“No,” he said. “It was the realization that I was there for him, supporting him, even fighting him, becauseIwanted to. Not because I felt an obligation, not because I had to put on a show, but because I wanted to. I cannot express to you how liberating that was, anymore than I suspect you or Clay could properly express what it’s like to lose all that you’ve lost and then be left to live with the…fallout.”
“Yeah,” I said gruffly because I could see his point, but I wasn’t happy about the reminder. “It’s nice, though, you two doin’ what ya need to do for yourselves. It’s real nice…lonely here, but nice.”
He sucked in a soft breath and let out a knowing, “Ahh, I see.”
I groaned. “Oh, don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“You’re about to do that thing where ya dig into my head and tell me stuff about myself. Or you’re gonna get on my ass about what I’m doin’ here. Or just…any of those things you do.”
“Those things I do,” he said with a laugh. “Don’t tell me that battle-hardened, tough as nails, big man Cade is scared of little ole me.”
“A little,” I admitted, because I wasn’t so big and bad that I couldn’t admit when something scared me. You were a liar or a psycho if you told people you weren’t scared of anything, and I had seen enough in my life to understand what it was like to be afraid. “Knew someone like you once; scared the shit out of me.”
“Someone like me, huh? And I thought I was unique,” he said in that wry voice that said he was teasing me again. “What made us so similar?”
“He was like you, could see stuff in other people and figure ya out in a heartbeat, even if ya didn’t want him to,” I said with a snort. “And havin’ someone who can peek into your head, and probably your heart? That’s scary.”
“Is it?”
“I mean…yeah?”
“You don’t sound sure.”
“I mean…yeah.”
He laughed. “That was a little more convincing. But it tells me you’ve never been in love. Ah, don’t make that noise at me. I didn’t say you don’t love; I’m saying you’ve never beeninlove.”
I couldn’t help but squirm. “No, I guess not.”
“Never found the right woman?”
“Apparently.”
He snorted. “It will never not amuse me how you and Clay are so much alike. I can’t tell if you’re trying to keep things from me or from yourself.”
“I don’t think a love life is gonna help me right now,” I said with a frown. “Kinda got other things on my plate.”
“Things you’ve still not dealt with, and don’t growl at me like that; it gets me confused because Clay always does that whenever we?—”
“Stop!” I huffed. “Fine, I won’t growl.”
He snickered. “And for the record, you just got done saying that having someone in his life like me is what helped Clay. So why would you be any different?”
“I’m in a place full of guys,” I said dryly. “Ain’t the best place for me to be findin’ love, now is it?”
“Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “I suppose not.”
“You ain’t gonna ask?”
“Ask what?”
“Clay asked a buncha times if I was ever with a guy, all ’cause I was in the Army.”
“Yes, well,” he muttered. “I’m not Clay, but that sounds like him. I can picture him imagining it as a bastion of hot men in various states of undress for him to ogle and touch to his heart’s content.”
“There was some of that, but people were pretty good at keepin’ it quiet,” I admitted. “Didn’t bother me none.”
