I sat up straighter and turned to look at Jax, who was next to me. There were six of us on this patrol and in this vehicle: two in the front and four in the back facing each other. Our uniforms were on, guns attached to us as we gripped them with our hands. We were ready for anything. We were always ready.
Jax’s gaze met mine, and I knew at that moment he felt it too. I opened my mouth to tell the driver to pull over, but I was too late. An explosion went off and catapulted us all into the air. We rolled several times, and it felt like the Humvee disintegrated into nothing. Burning flesh seared my nostrils and screams of pain ricocheted in my ears. My breath had been forced out of me as I got thrown out of the remaining part of the vehicle and hit the ground. I couldn’t get my mouth to work. I couldn’t get any words out and—
I gasped, flung myself out of bed, and whipped my head back and forth, searching for the imminent threat. Beads of sweat rolled down the sides of my face, and I swore I could feel the heat surrounding me and the heaviness of my Marine uniform weighing me down. But I wasn’t there. I wasn’t back in Afghanistan. I was home. I was in the States. I was in my bedroom.
A dream. It was just a dream.
My hand clutched at my chest as my racing heart started to slow, and I swiped my arm over my face, trying to bring myself fully back to the here and now. Light shone through a gap in my blind, so I ambled over to the window and let it up completely, needed the morning light to wake me up and bring me out of the hazy state I was in.
It had felt so real—they always felt so real. It wasn’t a dream I was having, though. It was more like a memory being replayed over and over in my head. We’d lost four of the other people in the Humvee that day. Four men who had fought by my side. Four men who became like brothers to me. But now there was only me and Jax left. We got to come back stateside still breathing.
And they hadn’t.
I placed my palms on the glass pane of my window and stared out into my backyard. The grass needed cutting, and the deck needed blasting with a power washer, but I hadn’t had the time to do either of those things. My house had been my first big purchase, the thing I’d saved up for from the moment I started earning my own money, but it was empty with only me in it. It didn’t matter how much furniture I put in it, or however many throw pillows Belle kept buying me, it was still a place which felt half complete.
Shaking my head, I pushed off the window and spun around. My king-size bed sat in the middle of the bedroom, and I ripped the sheets off it, knowing after the dream I’d had they’d be full of sweat, and there was no way I’d sleep on them again tonight. I threw them in the hamper in the bathroom and stepped right into the shower. The cold water blasted over my skin, and I sighed in relief.
I needed to be on full alert today because it was family cookout day, a tradition that was started before I was even born. My mom and dad always hosted them in their backyard, and the entire family turned up, including the unrelated people. We were a big extended bunch, but I knew I could turn to each and any one of them if I needed to.
I thought about Elodie and what had happened to her a few days ago. I’d messaged her, but she hadn’t replied—not that I’d expected her to. Maybe I shouldn’t have sent her a message. Maybe I’d overstepped some invisible line I hadn’t even realized was there. Or maybe I was overthinking it. I’d helped her as much as she’d let me, but that didn’t mean she didn’t need more help. But it wasn’t my place. It wasn’t like she was anything to me, so why did that single thought cause a heaviness in my chest? Why did I want so badly to knock on her trailer door and
see if she was okay?
I closed my eyes and let the water rain over me as I tried to get all my thoughts in order. My brain was a jumbled mess, which I needed to sort through. I had to compartmentalize everything just so I could survive the day ahead.
I finished washing, then stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around my waist. The large mirror above the basin was fogged up, and I didn’t bother wiping it as I brushed my teeth. Sometimes it was hard to look myself in the eyes and witness what shone inside them. The past was exposed for all to see, and I was afraid everyone would see it, which was why I had to lock it all down before I left.
And that was exactly what I did, once I was dressed in some dark jeans and a T-shirt. I halted at my front door, took a deep breath, and made sure I was the Asher everyone expected to see. The Asher who laughed and joked, the Asher who anyone could talk to. I didn’t want to be the Asher who constantly relived events from the past. Or the Asher who had a scar take up the entirety of his left thigh. I wanted to be the old Asher, even if it was only for a few hours.
It didn’t take me long to get to my mom and dad’s place across town, and as soon as I walked in the house, I could hear Belle and Aria laughing. I pasted a grin on my face and sauntered into the kitchen. “Afternoon, ladies,” I greeted, putting on my easygoing attitude.
“Ladies?” Belle snorted. “Where the heck do you think you are? In the 1900s?” She raised a brow and tilted her head to the side, mocking me.
“What?” I widened my eyes at her and flicked my gaze to Aria. “I was tryin’ to be polite.”
“You were being weird is what you were doing.”
“Me?” I gasped, in the same way I’d heard Belle gasp since she was a teen. “How dare you.”
“How dare me?” Belle asked, stepping forward. “How dare you think you can call me a lady—”
“Would you prefer me to call you a gentleman?”
“Mom!” Belle shouted. “Asher called me a man!”
“Asher,” Mom huffed out, and I spun around, not realizing she was standing behind us. “Don’t pick on your sister.” Her brown hair was graying in parts, but she hadn’t dyed it to cover it. She was in her early fifties, and I was sure she was happier now than when she was younger. She could do more than I could, and I was thirty-two.
“Mom, seriously?” I shook my head, but she just stared at me in that way like she always did. She knew me and Belle were as bad as each other. “I didn’t say—”
“It’s crazy how you’re both in your thirties, and yet it’s as if you’re small kids, arguing over who gets to be the captain of the ship,” Aria inserted, leaning against the kitchen counter. Aria was my older brother’s girlfriend, which kind of made her my sister-in-law, although they’d never married. They’d been together since before I could remember.
“That would be me who is captain,” Belle inserted, smirking at me as she pointed at her chest. “I was always the best captain.”
“You were not,” I growled, following her as she exited the kitchen. “You never let me be captain, and I was the one who had a ship for a bed.” It was the truth. I had this amazing bed when I was a kid, but she always had to be the boss, no matter what.
“Whatever, you’re just a sore loser.” She walked past Dad, who was manning the grill, kissed his cheek, and then moved over to Ford, who was sitting at the table.
“Since when did I lose?” I asked, stopping at the edge of the decking and widening my stance as I looked down at Belle. She may have been able to talk forever, but she was still shorter than me. “I seem to remember you not be able to eat as many pizzas as me.”