A Soldier's Homecoming. Rachel Lee

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      He did, Connie thought. He certainly did.

      

      Together she and Ethan stopped by the motel to pick up his gear; then they drove to her house. Julia’s eyes widened when Connie walked into the kitchen with Ethan in tow.

      “What’s this?” she asked.

      “This is Ethan, Mom,” Connie answered. “An old friend. He’s going to stay with us for a while.”

      Julia’s eyes narrowed. “I can smell a fib from fifty feet.”

      Ethan surprised Connie by pulling out a chair from the kitchen table so that he and Julia were near eye level. “The truth is, ma’am, I’m here to keep an eye on Sophie. I’m a deputy.”

      “A new one.” Julia’s eyes narrowed. “Looks like you’ve seen some grief.”

      Ethan shrugged. “The point is, I’ve been hired as personal protection for your granddaughter. Good enough?”

      “Better than nothing.”

      “Mom!”

      Julia looked at her, then back at Ethan. “She hates it when I’m truthful.”

      “Well,” said Ethan, “that wasn’t exactly truthful.”

      “Why not?”

      “Because Connie is protection, too. She’s not nothing.”

      At that, Julia cracked a smile. “Okay, then. Go get settled.”

      “I have a spare bedroom where—” Connie began, but Ethan interrupted her.

      “No bedroom,” he said. “I’ll camp out in the living room. I want to be able to watch the doors.”

      “Okay.” At that point, Connie didn’t care. He could perch on the roof if he wanted to, as long as he kept Sophie safe. He tossed his backpack into a corner, out of the way.

      “Is it okay if I look around?”

      “Help yourself.” Connie dropped her plastic bag on the armchair. “I’m going to have to figure out how to use a cell phone by tomorrow morning.”

      “Why is that?”

      “I got one for Sophie.”

      He nodded. “Good idea.”

      “It’s not something I ever thought I’d do for a seven-year-old.”

      “Seems smart to me.” Then he gave another small smile. “But don’t look to me for lessons. I’ve never had a cell. I’m a radio kind of guy.”

      “I was a radio kind of girl until yesterday.”

      She walked him through the house, not that there was much to see. She’d converted the downstairs dining room into a bedroom for her mother. Upstairs, there were three small bedrooms, two with dormers. She used one of those and Sophie the other. The third room, at the back of the house, was cramped, with a low sloping ceiling, but adequate for a twin bed and dresser, if little more.

      The house’s only bathroom was downstairs, behind the kitchen. The house had all the earmarks of a place that had been built a bit at a time, the mudroom tacked on like an afterthought next to the kitchen. When the weather was bad, it was the way to enter. Otherwise Connie preferred the side door, between the kitchen and the driveway.

      By the time they finished the tour, Julia had a pot of coffee brewing and invited Ethan to join her. He seemed willing enough, so Connie sat with them. She could barely hold still, though. Her eyes kept straying to the clock, counting the minutes until she went to pick up Sophie. Counting the minutes until she could hug her daughter and assure herself that everything was all right.

      “What time do we pick her up?” Ethan asked.

      “Two-thirty.”

      “Okay. When I finish this wonderful coffee—” Julia beamed “—I’ll walk down to the school and scope things out from cover. After I get back, I think we ought to walk back down together to pick her up.”

      “Why not take the car?”

      “Because if anyone’s watching your daughter, I want to know it.”

      “All right.” She wondered how he could be so sure, then decided he’d probably developed a sixth sense for such things where he’d been. It was probably the reason he had survived.

      “All right,” she said again. “What if I take a ball and we stop at the park on the way back? Let her get some exercise.”

      He nodded. “Soccer ball?”

      “I have one, yes.”

      “Good. Bring it.” He smiled then, a real smile. “Soccer is an international language. It was a great way to break the ice in Afghanistan. All I had to do was take out my ball and start kicking it around, and pretty soon I’d have a dozen or more kids with me, everyone having a great time. Some of my best memories are of kicking a ball around in that dirt and dust.”

      Connie felt herself smiling with him. She could see the pleasure the memories gave him, and she felt relieved to finally see a softer side to him.

      But then her eyes strayed to the clock again. The minutes couldn’t possibly move any slower.

      

      Ethan and Connie left early to pick up Sophie at the school. Ethan carried the soccer ball under his arm, and they strolled along as if they had all the time in the world.

      Ethan wanted it to look exactly that way. His eyes moved restlessly, noting every detail of the streets, the cars, the houses that lined them. Connie found herself doing pretty much the same thing, seeking anything that seemed out of place.

      Ethan spoke. “It must be hard, being a single mother.”

      “Easier than being married to an abusive jerk. Safer for Sophie and me both.”

      “I’m sorry. What happened?” He paused. “I guess it’s none of my business.”

      “I don’t mind discussing it. I’ve given some courses in anger management, and I’ve used my personal experience to illustrate. My ex beat me. As in most cases, at first he was just controlling. It didn’t seem too bad. Then he started to object to my friends. Classic. Cut me off from my support network.”

      Ethan nodded.

      “But even though I was a cop, I couldn’t see what was happening to me. It’s odd, isn’t it, how you can see something happen to someone else but not see the same thing happening to you?”

      “I think that’s pretty much normal.”

      “Maybe. Anyway, he undermined my self-confidence, made me feel responsible for everything that went wrong. Then he hit me a couple of times. He always apologized and swore it would never happen СКАЧАТЬ