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Weston looked at him. “Don’t you have significant time off you could use? Take a month and let one of us impress the admiral.”
He laughed dryly, tilting his head at Weston. “It would make my return just too cruel.”
Kent cleared his throat. “All right, the meeting is over. Everyone can head to their areas and get going.”
Everyone cleared out, and Axur looked at Kent. The leader returned the look and sighed. “I’m getting too old for this.”
“You’re never too old to tell them that they don’t know their heads from their asses, sir.”
Kent laughed, waving a finger at him. “You’re one of them, so I’d watch it.”
“Are you perhaps thinking of retiring?”
Kent nodded. “Possibly. I don’t know. Sometimes, I feel that I missed things in life because I focused on this so much.”
Axur felt a twist in his gut. He had always been the perfect soldier, the military man. Would he someday say that he had sacrificed too much of himself to this calling?
“Your team’s doing great,” Kent said. “Always perfect.”
Axur gave a smile, unable to hide his pride. Perhaps he couldn’t marry according to the regulations. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t continue his relationship with Katie, even unofficially. Maybe Katie was right; the rule was silly. It was possible to balance both a career and a love life.
Or maybe not, and he was making a huge mistake even considering it.
He left the room and headed for the training ground, where his men stood waiting around. All were great, hard workers. He felt pride in knowing he kept them in line and worked hard to be the top soldiers.
He stopped and looked at each of them. They all were clean and alert, as he expected every morning.
“Morning, I hope you are all wide awake and ready for today.”
Michell rubbed at his forehead. “If you mean awake and ready for another day in hell, sure.”
He raised an eyebrow at Michell. He was the biggest complainer but the hardest worker. He was pretty sure the back talk was to have his boss push him harder. Axur picked up on it a week into his being in his group.
“Would you like an extra ten laps added to your list of things today, Michell?”
Michell smiled at him, showing his perfectly lined teeth. “If it makes you happy, sir.”
The others smirked, and he crossed his arms. “You all get an extra ten laps since Michell has so much leftover energy from yesterday.”
They all glared at him, and Michell frowned. “Are you trying to get them to kill me? Because there are a lot of better ways to do that.”
Axur shook his head. “Go. We have a lot of things to get done today, and I don’t want to stay late.”
The day went smoothly, and as he watched the men, he started to think he could do it all. He could balance having Ayla and work. He didn’t know how he would because he was only keeping her for a while, but he could figure something out.
He just needed to take each day a step at a time, and it would be fine. If he just took things slowly, everything would work out for the better. He just didn’t have to look at the whole picture.
As the day came to a close and everyone hit the showers, he looked at his communicator. He opened the message Katie had sent earlier, finding a good morning message and a picture of Ayla and her outside.
He smiled, knowing he had fallen for Katie. It was wrong, but he couldn’t help how he felt about her. He couldn't marry her in the end, but that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy her. He should enjoy having her around while it lasted.
He headed home and set his bag down at the door. It was quiet, and when he walked into the living room, he found the girls on the couch watching a movie.
“Uncle Axur! Are you going to join us?”
Katie looked up and gave him a smile. “Busy day?”
He nodded, taking a seat next to them. Ayla moved closer, pulling the blanket with her.
