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His Road
Home
By: Anna Richland
Releasing October 13th, 2014
Carina Press
Special
Forces medic Rey Cruz needs to find a fiancée, fast, to avoid insulting a
matchmaking Afghan warlord. Finding a picture online of a girl he barely knew
back home, he fakes an engagement photo, thinking no one else will see it. But
when Rey is injured while rescuing a local boy, the image no one was supposed
to see goes viral.
Seattle
marine biologist Grace Kim is shocked to find out she's engaged. When she's offered
a plane ticket to visit her "fiancé," she takes it, looking for the
answer to one question: Why did he lie? A traumatic brain injury means Rey
can’t tell her, until they figure out how to communicate. Touched by Rey's
funny texts and determination, Grace offers friendship—a big step for someone
who prefers whales to most company.
And when
Rey is finally sent home, Grace agrees to help him drive his classic car
cross-country over Thanksgiving—a once-in-a-lifetime road trip that leads to
what feels like real love. In front of his friends and family, she plays the
caring fiancée, but what place will Grace have in Rey's new life once he's
ready to be on his own again?
Reynaldo Cruz
looked terrible. Two fat rolls of bandages stopped above where legs and feet
should fill the bed. Tubes emerged from the wrappings and disappeared under the
sides. He’d lost both legs, that was obvious. He also had an oxygen tube taped
under his nose and an intravenous line in his hand. Dark hair stuck to his
head, and his tan skin shined as if coated with lotion or sweat. His eyes were
closed.
She’d studied the
pictures she could find, including one of him on the Pateros football team as a
junior in 2003 and one printed in the Quad City Star Tribune when he’d
completed basic training. Ten years ago, he’d been a skinny boy in an oversized
army hat, but the arms and shoulders of this man were too muscled to be labeled
boyish. Her stomach lurched over the contrast of his upper body filling the
space between the bed rails and the empty mattress at the foot of the bed.
When the nurse
looked over her shoulder and connected with Grace, she jerked her head at the
bed, as if she’d been waiting for Grace to enter. Maybe some visitors fled
without stepping inside, but taking the easy route wouldn’t give her answers
about the engagement photo. To get her life back, she’d have to come all the
way in.
Despite the
monitors arrayed around the top of the tilted bed, the room was quieter than
she’d expected. No repetitive beeps, just the generic white noise of
electronics and humming ventilation.
“Hello.” She
swallowed and tried again, but the new greeting sounded too loud.
The man in the bed
fluttered his eyelids and turned his head, and then his mouth fell open and his
skin flushed to his hairline. She might have no earthly idea why he’d
fabricated an engagement, but even with the robe and hairnet, he recognized
her.
“Surprise,
Sergeant.” The nurse stood. “Your fiancée’s here!”
The whole world
believed the lie.
Standing at the
head of the bed, if she focused on his face, she could keep the bundled stubs
out of her peripheral vision. “Hello, Reynaldo.”
The nurse gathered
a tray of dishes. “Buzz if you need me.”
After the other
woman left, the silence absorbed the energy Grace’s nerves had supplied on the
way to the room. She could almost graph how the longer she stood five feet from
the bed, the smaller she became. Eventually, if neither of them spoke, maybe
she would disappear.
On a paper taped to
the wall, someone had written SSG Reynaldo Cruz, Pateros, WA and a string of
numbers and letters that must have meaning to army people.
Enough time passed
with her studying the room and him staring wordlessly that any change felt
awkward, but she tried again. “I’m Grace Kim. But you know that, don’t you?”
The disposable
paper cap created a desperate urge to scratch her scalp, a feeling almost as
sharp as the one that overcame her when her cubicle-mate talked about his kids’
headlice, but she kept her hands at her sides and waited for the man in the bed
to reply.
He nodded, and his
lips flexed like a ling cod until he managed to say, “Rey Cruz.”
“This is awkward,
isn’t it?”
“No.” This time his
voice was deeper and stronger than she’d expected, and he nodded, which
confused her.
“You don’t think
so?”
He closed his eyes
and blew out a huff of air while he made a twisting gesture with his hand, as
if screwing in a light bulb or flipping things.
“You meant yes?”
He nodded again.
She pulled a chair
beside the bed and looked over the rail at his head and shoulders. The edges of
a tattoo peeked below the sleeve of his blue hospital gown. “I had two flights
full of babies, so let’s cut to the chase. Why’d you claim we’re engaged?”
“Long.” His lips
moved, and eventually a word emerged. “Stor-stor-story.”
“I have a week off
that I didn’t want. Go ahead and tell me.”
He rolled his eyes
and lifted empty hands, palms up. “No.”
Idiotic laughter,
as sudden as the tears she’d almost released downstairs, bubbled close to the
edges of her control. Of course he must have some sort of brain damage. “So how
are we going to clear up this mess if you can’t even tell me how it started?”
I don't think I've ever read a story like this one - loved it, loved it, loved it!
It was refreshing to see them build a friendship before giving into their attraction instead of the insta-love that seems to be going around lately.
Sweet, romantic, hopeful and sexy story about a wounded soldier who finds love.
It was refreshing to see them build a friendship before giving into their attraction instead of the insta-love that seems to be going around lately.
Sweet, romantic, hopeful and sexy story about a wounded soldier who finds love.
Anna
lives with her quietly funny Canadian husband and two less quiet children in a
century-old house in Seattle. Like the heroine of her debut paranormal romantic
suspense novel, First to Burn, Anna joined the army to pay tuition, a decision
that led to a career on four continents.
She
donates a portion of her book proceeds to two charities: the Fisher House
Foundation, which provides free accommodations near military hospitals for
families of wounded soldiers in the US and Great Britain, and Doctors Without
Borders, which delivers emergency medical care in more than sixty crisis zones
world-wide.
To
sign up for Anna's newsletter and find out about her next release, The Second
Lie (The Immortal Vikings, Book Two), visit her website at www.annarichland.com
Website: http://www.annarichland.com/
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