The Way Home

Chapter 4

LIVING ON LAKE KABETOGAMA WAS like living in a fishbowl. There were no secrets. Kabby was a small, tightly knit community of shopkeepers, innkeepers, carpenters, and loggers mixed in with the summer residents and a steady rotation of tourists, many of whom were repeat resort customers summer after summer. Everyone looked out for everyone else—to excess sometimes—and word of a change in the norm moved faster than Kayla’s fingers across the keypad on her iPhone.

There were several restaurants on the lake within ten miles of the store where they could go for dinner but nowhere close where Jess wouldn’t run into someone she knew—from the owners to the waitresses to the regulars. So when Ty picked her up promptly at six and asked where she’d like to eat, she hadn’t hesitated.

“Would you mind terribly making the twenty-minute trip back to the Falls?” Since International Falls had the only airport within eighty miles, she’d figured he’d rented his Jeep there. “We can swing over to Rainey Lake. There’s a pretty good restaurant right on the water.” In this land of ten thousand lakes, there was always a restaurant on another lake within driving distance.

“And a pretty good chance no one will find out you’re on a dinner date?”

He got points for being intuitive. “It would be nice to think so, but that ship has already sailed, I’m afraid.”

“Kayla?”

She smiled. “The girl has a network that would make Ma Bell green with envy.”

“Am I causing trouble for you?”

Oh, she’d have to contend with dozens of “drop-ins” within a day or so, people stopping by the store on the pretense of needing a loaf of bread or a case of soda or any number of excuses, but in truth, they’d all be angling for information. Nothing she couldn’t deflect.

J.R.’s brother, Brad, however, would be a different story. Brad had been wonderful since J.R. died. Helpful, supportive, and kind. But she knew exactly what his reaction would be when he heard about Tyler Brown. He’d be resentful. Angry, even. He’d loved his brother. He cared about her, but he would consider her interest in any man a betrayal—even after three years. More than once, she’d heard him say, “Mallards mate for life. If the drake dies, the hen never pairs up again.” Brad believed the adage applied to human marriage, too.

“No trouble,” she lied, and put Brad out of her mind. She’d deal with him when the time came… which, if Kayla’s grapevine was humming, would probably be sometime tomorrow morning.

Tonight was about what happened tonight. Now that she had acclimated herself to the truth—Tyler Brown had come a long way to see her—there were things she wanted to set straight both in her mind and in his. Starting with the dressing down she’d given herself as she’d showered and gotten ready. Having dinner and polite conversation with this man was fine. But she was a pragmatic person. She knew that was as far as it was ever going to go—dinner and conversation—regardless of what he might be thinking. Regardless of how flattering it was. Once he thought about it, he’d realize it, too.

She’d reaffirmed that as they made the drive, and now, with her head on straight, she looked across their table near the window with Rainy Lake shimmering in a wide, glistening swath across the northland, glad she’d picked this place. Even though many people she knew frequented the Thunderbird restaurant, they usually reserved their dinners there for the weekends or during the off season. So she figured they had about a ninety-percent shot at anonymity on a Wednesday evening at the height of the tourist season.

“You look very pretty,” Ty said, breaking into her thoughts.

She didn’t know about pretty, but she did know it pleased her a little too much that he’d said she was. She’d turned up a soft white cotton knit top with a deep U neckline and little capped sleeves that was almost new and fit her like a glove, then tucked the shirt into a summer print skirt she’d bought for one of the Bradley boys’ weddings two summers ago. The skirt hit her mid-thigh, and between it and a pair of woven sandals with wedge heels, her legs looked long and toned.

She hadn’t given a thought to removing the wedding ring that felt like it had always been a part of her. In fact, it felt like a protective barrier of sorts tonight. A reminder of many things. She’d seen Ty’s gaze stray to her left hand when she’d gotten into the Jeep, wondered what he’d been thinking and embarrassed by her hands, which were work-rough, with short, no-nonsense nails. Nothing she could do about that, but she’d been glad for Kayla’s jasmine and musk lotion. It had taken a couple of applications to smooth out her hands and moisturize her arms and legs to a dew-soft glow.

There wasn’t a lot she could do with her hair, but for once, the curls fell softly around her face and were actually kind of flattering. Or maybe it was the eyeliner she’d lightly smudged on her lids and the bit of blush she’d brushed on her cheeks. It had been so long since she’d made herself up and dressed for a man—even though it was not that kind of a date—and she actually felt a little foolish for making the effort tonight.

It hadn’t stopped her, though. She’d traded her standby gold studs for a pair of dangly copper earrings sculpted into the shape of feathers. Her necklace matched. The local artisan who had made the set had called the necklace a cleavage piece, and as Jess felt it warm against her skin, she felt a tiny stirring of arousal that self-consciousness quickly undercut.

Maybe she shouldn’t have worn it, because not only had she noticed Ty’s gaze on her left hand, but once or twice, it had also drifted to the feather between her breasts before he’d quickly looked away again.

And whoa, he was watching her face now, she realized, about the same time that she realized she’d been so busy second-guessing the effort she’d taken to look nice that she hadn’t responded to his compliment.

She met his eyes across the table and blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “You look pretty, too.”

“Thanks. I think.”

They both smiled at that, and she worked hard at stalling a blush. His dark hair wasn’t overly long, but the tips had been wet when he’d arrived, which had conjured an immediate and vivid picture of him naked under a steamy spray—along with a jarring olfactory memory of how wonderful a man smelled fresh from a shower.

She’d be lying if she said she didn’t think about and miss sex. And yes, nights when the bed felt so empty and she ached with loneliness, she’d call on a memory or a fantasy and make the occasional solo flight, and oh, boy, she needed to steer clear of that arena right now.

Except that the man watching her with compelling and inquisitive eyes made that next to impossible. He really did look pretty. She’d told him to dress casual—everything in the summer in northern Minnesota was casual—and he’d taken her at her word. He’d traded his white T-shirt, jeans, and deck shoes for a soft butter-yellow T-shirt, olive-drab cargo shorts, and brown leather sandals. When he’d pulled up, he’d been wearing aviator shades that hid his eyes—eyes that had latched on to her from behind those dark glasses for several long, humming seconds that started up that muscle clenching she didn’t seem to have much control over when he was around.

He was tan and buff and self-assured, and if that wasn’t enough, every time he smiled, something inside her melted a little bit more and reminded her, again, that while Bear had taken away some of the sting of being alone, a snuggly puppy was no substitute for a man.

However, a man like Ty—so much like J.R.—was fine for dinner and conversation, but beyond that, he was way too risky.

He’d ordered a bottle of red wine, and she reached for her glass. “I meant to ask earlier. How are your friends? And your brother? Mike, right?”

A smile came over his face that conveyed how much he loved his brother. “Joe and Stephanie are fine. And Mike—well, Mike is Mike. There’s not a lot more to say… except that he’s living in the States again, so I get to see him a little more often.”

“What is it that he does, exactly?”

Another fond smile. “Let’s leave it at Mike has one of those jobs where if I told you what he does, he’d have to kill me.”

“You two don’t work together?”

“As a rule? No.”

She didn’t miss the implication. All Mike had to do was call, and no matter what he needed, Ty would be there. Yup. Way too risky. Been there, done that. Had the condolences of the U.S. military to prove it.

Time for a new topic. “Did Shelley get you settled at the resort?”

He lifted his wine, too, and something about the way his strong, lean fingers wrapped around the delicate stem of the glass captivated her.

“She did. Nice lady. Very nice resort.”

“Shelley and Darrin—her husband—run a tidy ship.” The Whispering Pines boasted twelve rustic log cabins with varying numbers of bedrooms, all charmingly furnished with an eclectic mix of new and antique furniture and art that Shelley had collected locally over the years, and all with gorgeous lake views.

“Been a long time since I breathed deep and all I smelled was pine. Makes me think of home.”

She stopped with the wine almost to her lips. “Florida’s not home?”

“It is now, yeah. Key West. But I grew up in Colorado. Very rural. Our log house was a lot like the main lodge at the resort. Huge native stone fireplace, open beams, big wraparound porch.”

The wistfulness in his voice and the soft smile on his lips told her that home for him was a very fond memory. “You miss it.”

He shrugged. “Like I said. Been a long time since I’ve smelled air this fresh. Substitute horses for motorboats, and I’m almost back there.”

“Are your parents still there?”

“Yeah. Saw them last month. They’re doing great.”

“So why Key West?”

He settled back in his chair, looking very male and very comfortable with himself. “That’s where my business is. Air cargo.”

It had taken several months for the full story to emerge about the events of the night Ty and his brother and Joe and Stephanie Green had rescued Stephanie’s parents—her mother was now secretary of State—from would-be assassins. “We can’t comment for reasons of national security,” had been the answer most given when reporters had knocked on doors attempting to ferret out the facts. But a local reporter had been dogged about digging up all the details he could. Airport personnel had confirmed that Mike Brown had indeed successfully landed a small private jet at the International Falls airport in the midst of a blizzard and that Ty had been his copilot.

“You were military.” She’d known the first time she’d met him that he was or had been in the service. All it had taken was a look. J.R. had been Special Forces. All those guys had a look about them. Edgy, intense, focused.

“Right. Navy.”

“Navy what?” Every man in uniform was a special man, but again, she had recognized him from the beginning as something more.

He looked out over the lake, then back at her. “HSC-23. Wildcards.”

She shook her head. “Sorry. I’m not familiar.”

“Air ambulance. We choppered casualties in and out of combat zones in southern and western Iraq to supplement the Army’s Dustoff operations.”

Because she’d been married to a Green Beret, she was semiliterate in spec-ops speak, but this was a new term for her. “Dustoff?”

“A credo attributed to a guy named Kelly—Major Charles L. Kelly. Back in the Vietnam era.” He stopped. Shook his head. “But you don’t want to hear this.”

“Actually, I do. Tell me about Kelly and Dustoff.”

He shrugged. “Kelly—Combat Kelly—was commander of the 57th Medical Detachment, helicopter ambulance. He was some kind of man. ‘Dustoff’ was his call sign. When there were wounded, in came Kelly, no matter what. July sixty-four, Vietnam, he approached a hot area to pick up wounded, as usual, and started taking fire. The red cross on the bird’s fuselage made a nice bull’s-eye,” he added, with the insight of one who knows and has been under fire himself.

“Anyway, ground support called him off over and over, but he didn’t listen. ‘When I have your wounded,’ he told them. Not long after, he was killed by a single bullet.”

Ty became quiet and reflective for a moment. “Anyway, Kelly’s gone, but ‘Dustoff’ became the call sign for all aero-medical missions in Vietnam. And since then, ‘When I have your wounded’ has become the personal and collective credo of all Dustoff pilots who followed him.”

While he’d said very little about himself directly, he’d revealed a lot. J.R. used to tell her about the bravery of the medical-evac crews. Because the Army and Navy air ambulance birds have a red cross painted on their sides, the Geneva Convention rules don’t allow them to arm themselves with machine guns or mini-guns. Pilots like Kelly and Ty flew into hot zones with nothing but personal weapons—M-4 rifles and handguns—for protection against RPGs and small-arms fire. This practice was supposed to ensure humanitarian treatment of wounded during war, making aircraft, ships, corpsmen, trucks, facilities, and anything else displaying red crosses off-limits to enemy fire. Big surprise, the Taliban and Al-Qaeda—like the Vietcong in Kelly’s era—were not signatories to the Geneva Convention, so they use the red crosses as targets.

“My husband held the medical crews in very high regard. He said what you did was the equivalent to tap dancing blindfolded into a minefield.”

Another throwaway lift of a shoulder. “Everybody’s got a job to do.”

He looked at her then. “Your husband…”

“J.R.,” she supplied when he hesitated. “Army. Special Forces.”

She toyed with her wineglass. Another change of subject seemed in order. “So… you weren’t a career man?”

A slow shake of his head. “Wanted to be.” Another shrug. “Didn’t work out.”

The statement begged for a follow-up, but the distant look in his eyes told her it might be best not to go there. That maybe it was a confidence he didn’t want to share and she didn’t need to hear. Not on a date that was not a date.

Clearly, though, his military career had been cut short. She wondered if he’d been injured in some way—couldn’t tell by looking, although now that she thought about it, she had detected a slight limp when he’d first gotten out of the Jeep. She’d chalked it up to a long plane ride in one of the cramped commuter jets that routinely flew in and out of the small airport in the Falls.

“So enough about me,” he said with a quick smile. “Why a general store in the middle of Nowhere, Minnesota?”

It was her turn to shrug. “I grew up here. Kabby, Lake Kabetogama,” she clarified, “it’s home. Crossroads was my mom and dad’s store. When they retired in Arizona a few years ago, it seemed like taking it over was the right thing to do at the right time.”

“Before that, what did you do?”

“I was an ER nurse. Last place I worked was Womack, the Army Medical Center near Fort Bragg—it was the last place we were stationed.”

He looked impressed, and she tried not to let it please her. “You miss it?”

“Nursing? No. At least, not yet.”

“Burn out?”

“Some, yeah,” she admitted. “But it was more than that. After J.R. died… I guess I needed to come home, you know?”

She could see in his eyes that he did know.

“Anyway, on any given day, I end up treating anything from sunburn to sunstroke to removing fish hooks embedded in… well, you can imagine some of the places those things get stuck. So I still keep my fingers in the pie, so to speak.”

“Sort of a local Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman?”

She grinned. “Closest doctor is twenty, twenty-five minutes from the lake. Everyone knows I’m a nurse. So I’m going to turn them away?”

“No, I don’t imagine you would. You didn’t turn me away.”

Not that winter night. Not today. She didn’t regret what she’d done that night. She hoped she wouldn’t regret not sending him on his way today.

The waitress had brought their salads several minutes ago, and they’d both been halfheartedly working on them when he finally posed the question about something she’d been too chicken to ask.

“Why haven’t you asked me what took me so long to come back?”

She looked across the table—and saw in his eyes that the small talk was over.