“Eden, I’m taking you out. We’re celebrating! I’m taking you out to the nicest place we can find, now that my pay grade’s been restored.” Adam was actually babbling.
I thought it was sweet.
“You should call Amanda.”
“Jesus, you’re right. I can’t think straight. Where’s my phone?” He patted his pockets so I handed him mine.
We were again in the back seat of the car the Army had sent, on our way back to Long Island. It was going on one o’clock.
He pressed a few buttons, held the phone to his ear. “Captain Sanders was something else. Eden, you should have seen him. It was like watching a TV show. They’re not answering. Why are they not answering? Mandy, it’s Adam. I was cleared! Full reinstatement. We’re celebrating! Call me. Bye.” He closed the phone, handed it back to me. “I kept waiting for Sanders to shout, 'You’re out of order!'– that would have been cool, but it didn’t get quite that far.”
With a laugh, I squeezed his hand. “Why did it take so long?”
Adam waved a hand. “They had to go through the whole incident. Questions on top of questions. Why did I do this, why didn’t I do that. Sanders went back at them, question for question, took out their legs, and then it was over. You can’t argue with the truth.” He grinned and I had to smile back. I’d never seen Adam so excited.
“You look great today. I should have told you this morning, but things got nuts.”
I shrugged. “It’s okay.”
“No. No, Eden. It’s not. I’ve been so obsessed over this, I haven’t been able to think of anything else. But things will be different now. I can’t get back to my unit yet but I can get back to work. You can come with me if we get married, they’ll take care of us – base housing.”
Wait, what? I let go of Adam’s hand, my jaw hanging. Married? Base housing? Come with him? Who is this guy?
“Eden.” Adam’s voice changed. “Look at me.” His hand took my chin, tilted it. “Now that things are, you know, settled, there’s something I want to tell you.”
No. Please don’t.
“I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while.” His thumb caressed my cheek. “But…” He trailed off, brown eyes dark with regret. ““It doesn’t matter. Can’t change the past, right?” He swiped a hand over his head, took off the beret. “All we can do is take care of the future.” And then he smiled and the earth tilted. “Eden, I-“
His cell phone buzzed. He pulled it from the jacket pocket he’d patted twice before. I smiled and shook my head. He was awfully cute when his thoughts were scattered.
“Mandy, you got my message?”
The smile slid off his face and his entire body tensed. A long silence.
“Zach, what about the girls? Are they okay?”
Oh, God. Cassie? Amanda? What happened?
Adam closed his eyes, his hand pressed to his mouth. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. We’ll meet you there. It’ll be at least an hour.” A pause. “Yeah. Thanks.””
The click of the phone closing sounded like a bullet. I took Adam’s hand and squeezed.
“What happened? What’s wrong?”
He drew in a deep breath and let it all out, slowly. “Eden, it’s Ray.”
The sound of his name made my entire body clench.
