Virgin River (Virgin River #1)(59)

Preacher didn’t seem particularly worn out. He presided over the bar with the help of Ricky, polishing glasses, serving food, bussing tables and partaking of the occasional game of cribbage. “What’s the matter with Jack?” Mel asked.

“Marines. They take their toll,” he replied.

Four days later, a week ahead of schedule, Mel got the call from the Patterson farm that it was time. Given the fact that Sondra reported easy, quick births and had already been experiencing contractions through the night, Mel went immediately. Babies are odd—they do as they please. Having a history of short labors didn’t necessarily mean they would all be that way. With the support of her mother, motherin-law and husband, Sondra labored hard through the day. Finally in the early evening, the little boy arrived. He didn’t emerge with a lusty cry and Mel had to suction, stroke and cajole him into the world. Sondra bled a little too much and the baby wasn’t interested in nursing right away. Even Sondra quickly knew the difference between this and her previous two experiences.

Getting a slower than usual start in the world doesn’t necessarily mean trouble, and the baby’s heart, respirations, coloring and cry caught up right away. Still, Mel stayed a bit longer than she ordinarily might have. She rocked the baby for three hours past the time she felt everything was fine, playing it extra safe. It was ten at night by the time Mel finally decided to give them back their lives, their family, that it was perfectly safe to leave them. “And I’m wearing my pager,” she said. “Don’t hesitate, if you think anything is amiss.”

Instead of going right back to her cabin, she went into town. If Jack’s was dark and closed up, she’d go home. But the light was on in the bar, though the Open sign was not lit.

When she pushed open the door, she was greeted by a most unexpected sight. Preacher was behind the bar, a steaming cup of coffee in front of him, but Jack sat at a table with his head down on his arms. In front of him was a bottle of Scotch and a shot glass.

When Preacher saw her enter, he said, “Throw the latch on that door, Mel. I think this is enough company.”

She did so, but the look on her face was completely non-plussed. She walked over to Jack and put a hand on his back. “Jack?” she asked. His eyes briefly opened and then rolled back in their sockets and closed again. His head lolled and one arm fell off the table and dangled at his side.

Mel went to the bar, hopped up on a stool in front of Preacher and said, “What’s the matter with him?” Preacher shrugged and made a move to reach for his coffee mug, but before he could connect with it, Mel virtually lunged across the bar, grabbed the front of his shirt in her fist and said, hotly, “What’s the matter with him?!”

Preacher’s black brows shot up in surprise and he put up his hands as if being arrested. Mel slowly let go of his shirt and sat back on the stool. “He’s drunk,”

Preacher said.

“Well, no kidding. But there’s something wrong with him. He’s been different all week.”

Again the shrug. “Sometimes when the boys are here, it dredges things up. You know? I think he’s having some remembering of things not so good.”

“Marine things?” she asked. Preacher nodded. “Come on, Preacher. He’s the best friend I have in this town.”

“I don’t think he’d like me talking.”

“Whatever this is, he shouldn’t go through it alone.”

“I’ll take care of him,” Preacher said. “He’ll snap out of it. He always does.”

“Please,” she implored. “Can’t you guess how much he means to me? I want to help, if there’s any way I can.”

“I could tell you some things, but they’re very ugly things. Not for a lady to hear.”

She laughed a little. “You can’t imagine the things I’ve seen, much less heard. I worked in a trauma center for almost ten years. It could get pretty ugly at times.”

“Not like this.”

“Try me.”

Preacher took a deep breath. “Those boys that come up every year? They come to make sure he’s okay. He was their sergeant. My sergeant. Best sergeant in the marines. He’s been in five combat zones. The last one, Iraq. He was leading a platoon into interior Fallujah and one of the boys stepped on a truck mine. Blew him in half. Right away we were pinned down by sniper fire. Our boy who stepped on the mine, he didn’t die right away. Something about the heat of the explosion—it must’ve cauterized arteries and vessels and he didn’t bleed out. Didn’t have pain, either—it must have done something to his spine. But he was fully conscious.”

“My God.”

“Jack ordered everyone to take cover in the buildings, which we did. But he sat with his man. He wouldn’t leave him. Under sniper fire, leaning against a fat tire on an overturned truck, he held him and talked to him for a half hour before he died. Kid kept telling Jack to go, take cover, that it was okay. You know he didn’t go. He’d never leave one of his men behind.” He took a drink of coffee. “We saw a lot of stuff back there that will give you nightmares, but that’s the one that sometimes gets to him. I don’t know what hits him harder—the kid’s slow death or the visit he paid his parents to tell them all the things he said before he went.”

“And he gets drunk?”