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“No.” Hunter paused. “He worked for the government. Ex-Marine—Special Ops. That’s where he learned the self-defense stuff. When he got out of the Corps, he took a job in the private sector. I still don’t know everything he did, but Mom used to worry that he’d die on some top-secret mission and we’d never know what really happened. I don’t know if he was aware of the car crash—like, I don’t know if it was instantaneous or whatever—but I know he’d be pissed to go out that way.”
A lot of pride hung in his voice—and grief, too, though that was better hidden.
“When he and my uncle got together—they never let me come,” Hunter said. “The last time, I’d been bitching about it for days. I always thought they just went fishing and told bullshit stories, and it used to drive me crazy that they wouldn’t let me go. We had a big fight the morning they left.”
Tension crawled across his shoulders, and she lifted her head to look at him. Hunter’s face was close, his eyes dark in the shadowed room.
“They left,” he said. “I was pissed, but they were gone.”
He held his breath, looking at her. The look in his eyes was almost fragile.
“You don’t have to tell me,” she said.
He glanced away. “I just—I’ve never told anyone,” he said, and his voice was nearly steady. He paused again. “They came back.”
She nodded.
“My uncle—he’d told my dad that if I was old enough to put up a fight like that, I was old enough to come along. So ... I went along. But it wasn’t a guys’ weekend at all. My dad was taking private security jobs. Like, on the side. Mom had no idea.”
Hunter’s eyes flashed to hers. “She still doesn’t.”
Becca nodded, and he continued.
“It was supposed to be something simple,” he said. “I never learned all the details. I kept some of his things after the crash, but most of it was lost. Just some surveillance or something—Dad was careful about what he told me, but they didn’t think it was a big risk for me to come along. I’m not stupid, and I can take care of myself. He made sure of that.”
His voice started to sound fractured.
“He did a good job,” Becca said softly. If anyone could take care of himself, Hunter could.
Then she wondered if he’d agree with that.
Becca thought of her father’s hand on her back in the hospital, the gentle support he’d offered. She’d run him out of the house without even a thank you. She’d been pretty clear that she didn’t need him.
But was that true?
“We were driving fast to make up time,” said Hunter. “When we drove through western Maryland, where you’re practically climbing the Appalachians? There was a thunderstorm, and a rockslide, and the car was crushed.”
The last sentence fell out of his mouth as if he lost control of it. Hunter was staring at her like her gaze was a lifeline—if she looked away, he’d be lost.
But she swallowed. “Were you ... hurt?”
He nodded, and his eyes flicked up. “Dislocated shoulder. Concussion. I had a pretty bad cut across my hairline. Thirty-six stitches. The white streak—it’s a scar. They said it would probably go away, but it hasn’t.”
She wondered why he didn’t dye it—why he’d want a reminder in the mirror every morning.
“That’s why I don’t believe in accidents,” he said. “The timing was too perfect. Coming back for me, the fight that made them late in the first place—the storm, the rockslide. All of it.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” she whispered.
“I know.” His voice hardened. “But it wasn’t an accident, either.”
She held still, feeling his breathing slow under her palm. He seemed to sandbag all that emotion, and he reached up to push her hair over her shoulder.
“I didn’t mean to get so heavy,” he said. “I don’t want you to think I’m a psycho.”
Hardly. She wanted to hold him. “I don’t think that.”
“I get protective.”
