“Who told you you’re the master of note leaving?” Indie asked, unable to wipe the smile from her own face.
“Plenty of people.”
Yet he couldn’t name a single one of them. She took the steaming cup of cocoa from his outstretched hand. “I’m sure that’s what it is.”
He lowered beside her. “Whatwhatis? And why are you smiling like that?”
“You like her.”
He scoffed. “She’s younger than me.”
“You like her.”
“She works for me.”
“Youlikeher.”
He shook his head. “Can we talk about something else?”
He liked her. She didn’t need his confirmation to know she was right.
She lifted her mug and sipped the warm liquid. It was good. Really good. But that shouldn’t surprise her. Her brother was good at everything. Had been his entire life. Someone should really hurry and wife the guy up.
“Okay,” she finally answered, the smile falling from her mouth as she said her next words. “I don’t believe you’re doing as well with the fact that you’re not a Marine anymore as you want people to think.”
There was a small tightening of his eyes. “I’llalwaysbe a Marine, Indie. Once a Marine, always a Marine.”
“Okay, I’ll rephrase. I don’t think you’re doing as well being home as you want me to believe.”
“Indie—”
“And if you don’t want to talk about it, that’s okay. But I need you to know that I’m here if you ever do want to talk.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face, and she noticed the scar peeking out from beneath the short sleeve of his shirt, on his biceps. It was long and red, like it was still kind of new.
“What’s that?” She leaned forward to touch it, but Noah shot off the couch. “Noah—”
“It’s nothing.”
“It’s notnothing. It’s a scar!”
“People get scars in the military, Indie. It happens.” There was a thread of something in his voice. Annoyance, maybe? It wasn’t like him at all.
“That looked like a knife wound,” she said quietly.
“I’m going to do a perimeter check.”
Before she could say anything more, he was out the front door.
What the hell was that? Why was he acting so strange at the mention of a scar?
She had questions, and it was so unlike Noah to not tell her things.
The questions were still flickering through her mind when his phone rang from the table. She glanced at the screen…and her muscles immediately locked.
Bonnie.
She hadn’t spoken to her sister in years. Thirteen, in fact. It had been thirteen years.
