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“Shit,” Hunter muttered, running a hand through his short-cropped hair. “He’s right. I’m being a dick. I want this to be easy, and it pisses me off that I can’t just make it work. It’s not your fault or his, and I need to get my shit together.”
Liam froze, going absolutely rigid. Even as she noted her husband’s reaction, shock slowed her thoughts as she processed that bit of information. “What do you mean?”
“I make shit happen. It’s what I do. Mostly that’s blowing stuff to hell, but I make it happen. When I went up for gunnery sergeant, I made it happen. I worked my ass off, jumped through the right hoops, did what needed to be done to get it. The thing is, it’s not like civilian promotion. From here on out, every time I go up, I have to clear a selection board, and they aren’t just looking at my fitreps.”
Kat frowned. She wasn’t sure what a fitrep was, but she got the idea. “I think we understand that. It isn’t just about what you do in uniform, but out of it that affects promotion potential.”
Hunter shook his head sharply. “Not just promotion. If they wanted to, they could drum me out of the Corps with a dishonorable discharge.”
Liam cursed under his breath, but the buzzing in Kat’s head muffled the sound of it. She’d realized Hunter was taking a risk with his career, but she hadn’t realized the results could be so catastrophic. Being forced to leave the military was one thing, but a dishonorable discharge was something else entirely.
“Do you want to walk away from us?” God it hurt to offer him that option. It hurt to think, after one very uneven week, of letting him go.
“No.” His response was immediate, reassuring. It let Kat breathe again. After a moment, he continued, “That’s my problem. I knew the possible consequences when I made this decision, so I’m not going to back off now, especially not when I have strong feelings for you. For both of you. But I don’t want to fuck my career, either. So I’m pissed at the situation, which is making me act like a dick.”
Relief flooded her and she sagged in her chair, followed by alarm. Yes, she wanted them to be together, but she didn’t want to ruin his career, either. There had to be some way to reconcile those two goals.
Liam rubbed a hand over his face. “What do you want us to do?”
“I need you to understand how serious this is. I’m not just jerking your chain. This is a hard limit not because I don’t want you grabbing my ass in a restaurant. It’s a hard limit because grabbing my ass in a restaurant shows that you not only don’t respect my limits, but you don’t respect my being a Marine.”
“Shit, Hunter,” Liam muttered. “We aren’t out to make this harder. If you’re willing to take the risk, then I’m willing to keep it on the DL. I have no issue with that.”
“Absolutely,” Kat agreed. “I love that you are so committed to being a Marine. It’s made you who you are. I don’t want that to change. I just want to know you.”
“Yeah, well, then, that’s fine.” After a long pause, Hunter met Kat’s eyes. Whatever he wanted her to see, she didn’t yet understand. Finally, he shrugged uncomfortably. “That’s all I have.”
Caught by his discomfort, Kat cocked her head. Wait a minute. “No physical limits? No rules for what we can or can’t do?”
A corner of his mouth quirked in acknowledgement, and Kat knew she’d hit it right. They were both thinking back to Christmas morning when she’d pushed his limits. To when she’d asked him to think about pushing them more.
“No. I can’t guarantee I won’t decide I don’t like something, but right now, I don’t have hard limits.”
Kat’s breath caught. Was he saying what she thought he was saying? She opened her mouth, then closed it again. She wasn’t at all certain she wanted to force that into the open now. Better to deal with it a bit at a time.
“That’s good to know,” Liam said.
The very casualness of the delivery cued her in that he’d caught the implications of Hunter’s statements just as quickly as she had.
“Like I said, I can’t guarant
ee anything.”
Liam lifted a hand in acknowledgement. “Any other limits we need to discuss?”
Hunter shook his head slowly. “Not from me.”
“Kat?”
“No. We covered mine.”
“Then we’re to me. And I do have some limits. They aren’t things that really came up when it was just me and you, K-K,” Liam explained. “It does come into play now, though.”
Perplexed, she studied him. She was glad it wasn’t something that had been festering between them, but...
“Let’s hear it,” Hunter prodded.
“We’ll do physical first. No hitting and no bondage without discussion ahead of time.”
