Page 38 of Rescued Hearts

She reached his desk, walking the length and trailing her finger along the scarred wood. She stopped at his laptop. She wasn’t being nosy—not exactly. But it wasn’t possible to ignore the screen.

Or the fact that it wasn’t a document filled with words.

It was a spreadsheet filled with names and photographs.

“What’s this?”

He didn’t immediately respond. He stood frozen a few feet away.

Rows and rows of names with photos attached, each one staring back at her.

All of them military.

“Gray.” She turned to him, aware of how his whole body locked up. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

He cut her off. “It’s not a book.” His Adam’s apple bobbed in his tanned throat.

She searched his gaze, even stormier after his declaration. “What is it?”

“It’s a list.”

Her heart thudded. Waiting for him to share or throw her out—of his room, his house, his life.

“It’s a list of 5003 names.”

She took a step closer to him, needing to offer comfort even though she didn’t know why. Needing to touch him.

A breath trickled out of him. “They’re my fallen brothers and sisters.”

Her jaw dropped. “All of them?”

He nodded. Then she saw it—the raw grief. The devastation creasing his face.

Reaching out, she settled her hand on his chest the same way she’d done the night before after their kiss. Only this time she was offering him something much different—comfort. And a listening ear if he wanted it.

He took her hand and drew it off his chest but held it prisoner in his rough grip. When he led her to the bed and sat down, she followed.

Thigh touching hers, Gray began to share his story. It came out in chunks at first, blocky and awkward with pain. How the USSValor Heightssank in a fiery tragedy. She’d heard about the event, of course. Everybody had. The news had been full of nothing but that for weeks.

Then nothing.

At least to the public. To Gray, who had been in the air at the time and escaped the same fate, it was everything.

He didn’t shed a tear, but his voice was thick as he spoke. She wasn’t seeing a man burying his ghosts in silence.

He wascarryingthem home.

By writing three emails or handwritten letters a night, he would achieve his goal of sending a personal message to each and every family of the soldiers who perished in that terrible tragedy.

For a long moment, neither of them stirred.

Until she moved.

She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her face gently against his chest. He tensed—for just a second. Then he let go.

His arms wrapped around her, and he crushed her against him, letting her feel the weight of it all—the responsibility, the loss. The sheer, relentless duty.

It cracked her in two.

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