15
Holt stepped out of Moonbeams and Sweet Dreams, an enormous bouquet in hand and a glare of judgment at his back from its quiet proprietress. Misty hadn’t let on that she knew what was going on, but he supposed it was obvious enough he was in the doghouse and angling to get out of it. Girl Code probably dictated she be on Cayla’s side, regardless. He could respect the support, but he was damned glad he hadn’t been treated to a tongue-lashing from her, too. The one he’d gotten from his wife had been bad enough.
In his time with her, Holt had seen Cayla all different shades of happy. The happy was what had drawn him in, despite himself. It was the terrified fragility that had pulled at him, overcoming his initial reservations to land him a front-row seat to her life. Since then, he’d been witness to passion, exhaustion, frustration, and the edge of a total overwhelmed meltdown. But he’d never seen her angry. He hadn’t imagined she had that level of fury in her and was more than a little shamed that it had been directed at him. In front of his friends. Hell, they’d been thoroughly chastened, too. The shame pissed him off. He’d been doing what he believed was right in the name of protecting her. That should damned well count for something.
“You’re scowling awfully hard at those flowers.”
He looked up to find Rebecca smiling at him. “Hey. What are you doing here?”
“Just finished up with my last client of the day and spotted you down here. Thought I’d come say hello. Where are you off to?”
“Home.” Where he’d be having a conversation, per Cayla’s edict. All the possible negative outcomes of that scenario had his gut tied in knots. Hence the flowers.
She studied him, those green eyes she shared with her son, seeing way too much. “You have the look of a man who’s just had a fight with his wife.”
“That obvious?”
“I have keen powers of deduction.” Her smile softened the sarcasm. Tucking a hand in the crook of his arm, she tugged. “Walk with me.”
Holt gave her a little bit of side eye but fell into step beside her. “Is this the part where you mom me?”
Rebecca glanced up at him from beneath those ridiculously long, former pageant queen lashes. “Do you need momming?”
God knew he’d never had it from his own. “Can’t hurt. Brax said you give good advice.”
“Well, I can try. Why don’t you tell me what happened?”
Hell, it couldn’t hurt to have the perspective of another woman.
As they strolled along Main Street, down toward the city park, Holt kept his eye out for eavesdroppers and laid it out—leaving out the details about how Brax and Jonah had been involved since that wasn’t his to tell. His shoulders had risen toward his ears by the end. “I had good reason for doing it the way I did.”
“I’m sure you feel like you did.”
His shoulders hunched some more. He hadn’t done this to get lambasted by another female in his life. “I was a Ranger. I’m used to giving orders, taking action. Checking in like this, giving partial intel, is not part of my way of operating. It’s inefficient. My superior officers expected answers, not half-assed reports.”
“I get that. My son’s a SEAL, after all, so you’re cut from the same cloth. But first off, you need to remember that life is not a mission. You’re dealing with civilians, not other trained soldiers. Aside from that, you need to remember that your wife is a partner, not a superior. A partner gets included in things.”
“I wasn’t excluding her. I was trying to save her from some stress. God knows, she’s had enough.”
“True, but I still think you should give Cayla some more credit. She’s stronger than you realize.”
“I never said she wasn’t strong or capable.” She was one of the most capable people he’d ever known.
“Maybe not with words. But stop and think a minute. How much do you think it took her to go to the FBI about her husband in the first place? How much more do you think it took her to leave him? To divorce him and raise that child on her own?”
“It took an amazing amount of courage, but—”
“I’m not finished.”
Her tone was mild, but the rebuke was firm, so Holt shut his mouth.
“She came out of an abusive marriage to an incredibly controlling man who kept major secrets. It damaged her ability to trust. In all the years she’s been back, I haven’t seen or heard of her even saying yes to dinner with somebody. She hasn’t let anybody in until you, and then you turn around and keep something huge from her. That’s a really big deal.” Rebecca stopped and pulled him down to sit on one of the park benches. “Now, I don’t doubt you were well-intentioned. You’re a good man, Holt. And maybe you didn’t plan to keep it from her forever, like he did. But she didn’t know that. How’s that gonna feel to her?”
Surely she wasn’t equating him to Raynor. The very idea of it put his back up. “I wasn’t keeping it from her to hide it. I just wanted the full picture before I brought it to her. It was a day.”
“That may be, but it still doesn’t change the fact that she got blindsided, just like before, so it’s bound to be stirring up all those feelings all over again.”
Cellophane crinkled as his hand fisted around the flowers. He forced himself to relax. “I’m not him. She can trust me. I’d never do anything to hurt her.”
“Not on purpose,” Rebecca agreed. “But you two are still new, and you’ve both got a lot of baggage to work through to understand each other. You would, even if you weren’t in this rather unusual situation. So what I’m telling you, son, is to keep that in mind when you go home to talk about this. You deserve the chance to explain yourself, but be sure to actually listen when she talks. Don’t just wait for a pause in the conversation so you can explain why she’s wrong.”
He sighed, staring out over the lush expanse of spring green grass. “I was trying to protect her. I didn’t want to worry her any more than I already had to because she’s already got so much on her. But I can see now that being kept in the dark probably upset her more than the details. I didn’t count on someone else telling her before I did.”
Rebecca nodded in approval. “Tell her that. It acknowledges and validates her perspective, while still getting your reasons in.”
He could do that. But as he remembered the twin expressions of hurt and disappointment on her face, he had to acknowledge, “Flowers and an apology don’t seem like enough.”
She looked at the bouquet he still held. “Oh, yeah. I’d go bigger.”
* * *