Read Online One September Morning by Rosalind Noonan - Free Book Online Page B

be a huge story. The guy was already considered a hero. One of the best college running backs this decade, and then a star player for the Seattle Seahawks who left a promising career in the NFL to enlist in the army with his brother. And now that John had made the ultimate sacrifice, well, the media is going to go wild.
    “Can you say ‘feeding frenzy’?” he mutters.
    Will Abby give him an exclusive interview? Is he slimy enough to ask?
    Any reporter worth his salt would have been on the phone already, but Flint is still unsure. Abby was his friend. She is his friend, unless you factor in the fact that they haven’t had any contact beyond joke e-mails for the past year. Is he a scumbag for thinking about swooping in on her? It reminds him of the joke: When you X-ray the chest of a reporter, is there any dark spot for a heart?
    On the other hand, shouldn’t he e-mail and offer his help? Abby is his friend, and she could use someone from the inside to help her field the media. He’d like to help, and it looks like he’s stuck here for at least another day or two with this wind storm brewing. On second thought, the wind storm is going to keep other reporters from flying in. He opens his mail files to send Abby an e-mail.
    In the meantime, he can always join a convoy heading over to Camp Desert Mission and see what’s what. Stanton’s brother, Noah, is stationed there, too, a medic, the report says. Maybe Noah wants to talk. He scrolls through his address book and clicks on Abby’s name. He’ll offer to help, and if it delays his return to Seattle, he can tell Delilah it’s business.
    Which it is.
    Sort of.

Chapter 9
     
    Fort Lewis
Abby
     
    “W hat time did it happen?” Abby asks. “I don’t have that information,” Sgt. Jason Palumbo answers, thoughtfully tapping one finger against the rim of his mug of tea.
    Having spent the past few hours in her kitchen with him, Abby no longer finds him intimidating. The sergeant is the messenger, her only line of access to John’s whereabouts, and oddly she feels compelled to hold on to this man as if he offered a lifeline.
    “We do know that he was shot during a warehouse raid, sometime yesterday,” he adds.
    “Yesterday…” Abby says.
    “And their day is our night. They’re eleven hours ahead,” Suz reminds her, dumping the wet coffee grounds so that she can start a fresh pot. “What time did you have that dream?”
    “In the middle of the night. Though it wasn’t so much a dream.” Abby bites her lower lip. “It felt like he was right here with me. His side of the bed was even warm.” She hugs herself and closes her eyes, trapped between the memory and the raw pain of here and now. She has said too much, exposed an open wound. “I know it sounds crazy.”
    Suz leans back and fingers the charm strung around her neck, a golden “S” that was a gift from her husband. “Honey, when you look up crazy in the dictionary my picture’s printed there. What did John say to you?”
    “He just said my name, over and over.” Abby rakes one hand through her dark hair and holds it in a knot at the back of her neck, remembering. “At one point, the room was rocking and rumbling. The pictures and bowls on my bureau were shaking. Did we have an earthquake last night?”
    “Not that I know of, but then I’ve been known to sleep through tornadoes.” Suz turns to Sgt. Palumbo. “You read about anything rocking the Richter scale, Sarge?”
    “Nothing that I’ve heard about,” he says. The casualty assistance officer does not strike Abby as a man who believes in the supernatural, though Abby doesn’t sense that he’s judging her. Instead, she perceives concern, sympathy. And she’s come to appreciate that tiny spot on his chin where he nicked himself shaving. Against the smooth fabric and shiny buttons of his dress uniform, it’s nice to know he’s a human being.
    “Well, I say it’s all more than a coincidence, you seeing him in your dream and now