“Overseeing all three locations? You’re working yourself to death.”
Tess grimaced.
Instinctively Sandy grasped her arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think before I spoke.”
“It’s okay.”
“Are you ready?” the young cashier asked as the customer in front of them departed.
After paying and arranging to have the desk delivered, Tess picked up the painting. One of the porters loaded the file cabinet on a dolly and walked with them to load it into Tess’s Lexus SUV. As the heavy-set man lifted the cabinet into the rear of the wagon, it rattled.
Sandy leaned closer. “I wonder what that is?”
The porter opened the top drawer and reached inside, pulling out a portable computer.
“The owner must have forgotten it was inside,” Tess said.
“Doesn’t matter,” the man replied. “Rules of the auction. It’s yours now.”
Tess frowned. “That doesn’t seem quite right.”
He shrugged. “The seller knows the rules when he consigns the lot.”
“It is a business lot,” Sandy pointed out. “It’s not as though the computer belonged to some poor widow. The company probably had so much excess stuff they just didn’t bother to catalog it.”
“Yeah. You’re right. And it is pretty beaten up. Okay.” Tess put the computer in the front seat and then reached for a blanket to wrap the painting.
“I’ll head home,” Sandy began. “Unless you…”
“You don’t have to babysit.”
“That’s what family’s for, so you don’t have to be alone unless you want to be.”
Tess hugged her petite cousin, then stepped back. “Thanks. I’m okay.”
“You’re not, but I won’t argue.” Sandy hesitated, her blue eyes clouding. “We all miss David, you know.”
Seeing Sandy’s mouth tremble, Tess reminded herself that they all shared the loss. “I know. It helps.”
Tess read the guilt in her cousin’s face. Sandy still had her sisters and brother.
She’d never noticed the small size of her family, always surrounded as she was by numerous aunts, uncles and cousins. Not until David was gone. “I’ll see you Saturday.”
Sandy nodded as she unlocked the door to her sleek Eclipse, parked next to the Lexus.
After their vehicles were started, they honked, an old habit, each making sure the other wasn’t stranded by a possible dead battery or mechanical failure.
Tess took the long way home, driving the quiet, curving lanes of Memorial Drive, which divided the huge park of the same name. Even though darkness was falling, she could appreciate the miles of untouched green that wound through the most beautiful portion of Houston’s west side.
Calm by the time she reached her town house, Tess parked in the garage. As she opened the car door, the dome light illuminated the laptop. She scooped it up along with her purse.
Molly, her Norwich terrier, barked out a quick, happy welcome. Hector, David’s more reserved Scottish terrier, patiently waited his turn as she petted them both. Scotties, known to be one-master dogs, were often standoffish with anyone else. But she’d known Hector since David had brought him home as a puppy, and he willingly accepted her affection. Although he continued to behave as if he expected David to return. Even now he looked at the doorway to see if his master would step in behind her.
“I wish he’d come home, too,” she murmured, scratching Hector’s upright ears.
He cocked his head, his dark eyes set in an even darker face, fixed on her.
“Better you don’t know what I’m saying.”
Molly wriggled her smaller red-tan body in between Hector and Tess.
Tess hugged the dog, then set her down. “Don’t be jealous. I love you both.”
They trotted beside her as she entered the kitchen, dumping her purse and the laptop on the counter. “How about a carrot, guys?”
This was a word they both recognized and loved. Setting Molly down, Tess fished in the vegetable drawer of the fridge for the package of baby carrots. She gave them each one and they peeled out in separate directions to enjoy the treat. Tess uncapped a bottle of ginseng-in-fused tea, then glanced at the computer.
After flipping open the cover, she plugged in the unit, browsing through the directory. Within a few minutes, she saw that the hard drive hadn’t been cleaned by the previous owner.
Designs, Schematics, Financials. Nothing there that interested her. Pausing at a subdirectory entitled “Letters,” Tess frowned. What kind of letters? Dull, boring business ones, no doubt.
Pulling up a stool, Tess settled at the bar, scrolling through until one file caught her attention. Deceptively simple, it was entitled “Home.” Letters home.
Instantly she thought of David, the last words from him.
And she clicked on the file. A letter appeared on the screen, full-blown.
As Tess began to read, she found she couldn’t pull herself away.
The days are still full 24/7. I’m so wiped out by night that my cot actually looks good. It’d be like sleeping on a saggy lawn chair if I could feel anything by that point. I come to in the morning and then the day’s gone before I can blink. But the weeks and the months, they crawl.
I lost another man today. Specialist Dixon. Michael Dixon. Twenty-two years old, had a girlfriend in Louisiana. He was quiet, but you always knew you could count on him. I wish I’d gotten to know him better, but sometimes that just makes it worse. My unit’s feeling the loss. You have to keep on, put it out of your mind, but when it’s quiet, you remember. And I think about his parents, the woman he planned to marry. How they’ll go on, too.
Tess’s breath shortened.
Tell Mom that the First Lady visited the main camp. No fashion updates, though. She was wearing camouflage fatigues. Reporters ate it up. Beats showing what’s really going on over here.
It was simply signed “Cole”
Shaken, Tess sat back. This soldier reported a slice of military service unlike anything her brother ever sent. David’s letters had been cheerful, mostly full of newsy chatter.
Unexpectedly connected to the author of the letters, Tess opened a second file. This letter was also disturbingly real, expressing the soldier’s feelings about the military engagement and the people in the country where he was serving.
Unable to stop, Tess read his anguish for home and family, the liberty he was fighting for, the loss he experienced for the men under his command who’d been killed or wounded.
David had apparently been shielding her from how bad it actually was, which was so much like him. These letters were a window into that world. David’s last reality.
And Tess absorbed each detail. This soldier was a person of deep convictions and loyalty. So much so, she was compelled to read the next letter…and the one after that. Time forgotten, Tess continued reading and reacting. And building a link to a stranger who might not have survived the place she now read about.
BY DAWN, Tess’s shoulders and back were stiff from crouching over the laptop all night. She forced her eyes, gritty from lack of sleep, to focus until she’d read the final letter. It was as though she’d met Captain Cole Harrington, had spent the night talking with him about his deepest thoughts.
Closing the lid on the computer, she was bereft that there were no more letters.