Close to an hour later, General Graham observed over my CommLet, a wrist-worn communication device, “Dani, you sound tired. Now that all of your crew has arrived. I am giving you and the skeleton crew that has handled all the incoming wounded over the last week three days off. I have already arranged it. No command duties. No surgery. But you can work on your next IIB assignment.”

“Which is?” I pulled the baked ziti out of the oven.

“You have to promise not to tell me you told me so.”

I placed the ziti on the potholders on the counter. “We have some kind of evidence that the disease that killed Josh was man-made.”

“Yes, but I am assigning you a partner for this one. I am only looking out for you. I am afraid that you might become obsessed again. He should have arrived by now. He is your new Chief Surgeon. Since you are working three jobs, you are limited to only practicing medicine when you have incoming wounded, but seeing as you are a MASH unit, that could be a majority of the time.”

“Jake,” I decided, leaning with my back to the counter.

“Jake.”

“He is already here. I have already spoken with him.”

“How did that go?”

“About how you would expect. We broke up right before he was captured. You should have seen the hurt in his eyes when he realized I got married…and widowed. He wants things to go back to what we were before. I don’t know that I can do that. Too much has happened to both of us.”

Graham answered, “Just take it one step at a time.”

Before I could answer, I heard the doors chime, signaling a visitor followed by “Daddy!”

“I’ve got to go. I am suspecting Jake has arrived for dinner.”

“How did that happen?”

“We can talk about it later.”