I grinned. “That thing? Naw. The hurt part is long over. It took me a while to get used to it being gone. That phantom limb shit ain’t no joke.”
“How’d it happen? I mean, how’d you lose your foot?” Sean’s palm was warm on my shin, and I wished he were touching me a bit higher up… Maybe my dick?
“I was on patrol in South Korea and accidentally tripped a trap.” It was all I was allowed to tell, not that I really gave a shit about what the Army wanted to keep secret. Those fuckers didn’t give a damn about me, so why should I give a fuck about them?
“How long were you in the hospital?” Sean asked.
“Long enough for them to repair what they could. They had to take a little more of my leg to properly fit me with the prosthetic. After I healed from that, I had to go to a rehabilitation facility to learn to walk again, and here I am.” I took another breath before glancing up to see tears in Sean’s gorgeous eyes.
“You don’t need to cry for me, Sean. I’ve learned to make the most of what happened. I can get on and off a horse the same as I always did, and I’m able to care for my mother. My life is just fine.”
Sean gently moved my foot from his lap before he slid to the floor in front of me. It was a perfect picture, Sean in front of me on his knees. “What about the drinking?” he asked as he placed his palms on my thighs.
After I swallowed the lump in my throat, I exhaled. “There was a lot of shit to deal with after I left the Army rehab and got my medical discharge. I took off to the mountains and hid out for two years, wallowing in self-pity while I tried to adjust to my newreality. Without a foot, I told myself I was worthless to everyone I knew.
“I had a disability, or so my discharge papers said, and I couldn’t go back to the ranch I grew up on because my father… Well, he had some concerns with me being gay in the beginning when I came out in high school. When I told him I was planning to enlist and not go to college, he was worried I’d be treated poorly because of it. He thought I should stay on the ranch with him and Mom, where they could protect me from the big, bad world, but I wanted to see it, not hide from it. I got to do that, but things didn’t turn out the way I hoped.”
Sean’s forehead was wrinkled in concern. “Did drinking help you cope?”
I put my hand over his on my thigh. “It was a way for me to hide from a lot of shit. It numbed my mind, and I didn’t have to think about my demons.
“What I did and saw while I was deployed weighs heavily on me, like most vets. A lot of it is shit I can’t talk about because it’s classified, but it was all stuff I needed to work through and didn’t want to. Once I hit rock bottom, I had to deal with it once and for all.”
“Can...uh, can I ask what your rock bottom was?” Sean moved to sit in his chair and twist his fingers together. I reached for his hands and clasped them with mine.
“Last year, my father got sick—lung cancer—and my mom needed me to come home. She tracked me down through my military shrink because I wouldn’t give her my new cell number when I got discharged. I was too embarrassed about how fucked up I was.
“Hearing how upset she was, I felt horrible that I’d ignored my parents for so long, sure they wouldn’t understand what I’d gone through. I was pretty fucked up and faced with the fact that myfather was dying, I knew I’d been a selfish prick for leaving it all to Mom.
“I missed his death by a week, so I went home to help her bury him and then went to rehab like Mom asked to kick the drinking. Once I had a handle on it, I returned to the ranch to take over.
“I started going to meetings so I could be strong for my mom. Dad left a big fucking financial mess she didn’t know about, and this job was going to help me get my mother out of it, but I’ll figure out something else.”
“God. How’s your mother?” Sean crossed his legs as he kept his gaze on me.
“She’s fine. I’ll get back home and relieve my friend who’s looking out for her. Look, there are no hard feelings between us, Sean, if you want someone else to protect you. Maybe you need someone different from me. Everyone doesn’t have to like everyone else.”
Sean sighed, glancing at the tabletop before he lifted his gaze to meet mine. “I was raised by a nanny because my parents were too busy to bother with me.
“My father’s a well-known lawyer who’s advised presidents throughout the years, and my mother’s a member of the board of the Smithsonian and a professional socialite. We no longer speak because I ruined all their grand plans for me by coming out very publicly after I graduated from law school at Georgetown. They don’t even want me in the same city as them, but this is where my business is, so tough shit. That was fifteen years ago, and we haven’t spoken since. We’ve been at some of the same events in the area and my parents do their best to keep a full ballroom between us when we find ourselves at the same party.”
It sounded like there was a story there. “How’d you come out?”
Sean smirked. “I brought a paid escort to a fundraising dinner party they were hosting for the RNC at their home in BarnabyWoods. A friend of my father’s walked in on me giving the escort a blow job in the butler’s pantry off the dining room.”
“No shit!Wow, that must have been some coming out.” I tried like hell to keep from laughing as the visual circled my brain. “Who caught you?”
Sean chuckled. “A former president who’s a good friend of my father’s. He’s a conservative from Texas.”
I chuckled, imagining how that must have gone. “If it’s who I think it is, he had his fair share of fuckups along the way when he was younger, right?”
“Oh yeah, and my father was right there trying to keep him out of jail many times. So, see. I’m not anyone looking for perfection. I find beauty in most people’s perceived flaws, and I can tell by the way you carry yourself that you’re a remarkable man. What do you have to do in DC?”
“I’ve gotta call Schatz and see what I need to do.” I picked up my phone from where it rested on the table and walked into the dining room, calling him while Sean hurried down the hallway to his bedroom. He sure had a gorgeous ass.
Chapter Seven
Sean
