out her kitchen window to Chris’s new front door. The sun was just starting to light up the sky. Was she going to be able to maintain her distance from him? It had been so hard since he came back, so wounded, so hurt. She wanted nothing more than to be able to wrap her arms around him, but she’d been with Aaron. And Chris had made it more than apparent that he wanted her to maintain her distance. Now, given their history and his impending proximity, distance was an impossibility. But where did this leave them? She still wanted to wrap him in her arms, but she’d given up that right when she’d accepted his death the year before. Another man for which she felt entirely too much guilt over.
* * *
Moving day. It was past time for him to move out of Cassie’s house. Chris lifted the last box into the moving truck, wondering for the fiftieth time that morning if this was a huge mistake. Could he live next door to Julie? Of course the answer was yes. There was nothing to stop him, especially since he’d already signed the lease and had the keys to the townhouse in his pocket. But was it really a good idea?
There was no doubt Julie wasn’t in a good place in her head right now, the dark circles under her eyes became more pronounced daily as her clothes became baggier. But would his move make that better or worse? All their friends could see nothing but positive things about him moving in to watch over her. They all knew she was drowning under her grief from Aaron’s death. But they didn’t know about the history between the two of them, and he feared this might risk her mental state even more.
No one knew what happened that Valentine’s Day weekend fourteen months ago and both he and Julie had carefully avoided discussing it since he’d been back. That was better though. There was no repairing the damage done by his broken promise. He’d promised he’d come back healthy and safe. That didn’t happen. They were both very different people now than they’d been then. They could only move forward and that meant helping Julie to heal.
Chris squinted into the sun. Damn, only April 25th and it was already too damn hot in the West Texas sun. He rubbed his left knee to ease the ache. He probably shouldn’t have run this morning, as this day was shaping up to be a hard test for the newly re-formed knee. Made up of more steel plates, screws and rods now than original body parts, this knee probably qualified for bionic status. Too bad it didn’t feel that way.
“You’re barely off those crutches. Why don’t you let Jake and I handle the rest of the carrying for the day?” His older brother, Colton, stepped around him in his usual take-charge manner.
Chris tried to curb the irritation that came from dealing with Colton’s attitude. The two of them had come a long way, but his heavy-handedness with Chris still chafed. “I’ll be fine. I talked to my physical therapist earlier in the week and told her I was moving. She said the knee was strong enough to handle the extra stress. Don’t worry, Colt. I have no intention of doing something that will land me back on crutches. I never want to see those things again.”
Colton struggled to keep his mouth shut and Chris had to work to hide his smile. Colt’s girlfriend, Penelope, was good for him. Any given day, Colton was incredibly bossy and overbearing, but now he’d physically bite his tongue when he knew he was about to overstep. The guy would be lucky if he had a tongue left after ten years of marriage to her.
But from what he’d seen of the two of them together, Penelope wanted to keep Colton’s tongue in good shape. Their public displays of affection were damn distracting. These days it seemed like everyone in his family was getting some but him, which brought him right back to Julie again.
She’d been the last girl he kissed. The last one he made love to before that fated deployment. She seemed so damaged now. He wanted to pull her into his arms and protect her.
He was worried about her. They all were. Julie was the quiet one and didn’t share much with any of them, but they could all see her struggle and it was becoming more and