Winds of Fortune Read Free

the skin turned pale and the scar disappeared. “No.”
    Nita’s immediate impulse was to apologize, because she heard not anger, but pain in Deo’s voice. Then a sudden realization turned her cold inside. She knew nothing of this woman except that she was beautiful and at the moment, in pain. A dangerous combination that she found all too compelling, and exactly the kind of woman she wanted nothing to do with.
    “I’ll be in to see your cousin in just a few moments,” Nita said, then pulled a chart off the nearest door and quickly stepped inside.
    Deo stared at the closed door, feeling the sudden silence in the hall like a weight on her chest. She had let a stranger stir her up, and worse, rouse banished memories. No one did that. She never let anyone close enough to risk awakening those unforgiven sins.

    *

    “Is Reese home yet?” Tory asked breathlessly as she hurried through the door into the sunny living room. She petted the concrete block-sized head of the Mastiff that ambled to greet her. “Hi Jedi.”
    “Not yet.” Kate, a blond version of her dark-haired, blue-eyed daughter Reese, held out a squirming toddler to Tory. “And the birthday girl has been asking.”
    “Hey, honey,” Tory said, taking her daughter. Reggie replied with a string of excited words, the bulk of which sounded like ma ma ma ma ma . Tory laughed. “That’s me. Well, one of them anyways.”
    When she kissed Reggie’s forehead, the wind coming in from the open door to the deck off the living area blew her hair into Reggie’s face. Reggie promptly grabbed a handful and held it to her mouth. Reggie’s red gold locks were lighter than Tory’s own auburn hair and her eyes more blue than green, but everyone said they could see Tory in Reggie. Sometimes when Tory looked at her daughter, she was struck with helpless wonder at what a miracle she was. At the sound of the screen door closing, Tory lifted her eyes from her daughter to the other miracle in her life.
    When she returned from Iraq, Reese had been thinner than Tory had ever seen her, as if the desert winds and searing heat and senseless, relentless death had carved away everything except what she needed to survive. But she had survived. And she had come home. Wounded, disillusioned, weary in body and soul. But alive. She had come home where she was loved and needed.
    With her coal black hair trimmed neatly at her collar, her intense deep-blue eyes, and her imposing body in a crisp khaki uniform, Sheriff Reese Conlon radiated strength. But Tory saw what others didn’t. Though Reese insisted she was recovered, she was still too thin, and there were still too many shadows under her eyes and in her eyes. Tory knew Reese tried to hide them, just as she knew that she tried to hide the fact that she rarely slept an entire night—or even more than an hour at a time. She didn’t know if Reese would ever talk about what haunted her. Not all pain could be purged. Until the time came, if it ever came, when Reese asked her to share that pain, Tory would give her the only thing she had to give—herself, in every way she could.
    Tory smiled at her lover. “Hello, darling.”
    “Hi, baby. I’m sorry I’m late.” Reese tossed her uniform hat and car keys onto the counter that separated the kitchen from the living area, smiled at her mother, and strode across the room to Tory. She put her arms around her and the baby, kissed Tory gently, and nuzzled Reggie’s neck, making her laugh. “Hi, Champ.”
    “You’re not late. I just got here myself.” Handing the baby off to Kate, Tory rested her head on Reese’s shoulder, still unable to forget what it had been like being without her. She had gotten up in the morning, had cared for Reggie, and had gone to the clinic and looked after her patients while all the time sensing that some essential part of herself was missing. She had never experienced anything as frightening as the hollow ache inside that she had known without doubt would