Page 59 of Echoes in the Storm
“Of course.”
“What was your wife like?” Cam whispers to the dark.
“Are you sure you want to talk about this?”
She moves around on top of me, and even though I can’t see her, I know she’s propped herself up by the bony elbows digging into my ribs. “I feel as though she’s a part of what made you who you are today, and if I want to know the gorgeous man in my bed a little better, I need to understand that aspect of your history as well.”
I get what she’s saying, but a part of me is reluctant to tell her because that would only open the Pandora’s box of pain and confusion I’ve kept shelved for so long.If she did it, so can you.
“We got together the same year I enlisted in the army,” I explain. “We were young: I’d literally just turned twenty, and she was nineteen.”
“High school sweethearts?”
“No. We met after graduating. Her brother was friends with mine. We didn’t date for long before we were married.”
“Love at first sight, then?”
“Not quite. I thought if I married her it would tame her jealous streak.” I chuckle, recalling the night of my stag do. “Just made her worse. She had a wicked temper when it came to other women and me.”
“She loved you.” Cam says. “I’d be jealous too.”
“That so?” I reach out and run my hands over her head, brushing Cam’s hair off her face.
“Mm-hmm.” She leans across and flicks the lamp on, a shy smile on her lips as I blink at the light. “I figured we’re not trying to sleep anyway.”
Doesn’t bother me any. At least I can see her now, read her expressions and reactions to the things I tell her.
Cam pushes on my chest to lean forward and place a chaste kiss to my lips. “Carry on.”
“There’s not much else to say, other than we decided to start a family while I was home between deployments. She was six and half months pregnant when they died.”
“Why didn’t you say that before?” Cammie frowns. “Duke?”
“Never seemed relevant, given what you went through. I didn’t want you to feel as though I was cheapening your loss by comparing it to mine.” I run my thumb across her bottom lip as she stares at me, her frown still in place.
“Why would you think that’s how I’d feel?”
“Because you knew your daughter,” I say. “I didn’t meet my son. He didn’t have a name until he died with her.”
“Doesn’t make him any less important,” she whispers.
I wipe the tear from her cheek and continue, keen to get this conversation finished and shelved again for another day. “We’d talked the week before, and she was happy; baby was good, she was healthy.” I pause when I realise Cam stares at me with a sad smile on her face. “What?”
“Nothing really. It’s just …”
I lift my eyebrows to tell her to explain.
“It’s just the look on your face when you talk about her. I can tell you loved her.”
She picks her words carefully, but I can still see the uncertainty in her eyes, feel the tension in her body. Yeah, I loved my wife. Still do. But our time together came to an end the day she died, and this fucking ace of a girl lying on top of me needs to know that.
“Lovedher,” I stress. “She’ll always be in my heart, but Cam, it’s time to move on. I’m ready to find forever in someone else, someone who’s here, now.”
She can’t hide her relief. Cam’s cheeks pink as she tucks her chin against me to hide her face behind her hair.
With my thumbs on her jaw, I coax her head up again, holding her gaze. “Talk to me.”
“It’s nothing.”