Deploy, Part One (Rawlings #1)(43)

There was more...things she knew he wouldn’t write to his brothers, the hint of fear, of fighting separation, wanting to but not wanting to become something else, something more.

She read a marked change in him.

When she walked into her kitchen and sat down to read she had a version of Declan Rawlings firmly in her mind, and in her heart. Now she had a new one. She could feel, as her grandmother had said, the boy was gone. A man was there. Declan was near the end of phase two of his training. The polishing of the warrior and his newfound skills was all that was left.

Hours had gone by. She had heard the mower outside, the banging of wood, other sounds that all drifted to the back of her mind as she lived through Declan’s life changing moments at his side, through his words.

It wasn’t until her grandmother, Bell, walked in that the spell was broken and she lifted her gaze and realized she was still there. Seventeen, ‘grieving’ for her father and trapped inside a sickening secret. And poor as the day was long.

Bell had grocery bags filling each arm. “Is that Atticus Rawlings’ truck across the way?” she asked before her gaze found Justice.

Who was sitting at a table with every letter opened. “He wrote...” she said in a ghost of a whisper.

It took Bell a second to decide how she felt about this. If Declan had the power, at a distance, to bring her granddaughter back around or if he would just cause her more grief she could not deal with right then.

“I can see that,” she said with a smile before making her way to the counter. “Did Atticus bring them by?” she asked, looking out the kitchen window, noticing all the limbs from the storm months back had been picked up, the sporadic grass had been cut, the boards on the back porch were fixed, and that was just what she could see at a glance.

For a moment she was nostalgic, remembering when she was a girl. Bradyville wasn’t a military base by any means, but its location somehow attracted those who had either loved a warrior or lived on a base.

They didn’t stand out, not really, but you could see the protection in their eyes, and when they stepped up to help—to balance a family who had sacrificed someone for the country they lived in, you felt it.

“Looks like he had a lot to say,” she said as she unloaded the groceries, keeping her gaze to the window. Her home almost looked the way it did when her husband was alive. Prim, neat, and well cared for.

“He heard about Dad. I think he was worried about me.”

Bell glanced at Justice with a raised brow as if to say ‘seems like more than worry in that sea of paper.’

“By the time I answer all these he’ll be gone,” Justice said with regret heavy in her mind. She felt guilty as hell for letting one of the last things he said slip her mind—that he was going write to a box she rarely checked but would now if there was a hope of a letter from him.

Bell ticked her head in agreement. “I’m sure at this point, one letter would help matters.”

Justice heard the blower outside kick on and glanced at the groceries her grandmother had. She knew from experience Atticus was a bottomless pit when it came to food, even though he was nothing but raw, lean muscle. “I promised Atticus food for my ride home. Do we have enough? I can go without if I need to, my stomach is in knots.”

“Plenty,” Bell said. She knew how to stretch a meal, and had done so for years. “How did Murdock feel about this ride home?”

Justice shrugged as she read over Declan’s last letter. She could swear she could smell him across the pages, feel him surrounding her. So close, yet so far away. The way they had always been.

She didn’t care what Murdock thought.

Hearing Atticus tease her all the way home about how scared she was about being seen with him made Justice realize she and Murdock had become toxic. And even though they were by no means BFFs before all this, it still sucked. And in some way it made them seem obvious, and she planned to tell him as much when he took her to work on Sunday.

“I don’t know,” Justice said, lost in Declan’s words, which made Bell smile. Nothing was fixed yet, but at the very least she could see her granddaughter emerging from her latest battle.

***

Justice was a rude dinner host. She spent most of her time writing, and being too late to answer questions her grandmother or Atticus sent her way, but neither of them seemed to mind.

The next day when the mailman came at noon, she was waiting on him and handed him seventeen letters. She had more to write, but she wanted some to at least be on their way.

She didn’t write every word the night before, some of the pages had been pulled right from her own journal, words she had written to just get them out, to say what would not leave her lips.

There were parts she did stay up to write the night before, too. Ones where she told him she had forgotten about the P.O. box, but not him. She never explained what happened the night she lost her dad or why Murdock was so close, but she told him no, her and Murdock were friends, only friends.

Letting him know she had it bad for weeks was not good and she knew it. People tended to remember what they read, right? Well, he would remember it because there was a good chance he would read it more than once. People most assuredly remembered how they felt when they learned anything about people they knew. But Justice was caught between a rock and a hard place. For weeks, he had already imagined the worst.

The rest of Saturday was spent responding to even more letters. She signed each one: Your Justice. And each time she felt a twist in her gut, a doubt that the wording was right. What were they? Friends? Pen pals? A hook up? Something real? She didn’t know.