Bring Him Home Read Online Free PDF Page A

was my husband, Nate.”
    “Claire.” He took a step toward her and she held up a hand.
    “ My husband. All I want to do is take control of my finances and protect my son.” Tears prickling her eyes, she turned to Mia. “Can’t you see he’s only using you to avoid dealing with me? The war hero is a goddamn coward!”
    Mia opened her mouth, closed it. Nate stood frozen to the spot.
    She had to get out of here. Holding tight to her anger, Claire stormed out of the house, remembering too late her bag was still in the kitchen. She’d walk along the beach until they went to bed, then sneak back and gather her stuff, because she wasn’t going to spend one night under her former friend’s roof. At least she still had Nate’s spare key.
    She heard hurried footsteps behind her. “Claire!”
    Blindly she kept marching along the canal path. “Go to hell.”
    “Come home, Claire.” Nate tried to take her arm and she shook him off.
    “Not until I’m good and ready.… Go exploit poor Mia.”
    “We decided she could do better than me.… And you can’t go walking around here at night,” he added patiently. “It’s not safe.”
    She hadn’t even considered that. Her anger deflated, leaving only a bone-deep weariness. What was she going to do now? Her footsteps slowed and then stopped. She looked at him, but the streetlight was behind him and his face was in shadow.
    “I’ve been selfish,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
    “Too little, too late.” Claire returned the way she’d come. This time he knew not to take her arm.
    “How many days are we talking about?” he asked as they reached his house.
    Relief was a lump in her throat. “I figure two, maybe three at most.”
    “I don’t want anyone to know I’m in the country.”
    Her heart sank.
    “That means Lewis too,” he said, spelling it out.
    She’d had to rip a scab off a wound to make him do this. She wouldn’t show vulnerability again. “You’re in luck. He’s at Dan’s for the school holidays.”
    “I can’t tell him anything he hasn’t already heard from you.”
    “Any other conditions?” she said coldly.
    “No.” The exterior light illuminated a stranger’s face. “That about covers it.”

CHAPTER FOUR
    “I F YOU ’ RE NOT GOING to eat that…”
    Nate handed Claire the bread roll and cheese from his barely touched airline tray. Under different circumstances he might be amused by her appetite. She’d already eaten his complimentary cashew nuts, along with her own.
    “Anything else you want?” It had been a long time since he’d flown cattle class, but she’d refused to let him upgrade her to first, telling him to go ahead and book for himself.
    Much as Nate needed the space, he couldn’t bring himself to enjoy Air New Zealand’s premier service while she sat in economy.
    Accepting the roll, she eyed his dessert—a slice of blackberry cheesecake. He drained his glass of wine and indicated her unopened 187 ml bottle of merlot. “Swap you,” he suggested.
    Claire passed it over. “Hair of the dog?” Her tone was carefully neutral.
    “It’ll help me sleep.”
    “I have a homeopathic remedy.”
    “Hell, no,” he said feelingly and they shared an involuntary smile. Claire had once given Steve a sleeping tincture for the unit. The smell of the stuff alone—a cross between a decomposing rat and a flatulent elephant—had made everyone gag. The pilot of the Hercules had dropped altitude solely to jettison the bottles into the Pacific.
    “It’s odorless,” she promised.
    Nate unscrewed the cap on her wine and refilled his glass. “This will do fine.” Her lips tightened. Good. A buffer of disapproval made this whole thing easier. After the ambush, alcohol had helped counter his chronic insomnia, but since moving to the States he’d only needed it on the first anniversary of the ambush. And when his old life collided with his new life.
    “You didn’t used to drink so much.”
    “You didn’t used to eat so much,”