It was nearly seven in the morning on Sunday, almost time for them to get up anyway. "Do you want to talk about it?"
His expression turned grim. "Trust me, those nightmares are something I have to live with, but the details of those dreams aren't something you want to hear about."
"How do you know that?" She wasn't a weak and fragile female who couldn't withstand to hear a few harrowing stones.
"Because the details are shocking, ugly, and vile," he said, an angry, bitter edge to his voice. "And worst of all, what I dream about is real and something I had to live through and will never, ever forget, no matter how hard I try. There's no sense dragging someone else into my own personal hell."
There was so much pain and heartache in his gaze, and it hurt her to see him hurting so much. He was doing his best to push her away emotionally, and she just wasn't going to let him shut her out that way. Hopefully, if he talked about those awful memories, maybe he could begin to heal inside and those nightmares would finally leave him alone.
"What happened to your fiancée. Ben?" she asked softly, persistently.
Sighing heavily, he lay back down on the pillow and draped his arm over his eyes. "Let it go, Christine."
He sounded tired and weary-no doubt tired of carrying so many painful burdens and weary from years of holding it all inside.
"I don't want to let it go." She recalled the picture she'd seen in his apartment of Ben and his fiancée-once very happy and in love. "Tell me about Kim, please?"
When he remained quiet, she tried to think of a way to draw him out, to get him to talk, and decided to start at the beginning. "How did the two of you meet?"
He moved his arm to let one dark brown eye glower at her. "You really aren't going to leave it alone, are you?" he asked gruffly.
She smiled at him, not the least put off by his scowl. She'd learned enough about this man to know that his growl was much worse than his bite. "I'm afraid not, so you might as well start talking."
A deep breath unraveled out of him, and then he spoke. "We met when we were both deployed to Iraq and were stationed at the same Marine base near Fallujah," he said, staring at the ceiling. "We started out as friends, and things progressed from there. We'd planned on getting married as soon as each of our tours in Iraq was over."
Knowing how that had turned out, Christine's heart twisted with anguish for Ben and what he'd endured. "So, she was a Marine, too?"
He nodded. "She was a first lieutenant, and was part of the female search force that was used to pat down the Iraqi women for contraband when they came through checkpoints." Turning his head on the pillow, he met her gaze. "It was a job that had to be handled with sensitivity, and since many Muslim women cover themselves from head to toe to avoid contact with males who aren't close relatives, male Marines aren't allowed to touch them, but they still had to be searched to make sure they weren't concealing any weapons beneath their loose garb."
A small smile touched the corner of his mouth as he remembered, and continued. "She was small compared to a lot of the other female Marines, but Kim was strong and tough when the situation warranted. She dealt with the Iraqi women politely, but firmly, and didn't put up with any shit from anybody."
Christine settled more comfortably beside him on the bed. "You included?" she teased.
"Yeah, me included. She definitely kept me in line, but she was also such a kind and caring person, and as soft as a marshmallow inside. She loved giving candy and school supplies to the Iraqi children we often came into contact with, and she taught the young girls to play hopscotch and recruited us guys to show them how to do double Dutch jump rope. That was not a pretty sight," he said wryly.
She laughed, imagining these big strapping Marines attempting to be light on their feet as they tried to stay in sync with the two turning ropes.
"Anyway, Kim and I came from small towns and shared the same values and similar family situations that bonded us on a deeper level. Her father was an alcoholic that abused her, and she joined the military right after graduating high school as a way to make a better life for herself. And for the time that she was in the military, she did just that."
Christine swallowed hard, trying hard not to think about how big the contrast was between Kim's background and lifestyle, and her own. It reminded her too much of the differences between herself and Ben. "She sounds like a wonderful woman," she said, a bit envious of what the two of them had shared.
"She was my best friend." Shadows of anguish etched his features right before he looked away again. "One night, we were in a convoy of Humvees carrying members of a female search team back to base when we were ambushed. A suicide car bomber drove his vehicle into the second Humvee right in front of ours, which was carrying Kim. The bomb ignited a huge blast that killed the driver and set the vehicle on fire. But that wasn't all. There were about a dozen Iraqi gunmen who joined in on the ambush, too."
His voice had grown thick with excess emotion and he paused, then cleared his throat before continuing. "Kim and the other women in the Humvee immediately jumped out to get away from the fiery explosion, but as she ran toward our vehicle to take cover while we returned fire, she was shot in the back."
As she listened to his story, Christine's chest grew tight with sorrow and she ached deep inside for the pain and loss he'd endured. She knew he wasn't finished, so she remained quiet, waiting for him to go on.
"I saw it all happen, and as soon as she was shot and dropped to the ground, I went after her, right into open fire," he said hoarsely as he relived the harrowing past. "She was so vulnerable and defenseless out there, and I picked her up and ran with her in my arms until we were behind our Humvee while the rest of my unit fought off the gunmen."
He exhaled a shuddering breath and met her gaze again. "I kept telling her to hang on, that she was going to be okay, that I just needed her to hold on until I could get her to a medic. By the time the fight ended, two of the men from my unit, and three of the women, were dead. Including Kim."
The torment and haunting grief in his eyes was a tangible thing. "It should have been me. I should have died that day, not her! I was there in the convoy to protect her, and instead I failed her," he said angrily, then pressed the heels of his palms against his eyes, his bitterness and resentment obviously causing him so much inner turmoil. "She didn't deserve to be murdered in cold blood like that and I would have done anything to give my life for hers."
Christine hated that he felt responsible for Kim's death, that four years after the fact he was still blaming himself for what had happened-for not protecting as he'd been trained to do. But she also knew that there was absolutely nothing she could say that would make him feel differently about the situation. It was his burden to bear, until he was ready to let it go on his own.
She blinked and felt a trickle of moisture roll down her cheek. A tear for the woman he'd loved with such devotion, and had lost in such a devastating way. And sadness for the jaded man he'd become deep inside.
He reached out and gently wiped away the wetness on her cheek, his touch lingering on her face. "Not a pretty story, is it?"
"War is never easy or pretty." she whispered, and even though she knew her next words weren't much in the way of easing his internal misery, they were genuine and she felt compelled to say them anyway. "I'm sorry, Ben. So sorry."
"Me, too." Sliding his fingers around to the nape of her neck, he drew her down so that her head was resting on his chest and she was lying next to his warm, hard body once again.
She could hear the heavy beating of his heart against her ear, and she closed her eyes, wrapped her arms around him, and held him close. It was the only thing she could do to offer him a little comfort, to ease his suffering. To let him know that she cared and was there for him.