“So no one was coming up, which would be a major red flag,” she concluded.
“Yeah, for sure,” he said. “I told my men to keep at full battle rattle. Then I opened my door and stepped out. My men followed me. We were all leery, all on red alert.”
She waited, not wanting to interrupt. She felt almost as if she were there with him; the scene was so familiar for her.
“It took a good couple of minutes before the village elder stepped from one of the houses about forty yards in front of us. He nodded, then moved forward. I couldn’t suppress the unease I was feeling and told my men to stand at full attention.”
She was well aware of how easy it was to follow a commander you respected.
“I told the elder we had supplies when he was about ten feet away from us. Then I asked him where his people were. I didn’t like how this was going down. Right after I asked the question, doors began opening, and the people stepped out with those expressions we’d come to recognize.”
“I did it a few times. Those first steps they take are always hesitant, but then they move a bit quicker in anticipation of the new goodies. It was hard to stay on full alert sometimes when a small child was wrapping his arms around your legs, thanking you for a toy he’d never thought he’d own.”
“Yeah, giving toys to the kids was probably my favorite thing to do,” Finn told her.
Her heart softened even more for the man, dang it.
“I was talking to the elder when one of my men alerted me to look to my left,” Finn said. “A man stepped around the corner of a building, a thick coat covering him in hundred-degree weather. We knew instantly this was bad.”
“Very bad,” Brooke agreed, feeling Finn’s body tense.
“One of my men told him to halt. The man stopped about twenty-five feet in front of the nearest soldier to him, who demanded the man open his jacket.” A shudder passed through Finn.
“The next few seconds were the slowest and longest of my life. Everything happened too quickly for anything to be done to stop it. I knew what was coming, but there was nothing I could do about it. All I could think about is how foolish it had been for me not to trust my instincts in the first place.”
“If we’re always running scared, then we’ll never get a single thing done,” she told Finn.
“There was a massive flash of light as the man literally exploded, the suicide vest he was wearing instantly disintegrating him. The soldier standing about six feet in front of me disintegrated, his body ripping apart before either of us even had time to blink. It just happened so damn fast.”
“Oh, Finn,” Brooke said, feeling his pain.
“The Humvee windows shattered as rocks flew through the air with added pieces of blood, flesh, and bone.” He stopped talking as he cleared his throat. He was trying to get through the story, but he couldn’t do it without emotion.
“My body was thrown back about ten feet as I crashed into the Humvee behind me. My ears were ringing, and I was desperately trying to get to my feet, but my legs weren’t reacting to the command. I couldn’t move.”
“I’m sure you were injured more than the adrenaline running through your body was allowing you to know.”
“There was so much chaos all around. The villagers who’d been farther back ran into their homes, slamming their doors shut. So many men, both soldiers and civilians, lay still on the ground around me. Body parts were scattered all over the place. I wasn’t computing all I was seeing, but the nightmares I’ve had since have reminded me in vivid color what happened.”
“The man did maximum damage,” Brooke concluded.
“Yes, he’d had a powerful bomb, and he hadn’t cared who he hit. It didn’t matter if it wiped out his own people, as long as he was taking down US soldiers at the same time.”
“They never care because they aren’t human,” Brooke said.
“One of my men was talking to me, but I can’t remember this part. I’ve read it in the report, but I was fading fast. He called in a 9-line. I tried acknowledging him, apparently, the response so ingrained in my brain, but all I was seeing was darkness. All I was hearing was a deep ringing in my ears.”
“Do you remember any of it?” she asked quietly.
“I remember the soldier telling me to hold on, that everything was going to be okay. My men were trained well, and they knew what to do. He stayed with me, his hands pressed against my chest. There was so much blood. My blood, other people’s blood, so much blood. I’ve seen a lot in my years, but I’d yet to see anything like what I saw as that bomb went off.”
“I’m sorry.”
He didn’t acknowledge her empty words. That’s all they were. She was sorry, but she had nothing to do with it. It was odd how people apologized for things they didn’t do. You could say you were sorry they were feeling what they were feeling or had gone through what they’d gone through, but even then, they were just empty words. It was something she really wanted to quit saying.
“The last conscious thought I had of that day was realizing I was smelling charred flesh. I prayed at that moment it was something I’d never smell again, something I’d never see again.”
She waited for him to conclude as they reached her house. She wasn’t going to apologize again. She also wasn’t going to leave him standing on her doorstep right after he’d shared something so personal with her.
“When I came to next, I was in a hospital getting patched up. It was days until I found out we’d lost six of our men in that explosion, and eight villagers. It was a lose-lose situation all the way around. I didn’t know for another couple of weeks that I’d never go out in the field again.”
“How did that make you feel?” she asked.
“Angry,” he admitted. “I was forced to come home.”
She wanted to comfort him, wanted to take some of his burden away, but she was already falling for this man she didn’t want to fall for, and she didn’t want to keep encouraging that. She had her own demons she was fighting. How could two broken people have a healthy relationship? She didn’t see that as possible.
“Finn, this is a lot,” she told him. “I think you need someone to tell your story to, someone to help you, but I really don’t think that person is me. You didn’t want to come home, and home is where I feel the safest. Right there is a big difference between us.”
He turned them so he was pulling her against his hard body. His expression changed as his lips turned up the slightest bit. His eyes still looked lost, but there was a light in them that intrigued her no matter what she’d just said.
“I didn’t want to come home—not because I don’t love my family, but because I identified more with the soldier I was than the man I am,” he said. Then his lips turned up more. “But then I met you. You might not think you’re the person to help me, but maybe, just maybe, we’re supposed to help each other.”
Her heart thudded hard at his words. “Finn,” she warned.
He leaned down and gave her a kiss. It wasn’t slow nor fast. It was firm and gentle at the same time, and when he pulled back he took her breath with him.
“I’m glad to be home,” he said. The last of the shadows in his eyes had evaporated.