"And now here we are, right in the middle of it." A sad smile touched her lips. "So much for their plan."
Walker rubbed his palm across his jaw, the stubble rough against his skin. "There's something else we need to talk about—something I haven't told you."
Sabrina tensed slightly, preparing herself.
Walker looked down at his hands, the hands that had pulled triggers, treated wounds, buried friends. "I didn't choose to leave the SEALs. Not really."
"What do you mean?"
Walker's jaw tightened. This wasn't something he talked about—not with his brothers, not with anyone. But Sabrina needed to know what kind of man she was trusting with her life.
"My last mission." His voice dropped lower. "In northern Syria. We were extracting an asset, someone with intel on terrorist networks. It should have been routine."
Sabrina waited, giving him space to continue.
"We were ambushed. Heavy fire from all sides." Walker's gaze grew distant, seeing not the cabin walls but desert buildings, smoke, chaos. "My best friend Ray and I were covering the team's retreat. We'd been through everything together—training, first deployment, fourteen years of missions."
He swallowed hard. "I was hit first. Shoulder wound. Ray dragged me to cover, applied pressure." Walker's hand drifted unconsciously to the scar on his left shoulder, the one she'd noticed at her house. "Then he took a round trying to get us to the extraction point. Right through the throat."
She gasped.
He swallowed hard. "He died in my arms, Sabrina. Last thing he said was my name."
"I'm so sorry," she whispered.
Walker forced himself to meet her eyes, to let her see the truth. "After that, I couldn't... function. I did complete the mission, got the team out, brought Ray's body home. But something broke in me. I started having flashbacks, panic attacks. Couldn't sleep." He shook his head. "They called it combat stress reaction. Recommended extended leave, therapy."
"And that's when you left?"
"I realized I couldn't do it anymore." The admission still felt like failure, even now. "I couldn't trust myself to make the right calls, to keep my team safe. Fourteen years of war had hollowed me out." He hesitated. "The day Reed said your name was the first time I'd felt anything real in months."
She reached across the space between them, her hand covering his. "Thank you for telling me."
Walker looked down at their hands, her fingers pale against his tanned skin. "You needed to know what you're getting. I'm not the boy you knew at the lake. Not even the SEAL who proposed to you."
"I'm not the girl who turned you down, either," she said softly. She withdrew her hand, but leaned closer. "My turn now."
Walker nodded, surprised by the relief that washed through him after sharing his burden, even just this small part of it.
"You know I was married to Rob," she began, her voice carrying a tension that hadn't been there before. "It started well. He was charming, sophisticated—everything my father thought I should want."
The subtle emphasis on her father's approval wasn't lost on Walker.
"After two years, we started trying to have a baby." Her voice grew quieter. "Month after month, nothing happened. We saw specialists, tried treatments. Nothing worked."
She clasped her hands in her lap, knuckles whitening. "Rob changed. Became cold, distant. One night, after another negative test, he just... snapped." She drew a shaky breath. "He told me that if I couldn't give him children, I was worthless to him. That he needed an heir for his family legacy, and I had failed him."
Walker's jaw clenched, anger coursing through him at the thought of anyone speaking to her that way.
She sniffed and he could tell she was trying not to let her emotions get the best of her. "He apologized the next day, of course. He said he didn't mean it." Sabrina's laugh held no humor. "But you can'tunhearwords like that. They kept echoing in my head. Two months later, he asked for a divorce."
"He was wrong," Walker said, each word deliberate and firm. "About all of it. About you."
"I know. But it still hurt." Her voice softened. "That's why I panicked when you showed up at my house. I mean, not just because you scared me to death.” She gave him a coy look.
He couldn’t help but soften. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
She sighed. “I've spent years building walls, protecting myself. Then suddenly there you were—the biggestwhat-ifof my life."
