I didn't tell him I ran into Daisy last night, because I got the feeling she didn't want anybody to know where she was. Maybe it was the panic in her eyes, maybe it was the way she kept looking over her shoulder, but she looked like a woman who wanted togo. Somewhere. Anywhere.
Daisy's body screams to the front of my mind. She is all woman now. Filled out, and gorgeous. Honestly, I don't know how anybody in this town gets anything done with her walking around.
If I end up in her presence again, which I won't, it's possible I'll pass out. I hope Hugo is there to catch me because people die from that shit.
Up close or from a distance, Daisy is a sight to behold. A beautiful woman God created just to test my mettle. If Ican withstand a life where Daisy is not mine, I can withstand anything.
Something about the way she looked when she drove by earlier is bothering me. That expression on her face, framed perfectly by her car window, really threw me. Why did she look wounded?
The question torments me while I swing by the grocery store and pick up a few items. Am I making a mistake by not telling Daisy I'm here? By concealing my identity, like I did earlier with Margaret at the sandwich shop? Like I did last night, with Daisy?
For the briefest moment I allow myself to get carried away with an alternate reality, one where I tell Daisy it's me. She throws her arms around me, chucking Duke's engagement ring out into a desert filled with prickly pear. Daisy and I live happily ever after, and Duke disappears into a puff of smoke.
But then I catch my reflection in a door on my way down the freezer aisle, and the fantasy disintegrates. That scar running down the side of my face, raised and waiting to one day turn flesh-colored. The pink skin needs time, I'm told, but that's not the worst part. What's hidden from view on my body is worse. I've been put through hell, mentally and physically. I am a former Navy SEAL with scars, both visible and invisible.
I'm an idiot for allowing myself to dream of a happy ending with Daisy. There won't be one now, and it was never an option before. I did not return to Olive Township to introduce difficulty into Daisy's life. From now on, I'll treat this like a mission. I'm here to gather information, execute on what I find, and extract myself.
In civilian terms,do what I need to do and get the fuck out.
The universe has jokes.
Why else, on my way to the rental property from the grocery store, would I be sitting at a streetlight watching Daisy and Duke take their seats on the outdoor patio at a corner restaurant? The corner table, naturally. I'm sure Duke asked for it, so everybody could see him. Always showing off, always posturing,preening.
Fucking peacock.
The light turns green and I switch the brake for the gas pedal. Just to be a real dick, I lean on the pedal a little heavier than necessary, gunning the engine. Daisy glances over, gaze landing directly on me through the windshield. Recognition lights in her eyes. Surprise races through me for the shortest second until I remember she's not really recognizing me, or at least not who I really am.
The moment passes and then they are gone, growing smaller and smaller in my rearview. My resolve strengthens, growing and stretching. I will leave Daisy alone.
When I get home, a glance at my phone tells me I have a message from my old squad leader, Plato.
Don't forget you promised to continue your physical therapy while you're gone.
Did I promise that?
Literally. You literally said the words.
Was I under the influence?
Get your ass to PT while you're there. That's an order.
Chapter 9
Daisy
"New patient today,"Isla says, brown bob partially covering one cheek as she sticks her head in my small office. Her neon yellow nails grip the doorframe. Isla has been my office manager/assistant/work companion for approximately eight months. A single forty-four year old mother of two teenagers, Isla is flighty and scattered, but there's something about her I find incredibly endearing. "Name is—" she straightens, glancing down at the office iPad. "Bravo."
I breathe a short, disbelieving laugh into the half-full coffee cup poised at my lips. "Bravo?"
Isla shrugs. "That's what he said when he called yesterday. I'm not sure if it's his last name, or his first name. That's all he said."
"Sounds fake. Did you collect his insurance info?"
"He said he was self-pay." She taps a nail on the top edge of the tablet. "I think it sounds cool. With that name, you almost have to become a spy, or an actor on Broadway, or someone who jumps out of airplanes."
I lean back in my ergonomic and also astronomically expensive desk chair. "You have a great imagination."
Isla steps into the small space and flicks a finger on the Alice Cooper bobblehead on the end of my desk, making it dance. A gag gift from Vivi six years ago, this bobblehead is a reminder of a carefree time in our lives, when we sangSchool's Outat the close of every school year.
