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I rise up, so we’re eye level, because I don’t like to be in a position of weakness, even when I feel guilty. Especially when I feel guilty. “No. Men started the war. I’m just defending my sisters.”
“Men? Not me. I didn’t start this war. You dragged me into it.”
True enough. “But you’re a good man; why not fight bad ones?”
Anger flashes across his face and his lips thin. “Because I’ve tried that way. Tried it until I didn’t recognize myself, and that’s not my job anymore. There has to be more than that, Justice. Helping inthatway can’t be my only choice.”
Not just handsome, but right. It is his choice. Like it’s my choice to fight. “I’m sorry.”
Again, he doesn’t accept the apology, but continues to stare at me.
I don’t hide myself, don’t hide my desire as my eyes chart the muscles in his forearms, the length of his fingers, the spread of his hand. Strong and gentle. I want to know more of him. I want to knowallof him. “What made you decide to do this, to start a charity? Was it just that experience you had helping Victor? Or was there more?”
Unexpectedly, he starts to get up.
I stop him, putting a hand on his thigh. I swear I can feel my palm burning a brand into all his muscle and tension.
He looks at me for a long, long moment, then runs his thumb along my brow, across the edge of my eyes, and whispers, “Your eyes are endless.”
He drops his hand, clears his throat. “Partly, my time with Victor. Partly, my mom getting Early-Onset Alzheimer’s. It made me realize I wanted to create more good memories. I saw what the bad memories did to her. The terror of an abusive relationship she escaped too late, one that is now part of her waking nightmare, but it was also… my own nightmare.”
“The one from the plane?” When he nods but doesn’t answer, I press. “You have to know that I’ll listen without judgment. Trust that I’ll keep your secrets like you’ve kept mine.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you. It’s that… you have your own shit, Justice. You don’t need to carry mine around, too.”
What? That’s why he didn’t tell me on the plane? “So, what? I burdened you when I told you about Hope?”
His eyebrows raise as if he hadn’t thought of it that way before. Heat flushes up his face.
I sigh. “Men. Sometimes they get such a bad deal. Don’t share. Be tough.Sheesh. Tell me.”
He takes another moment to chew on it before saying, “I was on a mission in Syria. We were training the FSA.”
“FSA? Free Syrian Army? The good guys, right?”
“They weren’t the good guys, but a whole lot better than the Syrian president, Assad. Trainees usually met us in Qatar, but we’d been sent into Syria. We were close by when Assad dropped a barrel bomb filled with chemicals on the local girls’ school.”
He scratches hard behind his ear, as if digging out a memory. “Someone had a hose out, trying to wash the girls. The kids were screaming. Frantic. A young girl came running at me. I meandirectlyat me. I didn’t even think. I just picked her up. Her skin sloughed off in my hands.”
My stomach turns over. “Oh God.”
“Yeah. I didn’t know what to do. Nearly vomited. One of my team had called for an extraction earlier. He alerted me to the helo. I started to walk toward the LZ. Thought I could get her to safety. I was so tense with anger I could feel it harden my veins. The kid was shaking like a leaf in my arms when she reached up to me. The bones… The little bones in her hand were visible.” He rubs his eyes, but I don’t miss the tears. “Before she died, she said, ‘Poppa, don’t be angry. There is more.’”
More. More than violence. More than pain.
He’s reaching for the pot at the end of the rainbow. Maybe not something that easy, but a way to feel something other than anger. And he deserves that. He deserves the other side of the coin. He’s fought enough.
Something in my chest, a kind of hopeful ache, moves forward as if seeking him. “What did it mean to you when she said that? Themorepart?”
“It could’ve meant nothing to me, and in that moment of intense rage, it should’ve, but I knew exactly what she meant. She was telling me that as total and awful and fucked up as that moment was, it wasn’t all there was to life. She was telling me to keep going. Reminding me my life wouldn’t end that day. For me, there would be a lot more than the moment of violence that ended her life, even more than the violence I’d participated in. And she was telling me it was okay for me to have that more. So now, I’m trying to make my more be a way to help others, kids like her.”
Aw, hell. There’s so much I want to say, so much about my goals and reasoning, but I can’t take this moment from him, twist it back to me. Instead, I rise to my knees. “I’m sorry, Sandesh. Sorry I dragged you into this. I’m going to make this right. I promise.”
I run a hand along his clean-shaven jaw. It’s smooth and still damp. I feel compelled, called by his skin. I kiss him there, suck away that moisture.
His breath catches with a gust of minty toothpaste.
Moving up, I kiss the side of his lips. He sits deadly still, but I can tell he wants me. So says the boner tenting his boxers. I kiss along and up his jawline until my tongue reaches that soft place below his ear. I lick.
