The woman took a ragged breath and coughed dimly. It was close. “I want to go home...I think I might be going there now... Tell them I love them, will you? They won’t understand... Tell them—” Then, like a baby, her eyes closed, and her head fell to the side as though she had fallen asleep.
For a second, Gibbs wished he could follow her, wished for silence and bliss. But death was too easy an escape for him. Redemption would only come with his pain and his pain would come with his life. So, almost as though he could not stop it, his finger let go of her hand and grabbed the locket the woman carried around her neck. After securing it around his own, he made her a promise. If not her, a part of her would get to go home. He would take her there. Because he wouldn’t die.
“Momma!” a girl, no
