A Broken Christmas By Claire Ashgrove

Delta Force operative Kyle Garland divorced his wife to protect her. His top-secret missions expose him to constant danger, and his world is full of lies and deceit. But the threat to Aimee doesn’t come in the form of insurgents or bombs. Rather, his soul-deep love and the dreams he silently nurtures are her greatest hazard. When a career-ending injury brings him home for Christmas, to keep her safe he must bury his feelings and hide the monster he’s become.
Fourteen months ago, Aimee had the perfect marriage… then Kyle blindsided her with a divorce. Now, he’s coming home, and she intends to get her answers. Yet the crippled man she confronts bears scars her years of nursing cannot heal. The secret he’s hiding is tearing him apart. No matter how she tries, he keeps her at a distance, despite the love that’s still evident in his kiss. What Aimee doesn’t know is her own damaged past terrifies Kyle more than any wartime horror.
As she forces him to confront his demons, will the holiday shred the fragile bonds they share, or will Christmas complete all their broken parts?

Holly's Review:

I firmly believe the key to any great relationship is COMMUNICATION!! That said, the people in this story were apparently unaware of that and could have avoided a lot of heartache had there been a little more communication. Mostly on the mans part, but a good part of the time that's the reality, right girls?

Kyle is a soldier coming home from the war after doing, what he feels, was a terrible thing that has made him a monster. He is coming home to his wife ex wife, seeing as how her served her with divorce papers for no apparent reason shortly after he was last deployed overseas.

Now, Aimee is one determined chick and she had recently suffered a miscarriage and a bit of a breakdown before she was able to pull herself up and get some help. She thought they were doing well and both on the road to recovery when Kyle was deployed, so imagine her shock when shortly there after the sheriff knocked on her door to serve her with divorce papers. Aimee is totally having none of it. She is completely shut out and Klye won't return her calls, letters, emails, nothing! She refuses to sign the papers and after a year the courts declare them divorced.

So imagine Kyles surprise when he gets off of the plane in the states from his months of therapy in Germany recovering from his injuries to find Aimee waiting for him. It is a week until New Years and Aimee has taken a new job in another city, so if she can't break through to Kyle in that week, she has decided, with great difficulty, to move on.

We spend a lot of this story in Kyle's head, he came to the brilliant conclusion after the miscarriage and her break down that if he divorced her he could save her from further pain, should something happen to him at war. Since something did and he sees himself as physically and emotionally broken he doesn't want her to wake up one day and realize she is saddled with what he considers half a man. Uughh! This is where this book irritated me, damn men and thinking they can make decisions for us and what's good for us?? Shame on Kyle for not realizing his wife was strong enough to be the woman he needed.

This book was relatively short, but damn, did it pack a lot of emotion into a short story. This is my first by this author but really enjoyed it and will be definitely reading more by her.