A Soldier's Redemption Read Online Free

absolutely nothing. And the question about coffee seemed to give him pause. He treated it as if it needed real consideration.
    â€œThat would be nice,” he finally said.
    Only then did she realize she was almost holding her breath. Maybe she feared rejection of some kind. How could she possibly consider a no over a cup of coffee to be rejection? God, was she beginning to lose her mind?
    It was, of course, entirely possible. In the past year she’d come perilously close to living in solitary confinement with only her memories.
    â€œOkay.” She tried a smile and it seemed to work, because he nodded.
    â€œI’ll just take my stuff up and be back down in a minute,” he said.
    She watched him walk out of the room and noticed his broad shoulders and narrow hips. The ease with which he moved in his body, like an athlete. Yes, she was definitely slipping a cog somewhere. She hadn’t noticed a man that way in a long time, hadn’t felt the sexual siren song of masculinity, except with Jim, and since Jim not at all.
    She didn’t need or want to feel it now.
    Shaking her head, she rose and found that her strength seemed to have returned. Making the coffee was an easy, automatic task, one that kept her hands busy while her mind raced.
    Surely Gage had been right. The killers wouldn’t warn her they were coming. So it must have been kids pullinga prank. When she thought about it, her own reaction to the call disappointed her. There’d been a time when she would have reached the same conclusion as Gage without needing to consult anyone at all. A time when she hadn’t been a frightened mouse who couldn’t think things through for herself.
    She needed to get that woman back if she was to survive, because much more of what she’d gone through the past year would kill her as surely as a bullet.
    Piece by piece, she felt her personality disassembling. Piece by piece she was turning into a shadow of the woman she had once been. She might as well have lopped off parts of her own brain and personality.
    How long would she let this continue? Because if it went on much longer, she’d be nothing but a robot, an empty husk of a human being. Somehow, somewhere inside her, she had to find purpose again. And a way to connect with the world.
    As one of the Marshals had said when she argued she didn’t want to do this, “How many people in this world would give just about anything to have a chance to start completely fresh?”
    At the time the comment had seemed a little heartless, but as it echoed inside her head right now, she knew he’d had a point. She hadn’t liked it then, didn’t like it now, but there was a certain truth in it.
    A fresh start. No real reason to fear. Not anymore. If they were going to find her, certainly they’d have done so long since.
    Wade returned to the kitchen just as the drip coffeemaker finished its task. “How do you like it?” she asked.
    â€œBlack as night.”
    She carried the carafe to the table, along with two mugs and filled them, then set the pot on a pad in the center ofthe table. She always liked a touch of milk in hers, one of the things she hadn’t had to give up in this transition. She could still eat the foods she preferred, drink her coffee with a little milk, and enjoy the same kinds of movies and books.
    Maybe it was time to start thinking about what she hadn’t lost, rather than all she had.
    Brave words.
    She sat across the table from Wade, trying not to look at him because she didn’t want to make him feel like a bug under a microscope. But time and again her gaze tracked toward him, and each time she found him staring at her.
    Finally she had to ask. “Is something wrong? You keep staring at me.”
    â€œYou’re a puzzle.”
    She blinked, surprised. “You don’t even know me.”
    â€œProbably part of what makes you a puzzle,” he said easily enough. His deep