“What did you do before? Before the mountain?”
“Army. Fifteen years.”
That explained the posture. The controlled movements. The way he seemed constantly aware of everything around him, like he was cataloging exits and threats without even thinking about it.
“Why did you leave?”
He was quiet for a long moment, staring down at his soup. When he spoke, his voice was different. Heavier.
“There was a woman in my unit. Stacy Fletcher. She came to me because one of the officers was harassing her. Cornering her. Making comments. Touching her when no one was looking.” His jaw tightened. “I told her to report it. Go through proper channels. I thought if she did everything right, the system would protect her.”
I already knew how this story ended. I could feel it coming like a storm on the horizon.
“It didn’t,” I said.
“No.” He looked up at me, his eyes dark with old pain. “They retaliated. Found some bullshit reason to discharge her. Last I heard, she’d moved back to her hometown, but I lost touch. Don’t even know if she’s okay.” He set down his spoon, his appetite clearly gone. “I told her to speak up, and it destroyed her life. I should’ve done more. Should’ve gone with her, backed her up, raised hell. Instead, I gave her advice and went back to my bunk and told myself I’d done my part.”
“That’s not your fault.”
“Maybe not. But I was part of a system that failed her, and I didn’t do a damn thing to fight it.” He met my gaze, and something passed between us. Recognition. Understanding. “When you told me what happened to you tonight—some asshole grabbing you, you defending yourself, the whole world turning on you for it—I recognized that story. I’ve been carrying it around for years. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to watch it happen again and do nothing.”
My throat tightened. No one had ever said anything like that to me before. No one had ever looked at me and seen past the surface, past the body that drew stares and comments and unwanted hands. No one had ever been angry on my behalf.
“Can I show you something?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
He nodded.
I pulled out my phone. The battery was down to twelve percent, no signal, but the video was saved—I’d downloaded it before I left Springfield, some masochistic impulse to keep the evidence of my own destruction close.
I navigated to my photos and handed the phone across the table. He watched in silence. I couldn’t see the screen from where I sat, but I knew exactly what he was seeing. Me in my Naughty Fork uniform, standing at a table, my voice carrying across the restaurant.
“Does anyone know where this man’s mother is?” I heard myself say. “She missed a lesson.”
I could see it in my head as though I were watching the video myself. The camera shaking with the person’s laughter. The comments rolling in at the bottom of the screen.
When it ended, T.J. set the phone down very carefully, like he was afraid of what his hands might do if he wasn’t deliberate about controlling them.
“Where’s the part where he grabbed you?”
“They didn’t film that part.”
“Of course, they didn’t.” His voice was ice and barely contained fury. “And the bruise on your arm? Is that in any of these comments?”
“No.”
He pushed back from the table and stood, pacing to the window where snow still battered against the glass. His shoulders were rigid, his hands flexing at his sides.
“T.J.?”
“I’m fine.” He didn’t sound fine. He sounded like a man holding himself back from putting his fist through a wall. “I just need a minute.”
I got up from the table and crossed to where he stood. I didn’t know why. Didn’t know what I was doing. I only knew that something in me was pulling toward him like gravity.
“No one’s ever been angry for me before,” I said in a voice barely above a whisper. “It’s always beenatme. For what I’m wearing. For how I look. For existing in a body that makes men think they’re entitled to touch me.” I reached out and put my hand on his arm, felt the muscles tense beneath my fingers. “I’ve never let anyone close because of it. Never trusted anyone enough. I’m twenty-three years old, and I’ve never?—”
I stopped, my cheeks flushing hot.
He turned to face me now, his eyes searching mine with an intensity that stole my breath.
