the voice in his head whispered, But if it did, it would be your fault.
You give yourself too much power, the colonel had said in one of their sessions.
Okay, so I choose the wrong pair of socks and get some poor old lady hit by a truck because she’s staring at my ankles. Same difference.
He knew it wasn’t. Why did he keep feeling it was?
He might get better if he could go back in time and change some of the disastrous decisions he’d made. As it was, his safest course was not to make any more. How did he atone for disasters everyone else told him weren’t his fault?
Sean dropped back a stride. “Keep up, Jake.”
“Hey, look at the size of those suckers,” Hank said and pointed toward the pasture, where a half-dozen giant horses lifted their heads and watched the newcomers before continuing to graze. “When do we get to drive ’em?”
“Soon enough,” the colonel said. “Orientation and house rules first. Come on, everybody.” He opened a door into the stable and waited while the group walked inside. “This is the common room. It’s where you’ll meet and eat while you’re here. Mickey, will your chair fit through the entrance?”
“Yeah, if I aim right. Boy, this is some kind of plush for a stable.”
“The living quarters are for visiting clinicians and people interested in the horses,” the colonel said. “The bedrooms are through there.”
“The nearest motel is ten miles away,” Charlie added. “You would not want to stay there. This way, you’re with the horses twenty-four/seven.”
“We’ve got a room and bath set up on the first floor for you, Mickey,” the colonel said, heading in that direction. The others took a quick look and drifted back to the common room, but Charlie stayed with her father and Mickey.
The pocket door to Mickey’s room was extra wide to accommodate his wheelchair. Once inside, the colonel waved around the room. “Lift for the bed, shower and john set up for you. Dr. Steadman vetted it before he signed off to let you come out here. You and Mary Anne will be on the main floor. Sean, Jake and Hank all have rooms upstairs.”
“May need some help with the lifts and stuff,” Mickey said with a grimace. “Call me Tin Man. My braces don’t take to showers real well.” Charlie sensed how much he hated asking for assistance. He cocked an eyebrow at her and leered, “Want to help me?”
She laughed. “Good try. The colonel swears you can manage fine on your own.”
“Oh, well, if I have to. Just keep Li’l Buckaroo Hank away from me. He thinks because he was an officer he’s too good to help an enlisted man.”
“He’s not in the army any longer,” Charlie said. “I’m the only one with rank in this organization.”
“I thought the colonel was in charge here.”
“I’m officially retired,” her father said, “although this program is my idea.” He leaned a hip against the corner of the wheelchair-height dresser and folded his arms. “Charlie is actually responsible for training you guys.” He walked back into the hall. “When you’ve finished exploring, join us in the common room.”
“Excellent,” Mickey said, spinning his chair and rolling over to Charlie. “I can plug my battery in beside the bed. I don’t really need the hoist. I can make it from my chair to the bed and back without hydraulics. This should work.”
“How often do you wear your braces?”
“Not often enough right now, but I’m getting stronger. I’m supposed to walk every day.”
“Don’t you?”
He shrugged. “The braces are a pain to put on and a pain to wear. Sometimes I let it slide, you know? You do have Wi-Fi, right?”
“Yes, Mickey, even here in the outer reaches of space we have Wi-Fi. See you in the common room in fifteen minutes.” She shut his door behind her.
The other trainee room on the first floor had been given to Mary Anne Howell, since she was the only female. Charlie knocked on her door, which stood ajar.
“Settling in all right?” she asked.
Mary Ann turned away and pulled down the sleeve of her shirt to cover the edge of her glove. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”
“It’s Charlie, not ma’am, okay?” Charlie wanted to tell her that she didn’t need to cover up, that nobody cared about her scars. Not quite true. Mary Anne cared. Charlie didn’t know the extent of her disfigurement. The others might not, either.
Upstairs, Sean and Hank had rooms across the hall from one another. Charlie reminded them both about the meeting in the common room. “Short orientation, then lunch.”
O’Riley followed her down the hall, caught her arm and said, “Ma’am, better let me bring the major.”
By that time she’d reached Jake’s room. The door stood wide open, and she could see him sitting on the edge of his bed, his hands loose in his lap, while he stared out the window. What was he seeing? The trees and fields, or something else?
“Hey, Jake, buddy, we’ve got to go downstairs for a meeting,” O’Riley said. “You gotta be hungry.”
Without a word, Jake stood. As he passed Charlie in the doorway, he flashed her a smile so sweet it took her breath away. Watching him walk down the hall and start down the steps, she noticed the limp. She pointed to Sean’s room, followed him in and shut the door.
“Okay, what’s with Major Thompson?”
“He’s a good man.”
“I’m sure he is.”
“He took shrapnel in his knee. Knees don’t ever heal right, so he’ll always limp.”
“Sean, that’s not all. I need to know, if I’m going to train him to drive a horse-drawn carriage and take care of draft horses.”
Sean sank onto his bed. Charlie leaned against the wall.
“All I know, he was wounded in an ambush in Iraq. He got out with a bum knee. Nobody else did. Since then he can’t make decisions.” O’Riley shrugged. “Hard to hold a job.”
“I’ll bet.”
“He was my roommate at our halfway house, so I’ve been kind of looking after him since I went there to learn to use my hand.”
Great. So far, the kid in the wheelchair showed the most potential of the lot.
Sean could crush a carriage shaft with his prosthetic hand. Mary Ann wouldn’t look straight ahead, take off her glove or wear a short-sleeved shirt in Memphis heat because of what must be burn scars on her arm. The handsome rodeo rider with one foot gave every impression of being both bad-tempered and bitter.
And finally, Jake Thompson wouldn’t be able to take the reins on a carriage because he couldn’t make a decision about which way
