In a Book Club Far Away(22)

“Okay. I just missed you, is all.” Jasper’s voice, a deep and sexy baritone, was smooth through the earpiece. When they’d first met, his voice was what drew her to him. Well, that, and all the sex appeal that came with him and the uniform he wore so proudly.

She shivered at the thought of him now, at the broad expanse of his chest, at how he could move into a space and take command of it without even raising his voice. Jasper had a presence; he garnered respect.

“It’s only been a week. Don’t tell me you’re getting soft,” she teased, wandering into the kitchen. She glanced at the calendar tacked up near the phone’s base, where seven days were crossed out in pen. On the counter was a jar of jelly beans—one jelly bean per day of the deployment, per twin—that Olivia and Carmela dipped their hands into every morning.

“Actually that’s why I called.”

“What’s up?” She frowned. The yelling between her girls escalated. To settle them, Sophie took the box from Olivia and divvied the bags of fruit snacks on the kitchen table, and then walked away, for space. She went to the living room windows, which looked out to Liberty Road. It was quiet, even for a weekday afternoon, with wet leaves scattering the asphalt from the bit of rain that had come down that afternoon. No one was out except for a couple of her neighbors walking their dogs.

“Have you been hanging with Regina?”

“Um… not the last few days. We had so much back-to-school stuff happening. And I sent out a couple of applications to clinics in town, so I was tied up with that.”

“Oh, you sent out applications? I thought we discussed that you would wait a little?”

“Yeah.” She paused, flashing back to that conversation. Since the girls were old enough to understand the dangers of deployment, she and Jasper’d both decided that Sophie would not work, to give the girls some normalcy by having a parent at home, if only temporarily. “Yeah, well… I miss working.”

“Sure, but—”

As soon as Sophie heard the word but, she launched in. “Look, it’s no big deal. If I get interviewed, I don’t have to take the job.” She couldn’t bear to hear him utter the word no. This week, she’d begun to feel caged in, helpless. To think there were eight-plus more months of waiting. Waiting for phone calls and emails from Jasper, for him to come home.

To her relief, Jasper sensed her growing anxiety. “Yes… yeah, you’re right. I was just surprised is all. Anyway… about Regina?”

Sophie jumped at this change of subject and dug her cell phone out of her purse and pulled up her last group text with Adelaide and Regina. “Right… I heard from her yesterday, actually. You know the Lasseters, right?”

“I do.”

“Well, Colleen picked a book for October called Room, about a woman who was kidnapped and had a kid in isolation. Apparently, Regina’s not in the mood to read it.”

It sounds depressing was what the text read.

“Can you check on her?”

“Why, is something wrong?” Sophie stood and peeked into the kitchen at her girls—they were happily noshing on their fruit snacks—then made her way to the master bedroom. She pulled up her mini blinds, which she normally kept closed for privacy—the last thing she wanted was to be accidentally peeped on by kids playing in the communal playground behind their building—and she peered at the building across the yard, at the back windows of Regina’s apartment on Bell Street. The lights were off despite the night sky.

“The lieutenant came in.”

“Logan?”

“Yeah.” He sighed. “I can’t say what we talked about, and he didn’t ask me to have you check up on her. But the conversation raised a flag for me. If you can swing it…”

Sophie heard the message underneath the words: morale check. “Of course. Yes, absolutely.” With a tug, the blinds dropped closed. “I’ll get on it.”

Right then, she texted Adelaide to set a time for them to get together. Sophie had learned that Adelaide organized her life around appointments. And these days, Adelaide seemed to be busy, even sometimes too busy for a quick sidewalk conversation.

Adelaide

What’s going on?



Gotta check in on our friend.

SOS



SOS?



I’ll explain later.

Tomorrow afternoon?



Yes. 2pm?



Sounds good



“You’re amazing, do you know that?” Jasper’s flirtatious voice was back.

“I do know that.” She smiled. “You’re a lucky man.”

“I know. And I was thinking.”

“Yeah?” In perfect timing, her girls ran into their bedrooms across the hall. “Walk! Jesus, one of them is going to choke, and God knows I didn’t stay home from work to do the Heimlich.”

The voice in her ear laughed, deep-bellied.

“Oh, so you’re enjoying this?” She hiked a hand on her hip.

“You know I am.” He paused, bringing the moment down to serious. “I love it, hearing you.”

“You’re not so bad, either.” Sophie perched on the bed, and despite her attempt at deflection, her face warmed in the beginning of tears. In the four deployments they’d faced together, she’d cried twice, both during times like this, when she knew there was a novel in between his very few words.