Page 95 of A Hero Comes Home

No, he hadn’t meant like himself.

While he’d been looking the other way, at Izzie, Major Durand slid into the seat that Sally had occupied. Jake was about to tell him the seat was taken when Durand leaned closer and said, “We have to talk.”

“Here? Now?”

“No, not now. But right after this frickin’ show. You’re not sneaking out of here without our discussion.”

Was I so obvious? “What’s so important that it can’t wait?”

“Your wife is suspicious about what happened to you in Balakistan, and if she, a civilian, is savvy enough to dig up dirt on Nazim, the newshounds are surely three steps ahead of her. Plus, some Qadir dissident claims to have firsthand knowledge of your imprisonment and is going to announce it to the world if the US/Balakistan deal is approved.”

There was only one thing Jake heard or cared about in Durand’s spiel.

“Sally? What does Sally have to do with all this?”

“She told Bernstein about internet research she’s been doing about Nazim, and—”

“Hey,” Izzie leaned forward around Jake and addressed Durand, “I told you that in confidence.”

“Urgency takes precedence over privacy,” Durand contended.

“You knew . . . You talked to Sally about this? And didn’t tell me?” Jake asked Izzie, incredulous that his friend would betray him in this way.

“She swore me to secrecy.”

“Bullshit!” Jake said.

“Shhhhhh!” at least a half-dozen people hissed around them, and another half dozen shot glowers their way.

They all sat back and shut up, but Jake’s mind was simmering with a mixture of emotions. Hurt, anger, disappointment, fear. What to do, what to do? He needed to get out of here and think, but he was trapped, unless he wanted to make a scene.

But then Mayor Ferguson stepped out on the stage and announced, “We have a new, last-minute addition to our program. Please welcome Sally Dawson, and her sons, Matthew, Mark, and Luke.”

Whaaat? Jake jerked, his attention riveted to the stage now.

“This song will be a tribute to Captain Jacob Dawson, our own hometown hero, and all the hometown heroes out there, those who are fortunate enough to come home, and those who have not been.” The mayor bowed back, and Sally came forward.

Sensing his dismay, Durand and Izzie clamped hands on Jacob’s forearms to prevent him from vaulting from his chair and out of the ballroom.

When the audience went silent, with no musical accompaniment, Sally belted out the first line of the song that asked some guy if he knew he was her hero. People were surprised when they first heard Sally’s voice, which was so powerful, coming from such a small body, clear toned and sweet. Like Norah Jones. But then, before he could digest her verbal message to him, his sons stepped forward in their scout uniforms and repeated the refrain in voices that cracked and were tone-deaf, more like shouting. Utter heartrending love. Then all four of them, with piped-in background music kicking in, repeated the refrain as one and went on to the lyrics about the wind beneath their wings.

Jake was stunned and frozen in place. Durand and Izzie no longer held him. He couldn’t move if he’d wanted to.

Surely Sally knew how humiliated he would feel? He’d told her that he hated being in the parade because it called attention to himself. How much worse was this?

How could she?

And she’d been researching a terrorist behind his back?

How could she?

And talking to his best friend about her suspicions, also behind his back?

How could she?

What other secrets was she keeping from him? Maybe her claims of celibacy had been a lie? Maybe she had been having an affair with Kevin after all? Maybe the affair was still going on? She’d never said that she loved him since his return, even when he’d said those three words himself. Wasn’t that telling?

What a fool I’ve been!