She cupped his face, her voice filled with emotion. “You couldn’t shoot the boy, could you?”
“I hesitated, and it got me shot,” he answered, his throat tightening until he could barely get air in.
“Jesus Christ,” she all but breathed. “He killed his own mother?”
Rhett loosened a breath. “To him, according to the lies his father had hand-fed him, she was a traitor.”
A pause. A long, heavy pause. “Just before you woke up, you yelled, ‘Run!’ Who were you telling to run?”
“His sister.”
Kinsley’s breath hitched as she lay in his arms, snuggling her face into his chest. “Did he shoot her too?”
Rhett shut his eyes and forced his words through his dry throat. “The only person who came out of the garden alive was me.” And those were the haunting realizations. Three innocent lives were lost.
There was a long stretch of silence, as Rhett felt the dampness drip onto his chest where Kinsley lay her head on him. “Rhett,” she eventually said. “I’ll never understand everything you went through there. The things you had to see or do for your country to ensure I lived a safe life at home, and for people all over the world to be free from cruelty, but I do know one thing.”
He pressed his lips down on the top of her head. “What’s that?”
“I’m really happy you came home.”
He closed his arms around her and shut his eyes, letting this warmth she offered fill the cold places inside him.
Chapter 8
The next morning, Rhett leaned against the steering wheel, looking at Kinsley through the passenger side window of his truck on Main Street. “I’ll text you later today when I’m ready to pick you up.”
“That works.” She wrapped her scarf tighter against the chilly air, while big snowflakes fell from the dark sky. The day was dreary, and she’d rather still be in bed doing things with Rhett to make the windows steam. “Got any idea what time approximately?”
“Give me until five tonight,” he said. “Boone texted this morning while you were in the shower that the lab’s results are in, so we’ll want to press ahead with the investigation.”
Her investigation. She really couldn’t even believe it and didn’t want to think about all the stuff she needed to do to start rebuilding her bar. Last night had been a good night. Hell, a great night. She wasn’t exactly sure where this left them, but at least Rhett was not shutting her out. She figured that was a good start. “Okay.” She smiled and tapped the window. “I’ll see ya later then.”
She felt every bit of his stare the entire time it took for her to reach Remy’s magic shop. Her hand wrapped around the cool brass handle and the sound of Rhett’s engine turning on filled the air behind her. His nightmare stayed heavily on her mind all through breakfast this morning. She’d begun to understand what Rhett had endured. In all honesty, she thought his bullet wound had left him broken. She thought he wanted to be back alongside his military brothers, and because he couldn’t, he was pissed off at the world. But now she knew just how horrible the things he’d seen and done were and how they haunted him, and he was struggling to readjust.
Not really knowing how to help him, she opened the door to Remy’s shop, and was greeted by an overwhelming whiff of something spicy mixed with something sweet. The shop had cream-colored walls and gorgeous worn hardwood floors. Remy stood behind the black-painted counter, worrying her bottom lip. Leaning against that counter was Peyton smiling ear to ear. “Aren’t you two a stark contrast to each other,” Kinsley remarked. “One, happy as can be. The other, worried as hell.”
Remy shrugged and said all too quickly, “How did last night go? I wanted to call but Asher told me to stay out of it.”
Kinsley noted the dark circles under Remy’s eyes. “You should have just called, so you wouldn’t have spent the whole night worrying.” She strode toward a small circular table that had a new cream tester on it. “Everything…well, it went okay.”
“Oh, no, you did sleep with him.”
Kinsley whirled around with a dollop of the peppermint-scented cream on the tip of her finger. “Seriously?” She snorted a laugh. “How do you get that I slept with him out of what I just said?”
Remy lifted her brows.
Kinsley rolled her eyes. Remy knew her, sometimes even more than Kinsley knew herself. “Okay, fine, we slept together.”
“Does that mean you’re together now?” Peyton asked, nearly bouncing on her feet.
“No,” Kinsley said, rubbing her hands together. “It means we slept together again. That’s it.”
Remy crossed her arms and frowned. “I still say this is a really bad idea. Someone is going to get hurt here, and I’m guessing that someone isn’t gonna be Rhett.”
“Your concern is duly noted,” Kinsley said as she approached them, feeling a slight tingle as she rubbed the cream into her hands. She stopped in front of Remy and kissed her cheek. If Remy didn’t worry, she wouldn’t be Remy. But it wasn’t Kinsley’s place to tell them that she’d found Rhett in the shower. Or that when she saw him like that, her heart broke for him. Or that being close to him felt as natural as it did to breathe and there wasn’t a chance in hell that she wouldn’t be there for him. It wasn’t her truth to tell. And she couldn’t explain why she was so all in with a guy who could break her heart. She knew better. But she also couldn’t walk away. “Now, are we ready to go start tossing everything in the trash?”
Yesterday Kinsley had arranged for a crew to come this morning and clear out all her beloved furniture that was smashed to pieces. She assumed today would be equivalent to getting her nose hairs plucked out one by one, but in order to move forward, she needed to start fresh. Once the insurance money came in, she wanted to get things rolling. The less time the bar was closed, the better.