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She smiled. “Clear as mud.”
“Okay, how’s this.” Rhett polished off his tea. “Remember today, when you got so hot you said hell with it and stripped your shirt off? You didn’t want to. You knew what was coming. And like clockwork, those assholes in the truck honked and whistled at you. Exactly what you thought would happen. But you took your shirt off, anyway. Because you were just...so...damn...hot.” Rhett made a blade with his hand and sliced the counter to mark his words. “That’s how I felt, when I knew how my body would respond to your massage. I knew I was going to be a special fucking snowflake. But I just didn’t care anymore.”
“You can be any kind of snowflake you want, on my table.”
Rhett smiled.
“Did you say they put you on medication? After your last tour?”
“I took them a little while. They weren’t for me. Not the pills. Not the cortisone shots.”
Stanzi nodded. “Cortisone eventually just breaks you down.”
“Katrina liked me on meds,” Rhett said. “They dulled everything. And the cortisone shots. I got one, and never got another. Yeah, my leg felt better, and I walked straight for a couple weeks, but it was just a bandage. Eventually, the bandages have to come off, or the stuff underneath won’t ever heal.”
“This is true.” Stanzi came around to the other side of the counter and sat next to him again. “You can only use quick fixes so many times before what’s really going on underneath collapses. I should know.”
Rhett rubbed his face and knew he already sported a tinge of five-o’clock shadow. He could smell the eucalyptus from the massage lotion on his skin. “I don’t think Katrina cared what was going on underneath,” he said. “As long as everything seemed perfect on the outside. She liked the medals and the stories and the false gratitude. The kind of shit everyone wants to reduce to a ribbon of an unspecified color.”
Constance sipped her tea in silence.
“I don’t know if this will make any sense to you.” Rhett fiddled with the handle of his mug. “But I just...” He paused. “I just couldn’t be...” He trailed off and sighed. “Dammit.”
Constance bumped his shin with her toes. “Couldn’t be what?”
“You know.” He drummed his fingers on the counter. “A hero. That’s what.” He watched her in silence, then rubbed his hands over his five-o’clock shadow. “I don’t want to be a hero all the damn time.”
The corners of her mouth turned down. She covered his drumming fingers with her own. When they quieted, she said, “You don’t have to be a hero with me.”
Rhett pressed his lips together. He drew a breath and sighed, then rose to his feet. “You know what we both need?”
Constance slid off her chair and tilted her chin up at him. “What?”
“A change of scenery.”
“Well.” She shrugged. “My kitchen’s not the biggest or best. But it’s pretty cozy, if you ask me.”
“No.” Rhett laughed. “I mean, we need a big change. We need somewhere totally different to run together. Somewhere wild and open and nowhere near all our old haunts. Somewhere to get lost.”
“Oh, yeah?” The little dimple on her cheek deepened. “What’d you have in mind?”
