She came to see him off when he left to rejoin his unit. They were on the Cotentin Peninsula by then and had captured the port of Cherbourg. Allied bombers had caused extensive damage to the city of Caen, the Germans retreated, and Caen was liberated. They’d made some progress while he was in the hospital, and so had he and Alex.

“Take care of yourself. I’m expecting to see you in Paris one day, or New York. And be good to that leg,” she warned him.

“You too,” he said gently. “Watch out for those Krauts when you’re flying your missions.” She nodded, and he bent down, pulled her into his powerful arms, and kissed her. She smiled up at him afterwards. It felt perfect. “Stay safe, Alex. We have a lot to look forward to when we go home.” She waved as the bus that was taking him back to his unit with four other men who had been released from the hospital pulled away. She walked back to her barracks with a smile on her face. She felt young, and alive, and like a girl for the first time in a long time. She hoped they’d both make it through the war and come out safely at the other end. She had something to look forward to now, instead of dreading going home. No matter what her parents thought of him when they met him, she knew Dan Stanley was just the man for her. She hoped that he would survive and she’d see him again.

After Dan left at the end of July, almost two months after the navy’s invasion of Normandy, the Germans were pummeling the British even harder than before. British cities took a beating, and even the countryside was being hit hard. There were bombings in Yorkshire, near Pru’s parents’ home, which worried her. So far they’d been lucky. Her brothers hadn’t been wounded, and her parents were well.

Due to the increased activity of the Luftwaffe, they sometimes put two nurses on a flight, and they gave them a fighter escort for some of their missions. It was somewhat reassuring, but their missions had become more dangerous with more intense fighting on the ground. Emma was assigned to one of Pru’s missions, and they enjoyed working together.

They were on their way to their pickup location, on their second mission of the day, with two fighter escorts, when there was a strange staccato sound from the engine. Reggie checked his dials carefully, and looked first at his copilot, then at Pru. Ed had a day off, which was rare for him, but he and Lizzie had synchronized their days off to be together, and Pru had two new corpsmen with her.