Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story 
Chapter or Story
Disclaimer: Do any of us really own anything? Can anyone claim to possess the lives of these characters that we hold so dear? You betcha. But it isn't me. Don't own them. Just borrowing them. This is just my feeble attempt to keep the Pretender alive and well until we finally get to find him again on DVD release. If anyone tries to sue, I'll disavow all knowledge.
Author's Note: Here you go Rev. I'll try not to take so long with the next chapter.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Straight Path Lost Part 4
By Phenyx
06/23/04
Charles walked through the house, checking the locks and turning out lights. It was late, nearly twenty-four hours since he'd driven away from a darkened parking lot in Delaware. After driving until nearly dawn, the major had slumped in one of the passenger seats and slept while other members of his family took turns behind the wheel.
In the hours that had passed, the major and his family had managed to put nearly half a continent between them and the Centre. Jarod had directed them to this large farmhouse in a secluded area of the Mid-West. With little more than a phone call Jarod had arranged for the keys and unlimited access to the well kept home.
Charles went to the kitchen and spent a few moments opening cupboards until he found a glass. Pouring juice from a container in the refrigerator, the major took the cup and carried it down the dimly lit hallway. He stopped in front of a half open door.
The only bedroom located on the first floor of the house, this is where they had brought Miss Parker. She was weak from her injury, wavering in and out of consciousness since joining the group. Jarod seemed confident that she would recover, claiming that with rest she would be fine. But Jarod had yet to leave the wounded woman's side.
Charles gazed through the open door at his son. Jarod was precariously balanced on a wooden chair. His body was awkwardly folded over itself to lean forward on to the mattress. Crossed forearms rested on the bed to serve as a pillow for Jarod's head. He had one hand wrapped around Miss Parker's wrist while he slept, as though he was monitoring her pulse even while unconscious.
With a wry smile, the major stepped into the room. There was a sudden blur of motion, occurring so fast that Charles didn't even have time to flinch. The tender scene that the major had witnessed a moment ago was gone. Instead, the older man found himself staring down the barrel of a gun. Jarod, sitting bolt upright in the chair, had a weapon trained on the major.
It took only an instant for Jarod to recognize the intruder. The moment he did, Jarod pointed the gun at the ceiling and released his grip, allowing the pistol to twirl around his finger by the trigger guard. "Sorry, Dad," he mumbled.
Charles shrugged. "Not a problem," he said. "Just please, don't do that to your sister. No need to make her any more uneasy."
"Uneasy?" Jarod asked.
The major nodded. "I thought you might want something to drink," Charles said in an attempt to change the subject. "Apple juice. It was your favorite when you were little."
Jarod smiled as he took the glass. After a few sips he asked again, "Why is Emily uneasy?"
Charles didn't want to make Jarod aware of the recent change in dynamics between him and his sister. But Margaret was right. Jarod needed to know of the problem, if only to prevent matters from getting any worse.
"I've frightened her," Jarod replied in answer to his own question.
The major sighed. "She doesn't understand."
Gazing solemnly at the sleeping woman, Jarod said flatly, "What's to understand? I'm capable of frightening things. Her anxiety is well justified."
"Emily is your sister," Charles scolded. "You would never harm her."
"Wouldn't I?" Jarod's dark eyes carried a look of despair. "I've just pulled a gun on my own father. What makes you think Emily is safe?"
Charles stepped closer and placed a reassuring hand on Jarod's shoulder. "She is safe because Emily is no threat to either you or Miss Parker," he said. "You do what you have to in order to survive. You are simply protecting yourself and those who are important to you."
The skepticism in Jarod's eyes was all too easy for the major to see. Gazing at his son thoughtfully, Charles sighed. "You are a good man, Son. A good man forced to live in extreme circumstances."
"Dad," Jarod began to argue.
"No," the major held up one hand to stop him. They stared at each other in silence for a long moment. "I want to tell you about your namesake." Charles saw Jarod frown in confusion at the abrupt change in the conversation. "Now, don't look at me like that. You'll understand why I bring it up once you've heard the tale. But Jarod," Charles glared at his son. "I've never told your mother about this and I prefer her to stay ignorant of the entire thing. No need to trouble her over ancient history."
Jarod nodded. His interest had been aroused and he looked up at his father curiously.
"I wanted to name you Jarrett, after a man I greatly admired." Charles began. "But your mother thought the name sounded like a cartoon character. 'Jarrett the ferret' she said." The major grinned wryly at the old memory. "So we compromised a bit. She changed the spelling and found a name she liked. I felt it was close enough to pay homage to the man I had known. Besides, I couldn't really argue the point. Your mother went through a lot to give me a son." The major reached out and caressed his son's hair. "The least I could do was let her choose his name."
Jarod smiled at his father as the major carefully sat on the edge of Miss Parker's bed.
"I met Sergeant Robert Jarrett during my first year in the military," Charles remembered. "Years before I came to know your mother. I was as naïve as they come, the greenest recruit you've ever seen. I joined the Air Force before I'd finished high school. Less than a week after graduation I was on my way to boot camp. Six months later I was stationed in South Korea, surrounded by a war I barely understood."
"I wasn't a pilot then." Charles went on. "I didn't fly jets until 'Nam. Those first few years in Korea I was nothing more than a grunt on the stiff watch." At Jarod's puzzled look the major explained further. "We were a chopper crew of five. There was the pilot, navigator and three corpsmen. Our job was to fly into an area after a battle and retrieve the bodies of American casualties. We brought back as many as we could." Charles sighed. "Sometimes there were too many to get them all on the chopper. We'd run across the fields, dodging sniper fire on occasion, snatching up as many dog tags as we could. Once in a while we'd find a live one, someone that the medics had missed. Bringing a breathing soldier in to a M.A.S.H was so much more rewarding than hauling the corpses out of one.
"Anyway," Charles continued. "The sergeant was one of the crew. He was a grizzled old army veteran who had served as a paratrooper during World War II. He was a decorated hero with enough medals to easily intimidate a young airman."
Charles chuckled to himself as the memories washed over him. "Sergeant Jarrett ran me ragged, I'll tell you. He wasn't my superior officer, of course, but he acted like it. And not a day went by that he didn't make some crack about soft cheeked mama's boys." The major continued. "He was an old army soldier stationed with a bunch of young Air Force recruits who all had chips on their shoulders because they hadn't been chosen for pilots."
"It must have been difficult to get along," Jarod mused.
"Not one bit," Charles replied. "We all adored him. He'd give any one of us the last dollar in his pocket. Let us read letters from home to him over and over, until he knew our families as well as we did. When the homesickness and fear came to be too much, well, let's just say that he was very supportive for the rest of us."
"He sounds like a nice person," Jarod observed.
The smile slipped from Charles face as he went on. "For the most part. But at the core of it all, Jarrett was a soldier. He was at Normandy on D-day, fought in some of the bloodiest battles of World War II, and lived to tell about it." Charles looked at his son, trying to instill in the younger man some sense of the gravity of what he was about to say.
"One cold November afternoon, we were on a mission when our chopper was shot down," Charles said quietly. "Sergeant Jarrett and I were the only two to make it out of the wreckage. We were twenty miles behind enemy lines. I was scared to death and thought we were done for."
"What did you do?" Jarod asked breathlessly.
"We started to walk," the major said. "'Believe you'll make it, Airman.' he told me. 'A soldier who thinks he's dead, is dead.' He promised we'd get out of there, and in exchange made me promise to name a kid after him." Charles smiled ruefully. "He was trying to keep my spirits up, I suppose."
"Night fell and we spent hours sneaking across the countryside, sometimes even crawling on our stomachs. When the sun rose the next morning, we found ourselves less than five hundred yards from an entire unit of North Korean soldiers. They were bivouacked in this little farming village and we were hiding in one of the barns."
Charles went on talking, doing his best to keep his voice level and calm. "So there we were. Huddled in the straw trying to be very quiet when a girl came into the barn to feed the animals. She couldn't have been a day over fifteen, a lovely, sweet young girl." Charles shook his head. "I sat there and watched as Sergeant Jarrett sliced her throat so that she could not scream. He cut her larynx and then, before she had time to realize what was happening, he put the blade between her ribs and killed her with one swift jab."
Jarod's throat clicked as he swallowed. For a long moment, father and son stared at each other in silence.
"She wasn't the only one," Charles continued. "There were others over the next two days. Those we couldn't avoid, who crossed our path at just the wrong moment. I made it back because Sergeant Jarrett was a damn good soldier. He did what he had to do, what he had been trained to do. Right or wrong, I am here today because that man did what he needed to in order to survive."
Jarod glanced away, gnawing at his lower lip in anxiety. Charles rose and stood before the wooden chair. Taking his son by the shoulders, the major turned Jarod toward him.
"Jarod," Charles said with gentle firmness. "You do what you to have to do, what you have been trained to do. You're a soldier who has been at war for a long, long time. Survival is all you've known."
Charles placed a reassuring arm around his son's shoulders. "Emily can't understand," he said. "Reconciling the kind-hearted brother with the determined soldier just isn't something she can deal with right now. You need to give her time to realize that both can exist in the same man."
"But, Dad," Jarod said. "I don't believe they can. Light and darkness are mutually exclusive. Where one is present, the other is not. One aspect of the personality is real, the other is a façade, no more than a mask." Jarod sighed. "The hell of it is, I'm never sure which is the genuine persona and which is just pretend."
"Jarod," the major frowned, shaking Jarod's shoulders gently. "The world isn't as simple as that. You see things as extremes, all or nothing, black or white. But the truth is that no one on this earth is purely evil, or purely good for that matter. We each of us carry the seeds of both."
Jarod gazed at his father with large soulful eyes. "You don't know, Dad," he whispered. "You don't know the terrible things I've done."
Charles straightened with a sigh. "Do you want to tell me?"
"You saw the DSAs," Jarod said with a frown.
"Only a few," the major countered.
Jarod shrugged. "Watch the rest if you want."
"I shouldn't have seen the ones I did," Charles said kindly. "I didn't ask for permission. I shouldn't have invaded your privacy that way."
Jarod tossed his father a strange look that the major couldn't quite interpret. With a sigh he said, "Privacy isn't a concept I've quite been able to grasp."
A snorting sound rose from the bed, soft yet rude. "Common problem among stalkers," Miss Parker said in a raspy voice.
Charles was amazed by the abrupt change in his son. A delighted smile spread across Jarod's face, brightening the room with its intensity.
"I'm not a stalker," Jarod gasped, feigning shock. "Yours is the only privacy I invade on a regular basis, Miss Parker."
"Liar."
Sliding gracefully onto his knees at Miss Parker's bedside, Jarod laughed. "It's all a matter of perspective, I guess."
The insolent scoff came again from the lithe form on the bed as Miss Parker's eyes fluttered open.
Jarod caressed the woman's smooth forehead, checking her temperature as he smiled at her. "How do you feel?" he asked tenderly.
"I'll live," she croaked in response. "I can blame you for that I suppose."
"Yup," Jarod said as he sat on the mattress beside her. "Don't expect me to apologize for it either."
"Bastard," Miss Parker sighed as her eyelids closed wearily.
"I do my best."
The gray-blue eyes opened again, looking up at Jarod inquisitively. "How's Sam?" she asked.
Jarod glanced toward his father, as though looking for support of some kind. Jarod's dark brown gaze then fixed on the girl soulfully. It was apparent that Miss Parker had little trouble deciphering the look. When Jarod shook his head sadly, the woman flinched.
"Sam," she whispered.
Charles frowned as he watched the younger couple, trying to understand what kind of relationship existed between them. Jarod was looking decidedly uncomfortable, his back straight and his movements stiff as the woman looked away sadly. There suddenly seemed to be a distance between them. It was a distance that far surpassed the mere twelve inches of space separating their bodies.
"Would you like me to go find Sydney?" Jarod asked.
Miss Parker shook her head.
Grabbing the nearly full glass from the nightstand where he'd placed it, Jarod offered, "Would you like some juice?"
"No," she refused quietly.
There was a long, uncomfortable silence in the room.
"What can I do for you, Parker?" Jarod asked finally.
"Nothing," was the soft reply.
With a heavy sigh, Jarod nodded. "Try to rest," he said. He tucked the blankets around Miss Parker's body before settling himself back on to the chair. With a sigh, the injured woman let her eyelids drift shut and before long, she was breathing in a deep rhythmical way that indicated sleep.
"You should follow your own advice, Son," the major whispered. "Get some sleep."
Jarod nodded. "Thanks, Dad."
Charles patted his son affectionately on the shoulder then left the room, quietly pulling the door closed behind him. He made his way through the darkened house, up the stairs to the room at the end of the hall. As silently as he could, he tugged off his clothes and slipped into bed beside his wife.
"How is he?" she asked.
Charles shrugged, knowing that she could not see him in the dark. With a troubled sigh, the major curled against his wife's body and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer.
"Charles," Margaret's voice took on a scolding tone.
"He's fine," the major said. "Miss Parker woke for little while. It seems that she'll be okay."
Twisting in his arms, Margaret turned to look at Charles. "There is something between those two," she said.
"Without a doubt," the major agreed. "But what that is has yet to be determined."
"It frightens me, Charles," Margaret said. "He seems so different with them here. So... anxious somehow."
The major grunted as he pondered his wife's words.
"These people pursued him for years," Margaret continued. "That Sydney held him captive all his life. Do you suppose Jarod might be afraid having them here?"
"No," Charles said thoughtfully. "He doesn't fear them. He seems to be connected to them in some way, as though they share a terrible secret."
"I'm afraid we'll never know our own son well enough to learn that secret," Margaret sighed.
The major kissed his wife's temple and snuggled her against his chest. "There's nothing we can do about it tonight," he soothed. "Stop worrying and go to sleep."
Margaret sighed contentedly. Charles held her tight until long after she had drifted off. But for the major, rest would not come. His mind kept flitting back to a far away night on the Korean countryside. He thought of the sergeant he had loved and feared in equal measure. He thought of his son and tried to imagine what pain haunted the younger man's eyes.
In his heart, the major knew that he never really wanted to know what horrors his firstborn had lived through. He didn't want to know what evil had dwelt in Jarod's life. And yet, Charles had a gnawing feeling in his gut that the darkness of Jarod's past would catch up to them. No matter how hard they tried to ignore it.
Author's Note: Here you go Rev. I'll try not to take so long with the next chapter.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Straight Path Lost Part 4
By Phenyx
06/23/04
Charles walked through the house, checking the locks and turning out lights. It was late, nearly twenty-four hours since he'd driven away from a darkened parking lot in Delaware. After driving until nearly dawn, the major had slumped in one of the passenger seats and slept while other members of his family took turns behind the wheel.
In the hours that had passed, the major and his family had managed to put nearly half a continent between them and the Centre. Jarod had directed them to this large farmhouse in a secluded area of the Mid-West. With little more than a phone call Jarod had arranged for the keys and unlimited access to the well kept home.
Charles went to the kitchen and spent a few moments opening cupboards until he found a glass. Pouring juice from a container in the refrigerator, the major took the cup and carried it down the dimly lit hallway. He stopped in front of a half open door.
The only bedroom located on the first floor of the house, this is where they had brought Miss Parker. She was weak from her injury, wavering in and out of consciousness since joining the group. Jarod seemed confident that she would recover, claiming that with rest she would be fine. But Jarod had yet to leave the wounded woman's side.
Charles gazed through the open door at his son. Jarod was precariously balanced on a wooden chair. His body was awkwardly folded over itself to lean forward on to the mattress. Crossed forearms rested on the bed to serve as a pillow for Jarod's head. He had one hand wrapped around Miss Parker's wrist while he slept, as though he was monitoring her pulse even while unconscious.
With a wry smile, the major stepped into the room. There was a sudden blur of motion, occurring so fast that Charles didn't even have time to flinch. The tender scene that the major had witnessed a moment ago was gone. Instead, the older man found himself staring down the barrel of a gun. Jarod, sitting bolt upright in the chair, had a weapon trained on the major.
It took only an instant for Jarod to recognize the intruder. The moment he did, Jarod pointed the gun at the ceiling and released his grip, allowing the pistol to twirl around his finger by the trigger guard. "Sorry, Dad," he mumbled.
Charles shrugged. "Not a problem," he said. "Just please, don't do that to your sister. No need to make her any more uneasy."
"Uneasy?" Jarod asked.
The major nodded. "I thought you might want something to drink," Charles said in an attempt to change the subject. "Apple juice. It was your favorite when you were little."
Jarod smiled as he took the glass. After a few sips he asked again, "Why is Emily uneasy?"
Charles didn't want to make Jarod aware of the recent change in dynamics between him and his sister. But Margaret was right. Jarod needed to know of the problem, if only to prevent matters from getting any worse.
"I've frightened her," Jarod replied in answer to his own question.
The major sighed. "She doesn't understand."
Gazing solemnly at the sleeping woman, Jarod said flatly, "What's to understand? I'm capable of frightening things. Her anxiety is well justified."
"Emily is your sister," Charles scolded. "You would never harm her."
"Wouldn't I?" Jarod's dark eyes carried a look of despair. "I've just pulled a gun on my own father. What makes you think Emily is safe?"
Charles stepped closer and placed a reassuring hand on Jarod's shoulder. "She is safe because Emily is no threat to either you or Miss Parker," he said. "You do what you have to in order to survive. You are simply protecting yourself and those who are important to you."
The skepticism in Jarod's eyes was all too easy for the major to see. Gazing at his son thoughtfully, Charles sighed. "You are a good man, Son. A good man forced to live in extreme circumstances."
"Dad," Jarod began to argue.
"No," the major held up one hand to stop him. They stared at each other in silence for a long moment. "I want to tell you about your namesake." Charles saw Jarod frown in confusion at the abrupt change in the conversation. "Now, don't look at me like that. You'll understand why I bring it up once you've heard the tale. But Jarod," Charles glared at his son. "I've never told your mother about this and I prefer her to stay ignorant of the entire thing. No need to trouble her over ancient history."
Jarod nodded. His interest had been aroused and he looked up at his father curiously.
"I wanted to name you Jarrett, after a man I greatly admired." Charles began. "But your mother thought the name sounded like a cartoon character. 'Jarrett the ferret' she said." The major grinned wryly at the old memory. "So we compromised a bit. She changed the spelling and found a name she liked. I felt it was close enough to pay homage to the man I had known. Besides, I couldn't really argue the point. Your mother went through a lot to give me a son." The major reached out and caressed his son's hair. "The least I could do was let her choose his name."
Jarod smiled at his father as the major carefully sat on the edge of Miss Parker's bed.
"I met Sergeant Robert Jarrett during my first year in the military," Charles remembered. "Years before I came to know your mother. I was as naïve as they come, the greenest recruit you've ever seen. I joined the Air Force before I'd finished high school. Less than a week after graduation I was on my way to boot camp. Six months later I was stationed in South Korea, surrounded by a war I barely understood."
"I wasn't a pilot then." Charles went on. "I didn't fly jets until 'Nam. Those first few years in Korea I was nothing more than a grunt on the stiff watch." At Jarod's puzzled look the major explained further. "We were a chopper crew of five. There was the pilot, navigator and three corpsmen. Our job was to fly into an area after a battle and retrieve the bodies of American casualties. We brought back as many as we could." Charles sighed. "Sometimes there were too many to get them all on the chopper. We'd run across the fields, dodging sniper fire on occasion, snatching up as many dog tags as we could. Once in a while we'd find a live one, someone that the medics had missed. Bringing a breathing soldier in to a M.A.S.H was so much more rewarding than hauling the corpses out of one.
"Anyway," Charles continued. "The sergeant was one of the crew. He was a grizzled old army veteran who had served as a paratrooper during World War II. He was a decorated hero with enough medals to easily intimidate a young airman."
Charles chuckled to himself as the memories washed over him. "Sergeant Jarrett ran me ragged, I'll tell you. He wasn't my superior officer, of course, but he acted like it. And not a day went by that he didn't make some crack about soft cheeked mama's boys." The major continued. "He was an old army soldier stationed with a bunch of young Air Force recruits who all had chips on their shoulders because they hadn't been chosen for pilots."
"It must have been difficult to get along," Jarod mused.
"Not one bit," Charles replied. "We all adored him. He'd give any one of us the last dollar in his pocket. Let us read letters from home to him over and over, until he knew our families as well as we did. When the homesickness and fear came to be too much, well, let's just say that he was very supportive for the rest of us."
"He sounds like a nice person," Jarod observed.
The smile slipped from Charles face as he went on. "For the most part. But at the core of it all, Jarrett was a soldier. He was at Normandy on D-day, fought in some of the bloodiest battles of World War II, and lived to tell about it." Charles looked at his son, trying to instill in the younger man some sense of the gravity of what he was about to say.
"One cold November afternoon, we were on a mission when our chopper was shot down," Charles said quietly. "Sergeant Jarrett and I were the only two to make it out of the wreckage. We were twenty miles behind enemy lines. I was scared to death and thought we were done for."
"What did you do?" Jarod asked breathlessly.
"We started to walk," the major said. "'Believe you'll make it, Airman.' he told me. 'A soldier who thinks he's dead, is dead.' He promised we'd get out of there, and in exchange made me promise to name a kid after him." Charles smiled ruefully. "He was trying to keep my spirits up, I suppose."
"Night fell and we spent hours sneaking across the countryside, sometimes even crawling on our stomachs. When the sun rose the next morning, we found ourselves less than five hundred yards from an entire unit of North Korean soldiers. They were bivouacked in this little farming village and we were hiding in one of the barns."
Charles went on talking, doing his best to keep his voice level and calm. "So there we were. Huddled in the straw trying to be very quiet when a girl came into the barn to feed the animals. She couldn't have been a day over fifteen, a lovely, sweet young girl." Charles shook his head. "I sat there and watched as Sergeant Jarrett sliced her throat so that she could not scream. He cut her larynx and then, before she had time to realize what was happening, he put the blade between her ribs and killed her with one swift jab."
Jarod's throat clicked as he swallowed. For a long moment, father and son stared at each other in silence.
"She wasn't the only one," Charles continued. "There were others over the next two days. Those we couldn't avoid, who crossed our path at just the wrong moment. I made it back because Sergeant Jarrett was a damn good soldier. He did what he had to do, what he had been trained to do. Right or wrong, I am here today because that man did what he needed to in order to survive."
Jarod glanced away, gnawing at his lower lip in anxiety. Charles rose and stood before the wooden chair. Taking his son by the shoulders, the major turned Jarod toward him.
"Jarod," Charles said with gentle firmness. "You do what you to have to do, what you have been trained to do. You're a soldier who has been at war for a long, long time. Survival is all you've known."
Charles placed a reassuring arm around his son's shoulders. "Emily can't understand," he said. "Reconciling the kind-hearted brother with the determined soldier just isn't something she can deal with right now. You need to give her time to realize that both can exist in the same man."
"But, Dad," Jarod said. "I don't believe they can. Light and darkness are mutually exclusive. Where one is present, the other is not. One aspect of the personality is real, the other is a façade, no more than a mask." Jarod sighed. "The hell of it is, I'm never sure which is the genuine persona and which is just pretend."
"Jarod," the major frowned, shaking Jarod's shoulders gently. "The world isn't as simple as that. You see things as extremes, all or nothing, black or white. But the truth is that no one on this earth is purely evil, or purely good for that matter. We each of us carry the seeds of both."
Jarod gazed at his father with large soulful eyes. "You don't know, Dad," he whispered. "You don't know the terrible things I've done."
Charles straightened with a sigh. "Do you want to tell me?"
"You saw the DSAs," Jarod said with a frown.
"Only a few," the major countered.
Jarod shrugged. "Watch the rest if you want."
"I shouldn't have seen the ones I did," Charles said kindly. "I didn't ask for permission. I shouldn't have invaded your privacy that way."
Jarod tossed his father a strange look that the major couldn't quite interpret. With a sigh he said, "Privacy isn't a concept I've quite been able to grasp."
A snorting sound rose from the bed, soft yet rude. "Common problem among stalkers," Miss Parker said in a raspy voice.
Charles was amazed by the abrupt change in his son. A delighted smile spread across Jarod's face, brightening the room with its intensity.
"I'm not a stalker," Jarod gasped, feigning shock. "Yours is the only privacy I invade on a regular basis, Miss Parker."
"Liar."
Sliding gracefully onto his knees at Miss Parker's bedside, Jarod laughed. "It's all a matter of perspective, I guess."
The insolent scoff came again from the lithe form on the bed as Miss Parker's eyes fluttered open.
Jarod caressed the woman's smooth forehead, checking her temperature as he smiled at her. "How do you feel?" he asked tenderly.
"I'll live," she croaked in response. "I can blame you for that I suppose."
"Yup," Jarod said as he sat on the mattress beside her. "Don't expect me to apologize for it either."
"Bastard," Miss Parker sighed as her eyelids closed wearily.
"I do my best."
The gray-blue eyes opened again, looking up at Jarod inquisitively. "How's Sam?" she asked.
Jarod glanced toward his father, as though looking for support of some kind. Jarod's dark brown gaze then fixed on the girl soulfully. It was apparent that Miss Parker had little trouble deciphering the look. When Jarod shook his head sadly, the woman flinched.
"Sam," she whispered.
Charles frowned as he watched the younger couple, trying to understand what kind of relationship existed between them. Jarod was looking decidedly uncomfortable, his back straight and his movements stiff as the woman looked away sadly. There suddenly seemed to be a distance between them. It was a distance that far surpassed the mere twelve inches of space separating their bodies.
"Would you like me to go find Sydney?" Jarod asked.
Miss Parker shook her head.
Grabbing the nearly full glass from the nightstand where he'd placed it, Jarod offered, "Would you like some juice?"
"No," she refused quietly.
There was a long, uncomfortable silence in the room.
"What can I do for you, Parker?" Jarod asked finally.
"Nothing," was the soft reply.
With a heavy sigh, Jarod nodded. "Try to rest," he said. He tucked the blankets around Miss Parker's body before settling himself back on to the chair. With a sigh, the injured woman let her eyelids drift shut and before long, she was breathing in a deep rhythmical way that indicated sleep.
"You should follow your own advice, Son," the major whispered. "Get some sleep."
Jarod nodded. "Thanks, Dad."
Charles patted his son affectionately on the shoulder then left the room, quietly pulling the door closed behind him. He made his way through the darkened house, up the stairs to the room at the end of the hall. As silently as he could, he tugged off his clothes and slipped into bed beside his wife.
"How is he?" she asked.
Charles shrugged, knowing that she could not see him in the dark. With a troubled sigh, the major curled against his wife's body and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer.
"Charles," Margaret's voice took on a scolding tone.
"He's fine," the major said. "Miss Parker woke for little while. It seems that she'll be okay."
Twisting in his arms, Margaret turned to look at Charles. "There is something between those two," she said.
"Without a doubt," the major agreed. "But what that is has yet to be determined."
"It frightens me, Charles," Margaret said. "He seems so different with them here. So... anxious somehow."
The major grunted as he pondered his wife's words.
"These people pursued him for years," Margaret continued. "That Sydney held him captive all his life. Do you suppose Jarod might be afraid having them here?"
"No," Charles said thoughtfully. "He doesn't fear them. He seems to be connected to them in some way, as though they share a terrible secret."
"I'm afraid we'll never know our own son well enough to learn that secret," Margaret sighed.
The major kissed his wife's temple and snuggled her against his chest. "There's nothing we can do about it tonight," he soothed. "Stop worrying and go to sleep."
Margaret sighed contentedly. Charles held her tight until long after she had drifted off. But for the major, rest would not come. His mind kept flitting back to a far away night on the Korean countryside. He thought of the sergeant he had loved and feared in equal measure. He thought of his son and tried to imagine what pain haunted the younger man's eyes.
In his heart, the major knew that he never really wanted to know what horrors his firstborn had lived through. He didn't want to know what evil had dwelt in Jarod's life. And yet, Charles had a gnawing feeling in his gut that the darkness of Jarod's past would catch up to them. No matter how hard they tried to ignore it.
