Free Point of No Return by Susan May Warren

that, he draped the second poncho for rain protection. He held up one side. “I know you don’t like me much, but it’ll be warmer if we stick together.” He patted the ground next to him, trying to keep it casual, hoping, somewhere in the back of his mind, that she might fall asleep again in his arms. Even if by accident.
    She seemed to contemplate her options.
    â€œI promise not to be a letch.”
    His joke fell flat. Still, she sat down next to him and let him put the poncho over her. “What if someone finds us?”
    â€œWe’re in the middle of the woods—”
    She flashed her light against the folds of theforest. “What was that about trigger-happy Russian soldiers?”
    â€œOkay, fine. I’m sleeping. You stand watch. Wake me in four hours. Then I’ll take a shift.”
    He curled into a ball and tucked the blanket tighter around himself. Hopefully by tomorrow she’d be out of his life, his misery over. Hallelujah.
    She stared out into the darkness, probably thinking the same thing.
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    Dear Chet,
    I know you must be out of touch right now—you haven’t answered my previous two emails—but I’ve decided to just keep writing, and when you get this you’ll know that someone cares. I spent Thanksgiving weekend with my sister and her son, Josh. He’s a senior in high school—I can hardly believe it. It seems like only yesterday he was just learning to walk, navigating from our old green sofa to the Formica table to the back bedroom which he shared with my sister.
    I’m going to miss him. In a way, he’s like my own son—before I went into the army, mine was the only consistent face he saw. My sister spent the first three years of his life trying to finish high school, and occasionally disappearing for long weekends, trying to forget that she became a mother at thirteen. My leaving for the army forced her to grow up, maybe, although it didn’t help my mother, who still hasn’t figured out that she doesn’t need any of the deadbeats she brings home. Thankfully, she stopped letting them move in about the time Iturned twelve and her sodden boyfriend turned his attentions toward me.
    I probably shouldn’t have told you all that, but I felt it was only fair to tell you that I don’t come from the stellar West Point family you do. You should have all the facts.
    I don’t suppose you managed a morsel of turkey or cranberry dressing over the weekend? I miss you, and am praying for you. Stay safe.
    Yours,
    Mae
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    Yours. The word pulsed in his head, the memory of receiving her email fresh as if it had been yesterday. He hadn’t had a Thanksgiving turkey—in fact, he’d spent the weekend holed up in surveillance, watching a Chinese mobster beat the stuffin’ out of a fellow agent, helpless to intervene. He’d crawled back to his flat feeling raw and alone, only to discover her emails.
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    I am praying for you. Stay safe.
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    He outlined her now against the darkness, seeing her as a teenager, trying to keep her mother sober, her sister safe, her nephew in clean diapers, and food on the table. And yes, when he’d read the letter, an ugly part of him wanted to track down her mother’s perverted boyfriend and take out his eyes, and maybe some other parts.
    But most of all, he couldn’t get past the fact that she’d trusted him with the broken parts of herself…
    She had deserved more from him.
    At the very least, with a rush of clarity, he understood why she’d trek halfway across the world after her lostnephew. He could barely remember his own nephew’s name—or maybe he had two of them. He hadn’t talked to his sister for a number of years now, since the death of the General. His mother lived in a retirement community in Florida, he knew that much from the direct deposit address on his bank stubs.
    But if any of them vanished in a foreign country?