The Top Gun's Return

Chapter 11

"I see you've met my daughter."

To Jessie's ears Tristan's tone seemed mild enough, but something about it…edgy undercurrents…sparked undefined warnings in her mind.

No time, though, for even a quick glance at his face; the young man with Sammi June was clasping Tristan's hand with the kind of silent fervor that among women would invoke warm hugs and squeals of joy.

"Good to see you again, Lieutenant." His smile was restrained, but the emotion in his voice was unmistakable, and his eyes glittered behind a screen of rimless glasses. He nodded at Tristan's dress uniform, and the smile grew into a grin. "You clean up pretty good."

"Yeah, Pearson, you don't look too bad yourself," Tristan said, returning the grin. There was a long pause, fraught with so many things unspoken, and then he said abruptly, "Uh…this is my wife, Jessie…" and the clasped hands broke apart.

As Cory Pearson turned to her, Jessie's first thought was, He has nice eyes. He had a nice face, actually-not as handsome as Tris's, but attractive in its own way…long and lean, with a slightly crooked nose and sensitive mouth. Though, his eyes really were his best feature, she thought, with both compassion and intelligence lurking in their indigo depths behind a sparkle that hinted at both a sense of humor and an insatiable interest in everything and everyone around him. He had a nice handshake, too, she noted-firm and warm and enveloping.

Jessie murmured polite acknowledgments of the introduction, and she was thinking about what it must have been like for these two men from such different worlds, different generations, almost, discovering each other in an Iraqi prison. What had they talked about in those dangerous whispered conversations, she wondered, precious moments of communion stolen from under the watchful eyes of their guards. Had they shared memories and fears, given each other courage, helped keep hope and spirits alive? What kind of bonds must be forged from such experiences?

Nobody can understand. I can talk about it until the cows come home and it's not gonna make anybody know what it was like.

But this man would know, Jessie thought. Cory Pearson would understand. Because he'd been through it, too.

The thought blew into her mind like a brisk puff of wind, making her breath catch and her heart quicken. To cover that little spasm of hope, she turned to her daughter, who was standing off to one side, arms crossed and expression aloof, and managed to come up with something inane and falsely bright to say about how nice it was Sammi June and Mr. Pearson had already managed to meet each other. But all she was thinking about was getting Tristan and the reporter together, somehow. Tris desperately needed to talk to someone. And here was the one person in the world who would understand what he'd been through.

Once again, her Southern upbringing supplied her with all the tools she needed to accomplish her purpose. Polite phrases, tried and true, uttered by generations of Southern women before her, dropped from her lips like magnolia petals. "Well, now, I know you two gentlemen must have so much to talk about…Sammi June, let's you and me leave these menfolk alone so they can visit. Mr. Pearson, it's just so nice to finally meet you. You be sure and come visit us when you get a chance, now, y'hear? Sammi June, I want you to come and meet the senator from Georgia. His wife was askin' about you. She is just the nicest person…" With a gay little wave and a shameless wink for the two "menfolk," Jessie hooked her arm through her daughter's.

As she was turning them both away, she heard Cory Pearson say in his quiet voice, "It was nice meeting you, Mrs. Bauer. You, too, Samantha."

Samantha? Though her daughter mumbled an indifferent reply, something…an awareness-mother's intuition-found its way through the chaos of Jessie's concern for Tris. Carefully picking her way across the lawn in the high-heeled sandals with ankle straps Sammi June had insisted she buy, she said casually, testing the waters, "Well, he seems nice." Sammi June grunted. "Good-lookin', too. Didn't you think so?"

Carefully not looking at her, Sammi June shrugged. "I guess…" After a moment she sniffed and added, "Kind of old, though."

Jessie threw her a look. "What makes you say that? He didn't look old to me."

Sammi June threw her a look that said volumes, then shrugged again. "He'd pretty much have to be. He's a friend of Dad's, isn't he? I mean…he was in that prison…" And even though her face was averted as she intently watched her own high heels punch holes in the grass, Jessie could see a sweet warm blush creep into her daughter's cheeks.

Oh Lord, she thought. Lord help us. First she tells me she wants to fly, and now this. It's too much. Lord, don't make me have to deal with this now.

She didn't tell her daughter that Cory Pearson was just about the same age her daddy had been that spring day when he'd met her eighteen-year-old momma on a Florida beach.

Jessie waited up for Tristan that night. And she didn't make the mistake of getting into bed to watch television this time, knowing if she did she'd probably fall asleep again. Instead, she took a long shower and shampooed her hair and did all the self-pampering, girlie things she used to do when she was a teenager getting ready for a date. She put on the diaphanous black nighty she'd bought in one of the hotel's boutiques, making herself blush and whisper, "Oh, my Lord…" Then, to cover it up and distract herself from the thoughts it provoked, she wrapped herself in the thick terry cloth bathrobe supplied by the hotel and gave herself a manicure. Then a pedicure. After that she paced, wishing she smoked so she'd have something to do while her heart thumped a monotonous tomtom beat and nervous shivers whispered beneath her skin.

This is good, she told herself. It's good he's with Cory Pearson. He needed this. This is good.

She'd been so glad when Tris had invited the reporter to join him and Jessie, Sammi June and Max for dinner after the White House reception. She'd been hoping he would. And she'd suggested they eat in one of the hotel's restaurants just so she'd be able to excuse herself afterward and give the two men a chance to talk together privately. She'd counted on Sammi June and Max having their own plans for the evening, but to her surprise both of them had elected to retire to their rooms early, after announcing their intention to visit the Air and Space Museum before catching their flight the next day.

Jessie had noticed that Sammi June seemed unnaturally subdued during dinner, barely saying a word and only picking at her blackened Cajun-style flounder. Her mother hoped to goodness she was just tired or coming down with some virus or other, but she had a sinking feeling that what was wrong with Sammi June wasn't anything that could be so easily cured.

Undercurrents…

It was nearing midnight when Jessie heard the card-key click in the suite's outer door. Her knees immediately went weak. Too late now to jump into bed and pretend to be asleep. Nothing to do but put on her best face and go to meet her husband. My husband…this man I barely know!

She didn't know what to do with her hands. Or her galloping heartbeat. Once, she would have known what to expect when her husband walked through the door. If he was tired or had had a difficult day, he could be counted on to put his arms around her and hold her and exhale gustily into her hair…then fill his lungs with her scent as if she were a drug he'd been without for too long. If he was feeling good about himself and things in general, he might hug Sammi June instead or tease her and play with her while a wink and his secret smile for Jessie hinted at intimacies to come. And if he'd been gone a longer time, like on deployments, he'd be frankly and openly hungry for her, his appetites lusty and impatient as a teenage boy's.

But this Tristan…coming into the bedroom in a tentative, almost guilty way, barely meeting her eyes…the set of his shoulders and jaw defensive, as if not quite certain of his welcome…this man she didn't have the first idea what to do with.

"You're still up," he said, as he had the night before.

But this night she wasn't sleepy enough to walk unthinking into his arms. Instead she stood rooted in the middle of the room, wrapped in her bathrobe, twisting her fingers together. "Hi," she said breathlessly.

"Sorry to be so late." With barely a glance at her he turned to the dresser and dropped his card-key on its top, then began to tug at his tie.

"That's okay…" He was unbuttoning his jacket. She drifted nervously closer and held the jacket for him while he slipped out of it. His body warmth and scent still clung to the jacket, and as she turned away to hang it in the closet she resisted the desire to bury her face in it and comfort herself in its familiar embrace. "Did you and your friend have a good visit?"

"It was good seeing Cory again. Seems to be doing okay…"

She could hear rustlings behind her as he took off his shirt. The back of her neck prickled with awareness, and the intensity of her wish that he would come closer…wrap his arms around her and bury his face in the curve of her neck.

"He sure seems nice. I'm glad I got to meet him." She turned and found him tugging his undershirt out of the waistband of his slacks. The two halves of his dress shirt hung loose at his sides. "Here, let me get that for you," she said huskily, and as she did she was moving close and easing the shirt over his shoulders and off. Then, daringly, she placed her palms on his chest and rose on tiptoes to kiss him. "Mmm," she murmured, licking her lips, "you taste like beer."

"Cory and I quaffed a couple." His tone was sardonic. She pulled back and saw his eyes resting on her, a mysterious light in their depths.

"Did you, now?"

"Mmm-hmm…but only a couple." His fingers had begun to toy with the collar of her robe, rubbing the texture as if he'd never felt its like before. She swayed toward him and was taken off guard when he backed away, towing her with him until he came against the bed. He sat on the edge of the mattress and drew her closer by the lapels of the robe, like a fish in a net. "Nice robe," he murmured. "Is it the hotel's?"

She nodded. "There's one for you, too." Her tongue felt sticky; it was hard to form words. "His and Hers. If you put yours on we'd be a matched set."

"I'd rather take yours off," he said, and his voice was low and guttural. Her breath caught and her hands flew guiltily to the belt of her robe. His eyes kindled. "What've you got on under it? Come on, let me see."

"Nothing. I mean-not nothing-" Breath whooshed through her lips as he tugged the belt free. The two halves of the robe unfurled like a banner.

There was a moment of utter silence. Then he said in a disbelieving voice, "That's not nothing."

"That's what I was trying to tell you," Jessie said with a nervous gulp. "I bought it this morning. I thought…I was hopin' it might turn you on."

He didn't say anything for way too long. Seemingly oblivious to her discomfort, he was intent on watching his hands guide the terry cloth bathrobe over her shoulders. It fell in a snowy heap at her feet. His hands touched the nightgown's silky nothingness…it slithered coldly over her skin, and she began to shiver. His eyes trailed upward, searching the clouded outlines of her body. Then they snapped abruptly to her face. The fierceness in them made her gasp.

"Don't you know," he said harshly, "it's not your underwear that turns me on? You turn me on."

"Well-" she was trying for droll, but her voice was bumpy with shivers "-that's a relief."

"Take it off." Dazed and jerky, she hastened to obey, swaying a little, off balance with her arms lifted over her head. His hands on her waist held her steady. Totally naked, in an agony of self-consciousness, she endured the avid exploration of his eyes, and a silence that seemed to last forever. Then…

"God, Jess…it's been so long since I've seen…since I've seen you…like this." The raw emotion in his voice stunned her, speaking of so many long, empty years…of unfathomable longing and unspeakable suffering.

Only clenched teeth held back her instinctive cry of compassion. She reached for him, but he said thickly, "No…let me look at you…" and held her away at arm's length. Her hands had to be content to ride his as they traveled slowly, wonderingly over her body. "I remembered you…like this, but I didn't…" He shook his head like someone in a daze. His gaze clung, mesmerized, to the sight of his fingertips tracing the outline of her breasts. "Didn't really think you could be this beautiful. Thought…I had to be imagining you, that I'd been away from you so long, my mind had created some impossible ideal…"

Overwhelmed, she tried to laugh and failed miserably. "Oh, Tris…I'm not-"

"Shh…" His hands gently turned her. She stood with her head bowed, eyes closed, trembling…exposed…vulnerable…while his hands glided over her hips…buttocks…pelvic ridges, like a potter's hands shaping clay. When he kissed the nerve-rich spot above the base of her spine, she gasped, and her muscles contracted violently. Her knees buckled and she clutched at his forearms for support. Every part of her body had begun to swell and ache. In the protected, feminine places, she felt heat and throbbing pressure already building…building, pushing against the limits of her self-control. It had been a long time since anyone had touched her like this… Had anyone ever touched her like this?

She felt his mouth, his breath, his beard-roughed skin caress her buttocks, the small of her back, while his hands slid around her hips and his fingers wove their way into the thicket of hair between her thighs. "I'm going to fall," she whispered, but didn't think he heard her. She began to whimper softly.

He turned her again, his mouth dragging kisses across her belly, then lower…and lower still. His mouth was hot…humid…and so was she, and his tongue slipped into her, found her throbbing place and began to move rhythmically with the beat. Her body jerked and she gripped his shoulders, breathing in ragged sobs while his hands, cupping her buttocks, held her firm against the relentless stroking of his mouth and tongue.

She must have cried out…she may have screamed. If so, she didn't hear it. Her mind had left her body, but her body no longer belonged to her…it was only a clenching, quaking, sobbing, trembling mindless bundle of sensation, and he…Tristan…controlled it all. He played her body like an instrument, spinning out the sensations, holding on to the throbbings, making the quaking go on and on, refusing to let it die. Until she thought she surely would.

When she came to herself again she was lying on the bed, cuddled in Tristan's arms with her face buried against his chest, and he was murmuring wordless reassurances into her sweat-damp hair. Her body ached, her breasts felt tight, and her feet tingled with pins and needles. Her cheeks burned. She couldn't bring herself to pull her face out of its warm, protective nest; she wanted to crawl into it and never come out. How, she wondered, would she ever look him in the eye?

But, the voice of reason inside her head asked, why should you feel embarrassed? I don't know why, but I do. But he's your husband! Yes, and for some reason that only makes it worse.

"Well," said Tristan, and his voice was a throaty growl, full of masculine smugness, "we know everything still works."

Jessie's self-consciousness vanished in a heartbeat. She rolled back onto the pillow of his arm, made little murmuring, settling sounds in her throat, then said in a parody of a Southern woman's honeyed primness, "No, suh, I do not believe that is true." Surprised, he raised his head to look at her, and she smiled demurely at him from under her lashes. "I do believe there is one area that has not been thoroughly tested…"

"Is that a fact?" His smile grew slowly, making the commas at the corners of his mouth emerge little by little, like shy children.

"Yes, suh, it surely is." Already thirsting for the taste of his mouth, she couldn't take her eyes from it, and when he lowered it at last to hers, she closed her eyes with a happy sigh and drank him in as if she would never have enough. The kiss was leisurely and deep, and she was quickly intoxicated.

"You sure you're ready to have me inside you?" he murmured into her mouth.

Languid and dizzy she murmured back into his, "Yes, please."

He left her to finish his undressing and she lay naked under his avid eyes and stretched like a cat, too drunk with desire to be self-conscious. Back again, naked himself now, he knelt astride her legs, rising tall above her, his angular body mysterious to her in that gentle light. She gasped when he gripped her thighs and thrust them apart, but that was his only roughness. He lowered himself into the place he'd made and entered her with exquisite care, easing into her already swollen and lubricated body slowly, and as he filled her she arched into him and exhaled with a long, replete sigh.

"That about do it?" he asked, his voice thick and broken, trying to tease, anyway.

"Oh, yes," she whispered.

"Better be…that's 'bout all I've got…"

Breathless, she couldn't answer, except to laugh. It felt good to laugh with him inside her, and to feel him laughing, too. She felt his arms quiver with the strain of holding his weight away from her and writhed upward to nudge him with her body. "You don't need to do that."

"Don't want…to crush you."

"Pshaw. I'm not exactly a fragile flower of Southern womanhood, and you're not about to crush anybody. Come here to me." She looped her arms around his neck and, laughing, he lowered his body onto hers, then quickly rolled them both so that she was on top of him instead. "Oh," she moaned, "now I'm gonna crush you."

But when she would have risen to straddle him, he wouldn't let her. Holding her tightly around her hips, he brought his knees up between hers so that his thighs caressed her buttocks, and they were touching in every possible way. Then, as deeply seated inside her as he could be, he began to rock her, and all the while looked intently into her eyes. Without breath, he whispered, "Jessie…love…you feel so good."

Light-headed, sinking deeper and deeper into arousal, she wanted-needed-to close her eyes. But in a guttural rasping voice he cried out, "No…no. Look at me, Jessie…love…look at me."

She moaned, but obeyed…and in all too short a time felt her body spiral once more out of control and sobs burst from her throat and tears jump from her eyes. "I can't…I…can't," she wailed, and as her eyes refused to obey her a second longer and drifted closed at last, she felt his arms tighten and his body surge and shudder, then surge again.

Lying spent and sated on Tris's chest, Jessie tried to hold the world at bay. Like a child singing loudly with her eyes shut tight and her hands over her ears to keep from hearing what she doesn't want to hear, she closed her mind to all but loud and happy thoughts about staying right where she was forever. The world came in, anyway.

Tris was stirring purposefully beneath her. "Hate to do this, love," he mumbled. "Better let me up before I fall asleep right here."

"Sounds good to me," she murmured, knowing even as she said it that it wouldn't make any difference.

He kissed her forehead and separated from her gently. He eased her to one side and himself to the other and sat up. "Wish I could. But I think it's best if I sleep on the couch tonight."

With her elbow planted and her head propped on her hand, Jessie watched the scars on his back stretch over the bumps of his spine as he leaned to reach for his pants. Her throat ached. Stubbornly she said, "Why? You've been sleeping fine. Stay here. Hold me for a little while…"

"Sorry…" He rose and turned, thin as a wraith, his smile dark and wry. "Nothing I'd like to do more than stay and hold you. I'd like to spend the whole damn night holding you…sleeping with you in my arms. But…" and his eyes were soft with regret as he leaned down to kiss her, "I haven't had enough beer to calm my nightmares. So I'm gonna sleep out there…and you're gonna stay in here…and behave yourself…" The kisses he inserted into each pause grew progressively deeper and more arousing. Jessie's heart had begun to thump and her head to spin by the time he drew back with a wicked chuckle. "That oughta do you till morning, anyway."

She didn't agree with him, but knew it was pointless to argue. Playing along, she slapped at him, pretending outrage, then snuggled back into the pillows with a Scarlett O'Hara pout. "Well. I feel like Ah have been serviced."

Grinning, Tris leaned down to drop a last kiss on her forehead. "So you have been-and very well, too."

"Nothin' wrong with your ego, that's for sure," Jessie said with a sniff, but she was secretly delighted with his arrogance.

He chuckled. "G'night-sleep tight." In the doorway he paused. "Oh-and remember, if you hear anything-"

"-don't touch you. I know." She blew him a kiss and snuggled back into the pillows with a quivering, throat-easing sigh. It's going to be all right. He's going to be okay… And for the first time, for that moment, she believed it.

Tristan walked with an unhurried stride, winding casually among families of tourists sunning themselves or picnicking on the mall, testing the spring in his knee and in the new grass, quietly appreciating the miracles of dandelions and laughing children and Jessie beside him and kites dancing in a pale-blue sky. And freedom. Yes, the biggest miracle of all, and he still wasn't sure it had sunk in completely. It would hit him every once in a while, though-come upon him unexpectedly, like now-and he'd feel kind of a kick in his chest, and there'd be a catch in his breathing, and the sting of tears would come into his eyes. I'm free. And I'm home.

Home. That was something else he had to keep telling himself. Because he still didn't believe that, either. Maybe because he didn't feel as if he was home. Maybe because he didn't know where home was, anymore.

One thing that had surprised him, though, was how he'd felt this morning, walking around Washington, D.C., with Jess. It had been her idea to spend some time seeing the sights before catching their flight to Atlanta, since it was something neither one of them had ever done before. Max and Sammi June had planned to visit the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum, which had rather appealed to Tristan, too. But Jess had wanted to see the monuments, and he hadn't been in a frame of mind to disappoint her. Now he was glad he hadn't. It was a perfect day to be outdoors, not too warm, with a breeze that carried the scent of fresh-cut grass. The monuments were pristine white against that soft-blue sky, making him think of that line in "America the Beautiful" about alabaster cities, undimmed by human tears. But he'd expected beautiful. He'd even expected to be touched by it all…the history, the symbolism. What he hadn't expected was to feel proud. "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty…"

His eyes stung and, uneasy with that, he laughed out loud. Jessie gave him a questioning look, and he said, "Nothing-just glad to be here, is all," and reached for her hand. It gave him a little pang in his heart to realize she hadn't asked him to tell her why he'd laughed or how he felt. And that she'd probably stopped asking right after he'd snapped at her that day on the plane.

Ah hell, he thought, as familiar clouds drifted into his day. Just as well. That only meant he didn't have to try so hard to protect her from his thoughts…his feelings.

They paused to crane at the Washington Monument, hands lifted to shade their eyes from the morning sun but didn't join the line of tourists waiting to go inside. They were short of time, and Tristan's newly developed claustrophobia was a compelling enough reason all by itself to skip that experience.

"Feel like going all the way to the Lincoln?" Jess asked it lightly, and he knew she thought he'd be impatient with her "mothering."

So he squeezed her hand and forced a grin to let her know he didn't mind. "Sure, why not-we can always catch a cab to the hotel from there."

He didn't know exactly when it had come to him, the realization that it wasn't the Lincoln Memorial he wanted to see, but something else nearby. But he knew that this was a pilgrimage he'd have made on his hands and knees, if necessary. And maybe it was something in his face, his silence, or some kind of woman's intuition, but he didn't have to tell Jessie where he wanted to go. It seemed they both just aimed in that direction without either of them saying a word to the other.

They came to The Wall at its end, the tapering point of the black granite slash that represented the conclusion of the war…that terrible war that had ended with a whimper rather than a bang. Holding hands, they walked slowly along the pathway that led deeper and deeper into the heart of the conflict…the worst of the killing. Beside them, The Wall rose ever higher, and at its apex, the names seemed to tumble out of the granite and overwhelm by their sheer numbers.

Finally Tristan's steps slowed. He paused, heart hammering, turned and faced the shiny black surface. The names…so many names…seemed to dance and shimmer before his eyes. He put out his hand and rested his palm against the cool, smooth stone. His fingers found and traced the tiny cross carved beside one of the names. He felt smothered. The breeze was gone, the bright-blue sky had darkened, and now the cold black wall seemed to close around him.

"The crosses mean MIA," he heard Jess say softly. "I read that, somewhere. When-if-an MIA is accounted for, the body identified, the cross is carved out to make a diamond, like the others."

Tristan nodded, not saying anything. Not trusting himself to say anything. What he wanted to do was bow his head and let the tears come. He wanted to cry for those lost ones as he could never cry for himself. The lost ones who'd never made it home.

But Jessie was there, and he couldn't let her know how much he hurt. So he nodded and said gruffly, "I know." He pressed his palm hard against the granite, as if he could imprint the name of that lost soul there. Then he turned to face the light…the sunshine…the grass and the sky…the towering spire of the Washington Monument.

At least, he thought, drawing the sweet-scented air deep into his lungs, I'm one of the lucky ones. I made it back.