Clay didn’t need to know her mind was going in that direction.
He was best handled lightly.
“You’re right. That is a typical story about why you don’t like flies. Could be why you’re a neat person too. But flies are always going to be around.”
“I know. I want to get one of those electric zappers, but then the thought of killing something like that doesn’t sit well with me either.”
“So what do you want to happen? They just live but fly around someone else?”
“Yes. Exactly that.”
“Life isn’t that simple.”
“So I’m learning,” she said.
His arm tightened around her some. “Sorry I woke you up.”
“Don’t be sorry, Clay. I’d be more shocked if you didn’t have nightmares.”
He let out an enormous sigh. “It’s not like you think.”
“I won’t profess to even guess. You can’t know what I’m thinking because I don’t even know.”
“You don’t need to know what I went through and did. If flies give you nightmares, you couldn’t handle the knowledge of the guy in bed with you doing what I had.”
“I know you’ve killed people. I know what happened with Ford and Reenie months ago. That’s self-defense. Before that you were doing your job. We need people fighting for good to combat the bad. I’m not so weak minded that I can’t see orunderstand that. Nor would I let it change my opinion of you because I already know what you did before.”
She’d looked up what it meant to be on a team that did rescue and extraction. Yep, better to not know what the specific details entailed.
“That’s good,” he said. “Because it can’t be changed, nor why I left.”
She was surprised he admitted that something happened besides his father’s injury.
“Will you tell me what it is? I can keep a secret.”
“I told Ford some of it recently.”
And he’d been a different person recently too. She could use that.
“How did it make you feel to get any of it out?”
“I told Ford I didn’t need a shrink. I don’t need it from you either.”
Guess that backfired. “I don’t want to be your shrink. I want to participate in this relationship. I want you to know you can trust me like I do you. I can’t physically protect you, but I can be there for you. I can be a shoulder you can lean on.”
“I’ll knock you down if I lean on you.”
She knew he was joking, but she didn’t want that either.
She let out a gush of air and went to shift out of his arms to her side of the bed and return to sleep. They both had work in the morning.
He didn’t let her move.
“You don’t like cuddling,” she said.
“There was a young SEAL that joined our team.”
“What was his name?”
