His Girl Next Door: The Army Ranger's Return / New York's Finest Rebel / The Girl from Honeysuckle Farm

“Why don’t you practice on me,” she suggested, voice soft. “You can pretend I’m George.”

He nodded. She only just registered the incline of his head as he moved it.

Jessica took a deep breath. “Okay, I’ll start.” She paused. “Why did you really go back to war so soon? Why didn’t you come home? Stay with me?”

He kept his eyes shut. “I can’t answer that.”

She sighed and sat back. On second thought she reached for his hand, wanting to give him strength even if it hurt her. “If you can’t be honest with me, how are you going to be honest with a boy who wants the truth?”

She watched as Ryan’s thumb traced her palm, holding her hand back. It felt so good it hurt, but she didn’t dare pull her hand away. Couldn’t. The tingle in her fingertips and the pulse at her neck were enough to make her stay put.

When he was ready to talk he dropped his hold and pulled his chair around to face her head-on. She forced herself to breathe, had to concentrate on every inhale and exhale of her lungs.

“Okay, let’s do this.”

She nodded, still off balance from touching him, from his skin connecting with hers. From wanting him to do it again and hating herself for even thinking about him like that.

Ryan squeezed his eyes shut one more time then focused, looking firmly into hers.

“I left because going away was easier than staying. I was a coward and I should have been here for you.”

Jessica gulped silently as tears pooled in her eyes. This was what he’d been needing to say for so long. There was no disguising the pain in his voice.

“Go on,” she urged huskily.

“I told myself that you would be better off without me, and I felt guilty over your mom’s death. Like if only I’d loved her more, been here for her more, she could have pulled through. Everyone thought we had this perfect life, and in many ways we did, but then when she got sick everything just went into free fall, and after a while it was easier to just stay away than deal with her death.” He paused. “And with you.”

Jessica stood and walked away a few steps. She couldn’t help it. Tears hit her cheeks and trickled their way down her jaw. She’d known hurt before, known what it was like to be left, but she also knew what it was like to be the one who did the hurting.

“Jess?”

“I’m sorry, it’s just …”

“Did I say something wrong?” He sounded concerned.

She reached her fingertips to her face and brushed the tears away. Before she could turn large hands fell on her arms, holding her from behind.

“I shouldn’t have said all that, but once I started it …”

Jessica closed her eyes then turned back to face him. She’d tried not to let her own feelings intrude, but it was hard. Impossible even.

“I lost someone once, too, Ryan, that’s all. Hearing you say all that kind of brought that back. I don’t know why but it did.”

His eyes questioned her but he didn’t say anything. Instead it was as if a metal guard had been raised, shielding his gaze and putting a wall between them. A divide that hadn’t been there before.

Jessica didn’t want to think about her past. Probably as much as Ryan wanted to disclose his, if the look on his face right now was any indication. It did give them something in common. Not exactly the common element most people would wish for, but on some level she did understand him. And if she wanted to tell him, he’d probably feel the same about her. But she didn’t want to, and the last thing she intended was burdening him with her problems, or letting her mind dwell on what could happen to her.

“You know what? I think maybe it’s time for me to go,” he said, suddenly looking like a startled animal within sight of a predator. As if he wanted to flee the scene.

“Okay.” Now she was the one confused. “Do you want to maybe grab dinner tonight? Do that ‘start over’ thing again?”

He was smiling but it looked forced. Not like before.

“Can we take a rain check on that? Maybe tomorrow night?”

Ouch. She hadn’t seen that one coming. She’d overreacted, not been able to keep her emotions in check, but she hadn’t realized he’d react like that.

“How about you call me when you’re free?” she suggested.

He nodded and turned back toward the house. “See you, bud.”

At least he’d said goodbye to the dog.

“I’m sorry, Jess. It’s just that I need to pick George up from school.”

She shrugged. Even she knew that school didn’t get out for a while yet. “I get it. We can catch up later.”

She followed him back into the house, wondering what she would give to truly start over with him and be the strong girl from the letters. To go back to him standing on her doorstep and make the day turn out completely different.

His tall frame disappeared through the door and he didn’t look back, his broad shoulders and dark hair fading from sight.

Jessica stood with her hands on her hips and surveyed the huge stretch of canvas on the floor in front of her. Not her best work, but the colors were brilliant. The organic paint took some getting used to, although if it meant no toxic fumes she had no intention of complaining.

She’d tried to focus on her new piece, but her mind kept wandering. Going to a place she didn’t want to go back to but couldn’t claw out from.

She found it was easier sometimes to pretend it hadn’t happened. When you were surrounded by people who loved you or who had been the cause of grief, it sucked something from you. Pulled you into a world you didn’t want to confront.

Like her cancer. She’d dealt with. Fought it. Survived it.

Yet her family treated her like she needed permanent wrapping in cotton wool just to survive each day now. Looked at her in a way that made her uncomfortable. And she hated it.

Was that how Ryan felt? The same way she did when she looked in the mirror and saw the reality of her body? Is that how he felt about being home? About the reality of what he’d gone through and then battled every day? How it was to come home and face something you’d run from for years?

Sometimes she felt like that, too. Sometimes she wished she could run away from what had happened and leave it all behind. But just like Ryan had had to return, so had she. To the reality of life as a cancer survivor.

She let her hand brush over the almost-hard contour of her breast, skimming the side of it, not caring that her fingers were covered in paint. Jessica sighed. She’d always mocked women with implants. Found it hard to fathom why breast augmentation was such an attraction.

She smiled with the irony. When she’d faced the reality of a double mastectomy, the first question she’d asked was what kind of reconstruction they could do. How they could give her her femininity back. Her breasts.

So now she had teardrop-shaped silicone implants that were better than nothing, but that still made her shake her head sometimes. That despite being diagnosed with cancer, facing chemo, knowing there was a chance she could die, all she’d wanted was to feel like a woman again. To know that even though they didn’t feel soft when they’d once been natural, she still had her femininity, even if it had meant facing cosmetic reconstructive surgery to obtain them.

Maybe it was the same for Ryan. Without being a soldier, he would feel like less of a man, less of a human being. Maybe that was why he felt he had to go back, had to return to his unit. Had to offer himself up for redeployment.

If she could talk to him, explain to him how she felt, maybe it would help him. Help them both. But she couldn’t do it.

She didn’t want him to know. Couldn’t tell him. Because then he’d start looking at her the same way everyone else did, and with Ryan, she just wanted to be Jessica. Not the girl with cancer. The girl in remission. Or the girl who’d already lost her sister to the disease.

Maybe he wouldn’t look at her differently, or treat her like a different person, but she wasn’t prepared to risk it. Not when she only had a limited time to enjoy having a friend like Ryan.