A Soldier's Promise Page 8

  As in purple. Iridescent purple. With painted flames. Bumping up and down Main Street like it was having convulsions. Oh, yeah, she remembered it, all right. He’d sold it, right before they moved to Texas.

  Levi chuckled. “But Tommy felt like such hot stuff when he was driving it, what could I say?”

  Smiling, Val swiped at a tear trickling down her cheek. “I remember the first time he picked me up in that thing. I thought I was hallucinating. But you’re right—he was so proud of it.”

  “Not nearly as proud, though,” Levi said softly, “as when you said you’d go steady with him.” He looked back into the night now swallowing up the weed-wacked excuse of a yard, those flower beds, the newly planted vegetable garden tucked into a back corner. All Levi’s handiwork. “Your love, Val... That was the most important thing in the world to him. And I know he loved you like nobody’s business. Because he told me, every chance he got.” He slowly shook his head. “What you guys had was pretty damn special.”

  Levi pushed himself to his feet, reaching down to scratch the dog’s ears when he sauntered over, tail wagging. “Tommy was one lucky sonofabitch. But so were you, because there was no better human being than Tomas Lopez. Maybe your marriage didn’t last as long as it should’ve, but do you have any idea how many people would sell their souls for those memories?”

  Tears stinging her eyes, Val stood as well, her arms crossed over her rib cage. Her shoes were right by her feet, but she didn’t bother to slip them on. Instead she pushed herself up to grab Levi’s shoulder, pull him down enough for her to kiss him on the cheek. He looked justifiably startled.

  “What was that for?”

  “To say thank you.”

  “For dinner?”

  “For...helping me to remember. The good moments. Because nothing and nobody can take those away from me, can they?”

  His hands in his pockets, Levi smiled. A soft smile, his lips barely curved. “No, ma’am. They sure can’t.”

  He grabbed his denim jacket off the back of the chair, tucking it in the crook of his elbow rather than putting it on, despite the chill in the air. “You go on inside. It’s getting cold. I’ll see myself out.” Then, with a slight nod, he left the deck, his boots clicking against the flagstone path leading around to the front of the house. Moments later, she heard his truck start, the engine purring as he drove off.

  But Val didn’t go inside right away, even though she did slip her shoes back on before her feet froze. Because she needed a think, and she couldn’t do that properly with Elf—yet again—blasting from the TV. What Levi had done was give her permission to grieve, for as long as she needed. To hang out in the past—to remember, dammit—until she was ready to deal with the present. Something she now realized she hadn’t fully allowed herself to do, for fear of being a wallower.

  Not that she needed his—or anyone’s—permission. She was a big girl. It was her call how she handled her life. Even those aspects of it she rarely let anyone see. But all the same, he’d released her from a self-imposed prison, hadn’t he?

  Without asking, she thought with a start, or even suggesting, that she release him from his.

  Val sharply turned toward the side yard where Levi had walked away, as if half expecting to see him there. Had it really made her feel better, holding him at least partly accountable for something that had obviously been Tomas’s decision, and his alone? This was the man who’d driven around in a car so loud you could see it, let alone hear it, miles away. A man who didn’t care what anybody else thought, who even laughed at the taunts, the gibes. How could Val have believed that Levi held any kind of real power over her husband?

  Had she really been so jealous of their friendship?

  Val shut her eyes, reeling slightly, both from that realization and the one that followed hot on its heels: That Levi could have easily pointed any or all of that out tonight. Made some attempt to save his own butt, absolving himself of any responsibility for what had happened.

  But he hadn’t. In fact, he’d done exactly the opposite, not only still shouldering at least some of the blame, but trying to salve her still-raw wounds by reminding her that what she and Tomas had shared would always be greater than what she’d lost. By making her fall in love with her husband all over again.

  And in the process smashing to smithereens whatever vestiges of resentment she’d clung to so fiercely about her husband’s best friend.

  Damn him, damn him, damn him.

  Chapter Six

  His mother was in the living room when Levi got home, watching some dumb reality show. Brides picking out dresses or something. She paused the DVR, though, when Levi came to the door, leaning over to pat the nearby leather recliner. God love her, she’d saved the room from death by beige by adding bright area rugs and throws and wall hangings—many of them gifts from grateful clients—not to mention a forest of houseplants huddled in front of the picture window. Nothing matched, and heaven knew the place would never win any awards, but the longer Levi was there, the more he realized home was far more about what a person brought to it than what they put in it.

  After he obeyed Mom’s unspoken command, she glanced toward the door, then whispered, “You didn’t by any chance bring me a piece of that steak, did you?”

  “Crap. Sorry, we got to talking and I didn’t even think about it. I’ll remember next time—how’s that? Where’s Dad?”

  “In the garage. Tinkering.” One dark eyebrow lifted. “So there’s gonna be a next time?”

  Yeah, she would latch on to that. “Figure of speech, Mom. This is Val we’re talking about, remember?”

  Making a sound that was more grunt than sigh, his mother relaxed against the nest of pillows she’d made in the corner of the sofa, her bare feet tucked up by her hip. For a woman in her late fifties, she was still good-looking, Levi supposed, although not in a manufactured way. She rarely wore makeup, and midwives had no use for manicures. But even though her long, thick hair—usually worn in a braid—was mostly gray now, her skin was smooth and taut over high cheekbones, and deep brown eyes behind rimless glasses always sparkled with love and life and mischief. She could also rock a pair of formfitting jeans better than most women half her age. Although no way in hell would Levi tell her that.

  “So dinner went okay?”

  “I suppose. Yeah.” Even if things did get a little heavy there at the end.

  “If you want to talk about it—”

  “Thanks, but no,” he said, getting to his feet again.

  “Didn’t mean to sound nosy.”

  “Like hell,” he said with a smile. “It’s what you do. And, yeah, Dad told me about you and Val’s mother, so I can probably guess where you’re coming from with this. Even so, I doubt Val’d be down with the idea of me sharing our conversations with anybody else. Even you.”

  The corners of Mom’s mouth curved. “So you sticking around or going back out?”

  “Out. To walk off dinner.” He smiled. “I’d almost forgotten how good red meat was.”

  “And that’s just mean,” his mother said on a sigh, looking back at the TV. “Enjoy.”

  “Thanks.”

  But before he got to the door, she leaned over the back of the sofa. “Levi?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I think you are one of the bravest people I know. No, I’m serious. And I don’t only mean because of your military service.” She pushed up her glasses. “Which I wouldn’t know about, anyway, since you keep all of that to yourself, too.”

  “Mom—”

  She held up one hand. “I know. Grown boys aren’t partial to sharing with their mamas. But I also remember how you used to feel about that young woman.” Levi’s face warmed as ghosts from his past shuddered between them. Like he’d expected her to forget? “I also saw how you stepped aside for Tomas, after he told you how he felt about Val.” Her eyes narrowed. “Never could decide if you were being honorable or stupid, but since that was one of the few decent things you did back then, it seem
ed best to let it go.”

  “I think that’s called a backhanded compliment, Mom.”

  “And I meant every word of it. And if I’m not mistaken, you’re not over her. Not by a long shot.”

  “You’re nuts,” Levi said gently, smiling.

  “Common side effect of raising four boys. But I’m right, aren’t I?”

  Levi blew a breath through his nose. “And even if that were true, I’m not Tommy. And never will be.”

  “Which is why you’re so brave,” Mom said, her smile soft. “Not to mention selfless, doing all of this with no...expectations.”

  His face warmed. “I’m doing it because Tommy asked—”

  “Bull. You’re doing it because you’re a good boy. And because you’ve got a thing for her, but mostly because you’re a good boy.”

  “Mom.”

  She laughed. “Sorry. In my head you’re still that too-tall kid about to ship out who didn’t completely fill out his uniform. Gonna take me a while yet to wrap my head around the man who came back. But I can tell you I’m so frickin’ proud of you I could pop.”

  Her words should have warmed him, made him feel better. Instead, all Levi could think of was everything she didn’t know about him. Oh, sure, once he was in the service he’d been obedient to a fault, to the point where his parents wouldn’t have recognized him. And most of the time that discipline and order had been good things, corralling a boatload of wayward tendencies. Making him grow up, and fast. But that obedience hadn’t allowed much wiggle room, either, for things like judgment calls. He’d done what was expected of him, yeah. Didn’t mean he was always proud of it. Like Val had said, life was made up of moments. And unfortunately the bad ones often had a way of eclipsing the good ones.

  But his mother didn’t need to know that, either. So all he did was grin and say, “You’ll probably be a lot happier, though, when I get out of your hair, find a place of my own.” He snorted. “Not to mention a life of my own.”

  “Please. You’ve been home, what? A month? There’s no hurry.”

  “And like you said, I’m not a kid anymore—”

  “You’re twenty-eight,” she said gently. “And goodness, I didn’t even know I wanted to be a midwife until I was in my forties. The right thing will make itself clear. It always does. So give yourself a break. It’s not as if you’ve been sitting on your butt the last six years doing nothing, right? Now go take your walk. We’ll leave the door open for you.”

  Once outside, Levi filled his lungs with the clear night air, then started down the unpaved drive to the road leading back into the town proper, a trek of a couple of miles that hopefully would clear his head. Bring a little peace.

  The thing about mothers—his, anyway—was not only their uncanny ability to make you say stuff you instantly regretted, but that whatever they said was more often dead-on right than not. Part of the problem when he’d been a kid was that life never seemed to move fast enough to suit him, which living in a town the size of an apple only made worse. Nine times out of ten, he’d gotten into trouble because he was bored. And now that he was back, that old impatience reared its sorry head, that he needed to get on with it... Except he had no clue what it was he was supposed to get on with. He’d hoped joining the army would help him find his purpose, only to realize he’d only postponed the very thing he now had to figure out.

  Like what on earth he was supposed to do with his life.

  Not to mention his feelings for Valerie Lopez. Feelings that, after tonight, he realized weren’t less inappropriate than they’d been back then.

  The blue-black night inhaled his sigh, as if whisking it away for safekeeping in the nearby Sangre de Cristo Mountains, like a herd of slumbering dinosaurs against the moonlit sky. Levi smiled, remembering the stories he and Tommy used to make up about them, when they were kids. From miles away came the long, lonely whoo...whooooo of a freight train. Levi told himself it was the sound of the train making him melancholy.

  Not much traffic this time of night, except for the occasional car turning into Chico’s, the only place besides the Circle K open past nine. He caught the twang of an amped guitar, the distorted sound of an overloud mike, boots thundering on the wooden floor. Laughter. He briefly considered going inside, having a beer, maybe sweet-talking a pretty girl into dancing with him.

  Except there was only one pretty girl Levi wanted to dance with. Although he highly doubted she’d want to dance with him. Still, he let his mind wander again, just for a moment, imagining the feel of Val’s waist against his palm, her soft hair tickling his chin. The scent of flowers and baby powder overriding the tang of hops and leather and fried food.

  Blowing out a sound that was half laugh, half sigh, Levi kept on down the highway, hands in his jacket pockets, as the sounds from the tavern gave way to the chirps and squeaks of assorted night critters, the crunching of his boots against gravel.

  And, yeah, his thoughts, zip-zapping around his brain like hyper bats. He welcomed them, though—unlike a lot of the guys he’d served with, whose usual method of dealing with the junk inside their head was to drown it out with loud music or video games. Booze. Drugs. Being alone, being still? Far too scary. Levi, though, had early on decided he’d rather face the suckers head-on, and on his own terms, than having them ambush him when he least expected it. Because they always did. Nobody could run, or hide, or pretend, forever. No matter how much they might want to.

  Not that he was interested in sharing, and God knew there were plenty of times he wished the memories weren’t part of him. But he’d gotten pretty good at telling them to go to hell.

  Whether they were interested in listening to him was something else again.

  The town was asleep, silent except for the buzzing of the fluorescents in the gas station. A couple of tourist types passed, hand in hand, softly chattering as they peered into the windows of this or that gallery or gift shop. Then he heard more laughter, this time from a clump of teenagers at the far end of the block, probably on their way to somebody’s house, hoping to fend off the boredom before it ate them alive. Hard to believe that’d been him and Tomas barely a dozen years ago. Some things never changed.

  And yet Levi felt strangely at peace and antsy at the same time, like when you know the presents are waiting for you under the Christmas tree but you’re about to pop from not knowing what they are. The idea of staying here gave him the willies; the thought of leaving for good made his chest hurt. That whatever he did was totally up to him made him slightly dizzy.

  Pushing out a breath, he plopped his butt on a park bench in the town’s tiny square, only to nearly jump out of his skin when he heard shuffling behind him. He wheeled around, and the figure—a man, he could now tell, leading a stiff-legged dog on a leash—jerked back, as startled as Levi. Like Levi, he wore a worn denim jacket, jeans and cowboy boots, but his wiry beard and hair—held back by a sloppily tied bandanna—were heavily shot with gray.

  Squinting, the guy inched closer, into a patch of god-awful yellowish light cast by a new halogen streetlamp—somebody’s idea of improvement, no doubt. The dog yawned, then sat down to have a good scratch. “You’re one of Sam Talbot’s sons, huh?” he said a little too loudly. “The one who went into the army? Let’s see... Levi, right?”

  “Uh, yeah.” Then he sucked in a breath. “Charley?”

  The older man released a wheezy laugh, hopefully unaware of Levi’s shock. Time hadn’t done the man who’d given Levi his first job when he was seventeen any favors. Although a few years younger than his father, Charley Maestas looked at least ten, fifteen years older.

  “Yep. They were talking, over at Annie’s, about how you were home. Figured we’d run into each other eventually.” He swayed for a moment, caught his balance. “You okay?”

  Levi knew what he meant. Not all vets would ask, but they all thought it.

  “Yeah.” Because compared with so many, he was. Then he patted the space beside him on the bench, inviting Charley to join him. The pair
crept over, sighing simultaneously as they sat, Charley on the bench, the dog on the pavement by his feet. Levi reached over to pet the beast’s head. His stumpy tail wagging his butt, he gave Levi’s hand a quick lick, then lay down with a groan and shut his eyes, as if it was all too much.

  “What’s his name?”

  “What? Sorry, afraid you’ll have to speak up, I don’t hear so good these days.”

  Levi leaned closer, pointing to the dog. “His name?”

  “Oh. Senor Loco.” Charley chuckled. “Wandered into the yard one day, decided to stay. Mostly pitty, probably, but I swear he’s the most laid-back pup I ever saw.” Absently scratching his beard, Charley looked down at the dog for several seconds, then crossed his arms to squint at Levi. “I remember you boys, you and Tommy Lopez. How you two would help me and Gloria out from time with the yard and all like that. Or was it...?” Now he frowned at Levi, as though he was trying to get him into focus. “You used to work for me, too, didn’t you?”

  “I sure did. In fact, you taught me everything I know about woodworking and carpentry.”

  “Did I?” Charley snorted. “Maybe you can reteach me, then. ’Cause I don’t remember squat.” He tapped his temple with one finger. “Have a hard time these days, making the pieces fit. And I don’t only mean the wood. But let’s see... Tomas... Didn’t he...didn’t he marry the gal who makes the pies, over at Annie’s? Or am I mixing her up with somebody else?”