Page 139 of A Soldier's Return

Outside, the sun was just beginning its rise above the Coast Range. The sweetness of Abigail’s flowers mingled with the sharp, citrusy scent of the Sitka spruce and pines. It was a beautiful morning. She only wished she had room in her heart past this pain to enjoy it.

Still, the cool air did help her wake up and by the time she propped open the beach access gate and took off across the sand, she was moving a little less gingerly.

As usual, the moment they hit the beach, he tugged the leash for her to head downtown—exactly the direction she did not want to go. She couldn’t take the chance that Eben might be outside his beach house again. She just couldn’t face him this morning.

Or ever.

“No, bud. This way.”

Conan barked and kept going to the very limit of his retractable leash. She managed to find the strength to give him the resistance to keep him from dragging her up the beach with him.

Sage pointed stubbornly in the other direction, as far away from Eben’s beach house as she could get. “This way,” she repeated.

Conan whined but had no choice but to comply. When she started a halfhearted jog down the beach, he came along with a huffy reluctance that might have made her smile under other circumstances.

“It’s no fun when somebody makes you go somewhere you don’t want to, is it?” she muttered, wondering if his keen communication skills stretched to understanding irony.

After a few moments of running, she had to admit she felt slightly better. The slanted light of day breaking across the wild, rugged shoreline didn’t calm her soul, but at least the endorphins helped take the edge off the worst of her despair.

She had the grim feeling it would take many more of these morning runs before she could find the peace her heart needed.

Why did Eben and Chloe have to come into her life now—and leave it again—when she was still reeling from losing Abigail? It hardly seemed fair.

If she had met them both before Abigail died, would she have even let them into her life? She didn’t know. Perhaps she wouldn’t have been as vulnerable to falling for both of them if her emotions hadn’t been so raw and unprotected.

No, that was a cop-out. She had a feeling she would have fallen hard for them no matter what the circumstances. Chloe was completely irresistible and Eben... well, Eben reached her heart in ways no man ever had.

Or ever would again, she was very much afraid.

She sobbed out a little breath. Just from exertion, she told herself. It was good for her. Maybe if she ran hard enough, she could outpace the pain.

The tide rose and fell on Oregon’s coast approximately every twelve hours. It was almost low tide now, the perfect time for beachcombing. She passed a few early-morning adventurers as she ran, most of them tourists who waved at her and smiled at Conan’s friendly bark.

After a mile and a half, she stopped, her breath heaving in her lungs. That first rush of endorphins could only take her so far. She wasn’t up for their full five-mile round trip, she decided. Three would have to do for today. She started to turn around, when suddenly Conan barked sharply and tugged his leash so hard he nearly toppled her into the sand.

“What’s the matter with you?” She pulled after him to follow her but he gave another powerful lunge away from her and the leash slipped out of her perspiration-slicked hands.

In seconds, he was gone, tearing down the beach in the direction of Hug Point.

“Conan, get back here!” she yelled, but he completely ignored her, racing toward a couple of beachcombers several hundred yards away.

He was going to scare the life out of them if he raced up to them at full-speed, a big hairy red beast rocketing out of nowhere. She had to hope it wasn’t a couple of senior citizens with an aversion to dogs and a team of attorneys on retainer.

She groaned and hurried after him.

“Conan! Get back here.”

From here, she saw him jump all over one of them and she groaned.

And then she saw a small figure hugging Conan, heard a high, girlish giggle drift toward her on the breeze, and her heart seemed to stop. She shifted her gaze to see the other person on the beach who stood watching her approach, his dark hair gleaming in the dawn.

Eben and Chloe.

She wanted to turn and run hard in the other direction. She couldn’t handle this. Not now. She needed time to restore the emotional reserves that had been depleted by her crying jag the night before.

Were her eyes as puffy and red as they felt? Oh, she hoped not.

It was far too late to turn and run back to the safety of Brambleberry House. Conan was already wriggling around them both with enthusiasm and Chloe was waving for all she was worth.

---