Read Home by Nightfall for Free Online

completely by then, rolled inward to leave a tight, bloodless crease across her face. She’d spun on her heel and marched away, apparently to find out exactly what he had said.
    Learning that he’d declared her a stubborn goat, she returned with an officer who forbade Christophe from speaking French. He was not French, goddamn it, the strident, mustachioed captain had barked, looming over his hospital bed, and this was America. His name was Riley Braddock, he was an American, and Americans spoke English.
    Not Chinese, not Icelandic, not French.
    English.
    As the train rounded a bend, a small town appeared in the distance and the conductor announced their approach to Powell Creek. Chugging and squealing along rails that gleamed silver-blue, the train slowed to deliver him to a family of strangers, and Christophe again wished to God that John Bennett and Poppy Weidler, those meddling Red Cross workers, had never found him. He cursed the day he’d spoken with them—they’d told the army he was there, and now he was here . Although his injuries still ached, especially when the weather changed, he’d had a measure of peace on Véronique’s small plot on the other side of theAtlantic. There, it had not mattered that his memory had abandoned him.
    Since leaving her, he was reminded of it every day, and he felt lost, inadequate. L’étrangeté had become a malevolent shadow that followed him, ready to jump out and overtake him at any moment, inopportune or private. He glanced down and saw that his hand clenched and opened, clenched and opened on his knee. Glancing around to see if anyone had noticed the gesture, he made a conscious effort to open his fist and relax the muscles.
    “Powell Creek! Powell Creek Station!” the conductor blared again.
    A few of the passengers in his car began gathering their belongings and brushing at the wrinkles in their clothes. The sum of Christophe’s worldly goods was packed in a small suitcase that he kept at his feet. He turned to grab the cane hooked over the back of his seat, a practical piece of oak that had also been issued at the hospital, along with his suit, two changes of underwear, and a few other utilitarian items.
    A bubble of anticipation and fear swelled in his chest, one that seemed familiar for no reason he could identify. He stumped into the narrow aisle, blending with the flow of people working their way toward the door. Though he did his best to avoid hitting anyone in the leg with his cane, the woman ahead of him wearing a large, ugly hat turned to give him a severe look, and he knew he’d failed. He mumbled an apology and shuffled down the steps to the platform.
    His palms were already slick with perspiration.
    Around him, passengers, station workers, and people meeting the train all milled together, pausing in eddies, then flowed away. He watched them, wondering what to do next.
    “Riley!”
    “Riley Braddock, over here!”
    He turned toward the sound of the name and saw a small group surging forward, their faces alight with a baffling joy. There was a tall man about his own age with sandy, chin-length hair, an old one almost as crippled as he himself was, a couple of boys, and a blonde woman with shining green eyes. Another woman with them hung back a bit. She had long, dark ringlets, a fine, graceful jaw, and eyes that watched him with the same wariness he felt. He recognized her from the photograph in his pocket.
    They descended upon him and pulled his suitcase out of his fingers as they reached to shake his hand, clap him on the back, embrace him, all talking at once.
    “By God, boy, I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” the old man said, his voice quivering. He pounded Christophe’s shoulder with a twisted hand and gave a tremendous wet sniff.
    “This is a great day—I got my brother back! Your room is just the way you left it.”
    “Wait till we tell the kids at school about this ! Nobody’s got a story as good as this one.”
    “Oh, Riley,