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She unbuttoned his soft shirt and spread it wide, greeted with the sight of Charlie’s hard belly and defined chest. She smiled and laid her palms against that lean, tough body. The hair of his chest crinkled under her hands, and she enjoyed the sight of her pale hands, tipped with red fingernails, against his golden skin. 

She didn’t object when his hands fell on her naked hips, or slid up to her breasts. But when he tried to catch her mouth in a kiss she went to work on that special spot on his neck, the one that made him quiver, while she slowly massaged her hands down his abdomen. 

Her mouth followed her hands, trailing kisses down his chest and across his trembling stomach, until she knelt between his legs again.

His cock was standing, red and eager as a rooster at dawn. Experimentally, she brushed at the droplet of liquid at the tip with her thumb. 

“Goddammit, Briar.”

“Watch your language. I’m a lady.” 

She was stroking him now, slowly trailing her fingers over him. It was fascinating, a rod of steel wrapped in silky skin. She wrapped her hands around him and watched his body react. His muscles were tense, straining. His hands were clutching at the fabric of the couch. 

She looked up to find his gaze intent, his eyes as blue as the center of a flame. Holding his gaze, she leaned forward and licked the tip of him.

His hands clamped on her shoulders while she explored him with her tongue. A tortured sound wrestled out of his throat. Emboldened, she bent to kiss him while her hands stroked and squeezed. 

She took her time experimenting for her own pleasure until he was thrusting up at her from the couch. He was moaning steadily now, his hands roving over her shoulders and breasts, torn between watching her and closing his eyes in agonized delight. 

Receiving pleasure was wonderful, Briar realized, but giving it was spectacular. Knowing that she held this man captive with her body made her feel powerful and alive. There could only be delight here, in the magic between them. There could only be truth.

Suddenly, he tore himself from her grasp and, giving himself a quick stroke, he spilled on his stomach. 

“I wanted to do that,” Briar pouted.

“Jesus,” he swore heavily, his breath as short as if he had run a mile. “Next time you can. Good God, you’re incredible,” he said, hauling her up to kiss her. 

It was more than a kiss, Briar thought as her head spun. His mouth was conveying all of his gratitude and satisfaction and desire without saying a word. With a sigh, he tucked her in next to him while he reached for a tissue to clean himself. 

She snuggled into his embrace, then deliberately trailed a hand down his left thigh. “I forgot all about these,” she said, tracing his scars.

He stiffened, and she was sorry for it. When would he understand that she wanted all of him? 

She tried to not be hurt when he pushed to his feet and pulled his pants back on. “Can I ask you a very personal question?”

He eyed her as he fastened his pants. “As long as I don’t have to answer.”

“I remember hearing, after your accident, that the doctors wanted to amputate your leg.”

“Is that your question?”

“I know your leg hurts sometimes. Maybe all the time. Do you think it would be better if you had let the doctors take it?”

Charlie didn’t answer for so long that Briar feared he wouldn’t. Feeling cold, she began to dress as well. 

“It might still happen,” he said finally. “My circulation isn’t great, and as I get older it’ll just get worse. The doctor said I shouldn’t expect to ever have more mobility than I do right now. Someday, it might just be easier to cut the thing off.”

“Would that be so bad?”

“It would mean a wheelchair. It would mean I’d spend the rest of my life like a decrepit old man.”

“You don’t know that will happen.” 

“It’s not far off,” he said, balancing himself against the furniture as he made his way back to the chairs where he had left his cane. “Just look at me.”

“I can get that for you.”

“No,” he said. “I’ve got it.”

Carefully, he braced himself so he could lean over and pick up his cane off the floor. It was painful to watch, but Briar understood that he needed to take care of himself. 

When he straightened, he blew out a breath. “You have to understand, this is the best I’ll ever be. I’m just going to get worse. It’s only going to get harder for me to walk and stand.”

“I know.”

 He began to pace. “I’m never going to be able to dance with you. I can’t open the goddamn—gosh darn—door to the truck for you because it’ll take me ten minutes to get into the driver’s seat.”

“I don’t care about that.” 

He wasn’t listening. “I can’t even think about carrying you over a threshold, and I sure can’t get down on one knee.”

“What?” Briar managed. A terrified thrill was swooping through her. “What are you saying?”

“You deserve better. You deserve a guy who can take care of you.”

“I love you,” she said, and realized it felt as good to say it as it did to hear it. “I deserve you.”

He stopped in his tracks. “This isn’t how I thought my life would go. I was supposed to be a big baseball star who could afford to take care of my parents, not the other way around.”

“You weren’t supposed to be anything.” She crossed the room to where he stood. “You may have plotted out a life for yourself, but that’s not going to happen now. So you’re crippled. What are you going to do instead?” 

He looked down at her with haunted eyes. “If I had known … sometimes I wish I had died in that car too.”

“Well, I sure as hell don’t,” she said.

He choked out a laugh and pulled her into an embrace. 

She hugged him tight and laid her head on his chest. His heart beat beneath her ear, healthy and strong. “You have to find a way to deal with it, Charlie, and stop being so bitter and resentful. Otherwise the rest of your life is going to be just as ruined as your leg.”

She could feel him burying his face in her hair. “I’m not very good at being positive. You’ll have to help me with that.”

“And I’m not very good at trusting people. You’ll have to help me, too.”

“We’ll figure it all out,” he said, holding her close. “Together.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Charlie

It was bizarre to emerge back out onto the baseball field, where the atmosphere was just as festive and patriotic as it was when they had left. It seemed like Charlie’s entire life had shifted in the last hour, and he could hardly believe that the rest of the world was unchanged. 

He tightened his grip on Briar’s hand, keeping her close to him. He was starting to think he wanted to keep her close forever. 

Not just because she had treated him to the single most amazing sexual experience of his life. Although, that didn’t hurt. The memory of her blond curls brushing his thighs while she took him between her soft, red lips was enough to have him hard all over again.

Which was totally inappropriate, since they were walking through a baseball stadium swarming with people.

“People are staring at us,” she said quietly. 

“They can tell that you’ve been taking advantage of me, you minx,” he whispered back.

She slapped his arm. “Hush,” she said, a pretty blush coloring her cheeks. 

He loved her pockets of prim behavior, especially since he knew what she was like when she let her desires rule. Under her curious hands he found the courage to do all the things that lurked in his most fevered fantasies.

With effort, he turned his attention to the party taking place on the baseball field. The band had transitioned from patriotic songs into dance tunes, and the stage had been cleared of chairs to make room for dancing. Charlie heard a flashbulb pop, and saw that someone from the army had a flair for the dramatic. New recruits were posing with their families under a billowing American flag. 

Charlie wanted to be one of them.

He looked down at Briar again. Her face was pinched with worry. 

They hadn’t talked about her fear of the army, and he didn’t want to bring it up now. He knew that joining up was his best chance at a better life, but he had to figure out how to make her comfortable with the idea.

“How many people do you think have joined?” she asked, scanning the recruiting table. 

“Take a look,” he said, pointing out the line for pictures. He saw the Briggs boys, along with Clay’s wife, Cora. Meg was standing next to Will, and a nervous-looking Lucy was standing next to her. Ivan Sokolov was shaking hands with an officer while June Powell looked on with approval. 

He thought over the people he had seen at the mine the other night. “Ruth Baker’s not there. No Blanche either. But I think every guy in town has signed up already.”

She must have heard some of the envy in his voice because she leaned into him. “I’m sorry if I’ve made you give up another token of manhood.”

He wasn’t giving up yet, but he didn’t have to tell her that now. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

“I bet a former baseball star knows a back way out of this stadium.”

“The side entrance is this way,” he said, draping his arm over her shoulder and pulling her close. Charlie didn’t feel like celebrating with his fellow townspeople. The only person he wanted to spend time with was right by his side. 

Night was falling around them, faster now that they moved away from the lights of the stadium. It felt right to be there with her as the stars picked their way out of the sky. Was it only a couple of weeks ago that he had found her in the woods on a balmy night like this? 

Whatever happened, she would leave a mark on his life. Any tentative steps he might take toward happiness seemed impossible without her by his side. 

 He thought about that as they left the light and sound of the party behind. Maybe there was a way to have everything he wanted. 

Charlie’s leg ached by the time they turned onto their street. The nine blocks from the baseball stadium was the farthest he had walked in a year. Maybe he should start doing the exercises Dr. Porter had prescribed.

For the first time in a long while, it seemed worth the effort to get better. 

He wrinkled his brow when he saw his parents’ car in the driveway, parked next to his truck. “That’s strange. I figured they would still be at the party.”

“Are you going to tell them about your power?”

“I should have already. My mom is going to be so mad.”

Briar smiled and straightened his collar. “They love you. It’ll be okay.”

“I love you,” he said, enjoying the way a smile spread across her face. “You want to go on a date tomorrow?”

“Sure,” she said, smiling even wider. “Do you want to go to the movies?”

“I’ve got something special in mind,” he said. 

He took his time kissing her good-bye.

Charlie didn’t even have to open his door to hear raised voices. 

Uncle Rick, predictably, was bellowing. “What’s happening in this country is disgraceful! People have the right to believe what they want to believe.”

Charlie’s father was yelling back. “They can believe whatever they want, as long as they keep it on their side of the ocean. But somebody messes with my kid—”

“This isn’t even about the Army-McCarthy hearings, Rick!” said his mother. “This is about the Soviets who want to destroy America!”

“Oh, you two aren’t buying that cock-and-bull story, are you? You’re just as bad as those idiots in Washington, looking for Communists under every rock. A man goes to a political rally in the 1930s and now he wants to destroy America? Hell, I was a card-carrying Communist, back when we had the strikes. Do you think I would do something like this to our town?”

“Of course not,” Mindy said, exasperated. “But why would the government lie to us?”

Rick scoffed. “Some chemical gets released that nearly kills our kids. Isn’t it convenient to blame the Soviets? I’ll tell you what it was—aliens! Like the ones who landed in Roswell. I betcha it was aliens, doing experiments on us!”

“The little green men, like from the movies? Don’t be absurd, Rick,” Charlie’s father said.

“There’s been over a hundred sightings in the last five years, Jimmy. It’s hardly absurd. And some people have even been abducted! Just sucked right up into the sky with a cosmic vacuum cleaner. Poked and probed so they can figure out how to manipulate the human race!”

“Can we stay in the realm of reality here,” Jimmy said, rubbing his forehead. 

“Oh sure, I’m crazy because I think there might be something more in the universe than just this planet?”

“We’re getting off track,” Mindy said. “Rick, the Soviet Union is a real threat.”

“That doesn’t mean the kids in this town should sign up to be slaughtered.”

“Slaughtered,” Jimmy scoffed. “We’re not at war right now.”

“Exactly, right now. What about tomorrow? Those kids don’t have any idea what they are getting into. You remember, Jimmy? You remember what it was like? Starving and frozen with bullets everywhere, people blowing up because they stepped in the wrong—”

“It’s not worth talking about,” Jimmy said, but Charlie wished Rick would continue. His father never talked about his experience in the war. 

“It wasn’t a walk in the park, but it was worth it. We saved the world, and now those kids are going to protect it. I just wish Charlie could do the same,” Jimmy said.

“Why don’t we ask Charlie what he thinks? He’s standing in the hallway eavesdropping,” Mindy said. Charlie grimaced. The woman had ears like a bat. 

Charlie sheepishly let his mother bustle him into the room while she clucked at his limp. 

“Did you walk home? Oh, Charlie. Sit down and put your leg up. Do you want a coldpack?”

“Maybe in a minute,” he said. He looked around at his family and took a deep breath. “There’s something I have to tell you. Something I should have told you months ago.” 

Three questioning voices turned to shouts as he dropped his cane and leapt for the table.

He was half-cat by the time he landed, skidding slightly on the lace runner that ran down the middle of the table.