Incense & Peppermints by Carole Bellacera

Author:Carole Bellacera
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: romance, vietnam, vietnam conflict, love romance, love and death, vietnam era, love after grief, vietnam era fiction, vietnam combat veteran, vietnam combat, love again romance, love across time, combat nurse, vietname lost love
Publisher: Carole Bellacera

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Sergeant Clancy gazed up at Cindy from his hospital bed, his brown eyes welling with tears. He’d come through surgery with his leg intact, and would be shipping back to the World, barring any complications, within the week. Cindy was happy for him, but she couldn’t help thinking about how Quin would be going home once they found his body. He was officially listed as Missing in Action, but according to Sgt. Clancy, there was no hope he was still alive.

“Tell me how it happened,” Cindy said, her nails digging into her palms.

She didn’t know if she was ready to listen; maybe she’d never be. But Sgt. Clancy would be gone soon, and then she’d never know. For 24 hours, Cindy had see-sawed between total despair and wild hope that the corpsman was wrong. They hadn’t found Quin’s body, so couldn’t he be alive? Couldn’t the VC have captured him, and though it tore her apart to think of him in a POW camp, tortured and confined to a cramped bamboo cage in a rice paddy somewhere, at least he’d be alive. At least he could come back to her someday. But now, looking at Sgt. Clancy’s mournful face, she knew she was fooling herself.

He nodded, his eyes haunted. “It should’ve been me, too. If I hadn’t jumped out…”

“Start at the beginning, Todd. You’d landed to pick up the injured…”

“Yeah, it was a hot LZ. The VC were crawling all over the place, like cockroaches, damn them to hell!” With a trembling hand, he reached for his water bottle. Cindy took it from him and poured him a glass of water, then lifted it to his lips. He took a sip then fell back onto his pillow. “Quin knew it could be a suicide mission, but he went in anyway. There were scores of wounded on the ground, under heavy fire from the VC. We almost made it, too. We would have if not for me. It’s my fault!” A strangled sob issued from his throat.

Cindy squeezed his hand, trying to quell a sudden nausea. Her heart felt like a snowball lodged in her ribcage. She couldn’t really feel anything—hadn’t been able to feel anything since she’d first gotten the news. She knew this wasn’t right—that sooner or later, grief would cut through her numbness like an ice pick, stabbing away at the snowball that encased her heart, and then she’d surely die from the pain. It would be Gary all over again, only this time…this time…

She shook her head to banish the thought, and then gave Todd Clancy’s hand another reassuring squeeze. “You’ve got to stop blaming yourself, Todd. Go on…tell me the rest.”

He took a deep, shuddering breath and nodded. “Just as Quin was lifting off with the wounded, another guy stumbled out of the jungle, screaming for help. His arm had been severed just above the elbow, and he was jetting arterial blood. I didn’t think, I just acted. I yelled for Quin to hold on, and then jumped out to get him.

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