Home Front

“I love you, Jo,” he said simply, although they both knew there was nothing simple about such a declaration.

“I love you, too, Michael,” she said brokenly. “I always have. ”

He took her in his arms and kissed her. Her body came alive at his touch, opened to him, and she moaned his name, pressed against him. She drew him close, wanting him more than she ever had.

His hand slid under her shirt, unhooked her bra.

She took a deep breath, trying to gather her courage. She wanted him, wanted this to happen, but it frightened her, too. What would love be like with this new body of hers? Would he really still want her?

Moonlight came through the window, illuminating her pale legs. Her thighs were the same size—the swelling had gone down—one tapered to a knee and a shapely calf and a foot. The other …

She so rarely let herself really look at it. Now she did, and she knew Michael was looking, too, at the amputated leg, with its rounded end and Frankenstein stitches, still an angry pink. Lulu had been right: it kind of looked like a football.

“We might have to be … innovative,” she said.

“I love innovative,” he whispered, letting his hand move across her jutting hip bone and along her thigh. His touch electrified her. She pulled off her blouse and undressed him and lay against him, every part of her needing to be touched by him. She ran her bare hand along his chest, feeling him, remembering. Their kiss turned desperate. Her fingers slipped beneath the waistband of his boxers.

Had she ever felt this sharp, aching need before? She couldn’t remember, but it was in her now, fueling her, straining to be released.

He knew her body as well as he knew his own, knew when to touch her and where, knew how to bring her to this edge that was both pleasure and pain. It didn’t matter at all that they had to do things a little differently than before, that she sometimes needed to position herself with pillows. Lying on her side, she clung to him, her breath coming fast and hard, feeling him inside her again, filling her; she arched up, kissed him, and their cheeks were wet with each other’s tears. Her release was so powerful she cried out; it felt as if her entire body were being lifted up, carried on some dark wind, and then floated back to the softness of the bed she’d shared with this man for so much of her life. In the aftermath, she curled against him, her body sweaty, spent, and as he stroked her arm, she lay there, her cheek against his chest, remembering the feel of his tears on her face, the salty taste of his kiss.

* * *

“Can I ask you a question?” he said afterward, as they lay together, still breathing heavily.

“Of course. ”

“How come you never answered my letter?”

“What letter?”

“The one I sent you in Iraq, a few days before your crash. ”

She frowned. “I never got a letter from you over there. We were crazy that last week, missions constantly, and the Internet was always going down. I opened my e-mail once after I got home; there were hundreds of condolence messages about my leg. I couldn’t stand reading them. I haven’t gone to the computer in forever. What did it say?”

“That I wanted another chance. ”

She tried to imagine what that would have meant to her then, when she was so far from home. Would she have believed him? “How did it happen, you falling in love with me while I was away?” she asked, her body tucked up against his, her chin resting on his shoulder.

He slid his arm beneath her, pulled her closer. “After Dad’s death, I was depressed, and you were always so damn cheerful. You gave me the kind of advice I couldn’t follow—like think ‘good thoughts, remember his smile. ’ Honestly, I hated that shit. ” He looked at her. “I was unhappy, and it was easy to blame you. ”

“I thought you could will grief away. That’s what I did with my parents. At least that’s what I thought I did. The truth is, I knew loss. I didn’t know grief. Now, I do. ” She tilted her chin to look up at him. “I let you down. ”

He kissed her forehead slowly, lovingly. “And I let you down. ”

“We need to talk more this time,” Jolene said. “Really talk. ”

He nodded. “I want to know about Iraq. Can you do that?”

Her instinct was to say no, you don’t want to know and protect him. “I’ll tell you what I can do. You can read my journal,” she said. “And I need to talk to that doctor of yours, too. I need help with this, I think. ”

“You’ll make it through, Jo. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met. ”

“What about Betsy? How will I convince her to forgive me?”

He smiled. “You flew helicopters in combat. You can handle one angry twelve-year-old girl. ”

“I’ll take combat anytime. ”