is true—”

  “Bah?” the baby said, pointing at Levi with a slimy finger.

  Levi smiled. “Uncle Levi,” he said, pressing a hand to his chest.

  “Bah!” Risa squealed, clapping her hands and wriggling her nose, before hurtling herself out of Val’s arms and toward Levi.

  “Whoa, kiddo!” Levi said, laughing, catching the kid before she landed on her noggin.

  His heart skipped a beat when she immediately settled against his damp chest with a satisfied, “Bah.”

  “Oh, jeez... I’m way too smelly to be holding a baby.”

  “That’s okay. Give her time, and she’ll smell a lot worse than you ever could.”

  Levi’s gaze flicked to Val’s. And, yep, two telltale red splotches gave her away. Calling her on it, though, would be highly ungentlemanly. He grinned for the slobbery baby, then bounced her until she belly laughed, making Levi laugh almost as hard.