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Chapter Two

When an assignment landed Shane in a new town, one of his first orders of personal business on his first day off was to familiarize himself with the lay of the land.

Even though he didn’t particularly want to be in Celebration, Texas, he’d decided to make the best of it and explore. Earlier in the week, when he’d delivered the chocolates to AJ, he’d noticed a poster in her shop’s window advertising “A Taste of Celebration,” a fundraiser to benefit a new pediatric wing at Celebration Memorial Hospital. The sampling of fare from local restaurants and caterers was happening today in the town square. Despite his lack of appetite for small-town living and all the ghosts it conjured, he was always up for a good burger and a beer. Getting to know Celebration through its local cuisine was the best way to face down this assignment. Well, that and possibly the best chance to raise a glass with AJ Sherwood-Antonelli.

A pretty face and a good meal.

What more did a man need?

Shane parked on a side street of a residential neighborhood about a quarter of a mile away from downtown. He unfolded all six foot four of himself out of his shiny black Ford F-150. The truck was his baby. Since his living expenses were negligible and his life was signed over to the U.S. Army, it was the one indulgence he afforded himself. The truck had been in military storage during his tour of the Middle East. It felt good to be back in the driver’s seat.

As he hit the remote, locking the truck, a loud whistle split the air. “Hey, man, nice ride.”

Shane turned toward the direction of the words that weren’t so much a compliment as they were a mocking challenge.

Four teenage boys loitered on the corner opposite from where he’d parked. Shane hadn’t noticed them until now.

“Thanks,” he returned.

Something in the group’s collective posture and body language made him pause, then glance in his car’s window to make sure he’d put away the GPS and anything else of value.

He had.

He looked back at the group wanting them to know he was taking a mental snapshot of them. All four were Caucasian, probably sixteen or seventeen, all medium height, but one was taller and bigger. Three had dark hair; one was blond. They all wore sloppy T-shirts. Two sported holey jeans. One boy—the tallest kid with long, dark messy hair that hung past his shoulders—wore his pants so low they rode down his butt and his boxers were visible. Another kid was wearing long denim shorts and had a tattoo of what looked like a dragon or some sort of serpent winding around his left calf.

They certainly didn’t blend in, but they were probably harmless—this was Celebration, after all. Since he’d been in town, he hadn’t seen such a rough-looking gang hanging out. Maybe they’d come for the food festival. He wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, but a voice of reason made him wary. But what was he supposed to say to the sheriff? I didn’t like the way the boys were whistling at my truck?

Punks.

Putting an end to the staring standoff, Shane turned and began walking toward the square, knowing he shouldn’t judge. He was new in town and hated feeling conspicuous. So, he put them out of his mind.

It had been a long week on the new assignment, highlighted by meetings with construction crew chiefs and engineers who were working on the new training facility. Shane was exhausted—not from the work itself, as it wasn’t very demanding physically or mentally. It was more like babysitting.

He hadn’t gotten a decent night’s sleep since he’d arrived. In the army, he moved around so much he usually didn’t have a problem adjusting to a new place. But he wasn’t adjusting well to Celebration. The desk job gave him way too much time for clock watching and restlessness. Because work wasn’t occupying his mind, his thoughts had been running an endless loop of nonsense he couldn’t seem to shut off.

Even as he walked away, his mind replayed the way the teenagers had stopped their horseplay and called out to him; the way his guard had gone on instant alert; the way he’d turned back to face them down and how the short, stocky kid who seemed to be their ringleader—or at least the loudest one of the bunch—had hollered across the street, “Hey, man, nice ride.”

Shane bristled again and glanced back, but the kids were gone.

Training in counter terrorism—and life’s hard knocks—had taught him to be fearless in the face of danger. In fact, he liked to joke that there was nothing like a brush with death to make a man feel truly alive. But tying a man like Shane to a desk gave him too much time to think. That’s when he fell apart.

He smirked at the absurdity of his thought. They were just a bunch of smart alecks and he shouldn’t give them the satisfaction of responding. His reaction proved he was bone tired. This outing would clear his head, reset his mind.

With temperatures in the mid-seventies, fall was already making its presence known. Even though it was still technically summer—the equinox was two weeks away—the punishing heat of summer had given way to mild days and nights that were downright cool.

Shane drew in a breath through his nose, expecting to smell a loamy scent, autumn’s calling card—it was a reflex whenever he thought of his favorite time of year—but instead, he was tantalized by the aroma of A Taste of Celebration.

His stomach growled in response. The distraction—or reminder that perhaps he and this place might reach common ground through the food—helped him reframe and redirect his thinking.

So what if the job was boring? His objective was to serve out his MOUT duty and get the hell out of Dodge...or Celebration, as the case may be. What lay on the other side of construction hell was a plum European tour where he intended to exorcise the demons that had haunted him far too long.

In the meantime, he needed to get a hold of himself and calm the monkey mind that was wearing him down. “Monkey mind” was what his mother had called it way back when he’d been prone to similar restlessness as a boy, when his mind jumped from notion to notion as a monkey swings from tree branch to tree branch.

He swiped a hand over his eyes as if the gesture could scrub away the recollection. But his mother’s sweet smiling face was freshly imprinted on his mind. Memories like this were landmines that he preferred to avoid. He blew out a breath and looked around for something to refocus on.

The possibility of running into AJ again. That should be enough to grab the attention of any red-blooded man, he thought as he walked. And thinking of her did make him feel marginally better.

So, with seeing her to anticipate, what the hell was wrong with him? Feeling of loss like this hadn’t hit him this hard in twenty years. Maybe it was the impending anniversary.

Twenty years. Wow. It seems like yesterday.

After the explosion that had killed his family, he’d learned to shut down his thoughts when the mind apes got restless. He knew from experience if you loved too deeply you got hurt; if you dwelled on the hurt it ended up eating you alive. So, he’d become a specialist at isolating the enemy emotion, neutralizing it so that he didn’t have to give it another thought.

Shane had become an expert at feeling nothing. It made him a damn good soldier. Wasn’t that all that mattered, since he had nothing else to live for?

He’d been eighteen years old when he’d lost his family—his mother, father, sister and brother. Gone. In the snap of a finger, they were gone and his world was shattered beyond repair.

Why am I alive? Why did they have to die? Maybe if I hadn’t stayed behind in Italy?

In the first few years, he’d asked himself these questions nearly every day, until it had gotten to the point where the what-ifs had threatened to bury him. That’s when he’d to lock it all away.

Why, all of a sudden, were the ghosts he’d so carefully sequestered haunting him again?

As he continued his journey up the tree-shaded sidewalk toward the square, he glanced at the small clapboard houses that lined the walk. His mood darkened with each well-manicured lawn he passed. After several tours of the Middle East and living in government bachelor digs when he was in the States, it was no wonder this homey little town was bringing up issues. It reminded him so much of his childhood.

Fort Hood was just far enough away that it was more practical for him to stay in a rent-by-the-week efficiency. It wasn’t much, but at least it was closer to the construction site than commuting from the base.

This assignment was only temporary, he reminded himself. He’d be out of here soon enough. Then came Europe. And after that...he’d wait and see what life and the U.S. Army dictated.

In the meantime, distant strains of country music and aromas of delicious food beckoned him. His stomach growled again. Starving, he inhaled deeply, trying to discern among the mélange of inviting scents if there was a grilled burger in his near future.

It smelled promising.

As Shane closed the distance between his appetite and the town’s offerings, the sound of a bouncing basketball grabbed his attention. In the driveway of a two-story brick house, two boys were engaged in a game of Horse. The sound of a blaring car horn made one of them miss the basket. A mangy looking mixed-breed dog darted across the sidewalk, having narrowly dodged the honking car. Shane watched as the mutt, who seemed unfazed by his near brush with death, loped up to the boys, barking and dancing around them, licking their faces and wiggling in delight.

“Hey! You’d better put a leash on your furry friend,” Shane called to the boys. They froze, ceasing their whoops and giggles, staring at him warily as if they’d just noticed him. “He almost got hit by that car.”

The boys said nothing. They just stood there, the dog in between them and the stranger.

Shane didn’t mean to scare them. See, that was one of the things he hated most about small towns like Celebration. Everyone knew everyone. Everyone was accounted for...part of a family or at least the fabric of the community. It was just like where he grew up.

The boys didn’t answer, so he kept walking, hoping they would heed his suggestion to curb their pet. Loss hit hard when you lived in a sheltered world that fostered a false sense of immortality. By the time he reached the next driveway, the whoops of laughter and barking began again.

In the distance, he saw the town square, a park dotted with white tents. The source of the delicious aromas, he suspected. He waited for a couple of cars to pass before making his way across Main Street.

Closer to the square, the street had been blocked off with large traffic barriers to allow for free-flowing pedestrian traffic. It appeared that the entire town of 1,288 had turned out for the food fest and that everyone was here milling about.

Did the square have room for 1,289?

Shane bought his ticket and entered the fray. The first booth he came to was a restaurant called Quiche Me Quick. They offered a sampling of quiches.

Quiche?

He hesitated. But since the samples were cut into small pieces and he could take it and eat while he kept walking, he grabbed a plate and did just that.

In fact, he walked right past the next booth. Petite Four, was offering an array of bite-size cakes that were covered in shiny, pastel-colored icing and decorated to look like little presents. Too sweet for an empty stomach. The sight of them made his teeth hurt.

The third booth was even less promising. It was Deloris’s Delicacies, offering what looked like fluffy pink icing that smelled like fish. As if the appearance wasn’t unappealing enough, the smell nearly did him in.

Judging by the first few booths, it looked like the festival was about froufrou food; he craved something substantial. He inhaled again to make sure the delicious smell of something cooking on the grill hadn’t been a sensory mirage. It was still there. It made his mouth water.

“Hi! I’m Deloris. Care to try my salmon mousse?” A petite, middle-age woman, who looked like she would be more at home in a Junior League meeting than hawking fishy fluff, held out a white plastic spoon heaped with the unappetizing stuff. “I made it myself. When I bring it to parties everyone just goes wild over it and asks me for the recipe. They always say, ‘Deloris, you should go into business and sell that mousse of yours.’ So I did. Here, hon, have some.”