“Vermont, originally.”
“Why’d you come to Florida for school?”
He doesn’t look up from his menu. “No damn snow, for starters. Then there’s the James A. Haley Veteran’s Hospital right off campus. I wanted a school close to a large VA hospital.”
I feel the click in my throat as I swallow, the image of his back flashing through my mind again. “Oh.”
He doesn’t move his head, but I feel his gaze on me anyway. “Ask, if you want to. Either I’ll answer, or I’ll tell you I don’t want to talk about it. I’m rarely offended by the ask, if it’s polite.”
“I don’t want to be…rude.” Everything about Carter so far knocks me off-balance, but he’s not doing it deliberately. I realize it’s allme, onmyend.
Like I’ve forgotten how to adult properly.
Then again, he’s eight years older than me, so maybe he thinks of me as a kid.
Now his chin tips up and to the side as he studies me. “As long as what I tell you doesn’t get spread around, I’ll talk about most stuff. Assume anything I tell you is to be kept in confidence, unless I say it in front of others. Even then, assume on the side of privacy.”
“When I saw your back earlier, you kind of sounded like you didn’t want to talk about it.”
“That was before I realized you’re not an asshole.”
“Thanks, I think.”
He smirks. “You’re welcome, kid.”
I’m not going to ding him for that, because hell, heisolder than me.
And heispaying for my dinner. “How long were you in the Army?”
“Nearly eight years. Enlisted at eighteen. Pissed my father off.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t want to go through ROTC. For starters, the instructor at our high school was a dick. Always discouraged minorities and girls from wanting to join. Fuck that shit. I didn’t want anything to do with him and decided to take my chances. I also didn’t want to go to college first. Once I was done with my time in, I wanted to be out anddone. My brothers all did ROTC in college and went in as commissioned officers. My dad retired from the Army after nearly forty years. Two of my four brothers are still in. Two aren’t.”
“Four brothers?”
“Six brothers, total.” The waitress brings our beverages and says she’ll be right back to take our orders before she heads over to another table of eight people just seated by the hostess.
“What do your other two brothers do for a living?” I ask once we’re alone again.
He sips his iced tea and doesn’t meet my gaze for a moment. “Killed in action,” he quietly says.
That’s Carter to aT. Economy of speech, economy of living. I’m left sitting there feeling like shit, but Carter takes pity on me. “You have any siblings?”
I shake my head. “Only child. Well, by my father, I have two much younger half siblings I’ve never met. They live out in Nevada. Sister and brother. Basically, I’m an only child.”
“I take it your parents are divorced?”
“Yeah. Dad lives in Las Vegas with wife number three and the two kids. My mom was wife two. My mom and Austin, my step-father, live in Orlando. They got married when I was ten. I haven’t seen Dad since before then.”
“Ah.”
“Yeah. We don’t talk about Dad much at my house, unless it’s Mom and Austin inventing descriptive new ways to insult him.”
Which is a mild way of putting it. It’s actually an Olympic-worthy sporting event in my mother’s house, and everyone’s expected to actively participate or risk being viewed as giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
“Sorry,” Carter says.
