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“What about your child?” she asked him.
“Emily and I have already discussed all that,” he told her. “I’m taking full responsibility, of course.”
“I just meant...being a father is a good life plan...”
Frustrated again, he sat forward, elbows on his knees, ready to push off.
“Fathers have to have careers to pay support,” he reminded her.
“I’m just thinking...with you and Emily splitting, and then you being in the navy, with the possibility of being transferred anywhere in the world...you might not get a chance to know your son all that well...”
He was fairly certain he’d already made clear to her that he was only a biological parent in this situation.
Although, as he sat there, all of the reasons why that had to be didn’t come immediately to mind. Or didn’t ring as strongly true when he did manage to call them up.
So he didn’t believe that love was true. Or that “love of my life” was meant to be taken literally. He didn’t believe in Santa Claus, or some great power that watched over them all. He still had a lot of things he could teach the boy. Loyalty, for one. And duty.
How was he going to protect him if he was halfway around the world?
Emily could give the child all of the love Tristan needed.
But Winston still had valid things to offer.
“I got a notice this morning that you’ve received an offer for early discharge,” Adamson said as Winston sat silently contemplating—defensively guarding his thoughts from the woman who’d been trying to make him something he was not from the very beginning.
He’d actually meant to talk to her about the discharge. Since he wasn’t talking to Em about it.
“I was planning to re-up when my year is through,” he said now. Military life fit him. It spoke to all of his strengths.
“You want to be military police.”
“I think I’d be good at it. And enjoy the work.”
“So...have you considered civilian law enforcement? You’ve got the weapons training. If you want to stay with the navy, there’s always NCIS. You could request the Los Angeles office and with your record and history, I’m pretty sure you’d be given serious consideration for any special agent openings they might have.”
He hadn’t seriously considered anything but “A” school. He’d needed a goal to set his mind on, and that had been it.
Was still it.
The navy was his only constant.
“Have you talked any of this over with Emily? I’m assuming, since you said you’d moved out, that she’s agreed to the divorce?”
“She knows that what we thought we had doesn’t exist.”
“But again, have you asked her what she wants? Or just determined what you can’t give her?”
“I have my goals,” he told her.
“Career goals, yes, but there are other aspects to life. Equally, if not more important, aspects.”
Not for him there weren’t.
He wasn’t getting sucked i
nto happily-ever-after again. Turned out, he wasn’t good at it.
“My career is my goal,” he restated, because he had to set the woman straight. “No matter what I do...whether it’s walking dogs, being a cop or fighting wars, I am always going to be the man who, if faced with danger, will act. I will risk my life to save others. That’s what I have to offer. Not a promise that I’ll come home. Or even put home first.”
