Captured by Jasinda Wilder & Jack Wilder
PROLOGUE
THE LETTER
Thomas, my love.
I’m writing this in our bed. You’re lying next to me, sleeping.
There’s so much I wish I could say to you, but I know time is short. You ship out tomorrow. Again. I can’t say it doesn’t bother me. It does. Of course it does. It hurts every time. I act brave for you, but I hate it. I hate watching you lace up your boots. I hate watching you pack your bag. I hate watching you straighten your tie in the mirror. I hate how goddamned sexy you look in your uniform. Most of all, I hate kissing you goodbye, hate watching you turn around, your broad back straight as you disappear down the jetway. I hate that your eyes are dry when mine are wet.
I hate all that. I know I signed up for it when I married a Marine. I knew from the very beginning that you’d go into combat. I knew it, and married you anyway. How could I not? I loved you so much from the very beginning, from the first time I saw you, all those years ago.
You remember? I was visiting my brother at Twentynine Palms, and I saw you running with your unit. You looked right at me, and I knew in that very instant we were going to be together forever. You dropped out of rank, ran over to me. You kissed me. Right there, the gunnery sergeant yelling at you, in front of half the damn base. You didn’t even ask my name. You just kissed me, and rejoined your unit. You got in a lot of trouble for that stunt.
I never thought I’d see you again, but you found me. You knew my brother, who was with me at the time. You asked him who I was a few days later. He said he’d let you have a shot with me if I was willing, but if you broke my heart, he’d break your face. You showed up at my hotel room dressed in civvies. You took me to Olive Garden, and we got drunk on red wine. We made love that night in my hotel room. You remember that night? I sure do. I remember every single moment.
Just like I remember every other moment of our lives together. Eight years. Did you know that? You ship out tomorrow, and tomorrow is the eight-year anniversary—to the day—of the first time we met, when you kissed me.
God, Tom. You know why I remember every single moment? Because for most of our eight years together, you’ve been deployed. Three tours in Iraq, and you are just about to ship out for your third tour in Afghanistan. I miss you, Tom. Every day, I miss you. Even when you’re home I miss you, because I know you’re always going to leave again.
But this time? This ship-out? It’s been the hardest. It’s so hard I can’t take it. Can’t stand it. I can’t, Tom. I can’t watch you leave again, knowing you could die. Knowing you might not come back.
You didn’t say much about what happened with your friend Hunter, from your unit, when he went MIA, but I know it was painful for everyone. He came back, thank god, but you were a mess. You called me from the base. You were going crazy with worry. You thought he was dead. Your friend Derek had been injured, too. I remember all that. And I just…I don’t think I could handle it if that happened to you.
Especially not now.
I’ve gone in circles over this a million times in my head. I’ve nearly told you so many times. But I just can’t. It would make it harder for you to leave, and I know it’s hard enough as it is. It would make it harder for me if I told you in person. You’re going to be mad at me for not telling you. I know, and I’m sorry. But this is the only way that makes sense to me.
I’m pregnant, Tom.
I’m going to have your baby.
I wasn’t sure at first. I thought maybe it was just the stress of knowing your leave was ending that made me miss my period. But then I took a test. Three of them, actually.
I’m pregnant. God, I’m pregnant. I’m going to have a baby.
Please come home to me, Tom. Come home alive. No matter what, you have to come back. I need you. Our baby needs you.
I love you so, so much, Tom. More than I’ll ever be able to say. You’ll be fine. You’ll come back to me. To US.
Always, always yours,
Reagan.
P.S.: I hope it’s a boy. I want him to look just like you.
CHAPTER 1
DEREK
Eastern Afghanistan, 2007
The Humvee stinks of sweat and tension. I’ve got “Where the Green Grass Grows” stuck in my head. Some asshat had a Tim McGraw album on repeat for about two hours before I threatened to shove my fist down his throat if he didn’t turn it off. He shut it off real quick, but the damage was done, and that goddamn song has been running through my head for the last three motherf*ckin’ days.
So now, rumbling down some dirt track through the middle of nowhere, I still can’t get that song out of my head. I’m even humming the damned thing, and the guys keep ragging me about it.
I don’t even like country music.
Barrett is sitting next to me in the back, and Lewis is driving. McConnell is up front riding shotgun. Our Humvee is the third in line out of four. We’ve been going across some of the flattest, driest country I’ve ever seen, but that’s changing as we climb into a mountain range. Things are about to get hilly and serpentine, and that’s when shit could get hairy. Which explains the tension.
It’s the kind of gut-churning anticipation that, in my experience, always precedes something shitty and severely gnarly. You ain’t got dick to do but stare out the window, and, this being Afghanistan, nothing’s out the window except brown hills, brown dirt, and the endless blue bowl of the sky. And it’s always right in the middle of this mind-numbing boredom that you get yanked back to reality.