"I know that." He studied her intently, and with her heart pounding so it was a moment or two before she realized his thumb was rubbing back and forth over her fingers-specifically, the third finger. He'd been holding her left hand, and the place he kept rubbing was the place where she'd once worn a wedding ring.

She turned her hand so she could see it, remembering clearly the day she'd taken off her wedding ring and put it away in her jewelry box. Remembering how she'd ached inside, and how for a long time she stared dry-eyed at the little blue velvet box and willed the tears to come, hoping they'd give her some kind of relief. "It's at home," she said, aching the same way now. "I put it away. I was in New York when I found out you were alive. I flew straight here-I didn't have a chance-"

She halted then, because he was making a soft shushing sound. He'd enfolded her hand in both of his and was still holding it close to his lips. Above their hands, his eyes were closed, and she could see little knots of tension in his forehead and across his cheekbones. His face seemed tight and dark and closed, and she thought how different it was from the face she remembered…all warmth and charm, with an easygoing grin and laughing eyes.

Jolted, she shifted her gaze away from his face and found herself staring at his hands instead. But there was nothing familiar about them, either. They were a stranger's hands-bony and big-knuckled, striped with ropy tendons and irregular scars. Unbidden, the memories from the night before came rushing into her mind and collided with the image before her eyes, and suddenly she was imagining-no, feeling-those hard, alien hands touching her in the most intimate ways. Forgotten yearnings flooded her body with heat and she shuddered in spite of it, the way coming to a roaring fire when she was chilled clear through could sometimes make her shiver.

"That's okay. I think I'd like to be the one to put it back on you, anyway." He cleared his throat. "Maybe I ought to buy you a new one. Something better."

"The old one's just fine," Jessie said, giving her hand an indignant tug. Tristan laughed as he reclaimed it and they started back toward the guest house, their clasped hands swinging gently between them.

"Oh-we have a car," Jessie said as they were weaving their way through the clutter of tables on the patio, Tris maneuvering awkwardly with his cane. She told him about the Ford, and what Lieutenant Commander Rees had said about her being the one who'd be doing the driving.

"Oh Lord," he said, and Jessie burst out laughing.

"That's what I said." He was holding the door for her, and she arched her eyebrows teasingly as she passed him. "You gonna be able to handle that?"

Her driving style always had just about driven Tris crazy, which was why he'd always done the driving whenever they'd gone anywhere together. Driving herself had been one of the things she'd had to get used to doing every time her husband was sent away-and cheerfully given up again when he came home. It was just one of the realities of being a military wife, of course, learning to be completely self-sufficient during her husband's deployments, then cheerfully handing the reins back over to him when he came home. Something they all learned to deal with.

Only, she thought, I doubt very many wives ever had to adjust to a husband's return after a deployment of eight years.

"I guess that remains to be seen," Tristan said. "Has your driving improved any since I've been gone?"

"There's not a thing the matter with my driving, and never was," Jessie said indignantly, punching him smartly on the arm.

"Ow!" He feigned outrage, then grinned at her, a ghost of his old self. And she grinned back, irrationally, idiotically delighted with that small, bantering exchange.

They had dinner in the privacy of Jessie's room again, pork chops and applesauce and corn bread stuffing this time, with cherry pie for dessert. More of Tristan's favorites, and he tried his best to do them justice, he really did, even though his appetite was still a long way from what it should have been.

"You trying to fatten me up?" he said in the teasing tone that had made her smile, rolling a cherry around on his tongue and marveling at the tart-sweet miracle of it.

"You bet I am," she replied smugly, then paused to give the forkful of pie that had been on its way to her mouth a long, sad look. "Only, I think the wrong one of us is gonna end up puttin' on weight." She put the fork down on the plate with a sigh.

"You look great to me," Tristan said, and saw her cheeks warm with a quick flush of pink. He went on looking at her, unable to take his eyes from her, remembering the times he'd watched that same flush creep across her chest, her breasts…her belly…and her whole body lush and blooming in the aftermath of lovemaking like a sun-drenched rose. Remembering what it had felt like to hold her, his body entwined with hers and her warmth soaking into his very bones.

He saw her looking back at him, cheeks glowing like Georgia peaches-remembering how she'd hated it when he'd said that to her…about the peaches. Long ago. And he thought, This is now-not long ago. She's here and she's real, not a memory, not imagination. My wife. I could be lying with her now, making love to her in that big bed, enjoying her warmth and her softness…

Then came the thought, No, Tristan, you couldn't. Because she may be real, but you're sure as hell not.

The truth was, though the thoughts, the memories, the desires were all there, they were only in his head. From the neck down he was just a tangle of muscle, bone and sinew, without warmth or feeling. Once upon a time he'd learned to survive by separating his mind from his body, and both of those from his emotions, and he'd been that way for so long, he didn't know how to start putting himself back together again.

He swallowed the bite of cherry pie and said, "We should call Sammi June," forcing the bittersweetness past the tightness of his throat. "Think she'd be in about now?"

Jess put down her fork with a clatter, snatched up her napkin and dabbed at her lips with it as she twisted around to look at the clock on the nightstand. "Um…lemme see, it's Monday…if she doesn't have a class she could be in her room studying. We can give it a try."

He watched her make the call, standing beside her as she sat on the edge of the bed with her little pocket address book in one hand and the phone tucked between her jaw and shoulder. He watched her supple fingers punch in numbers, preparing himself, distancing himself from the remembered tug of a little girl's arms around his neck…the feel of a small grubby hand creeping into his. He listened to Jess's voice, speaking to someone in a thickening Southern accent, asking if Sammi June was there. He listened, preparing…arming himself with the images in the photo album Jess had given him, of a lovely young woman in a ball gown, smiling confidently, her tiara worn at a rakish tilt atop casually upswept blond hair.

"Hang on just a minute, hon'," Jess was saying, "there's somebody here wants to talk to you." With an abrupt, almost angry thrust, she handed the phone to Tris.

He took it calmly; his new crooked smile was fixed firmly to his lips as he put the receiver to his ear and said, "Hello…Sammi June?"

"Daddy?" A high, breaking voice. A little girl's voice.

Something burst, stinging, inside his head. He croaked, "Hey, baby girl…" Suddenly he was sitting on the edge of the bed with his elbows braced on his knees, head bowed, one hand shading his eyes. Dimly, thankfully, he heard Jess get up and go into the bathroom, as tears dropped from the end of his nose.

Chapter 5

Toddling along in the autobahn's slow lane at 100 kilometers per hour, Jessie flicked sideways glances alternately between the freshly plowed fields of the German landscape and Tris's silent profile. Reassured by the fact that he hadn't made any comments on her driving so far, she edged the Ford's speed up to 110 and settled back in the driver's seat.

"There, now-it's not so awful, is it?" she said lightly, flexing tense fingers on the steering wheel. She said it in a teasing way, but the truth was, she'd been a little annoyed by all the fuss over her driving, with herself more than with Tristan. It was true her driving had always given him fits, but that had been a long time ago. She'd been more than competent behind the wheel of a car for a good many years now, and there wasn't any reason in the world why she should start having doubts about her driving skills just because Tris happened to be sitting beside her. Okay, she'd never driven in a foreign country before, but as Lieutenant Commander Rees said, it wasn't as though this was England where they drove on the wrong side of the road. Interstate or autobahn, they both looked the same, and the signs were pretty much universal, so what was the big deal?

Why do I keep going back to where I was when I first met him? That was eighteen years ago. I'm not-I can't be that person now. It's not who I am.

"You're doin' okay." Tristan glanced at her and a grin flickered. "Long as you don't get us run over."

"I'm doin' 110!"

"Kilometers, darlin'-that's sixty-six miles an hour. That'd get you a ticket for obstructing traffic in Atlanta."

Jessie snorted. "Oh, well-Atlanta drivers are crazy, you can't go by them." She said it in a scoffing tone, but it was hard to hide a smile and a little shiver-of what, hopefulness? Encouragement? Optimism? It had been two days since the phone call to Sammi June, and although Tris still wouldn't stay the night with her, he seemed a little more like himself every day.