Page 31 of D-Day

She was used to dealing with all kinds of bodies, so his nakedness didn’t faze her. She towel-dried his hair and ashen face. He groaned softly once but was quiet after that. They pulled on a pair of soft gray cotton shorts over his hips and butt.

“I need Dr. Matthews’s medical kit,” she said, her heart lurching at the sound of his name. Clamping down once againat the urge to argue with Lando about going back and helping Greg, she removed the bandage Greg had placed over the wound to protect it. Her hands trembled as she cleaned the wound with sterile water and packed the wound with Quik Clot Gauze, then put a clean bandage over the bullet hole. The Quik Clot would slow the bleeding but if the bullet was in there, infection was going to set in, but that really wasn’t important. She couldn’t operate, and Taer was already dying. She injected him with some antibiotics out of the kit but knew it wouldn’t be enough. She had to find a way out of there.

She grabbed up more morphine and injected him, then covered him up with blankets. She eyed the dresser and crossed to it, pulling out the top drawer. Inside were neatly folded T-shirts. She pulled out a simple gray cotton one and rummaged in the second drawer for a pair of soft, flowing tan pants. She also found a long-sleeved sweatshirt.

She went toward the bathroom, but there was no door. She turned and said in Filipino, “Please give me some privacy.”

The men murmured some words under their breath, but she couldn’t make them out. Once the door closed around them, she pulled off the wet clothes and quickly toweled off the moisture, shivering, then got into the dry clothes. Taer’s clothes almost fit her. He was a slim man, but still a man, so she had to tighten the drawstring on the pants all the way to the end of the ties. Baggy, but they would do under these circumstances.

She bent over the sink and a small sob escaped as her despair and frustration threatened to overwhelm her. But she had to think about herself more than she had in her life, and that was so strange to her. She had given so much to so many, she wondered at having any pieces of herself left.

She walked out of the bathroom, towel drying her hair. Taer was still quiet and unconscious. The morphine would make his death as painless as possible, but she would have to wait a bitfor him to rouse before she could start questioning him. It all seemed so mercenary, but the stakes were too high for her not to try and find out as much information as she could.

She quickly braided her hair to keep it off her face and her stomach grumbled. She left the room, realizing that she would need some broth to feed Taer. She wished they had brought some IV bags with them on their trip to the village.

“I need to eat, and Taer will need some broth,” she said as she came out of the room. Lando turned to her.

“It’s already being prepared,” he said. “How is my brother?”

“Dry, comfortable, and I changed his bandage. He’s resting.”

He nodded, the hard edge to his face softening infinitesimally. “Sit,” he ordered, and she walked to one of the sofas and lowered herself to the soft cushions. She was thankful for the long sleeves, as the room was cool.

She wrapped her arms around herself, thinking back over the revelation that had smacked her over the head. She had never thought that she was personally avoiding her pain by using others to block it, making her thoughts, actions, and sympathies just part of their suffering. She had to face the fact that this type of nursing was nothing but her way of keeping everything fluid and detached.

The turning point had been when D-Day had rejected her attempts to try to connect with him the last time he was at the ranch. Before him, she’d kept her relationships at a superficial level because she didn’t want to deal with whatever wasn’t working, and it was easy to keep things superficial because she was always either out of the country or training. She just simply had to allow the distance and the lack of communication to kill anything that she didn’t want to pursue.

And D-Day had turned the tables on her. He had her heart, almost from the beginning. In him she saw pain and a terrible isolation, but how brave he had been to bond with her family, toopen up his heart and accept their love and affection. It humbled her and devastated her when her actions had driven him away from something that was so elemental for him.

Her armor had shattered, and she hadn’t been the same woman since.

A demure woman came into the room with a tray. She set it down on the coffee table. The aroma made Helen’s belly cramp. Lando sat down across from her and reached for a plate, and Helen then took hers. Chicken Adobo was easy to spot. There was fried chicken and very yellow rice with onions. She unabashedly dug in, savoring the perfectly fried chicken, and the vinegar, soy sauce, and garlic flavors that burst on her tongue.

Lando pushed a dish of what looked like spring rolls toward her. “Lumpia. Very good.”

Helen took one and crunched into it. Absolutely delicious and perfectly cooked. “Your cook is very skilled.”

He nodded but didn’t elaborate.

“Taer said you come from a fishing village in this area and that you help the people by providing for them with some of the proceeds from your…gunrunning.”

“Taer talks too much,” he muttered.

Just as they finished, the woman came back with a cup filled with a rich broth. Helen smiled at her. “The food was very, very good.”

She smiled and bowed, but after glancing at Lando, immediately left.

Sheesh, this guy was such a bully.

Without saying anything else to him, Helen headed back to Taer’s room. Slipping inside, she pulled a chair over to the bed and sat down. She shook him gently, and he opened his eyes. “Helen,” he rasped.

“You need to eat some of this broth and drink some water,” she said gently. Unable to tamp down that need to help and provide comfort. “Can you sit up a bit?”

He winced and nodded as she leaned in to help him get into a better position to eat.

He took several spoonfuls of the broth and drank some of the water, then reclined back, dark circles under his eyes and a gray tinge to his skin. “Where is your doctor?”

She swallowed hard and that anguish rose up in her, and she let it settle into her heart. She should feel this pain. Greg had once been her lover, and he had been so brave. She said, “He was shot on our way here.”

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