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“You have nothing to be sorry about,” he told her. “You have to know that I would swap places with—”
“Don’t you dare say what I think you’re about to say, Elijah Coolidge Crane.” Her eyes hardened as her voice wavered. She sniffed, visibly pulled her spine straight, and looked him in the eye. “Benji told me your middle name, too.”
He couldn’t rustle up a smile, not even when her mouth twitched at the edges.
“Don’t you dare tell me you’d rather be in the ground,” she said, “because I promise you there are people in your life who would be worse for it. You lost a limb, but you lived.”
“I know. That’s what has me drowning in guilt every damned day.”
“Refurbs for Vets is a good thing. You’re giving back in an active way. And yes.” She squeezed his arm. “You can use Benji’s picture on the website. I’d be honored.”
She startled him by wrapping her arms around his neck. “I forgive you. I don’t need you to be sorry, but if you need me to say I don’t blame you or hold you accountable, believe me when I say I don’t.”
He hugged Michelle, both arms wrapped around her back as one hand soothed her while she cried. Softly, gently, but she cried. When she pulled back, she smiled through those ebbing tears. A full-fledged smile like the one she’d given Destiny.
“Keep doing what you’re doing, Eli. Benji is watching you, and he is proud. I promise. He wouldn’t trade places with you. If the situation were reversed, he’d be honored if you’d traded your life for his. Since he traded his for yours, I suggest you live yours to the fullest.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Eli swallowed hard, his throat full, his heart fuller.
The moment was broken by a shrill cry coming from the baby monitor. Michelle wiped her eyes and shrugged, a busy mom with a routine. “I didn’t think I’d get that lucky.”
“I have to go anyway.” He stood and she walked him to the door, Destiny’s loud cries piercing the air.
“Thank you.” Michelle squeezed his hand and all he could do was nod. When he was on the porch, the door shut behind him, and he stood observing the sky over the house for a long minute.
“If you’re really watching, buddy,” he said, hoping Benji could hear him, “fuck you for telling your wife my middle name.”
Then with a smile, Eli stepped off the porch, and damn if he didn’t feel as if Benji—from wherever he was—smiled back.
***
“Dad is going to shit.” Tag’s smile parted his trimmed beard.
Reese’s smile matched their brother’s, big and blooming like Eli hadn’t seen in a long time. There was the smile he wore whenever Merina was around, and then there was this one. Like he’d come home from battle with the head of his enemy.
Since talking with Michelle, sharing dinner with her daughter, and hearing from her lips that whatever had happened had happened “for a reason,” Eli was absolutely, one hundred percent positive he’d done the right thing.
By visiting her, by handing off Refurbs, and by coming home to Crane Hotels.
Eli was the one who’d called this meeting and he’d taken the lead. The second Reese and Tag sat at the conference room table down the hall from Reese’s office, Eli had told him the decision he’d made.
He’d be stepping in as chief operations officer, effective immediately.
“Do you need an office?” Reese asked, pulling his phone out to take notes.
“I’ll work from home, but I’ll be here on occasion,” Eli answered.
“Need an assistant?” Tag asked with a wry smile. “Or will Isabella Sawyer be performing that duty among others?”
“Very funny.”
“Unless she refuses to let you pay her. Rachel was that way—she didn’t want any part of my money.” Tag leaned back in his chair and pulled both hands over his broad chest. “Parts of me, however…”
“Moving on,” Reese muttered with a peeved glance at Tag. It bounced off their youngest brother like he was surrounded by a force field. “There are several staff members performing parts of the position in your absence, Eli. I never truly replaced myself when I moved on from COO, so it’s up to you how you want to run it. General operations is comprised of several jobs. You can keep the men and women I’ve appointed in place and oversee them, or you can place them elsewhere and carve out an eighty-hour-a-week grindstone like I did.”
“Yeah, but you’re a masochist,” Tag interjected. “And Eli has a new girlfriend.”
“All right. I give.” Eli held his hands up in a surrender pose. “I have a girlfriend.”
