It was not the look of a soldier greeting an old friend. It was something deeper. There was grief in it, and gratitude, and a kind of love forged in a place I had never been allowed to see.
Julian wiped his face with the back of his wrist.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I didn’t mean to upset her.”
“You didn’t,” Marcus replied. “You could never.”
Lily finally lifted her head.
She stared at Marcus, then at Julian.
Her cheeks were wet.
I picked up the photograph from where it had fallen beside her welcome sign. The creased picture had slipped from the little pocket she had insisted on carrying it in.
I looked from the grainy image to the two men kneeling in front of me.
My stomach tightened.
In the picture, the soldier’s face was partly turned away. The image was heavily pixelated, and the desert light had washed out most of the details. Marcus and Julian had the same dark hair, the same build, and nearly identical uniforms.
