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the entire left side of Evan’s body. He’d escaped with his life, but left a lot of flesh behind. The villagers who had been guiding them— Oh, God . That stayed with him constantly.
    The carnage had been horrific, ghastly, so red. Every spilled drop of blood was on Charlie’s head, and just as he’d started to accept that he’d be bringing home a lovely parting gift of PTSD from Iraq, he’d realized that he could not, would not , drag Audra through his hell.
    “I can’t do this with you either,” he muttered.
    Not only was he damaged beyond repair, he’d made a mistake . And people had died. Evan had quit talking, lost in his own version of hell.
    How could he come up with the words to explain how unworthy he’d felt during those months after he’d texted her the five words that had torn them apart? The Saint had fallen from grace, and Audra had been a ticket back into heaven that he couldn’t purchase. He’d dreamed about her in a haze of memories, except he couldn’t close his fingers around the wispy, fragile bit of happiness. She was the Holy Grail he yearned to drink from but couldn’t bear to sully.
    But he still held out hope he could set things right with her. So he’d clawed his way out of the blackness, trying to get better, or at least to the point where he thought he could talk to her without feeling like he would taint her with his bloodstained hands.
    One week went by. Then two.
    Evan’s recovery had been so difficult, hampered by his descent into alcoholism that Charlie couldn’t ignore. That monkey was on his back too, and he’d dedicated himself to the task of getting his teammate sober. Then he’d gathered up the rest of his guys, gotten the hell out of Iraq, and brought them to the Caribbean to start a new life.
    It was supposed to be therapy. It was supposed to put him back in Audra’s world, in close proximity until he could tell her everything, beg for her forgiveness. If he’d meant anything to her at all, there was always a possibility she’d waited for him.
    Instead, she’d moved on. With Jared Anderson. It was poetic, actually, that she hadn’t waited for him to sort out his nightmares because, against all odds, she’d managed to heap a few more onto the pile.
    “Can’t do what, talk about your pathetic breakup text? Don’t like your sins thrown back in your face either, huh?” she challenged him, her voice rising. “I spent months wondering what happened. Waiting for more explanation. Nothing. I started to realize you’d probably just shacked up with a CNN reporter.”
    “We agreed no promises—” he shot back and cut himself off before he said something he regretted. It had been a lame excuse then, and it was no better now.
    God, he should have given her that closure, but he… couldn’t. It would have been too permanent, too hard to look her in the eye and lie about his feelings. It was still too hard.
    “Don’t you dare, Charlie. I agreed to that for you .” She stabbed him in the chest with a finger, but he didn’t miss that her hands were shaking. “Because I didn’t want to hold you to anything. But I was still here waiting for months , even though I knew better. Men have always let me down, but I trusted you with the crap about my dad, trusted you with…”
    Her voice broke on a sob, and it instantly dissolved his own anger. Her pain was on him. He could own that, despite the sudden confusion over how she could still be so upset after all this time. She’d been matter-of-fact so far, like she was mad about the way he broke up with her, but not the fact that they were over.
    This was… heartache.
    Audra’s shoulders quaked and she buried her face in her palms, muffling the sounds of distress, and there was no mistaking the fact that he had hurt her far more than he’d ever guessed.
    Hell if he was going to stand here and let her suffer. Pulling her into his arms, he grabbed on to her with every ounce of unspent passion, physically unable to