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‘That doesn’t mean I can’t be given a more responsible role.’ Her voice cracked, and she stopped abruptly. ‘Plus, this means I get to extend my assignment for a further three months. I gain more experience in this environment, which can only be good for my career.’
He sounded so disapproving. So dismissive. She needed a moment to compose herself, but he was already snapping out alternatives.
Commands. As though he thought he knew better.
‘Ask Mandy for more responsibility at Jukrem. After everything you did on that emergency run last month, and the evacuation the other day, you’ve proved yourself to be one of the most valuable members the team has. And Jukrem is where you’re meant to be stationed anyway.’
Her chest was pulling so tight she expected to hear her ribs crack any moment. He was doing it again—telling her what he thought was best. Expecting her to agree because he’d said it? Again, exactly as her father had done.
So how was it possible to want, so badly, to agree to what Hayden was saying? She hated herself for being so weak.
‘I’m not staying, Hayden,’ she managed to bite out suddenly.
She didn’t know where it came from, but she clung to it nonetheless.
‘You have to stay,’ he stated. The hint of barely disguised bleakness in his tone made her heart fracture. ‘If you leave...’
She didn’t want to answer, but she couldn’t help herself.
‘If I leave...?’
‘If you leave, how will I know that you’re okay? That you’re safe?’
The admission hung, shimmering, in the air between them. So ethereal that she was afraid that if she reached out to touch it, it would disappear, never to have existed in the first instance.
‘Hayd...’ she began at length, before stalling.
He began moving again, so slowly that at first that she didn’t even realise it until he came to a halt in front of her.
And then he reached out, his hand hovering millimetres from her cheek, making her want to lean into him. She would never know how she resisted.
‘Hayd...’ Her voice was barely more than a whisper, but that was all she could manage. ‘I don’t understand any of this. A few days ago, you were telling me I had to leave because you were mad you couldn’t focus with me around. Now you’re telling me I have to stay so that you know I’m okay. You must see how wrong that is.’
‘To want you to be safe?’ He let out a hollow laugh. ‘I’m sure that’s very wrong.’
‘No.’ She kept her voice even though she didn’t know how. ‘To ask me to run my life according to what works for you.’
‘That isn’t what I said,’ he refuted.
Still, he let his hand drop, the frankness in his gravelly tone jolting through her. It made her forget, for a moment, everything she’d in which just been schooling herself. Every caution.
‘Yes. It is.’
And the worst of it was that a part of her wanted to obey, as long as that meant being with him. Building something with him.
But what could they possibly build that could be real under those circumstances?
‘I know the army is your career, your life. It’s what you love. And I respect that. But the nursing, and this charity, is what I love. And you don’t respect that.’
‘I was keeping you safe the only way I knew how,’ he ground out, and disappointment roared through her.
‘Then you should have found another way than expecting me to fall in with everything you wanted. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t professional consideration. It wasn’t mutual recognition.’
‘What did you expect?’ he asked harshly. ‘For me to tell you to crack on and stay until things got really close to the wire? Or for me to beg you to leave in the first wave because I didn’t want you hurt and that I loved you?’
‘Do you love me?’ she asked abruptly.
‘Do you think loving someone means choosing them over your job? Your career?’
