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“I have another first for you.”
My lips tilted upward in a grin. “Yeah? What’s that?”
“I’ve never told anyone else I love them before,” she admitted, making my chest feel suddenly tight. “And Laeth? I love you too.”
A pained groan worked its way from my chest. “You’re making it really hard for me not to strip you out of my shirt and fuck you right here in the kitchen.” Her body shivered against mine, giving me the distinct impression she wouldn’t object. “But we can’t,” I said, determined to be the voice of reason. “Your body needs a little more rest.”
She shimmied her hips, like she was testing her pain level, before letting out a little wince. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. And besides, there’s one last thing we need to get out into the open so we can both let go of our baggage completely.”
I stood tall so I could see her beautiful eyes and arched a questioning brow.
“Your nightmares,” she said quietly, her eyes full of understanding and sorry for me as my whole body locked tight. “I had to learn to be a light sleeper in my previous life. If ananimal got into the gardens in the middle of the night, I was the one to blame. You think you’re good at hiding them, but I hear it every time one of them has hold of you.” She scraped her teeth across her bottom lip. “I think, maybe, if you talk about it, let it all out, it might start to feel less heavy.”
Just the thought of talking about the cause of my nightmares settled on my chest like an anvil. But she’d been strong enough to give me her darkness. I owed her the same respect and trust in turn.
“I was in the Army for several years. It’s actually how I met Jensen and Gage. We came up together. Did basic and ended up in the same squad. From there we joined up with a special team whose main focus was to infiltrate places the military wasn’t exactly allowed to enter. We were trained to get in, get our target, and get the hell out without being seen. The mission took us to this remote village where an arms dealer was supposedly holed up. But we had bad intel. It turned out, our guy was one village over. Where we were was full of families, parents with small children and elderly grandparents. The guy we were after had gotten word we were coming. We walked into an ambush.”
I closed my eyes, the screams and sounds of bombs going off assaulted my ears. I could have sworn I was right back in that desert. Then Deva reached out and touched me. Her palms came to rest on my chest, right over my rapidly beating heart. The sounds thundering in my ears began to fade, and when I opened my eyes, all I saw was her.
“Hey, it’s okay,” she said softly. “I’m right here. You aren’t alone.”
“As soon as we discovered what was happening, we tried to get as many families out as possible. They were in danger, and it was all our fault. But before we could save them, our target’s men attacked the village. They were slaughtering everything and everyone who crossed their paths, bombing buildings withouta single idea who was inside. They didn’t give a shit. They’d destroy every innocent civilian who called that place their home just to take out a few Americans.
“There was this boy.” My voice broke on that last word, my chest tightening as I pictured his terrified face. It was still burned on the backs of my eyes, and I wasn’t sure the image would ever fade. “He was standing in the middle of the road, crying and screaming for his parents. He had his hands over his ears, trying to block out the sounds of the explosions.” I shook my head, my throat feeling so tight as if I were choking. “He was so scared, Deva. So fucking scared. I tried to get to him... but I didn’t make it. I relive that day night after night,” I croaked. “For years, it was that boy I saw. Then Cash came into my life, and the dream changed. It starts with that boy’s terrified face, but it’s always Cash I see before that last bomb.”
She sniffled, burying her face in my chest and locking her arms around my waist. I could feel her hot tears leaking from her eyes and onto my skin. “Oh, Laeth. I’m so sorry.”
“I failed that boy,” I rasped, finally giving voice to my worst fear. “We failed that whole goddamn village. I’ve never been able to come to grips with that. I spent years drinking myself into oblivion and burying myself in nameless, faceless women in a sad attempt to forget. That was all Cash’s mother was to me, a distraction.
“But then I became a father, and all I’ve done since finding out I had a son is worry that I wouldn’t be able to protect him. That I’d fail... again.”
“Laeth,” she breathed, pulling back and tipping her head to look up at me, the tears leaking from her eyes, tears on my behalf, that were like salt in an open wound. “All these years, you’ve been holding that in? Keeping it to yourself?”
I nodded.
“I’ve known my share of failures,” she said, the sympathy in her beautiful gaze giving way to fierce determination. “I’ve known failures and losers and some of the worst excuses for human beings, and you know what each and every one of them had in common?”
“What’s that?”
“Not a single one of them tried. They didn’t try to do better. They didn’t try to help. They simply didn’ttry. The people in the Fellowship knew what was happening to me. Some of them even thought it was wrong. But they stayed silent. When I’d pass them by, they’d look away, because maybe if they didn’t see me, they could forget that they were letting me down by not trying to help. What happened to that village, to that little boy, it’s a tragedy, and I’m so sorry you had to live through it. But you aren’t a failure, Laeth. You could never be a failure. Because youtriedto save them all. That’swhat a good man does. That’s what a true protector does.”
I pulled in a sharp inhale as my arms banded tighter around her. In that moment, I couldn’t get close enough to her. But she wasn’t done.
“Cash was neglected before he came to you,” she said, giving voice to what I’d thought a million times but had been too scared to speak out loud because I’d hoped and prayed, for his sake, I was wrong. “No two-year-old is that pensive. Kids his age run headfirst into life without a second’s thought. They aren’t careful. Unless they’ve learned they have to be. He couldn’t have fun without considering every factor. But he doesn’t do that anymore. Because you make him feel safe to just be him.” She took my face in her hands as she lifted up on her toes. “Don’t you see?Youare his protector.”
I grunted, my arms growing even tighter as I buried my face in her neck, breathing her in deep and holding that clean, floral scent in my lungs. Just like her touch battled my stormclouds, her fragrance washed away my darkness. “I love you,” I whispered in her ear. Never in my life had I wanted to say those three words to a woman as badly as I wanted to say them to her. It wasn’t only for her, it was for me as well. Because I felt those words down to my very marrow.
“I love you too,” she returned, that light of hers shining down on me. “And there will never come a day where I’ll think of you as a failure.”
Chapter
Thirty
DEVA
I’d beento Hot Java plenty of times since moving to Redemption, but this was the first time I entered hand-in-hand with a man.Myman. And god, did it feel nice to think of Laeth like that. As mine.
People did double-takes as we stepped through the doors and started for the short line at the counter. I recognized several of the faces, and nearly everyone I made eye contact with, either smiled hugely or shot me a knowing wink. I guess it wasn’t going to take long for word to spread about the newest couple in Redemption.
