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“Was your brother…was he supportive?”
Vincent nodded and I felt a sliver of relief. “Pierce was a colonel when I was discharged, but even he couldn’t stop it. He managed to find me some work with a private contractor about nine months after David and I were discharged. The work mostly had to do with protecting U.S. contractors who worked in hostile countries…like the guys who worked for energy companies. I was basically hired muscle. But it meant I had to travel a lot, and I was away from David more and more. About a year after we were discharged, I was home for a few weeks of vacation. David wasn’t doing well and I begged him to get some help. He agreed, and within a week of seeing a psychiatrist to get on antidepressants, he was better. I thought it was a fucking miracle,” Vincent said with a hoarse laugh.
“I thought we’d finally turned a corner. I was hoping I’d be able to get David a job with the same company I worked for. Three days before I was set to leave, I found him dead in our bathroom. He’d shot himself in the head.”
I’d known from the way Vincent had been talking that his story wouldn’t have a good outcome, but he still caught me off guard.
“Vincent-”
“They wouldn’t even let me bury him at Arlington,” he whispered, and I felt my throat tighten as he wiped at his eyes.
I knew he was talking about Arlington National Cemetery. I reached out to cover Vincent’s hand with mine, not caring what it meant. He squeezed my fingers briefly, and then he was pulling his hand away. He got up and stepped closer to the edge of the cliff. There was a small guardrail, but it wasn’t much, and somehow seeing him standing so close to the edge after everything he’d told me had my heart leaping in my throat.
“I can’t tell you the details of what happened next, but I was approached by someone who’d been my commanding officer at one time in the army. He worked for the Department of Defense. He offered me a job.” Vincent turned to face me. “I said no at first, because I wanted nothing to do with the government that had betrayed us. You want to know why I hate politicians?” he practically snarled.
“Because they sat in judgement of me and decided I wasn’t good enough to serve this country. Not because I botched up a mission or I let men die on my watch. But because I fucking held my boyfriend’s hand for thirty seconds! Because I dared to allow myself those few seconds to feel! To remember what I was fighting for.”
I understood his anger and did nothing to try to stem the tide of it as he practically screamed at me. He seemed to catch himself, and he took several deep breaths.
“I eventually accepted the job because there was this part of me that wanted to show the fuckers that they hadn’t broken me.” His voice went particularly quiet as he said, “I guess David wasn’t the only one who’d found purpose in serving our country.”
Vincent shook his head. “The fucked-up thing is that I had a chance for something different. Beck’s uncle, Dom Barretti, had been stationed at the same base as me when I was discharged. He reached out to me right after I’d accepted the other job, and asked me to join the security company he and his brother were starting. I would have been a full partner.” Vincent’s eyes pinned mine. “I chose wrong,” he said cryptically, and then he fell silent.
When he didn’t speak again, I said, “Why are you telling me all this?”
“You were upset that I implied I didn’t trust you to tell me the truth,” he said as he turned and walked towards me. He stopped just a couple feet from me. “I think if last night hadn’t happened, you wouldn’t have been so quick to leave.”
The fact that he could read me so well bothered me more than I wanted to admit. “Would you have been so quick to follow me if last night hadn’t happened?” I asked, though I wasn’t sure why. Maybe I needed to know I hadn’t been the only one feeling things I shouldn’t have. But did I really want the truth? Assuming he would even be honest with me.
Vincent studied me for a long time, and I held my breath as he stepped even closer to me. I actually separated my legs in anticipation of him needing to be even closer. I hadn’t meant to do it, but like last night, my body was overruling my head. Vincent’s eyes fell to my legs and his jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. But just as I began to sit up and draw my legs back together, he stepped between them and then he was leaning over me, his hands coming to rest on the rock next to my hips.
