A Voice from the Field (5 page)

Connor's voice was patient but aggravating as hell. “You know it's not even supper time. You think maybe you should go easy on that stuff?”

Tia spoke cautiously to avoid slurring her words. “It's almost five.”

He gave a light laugh, making her feel judged even though she knew he didn't intend it. “It's three o'clock, girl. Let's go inside. The Brewers are on TV. They're in New York playing the Mets. I'll throw something on the grill.”

“You go on in. I'm good right here.” Tia hoped he'd take the hint, then felt the warmth of connection when he climbed the remaining steps and moved toward the neighboring chair.
There's no denying it,
she thought.
It's always good to see him.

Tia watched Connor fold his tall, slender frame into the seat, his right leg thrust straight out in front of him. He didn't look her way, just stared out across the open field, his blue eyes radiant in the sunlight, his jawline a near-perfect right angle, stubbled with a day's growth. The John Deere ball cap she had bought him at last year's state fair was pulled low over his brow, covering his thick blond hair.

“All right then, fine. Go on and sit there if you want, but don't ruin this for me.” She leaned her head back against the chair and closed her eyes. “I'm just about right where I want to be.”

Tia and Connor had gone to high school together. Well, not really together—Tia was a sophomore at Newberg High when Connor was a senior. He'd been making plenty of noise on the local sports scene as a star pitcher on the school's baseball team, but to Tia he was just one of five hundred students. He liked to take long looks at her … but after he passed she usually glanced back over her shoulder, taking a good look of her own.

After graduating, Connor had signed with the Brewers' Single-A team, the Appleton Timber Rattlers. He'd soon realized that an 83 mph fastball might mean something in high school, but it was a pitch made for batting practice in the pros, even if you could dress it up with a pretty good curve. After a single season, Connor returned to Newberg to work the family farm.

They hadn't really been in contact then—there was no connection between them, after all. So Tia had been quite surprised when she'd joined the Marines and climbed aboard a bus for a twenty-two-hour trip to Parris Island—and found Connor Anderson sitting by a window, with an open seat beside him. Tia was just eighteen and Connor was a month shy of his twenty-first birthday and it was during that long journey that they really got to know each other. Thinking about the bus ride still made her want to smile and cry at the same time.

Connor had spoken of his love of farming and his dream of owning land of his own. He'd talked about the secret of aging cheese and about the government conspiracy that was behind milk prices. He'd decided to join up to do his part in the fight against terror. He really believed in it. To him, the Marines were his way of paying back his country. Tia had just wanted to get the hell out of Newberg.

By the time they arrived at the recruit depot in South Carolina, Tia was thinking it was too bad they hadn't met before signing their lives away. Five minutes after the bus pulled in, Connor headed for the male side of the island and Tia went the other way. She didn't see him again until three years later, on the medevac chopper that carried them both out of Helmond Province. Tia with a flesh wound from a nasty fall that took a dozen sutures to close; Connor with his right leg shredded from the hip down and his left gone at the knee. What was left of him was in shock and near death. Looking at him now, she was impressed as hell with how far he had come.

Connor scratched at his hip socket—Tia knew that on hot days like this his skin became raw from rubbing against the hard plastic—but when he spoke his voice was lazy and laconic as ever, betraying no discomfort. “Hand me one of those?” He flapped one hand toward the ice bucket.

Tia passed over a cold bottle of beer.

“Shot of Patrón?” She figured she had to offer.

He gave her an easy smile that Tia thought had some pity laced in. “Nah. I'll stick with the beer.”

“Suit yourself.”

Tia poured another healthy shot into her glass and tossed it back. Connor shook his head like he had already seen enough. “I heard about this morning. I know you're angry but—”

Tia cut him off. “Don't start, Connie. Really. I just want to sit here and be free of all that bullshit. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to think about it. So just do me a solid and sit there and drink your beer, go inside to watch the damn ball game, or get back in your truck and leave.” Tia pointed an unsteady hand down the driveway to emphasize her point. “And by the way, next time Jackson calls to fill you in on everyone's favorite little pity project? Tell him to mind his own damn business.”

“Wasn't Travis who called me,” Connor said flatly. “Sawyer did.”

Great,
Tia thought, shaking her head.
That's all I need.
“Well, the same goes for him.”

“Sure.” Connor nodded. “I'll tell the chief of police you said he can–”

“Oh, knock it off, Connor.” Tia took a healthy hit off her beer. She loved Connor more than anyone, but at this point she was pretty sure he was out to ruin her afternoon. She shook her head in frustration. “What is it about men? Why can't a woman just kick back once in a while? Can't we just take a six-pack and relax? You guys sure as hell do.”

“Come on, Tia. You just told me a few days ago, you hadn't had a drink in two weeks.” He looked at the empties. “You making up for lost time or what?”

Tia poured another healthy shot and blew an air kiss Connor's way before she tossed the tequila back.

Ringo whined, turning his head back and forth in conflict over the only two people he cared about it. They sat staring at each other until, after a long moment, Tia gave in and looked away. An instant later, she felt Connor's strong grip on her arm.

The gentle squeeze of his warm hand set off a cascade of memories. His familiar touch: strong when it needed to be but usually gentle. The way he could effortlessly get inside her skin, understand her moods like nobody ever had. The way he used ten words to say what took most people a thousand. She knew he wanted to help, but her temptation was to tell him to stuff it.
He's not a cop. What does he know?

That was unkind, she knew. He had more experience of life and death than most of the people on the force in Newberg.

Sergeant Connor Anderson had been a team leader on a marine sniper unit, tasked with performing missions cleared at the highest levels of government. Connor had a dozen confirmed kills, the closest from seven hundred meters out. While on reconnaissance of an identified target, Connor had been less than three feet away from a marine who stepped on a massively powerful IED. That man was vaporized before his eyes and Connor's legs were shredded in the blast. His team came under immediate assault. Connor assisted in his own emergency first aid, then directed his team to repel the attack. Because of his skills, not only did the marines suffer no further loss of life, but the confirmed enemy body count was thirteen Taliban KIA.

After being evacuated, Connor spent ten weeks confined to a bed in the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, undergoing seventeen surgical procedures. There were another half-dozen operations during his four months attached to the Wounded Warrior Battalion at the Naval Medical Center San Diego. Eventually the navy hooked him up with state-of-the-art prosthetic legs. Before being medically discharged, Connor was awarded the Bronze Star with a combat V. Tia had flown out for the ceremony, which had been attended by a thousand marines including the assistant commandant, along with both California senators and the lieutenant governor.

Three years later, Connor had reached the point where a stranger wouldn't even know his right leg was man-made starting at the hip joint and the left was fake below the knee. His superhuman recovery was a testament to his determination, but it had gradually become clear his new body couldn't hold up under the rigors of farming. Even doing the work of a hired hand had proven to be too much.

Tia knew the man well enough to know he'd never give up on his dream, but for now Connor Anderson was stocking shelves in the freezer section of the Piggly Wiggly grocery store, earning a buck over minimum wage. That, combined with his disability checks, left him eligible for food stamps, but to her knowledge he had never cashed in. If he felt like he had gotten cheated, she'd never heard him say it. Not once.

“You need to take a step back,” Connor said. “Just regroup a bit.”

Tia shook her head. “You sound like Sawyer.” She knew her words were thick from the alcohol. “If it was up to you two, I'd still be sitting on the damn sidelines. How long, Connie, huh? How long am I supposed to sit around the office? I'm a cop, not a clerk. Both of you need to let me be.”

“I'm not saying you can't work, but didn't the doc say go easy? You know, light duty and admin stuff. You shouldn't have been out there.”

Tia didn't want to hear about what some shrink might think. “Being out there wasn't a problem. It was all the stuff afterward.”

“Whatever. It doesn't matter. You were doing great. Now look where we're at.”

“We?” Her voice was too loud. “
We
aren't anywhere. This is
me
. Me being alone with myself.”

Alone
wasn't the right word, Tia thought.
Abandoned. Forgotten.
Deserted.
That's how it felt.

In the months before she'd been shot, Tia and Connor had begun a relationship that seemed to have limitless possibilities. It had started with Tia helping Connor in the gym with his rehab. Some days he'd stop by and do light work around the farmhouse. Their friendship progressed to ball games and a few dinners for two. Long walks and hours spent talking. They both knew what was coming, but neither knew what to expect. They were tentative at first, even awkward. But together they soon established that what the Taliban had done to the man's legs didn't affect the rest of him.

Then came the shooting, Tia's long recovery in Mexico, and a series of life-shattering revelations that she was still figuring out how to handle. Her ridiculous breakdown in the courtroom. A long period of therapy that she found so humiliating and confusing that she didn't know what to do other than lock herself away and drink. It all got to be too much.

There had been many opportunities for her to sit down with Connor and tell him the truth. To tell him just what it was that scared the hell out of her and pushed her to the bottle. To the pills. Instead, she pushed him away.

“Look, Tia. You've had a hell of a shitty year. Now this? That was a nasty fight out there. Maybe you should take a step back again. Take some time. Hell, why not you and me? We could just get away. Just for a couple of days. Nobody is going to think anything of it. I know Chief Sawyer will approve the time off.”

Tia flared up. “I told you. Leave Sawyer out of this. If you talk to him, I swear, Connor Anderson, I'll—”

“I'm just saying I know he cares about you. I mean you and he are tight, right?”

“Tight? You bet, Connie. I'm crazy about him. The guy who pulled me off the front line and labeled me fifty-one-fifty. We're best buds.”

“That's not fair. Sawyer's got your back. Any other chief, you'd be gone already, and you know it.”

“Then why does he send you out here? Can't he come himself?”

“It's not easy, Tia. You guys … you and Sawyer. Hell, you've been through a lot, but he's the chief now. He can't be getting involved in this stuff without—well, without having to do some chief shit.”

Tia looked at Connie. “Chief shit?”

“You know what I mean. He sent me to check on you so it can be unofficial. Make sure you're okay, without having to get formally involved,” Connor said. “I know he just wants to help you get back to your old self.”

“Well, neither of you needs to worry about me. And what's this ‘old self' stuff?” She thumped the open palm of her hand against her chest and spoke with defiance. “This is me right here. Take it or leave it. People change, Connie.”

Connor shook his head. “I'm not buying that. Drunk and stoned on your porch? This isn't you, Tia.”

The truth hurt and she turned her face away.

Connor stood as if to leave. Tia knew she wanted him to stay. He leaned in and kissed her lightly on top of her head. She sensed another movement and reached out, clamping her fist over his where it was wrapped around the neck of the tequila bottle.

Her voice deadly serious, Tia said, “Leave it.”

Connor pulled his hand back. “Fine, but I'm going to stick around, all right? I'll be inside watching the game. You should join me.”

Tia had been terrified by the thought of being alone at the farmhouse, but she couldn't bring herself to show any gratitude toward Connor. She shrugged. “Do whatever you want. I'll be in after a while.”

Tia watched him enter her house until the screen door shut behind him.
Get back to my old self,
she thought.
What if he knew? What if he knew exactly what that would mean?

She shook it off, grabbing the bottle of tequila. She had bought it on the way home from the courthouse and had already powered through half of it. Tia knew if she put her mind to it she could muster the willpower to stop. It would have been harder alone, but Connie was here now. They could watch the ball game. Throw steaks on the grill. He would expect nothing in return. All she had to do was stand up and walk inside. It would be a smart decision. He'd stay the night and she knew that would help.

What happens if she shows up anyway?
Tia asked herself.
Calling out to me. Trying to pull me back in.
At this level of intoxication, Tia knew the voice would be weaker, as if coming from underwater. But she could still hear her, calling out.