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"Fine, fine, if it's that much of a problem, I'll change it." Will rolled his eyes and slid another CD into the player. Within seconds, the Beatles started wailing about being back in the USSR.
"Way to set the mood," Derrick had said, and Will smiled at him.
Will's smile had been crooked. Derrick remembered that. With one jagged front tooth that stuck out a little too far.
He was the youngest of their platoon, a recruit straight out of high school. In a way, the kid reminded him of himself. He was always talking about his kid sister whom he'd left behind, and of a girl back home who'd promised to wait for him. The guy had kept both pictures in a little pocket on the front of this uniform, but Derrick would be damned if he could ever remember which was the sister and which the girlfriend.
They all just looked so damned young.
From the back, the guys called jeers and prayers for Lady Gaga's return.
"Free bird!" One wiseass shouted.
"Ignore them. You got the radio. They can fuck themselves," Derrick said, and Will laughed.
"Thanks." The kid hummed along with the song and Derrick turned his attention back to the road. To where something tiny glinted in the sun so close that he didn't have time to inspect it. Didn't have time to stop.
The explosion was quick and devastating. One second he'd been sitting in his seat, relaxing and listening to Will's off tune crooning and the next he could hear nothing but the long, prolonged sound of chalk scratching on whiteboard over and over again. His ear rang with it, and as he stretched one hand out, he found that he couldn't move it. He could only stare around absently, taking in the wreckage of their convoy.
The Humvee had been flipped over, and few of the men still clinging to the sides of the windows. Their gaze met his and he knew they were alive. He'd thought...
He'd been so stupid.
In that moment, when he saw them, he really thought everyone was safe. That it was a mistake, but he'd been the only one to suffer for it. That he'd be able to manage.
Then he looked in the other direction and saw another pair of eyes, glassy and brown, gazing lifelessly back at him. A snaggle front tooth still prominent in his gaping mouth.
"Will, " he called for the other man, but he still couldn't move. Hell, he could hardly speak. The words grated on his throat and he pushed past the pain to focus on the other man. No, not a man. A boy. A boy who'd died because he'd been too much of a damned fool to pay attention to what he was supposed to be doing.
Derrick shook his head. That image was always the one he woke with—of Will staring back at him, unspoken words still hanging from his lips.
"I was almost up on my contract at that point," he forced himself to say, forced himself to remember that Jade was still here. Listening, expecting.
He cleared his throat and went on, "So when my tour ended I decided to come back to Hawaii and stay for a while. I didn't reenlist. You should have heard how happy my sister was about it. Like she thought she was getting me back after all those years. The thing people don't get, though, is that you don't come back. You never come back. Not really."
Jade was silent, waiting.
"The thing is, though, that even though I should have been paying attention, Will knew the risks of deployment when he signed up for the Army. Just like I did. Just like anyone else. It was the same way with this girl. She knew the risks of talking when she shouldn't. It's not your fault, Jade."
Jade folded her hands in her lap. "It probably wasn't your fault either," she said, almost too quietly for him to hear.
But he did. And he almost smiled.
"I've had a long time to deal with this. It might take awhile for you, too. And I'm not going to lie to you. You might not really come back. But you're going to be okay. That much I can promise you."
"Can you?" Her bright blue eyes met his at last and he held her gaze.
"Yes, I really can. Now let's focus on what's important. This case."
He paused, waiting to see if he'd made the right choice, but there was simply no way to know. No way to judge.
"This case isn't right, Jade," he tried again, gently.
"I know, I know it." She shook her head and slid lower in her seat, wringing her hands as if they might have some kind of answer for her.
"No, I mean...I looked at everything. There's no recent ex-boyfriend. No current boyfriend. The other investigators say there are no clear suspects."
"You know who did this as well as I do," Jade whispered.
