Phoenix (37 page)

“She’s not going to break. Not with you. Trust yourself. You know her real boundaries. I think you can nudge her.” Natalie smiled. “Just not with sex.”

Jack smiled back at her. “Touché.”

“You can prod her into opening up to you. I know she wants to.”

His smile faded. “She’s so lost. She wants help. Even when she can’t ask for it. But she doesn’t want it from me.”

“You have to be patient.”

“I’ve been patient,” he said, his voice rising. “Six months of being patient as hell. Before that a year of processing, a year of being alone, a year of blaming myself for every damn thing I might have ever done wrong in our relationship. Of overanalyzing every conversation, every misstep, every decision I ever made about anything.”

“You’re putting more of this on yourself than you deserve.”

“She hates me,” he said. “She can barely stand the sight of me.”

“Caroline doesn’t hate you, Jack. She’s torn. I don’t know one tenth of what happened to her but from what I gather it was incredibly traumatic.”

Jack had spent hours trying not to think about that. He was upset that Caroline hadn’t told him anything but was more worried that what she had to say would be worse than what he’d already imagined. “She won’t talk to me about any of it. She’s lost her confidence, her heart, her essence of being. I thought that was the one thing I could give her – security – but I can’t even do that. She’s never going to forgive me.”

Natalie moved to his side, clasping his hand in hers. “You cannot give up,” she said. “Caroline needs you but she’s afraid to admit it. Keep trying.”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Remember what she was like when she first got here? Think of the way she is now. Better, right?”

Jack smiled dourly. “I guess so. At least she can be in the same room with me for more than a few minutes at a time.”

“She’s made a tremendous amount of progress. But she feels useless.” Natalie went back to her desk and wrote something down. “We should get her back to work.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes. She and I had a very productive session today before we went to lunch. She told me about what happened last night. And she didn’t characterize it in nearly the same way that you did. I believe you have cause for optimism but don’t push too hard. She’s all over the place when it comes to you. But her mind is focused when it comes to everything else.”

“I don’t know if I want her back on duty.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want anything to happen to her.”

“What are you going to do? Lock her in her apartment until Santos is taken out? That seems counterproductive.”

“What do you suggest?”

“Full, active duty.”

No. It hadn’t been long enough. He needed more time to yank her out of that combat unit and into his panel of advisors. “I don’t care for that idea. I think she’s bound to do something irrational.”

“You’ve got to take that chance. You have to trust her.”

“Do you?”

“Put her with her old unit. She’ll have to ease back into things anyway. You need to do this.”

A nice non-answer, but that was beside the point. Natalie wasn’t technically one of his advisors but he knew when to listen to her. It was a risk. A big risk. But he could take it. They’d made progress, after all. He could keep the line moving. “You’re right. It’s not fair to do anything else.” He stood up and glanced at the calendar on her desk. “I’ll tell Caroline in the morning. Is that all right?”

“I don’t see why not.” Natalie rose to escort him out of her office. “She’s going to be okay, Jack. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.”

“Easy for you to say. You aren’t lusting after her.”

“Please don’t tell me anything else. Write it down in a diary or something.”

Jack returned her smile. “Okay. Thanks, Natalie. You’ve been a tremendous help. I hope you know what that means to me.”

“I know. Go be the rebel commander instead of the guy who cries on my shoulder.”

He stuck out his hand. “Have a good one, Dr. Haddad.”

Natalie shook it firmly. “You too. Get out of here.”

Caroline opened her door to go to the gym the next morning and was surprised to find a box on her welcome mat. Not that she needed or wanted a welcome mat, but it had been there when she’d been assigned the living quarters and she hadn’t bothered moving it. The box was wrapped in blue paper with a silver bow on top. Her favorite colors. She brought it inside her living room and opened the card attached to it.

I hope this brightens your day and makes you think of the many lives you have touched, especially those who have loved you unconditionally. Please stop by and visit me later. I have some news for you.

Happy birthday, sweetheart.

Jack

Caroline opened the box. It was full of candy. More specifically, Ghirardelli dark chocolate and caramel squares. Her eyes filled with tears as Christine’s face flashed across her memory. But she wasn’t mad at Jack for making the effort. He hadn’t done it to hurt her. During their marriage he hadn’t spent too much time dwelling on Caroline’s relationship with her best friend, since Chrissy and Jack so rarely got along. She and Christine had been born over a decade apart but their birthdays were within a day of each other. Caroline was surprised that he’d remembered.

After staring at the box and wiping away tears, she started smiling, remembering how she used to hassle Christine and deplete her candy supply when she wasn’t looking. Caroline grabbed a few pieces since she hadn’t eaten anything yet. It had been a long time since she’d eaten anything that decadent, and the sweetness of the caramel blended with the bitterness of the chocolate soothed her.

She had forgotten it was her birthday. It had taken her a minute to remember how old she was. She didn’t know what month or day of the week it was, what the weather would be in the morning or the afternoon or the evening, because why did it matter? Maybe she accepted San Diego’s temperate climate, or she stopped caring because time ran on regardless, or perhaps those details weren’t all that important in the grand scheme of things. 

She accumulated a nice little pile of wrappers on the couch next to her before she decided to head over to Jack’s office to thank him. It was the polite thing to do and he needed to see her anyway. She changed out of her gym clothes, knowing she could fit in a workout in the afternoon. Jack wasn’t a big chocolate fan but she grabbed another handful of the candy and shoved it in her pocket before heading out the door.

*              *              *              *              *

Captain Schroeder was sitting at his usual place behind his desk in Jack’s outer office.

“Is the commander in?” Caroline asked. “He said he wanted to talk to me.”

Jack’s assistant never seemed happy to see her. “Just a minute,” he said, picking up the phone. “Major Gerard is here. Are you sure? All right.” Schroeder hung up the receiver. “You can go in there now.”

Such a surly gatekeeper. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to punch him.” Caroline poked around in her pocket. “Want a piece of chocolate?”

“No, thanks.”

She hoped some candy might help him lighten up. “Your loss,” she said, making a point of shutting the door when she went inside Jack’s office. She didn’t want any churlish eavesdroppers.

Jack smiled when he saw her. “Good morning, Caroline.”

“Good morning.” She pulled the chocolate out of her pocket. “I brought you a present.”

“How nice of you.”

“Some guy gave them to me.”

“Castoff gifts. Even better.”

He seemed in an uncommonly good mood. “May I sit down?” she asked.

“Of course.”

Caroline put the candy on his desk and took a seat. Jack gestured toward the chocolate. “How much have you had to eat already?” he asked.

“A few.”

“Bit of a sugar high?”

“Maybe.” He must have attributed her equally decent mood to her choice of breakfast. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For the gift. I, um, forgot it was my birthday.”

“I figured you probably would.”

“It was nice. You didn’t need to get me anything.”

“Yes, I did. I’m sorry it couldn’t be from Hershey but as you might imagine, it’s quite difficult to get anything shipped to a rebel base from the United States.”

“I can imagine.” Caroline snatched one of the pieces off his desk, thinking of Chrissy again. “They tasted pretty good.”

“I hope I didn’t trigger anything.” His brow furrowed. She must not have been able to hide the expression on her face. “I – it seemed appropriate.”

“It’s fine.”

“I actually did like Christine, you know. Despite what she may have thought of me.”

“It’s
fine
,” she repeated.

“She might have loved you even more than I did. She certainly knew you better.”

Dammit. “Jack-”

“I miss her too,” he said quietly.

Caroline put the chocolate back on the desk. “Please don’t do this, Jack.” Tears flooded her eyes. “I can’t have this conversation. Not today.”

He crouched down by her chair. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I shouldn’t have gotten you anything. Or at least, not something that reminded you of-”

She blinked the tears back. “I said it was fine. Jesus.”

Jack stood up. “I’m sorry.”

He never knew when to stop but she felt bad for yelling. All that therapy and not a damn thing had changed. Caroline turned away from him. “You said you had news for me.”

He returned to his desk. “I’d first like to apologize for the terrible way I behaved the other night. That was inappropriate. I told you – no, I
promised
you I wouldn’t try anything and then I turned around and did exactly that. And I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“No,” he said. “It’s not. I don’t want to force you to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. I want you to do things on your own terms, on your own timeline. Not on mine.”

Man, he was into repetition this morning, which forced her to respond in kind. “I said it’s okay,” Caroline said. “Is that the only reason you asked me to come over here?”

Jack let out a slow breath. “No, there’s something else. Natalie and I spoke at length yesterday. We agree it’s time for you to return to duty.”

Words she hadn’t expected to hear. “Huh?”

“You seem surprised.”

“Were you not at the same disastrous therapy session we had earlier this week?”

“It didn’t go that badly.”

Caroline frowned. Either he had a highly selective memory or he was lying.

“We managed to have a decent conversation afterwards,” he said. “Aside from me fucking it up at the end.”

“Jack-”

“Don’t. You’ve made it clear that you don’t want to talk about it, so we won’t. All right?”

She wasn’t sure if she could believe him or not. “Fine.”

“Anyway,” he said. “Natalie and I have discussed it and given the progress you’ve made, you can resume your responsibilities.”

A bland, guarded statement that required clarification. “What does that mean?”

“No restrictions. Start training again. Whatever you were doing before.”

She rubbed her palm over her knuckles and stared at the floor.

His voice brought her out of her daydream. “Do you have a problem with my decision, Major?”

Caroline didn’t know why it stung when he addressed her by her rank, when such a reaction was usually evoked when he said her first name. “No,” she said quietly.

“Then what is it?”

She rubbed her knuckles again. “I don’t want to disappoint you.”

“In what sense?”

She looked up at him. His expression was unreadable. “I don’t – you’ve been giving me all these breaks and I don’t want to screw things up for you anymore.”

“Do you think you’re not ready to go back to work?”

She didn’t want to screw things up but she didn’t want to sit around doing nothing. “I’m ready.”

“The standards will be the same for you as they are for everyone else,” Jack said. “I’m sure you’ll have no trouble living up to them.”

He sounded so sincere. “You really believe that?” she asked.

Jack picked up the chocolate and shoved it in his desk. “Caroline, what do you want me to say? I had to pull you back after what happened with Buchanan. You know that. But you’ve improved over the last couple of months. There’s no reason to keep putting you through this without letting you see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

“Do I still need to meet with Natalie?”

“It might be helpful. Or you can chat. As friends.”

If that wasn’t code for
keep talking to your therapist
, she wasn’t sure what was. “Okay.”

“What else is there?” Jack said.

He wanted to keep talking. There were so many things she wanted to say to him but she had no idea where to start. “Nothing.” Caroline stood up. “May I go now?”

“I suppose so.” He lifted himself up from his chair, walking with her toward the door. He grabbed her arm.

“What?” she asked, spinning to face him.

Jack stroked her cheek, not speaking. Caroline started to turn around to leave, then noticed she was holding on to his shirt. How had that happened?

He pulled her into his chest and held her there for a moment. She could hear his heart beating, faster than normal. He was wearing cologne again.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I promised I wouldn’t try anything but it always feels so good to hold you. Even if that’s all I get, I’ll find a way to make sure it’s enough.”

Caroline very slowly brought her arms around him, leaning in. “Please don’t let go of me,” she whispered.

His strong arms kept her close and she held on until she couldn’t take it anymore. She pulled back from him, suddenly desperate to leave the room.

It didn’t matter how many times she was forced to see them. Her husband’s watery eyes broke her heart. And she didn’t know how to make them vanish, especially when they were so often met with tears of her own. Every moment she spent with him ripped him apart even further. She couldn’t let that happen even if he wanted it. She had to get out of there. Immediately.

“You’re as beautiful today as you were the night I met you,” he said quietly. Jack kissed her cheek and wiped the wetness from her face. “Don’t cry, sweetheart. I’m always here for you. No matter what happens.” His voice faltered. “Even if it’s only as a friend.”

“Thank you, Jack.” Caroline smoothed his shirt down where she’d wrinkled it, afraid that if she said anything else to him she’d start crying even harder.

“You’re welcome. I hope you have a good birthday.” He opened the door for her, hesitating ever so slightly, appearing disappointed when she walked through it without another word.

It was only after Caroline reached her apartment that she realized how much she wished she’d stayed with him for a bit longer. Let him hold her for as long as he wanted. Talked to him. Given him the answers she knew he desired, emotional consequences be damned. For a minute she contemplated turning around and going back, but she knew it was too late.