And now here I am repaying them by making out with their daughter?
Emotion trumps logic and I can’t hold back, my hand wrapping around her neck and grabbing her possessively as our faces press together tightly, our mouths going for broke as we kiss desperately.
In a brief moment of clarity, I pull back. “Sadie, you have to know that you’re it for me. This isn’t a game or some short-term thing. If we continue there’s no going back.”
She nods. “What about my parents?”
“I…I don’t think they’ll be ready to accept it yet, but in time they will.”
“You’re going to tell them or will I?”
“I will, but not yet.”
“Tell us what?” an accusatory voice from the doorway calls out.
My OPSEC got thrown off by my need for her and I forgot to shut the damn door. Standing there is Rick in his tighty whities and his wife Gwen in a robe.
Sadie gasps, but adversity is nothing new to me. I’ve been approached by Taliban when talking to informants before, and both I and my informant walked away unharmed. This is going to be a piece of cake, and I don’t even have to lie to my buddy.
“There was an incident at the party. I wasn’t going to tell you. Didn’t think it would come to anything. Didn’t want to put more on your plate than there already is.”
“Whatkindof incident?” Rick asks, jamming his hands into his waist as he looks at Sadie and then at me.
“Some boys were harassing Sadie. One picked her up and had her overhead. He was going to throw her to his friend. He did actually, but I caught her in mid-flight, got her to safety.”
“And?”
“And I neutralized the boys.”
“You’re a Navy SEAL, Soren. Neutralize means something different to you than it does to us.”
“Can you elaborate?” Gwen asks.
Before I can respond Sadie does it for me. “He kicked their asses and a few more boys who tried to take him down. Then we left and now we’re here.”
Rick exhales hard and jerks his head to the side, taking a few steps away and then moving back quickly.
“You think the news is going to pick this up?” he asks.
“Kids have phones. Phones have cameras. Sadie is your daughter. Never know.”
“You should have told me,” Rick says.
“Wake you up at…” I look at my Timex. “One in the morning?”
“Not important. I need to know these things.”
“Sadie is okay. That’s what’s most important.”
“That’s the least of my worries having you around here,” he says, and I can’t help but smile, knowing my friend knows with absolute certainty that his daughter is safe with me.
Safe from physical harm that is. Not necessarily safe from Rick’s biggest threat. The one he doesn’t even know about.
Me.
Rick and Gwen step out into the hallway and Sadie and I exchange a knowing glance. She stands and moves to her room and I find a place on the floor, knowing there won’t be any sleeping tonight.
But I also realize how close I was to sleeping under the stars. Because if Rick would have been a few seconds earlier or later I’d have been kicked out of his house, and his life.