“You once told me that nothing in here”—she tapped her forehead—“could hurt me.” She circled the air around them. “Then you told me that you had the rest, and you did. For all the years we spent together, you made sure me and our children were taken care of beyond my wildest expectations.” She tapped his heart with a gentle finger. “Don’t be worried about us ever being parted.” She looked up at the dark starry sky reverently. “I’ve got that.”
“Lily...”
“The mountains are beautiful tonight. I feel as if God can hear every word we’re saying,” she whispered, her hand tightening on his.
Shade wiped her tear away with his thumb.
“I do, too.”
Her violet eyes stared at him, the same ones she had passed on to their children and grandchildren. She was still staring at him when her eyes lost the special light they had always held.
“Where you go, I will go,” Shade said, holding his wife closer. “I love you, Lily. Always.”
Shade listened to the night, focusing on the sounds around him until he could separate each sound, searching for the one he wanted—the sound of his heartbeat.
He concentrated on the speed of his pumping heart then each single beat. Gradually, he slowed his heartbeat, one beat at a time, just how he had learned to do all those years ago as a sniper. It took time and concentration on each … single … beat … before there was nothing other than complete and utter silence.
“Life is eternal; and love is immortal; and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothing save the limit of our sight.”
― Rossiter Worthington Raymond