Shoulda Been a Cowboy (Rough Riders #7)(33)

“Oh, I’m plenty shy. Look how long it took me to work up the courage to approach you. Almost two years.”


“But offering yourself up to me any way I wanted was a great icebreaker, princess.”


He flopped onto his back and sighed. He hadn’t felt this good, this sated, this relaxed…since before his injury. Maybe not ever.


Domini rolled to her side and propped her head on her elbow. “Will you tell me about your injury and recovery?”


Cam rarely talked about his war experiences. Mostly because people who hadn’t lived it wouldn’t understand it. But with Domini growing up in a turbulent eastern-bloc country, she wasn’t innocent to the harsh reality of the world outside the U.S. borders.


“It was a late patrol in Baghdad. I was teaching one of the new kids protocol for an unsecured urban area when a bomb went off in front of us. We stopped and got out, only to have another detonation behind us. The dirt and debris cut us off from the rest of the caravan. Before we’d gotten too far off the road, I heard that distinctive whistling noise that meant someone had launched a rocket. I grabbed the kid, Jenks, and we hit the ground. But not fast enough. The jeep exploded behind us.


“It’s kind of blurry after that. The explosion knocked us both out. When I came to, I had a big chunk of metal embedded in my left calf. It was bleeding, but I knew if I tried to pull it out, I’d bleed out, so I left it in. I couldn’t hear, I could barely see, but I knew there was still fighting going on all around us. I also knew we were sitting ducks after the ambush. We limped our way off the road into an abandoned building, figuring we’d sit tight until the fighting died down and we could reestablish radio contact.


“No one realized we were missing until they did a head count at the base later that night. By then the gates were locked up and they couldn’t come back looking for us. Then a three day sandstorm hit that kept us cut off from any rescue attempt. Which was good and bad—the Iraqis weren’t able to find us any more than the patrols were.


“Jenks and I stayed put. It wasn’t like I could walk anywhere with a big hunk of metal sticking out of my leg, even though it was mostly numb. Once we realized the storm had ended I told Jenks to leave me because he only had surface injuries, but he wouldn’t. Then a goddamn rainstorm hit, which is how he managed to get water for us when we didn’t have food. The week of unscheduled leave was a gritty haze of pain.”


“How’d they find you?”


“My buddy, Brock, wouldn’t give up on finding me—either dead or alive. Once the storms passed, he was out looking discreetly, randomly checking through the buildings in the area, so as not tip off anyone there were a couple of American army soldiers MIA. He stumbled across us after we’d been gone for six days. Shrapnel wounds coupled with being a pint or so low on blood, a low body temp and I was in a coma when the medics got a hold of me. When I woke up four days later, I found out they’d removed my lower left leg below the knee, as well as my pulverized left pinky.” He shuddered. “I still have goddamn nightmares about that.”


“I’ll bet.” Her gaze moved to his stump. “But you don’t have a knee.”


“They got me stabilized, called my family, and put me on a plane to the amputee specialist docs at Walter Reed as soon as possible. I was only there a couple of days before another infection set in. The docs decided it’d be better in the long run to remove my knee joint entirely.”


“Did you have a say in it?”


“I was so doped up and in so much pain that I didn’t give a shit.” And he was seriously pissed off about the wrong turn his life had taken. At first he’d refused to talk to anyone. Then he went a step further and denied all access to him. No visitors. Period. Cam knew it’d hurt his family, but at the time he didn’t give a rat’s ass. He wanted to be left the hell alone.


But his sister wouldn’t accept his decree. She’d charmed her way into Ward 57 at Walter Reed Hospital and chewed him out, refusing to leave until he made some decisions about his life.


Talk about being yanked up by his bootstraps. At the time, he’d almost hated her.


Now Cam admitted he wouldn’t be where he was if not for Keely. If she’d shown up bawling her eyes out and wringing her hands, he’d’ve kicked her to the curb without apology. Her grim determination made him face the harsh realities. His life as a soldier was over. Period. He was handicapped. Period. So in Keely’s mind, that meant the sooner he learned to live with his disability, the sooner he’d be able to live a better life.


Keely rented an apartment for them in Cheyenne after he’d been discharged from Walter Reed and his medical records transferred to the VA hospital. She ran interference with their family. She dealt with his doctor appointments, his army discharge paperwork, his VA benefits. And she personally oversaw his physical therapy, including convincing a prosthetic specialist from Denver to offer Cam a second opinion. She pushed him until they both broke down. She was there when he took his first steps on his new prosthesis. She argued with the doctors about the fit issues when he probably would’ve walked away and suffered in silence. She gave up six months of her life for him and never once complained. Never once did she throw her sacrifice in his face. It humbled him.