“The footpath isn’t for biking.”
“The kid’s barely out of training wheels.”
Yeah, so he might have gone a bit overboard. “I wasn’t serious.”
“Yes, you were. You’re upset because she left and you’re sulking.”
“I’m not fucking sulking.”
“Then what do you call it? You should be chasing her down.”
Jake felt tired. “No one knows where she is.”
“So find her. You’re supposed to be a cop, aren’t you?”
Jake scowled. “Maybe she’s better off without me.”
“And now we get to the heart of it. You are not to blame for Rebecca’s death. No more than I am.”
He wasn’t saying anything Jake didn’t know. “We argued that night I left. She wanted me to quit the SEALs.”
Saxon nodded. “I know. She called me up the next day to vent.”
“She did? You knew all this time?”
Saxon frowned. “That’s why you feel so much guilt? Over that argument?”
“We made up later, but my last words to her in person were spoken in anger. I should have done it. I should have quit for her.”
“Jake, she knew who you were when she married you. She also regretted that argument. Yeah, she didn’t like worrying about you every time you left. But Rebecca was stronger than I think most of us gave her credit for. She was handling it. You can’t keep feeling guilty, she wouldn’t want that.”
“I think I’ve clung to the guilt as an excuse not to move on.”
“Being with a therapist has been good for you.” Saxon frowned slightly. “You know, just taking off like that isn’t the way I thought Molly would react. I thought she’d stay and fight it out with you. Make you confront your past.”
> “Something else is going on.” It had been niggling away at him for a while. He was missing something. “She loves it here. She wouldn’t have just taken off because we had a fight.”
“What would you do if someone did know where she was? Is she worth the time and effort of going after her?”
Jake straightened. “She did break the contract. She’s owed punishment.” And he owed her an explanation and an apology.
“I’m all about disciplining naughty subs, but I probably wouldn’t lead with that,” Saxon advised.
“You know where she is.”
“I do.” He pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket. “She’s in Rarotonga. You have a flight to catch in Houston. You’ll fly to L.A. then to the island. You might want to take some bug spray and sunscreen.”
Jack reached out and took the paper. “Thanks, man.”
Saxon shrugged. “What’s family for if we can’t help track down your naughty sub so you can punish her?”
13
She stared at herself in the mirror. The pale, bedraggled woman with red-rimmed eyes and slumped shoulders was a stranger. This wasn’t her. This was the woman who’d spent days wallowing in self-pity after her diagnosis, who’d yelled and screamed and decided the world was a shitty, shitty place.
But after a few days, that woman had picked herself up, told herself that she might have been dealt a crap hand, but that didn’t mean she should spend the rest of her days feeling sorry for herself.
That’s when she’d embarked on her new life. When she’d decided to do what she wanted. Not what was expected of her.