Page 66 of Cowboy SEAL Christmas

She sighed happily as the movie ended, and Gabe figured he should pretend it was fine. He should definitely ignore the claustrophobic feeling that the cabin walls were closing in on him. That the air was too heavy to breathe and everything…

“Isn’t it the best movie?” Monica sighed happily.

“You’ve obviously never seenDie Hard,” he managed to choke out, sounding mostly like himself instead of a dying frog.

“Die Hardis fine enough, but it doesn’t alter lives.”

“Now, you just don’t know that,” he said, pushing off the couch. He needed some air that didn’t smell like her or cookies or…life changes.

Nothing was going to change in his life, especially some sad sack old movie. Worth and meaning were fine enough on a movie set, war heroes could toast their heroic home-front brothers, and everyone could be so damn happy you wanted to smash in a TV screen.

But that was not real life, even when the words felt a little too real. A little too revealing. “I think I’m going to go…try to dig us out.” Anything,anythingto find some air.

“Those drifts are almost as tall as your shoulders. We’re lucky we have power. I don’t think you’re going to get anywhere.”

Gabe shrugged, trying to smile at her. “Can’t sit around in here twiddling my thumbs.”

He ignored the little flash of hurt that chased over her face before she smoothed it out. He focused on finding his coat, his boots.

“I didn’t expect the movie to bother you,” she said quietly.

Oh, he hated that quiet, hurt voice women could wield, far better than any man he’d ever known. Alex and Jack might get stoic, silent, but it was never that quiet quavering infused with hurt.

Becca had laid that on him a time or two, and it had been enough to eat him alive then. Coming from Monica, it felt like razors cutting his chest to ribbons. But what might happen if he gave in to that feeling? If he said he was sorry, if he told her all the things that bothered him?

He knew how those stories ended. He wouldn’t go there again. Not with her. Not in this place where he’d found the closest thing to home he was ever going to get.

“It didn’t bother me,” he ground out as he shoved his foot into his boot.

“I told you not to lie to me,” she said, and it was laced with all that hurt.

“I don’t know what you’re trying to do,” he grumbled, shoving the other boot on.

“I’m trying to understand.”

The look he gave her probably wasn’t fair, but at least he bit back the wordsStop trying to be my shrink. He knew she wasn’t trying to. He understood that to an extent, after the conversations they’d had, but it was easier to lash out with that, make her back off withthat, then try to understand this panic in his gut.

“I thought we’d gotten over this,” she said quietly. “I…I know I said I used it as armor, but that’s not what I’m doing. Not even close.”

“Then whatareyou doing, asking if that movie got to me? Just being friendly?”

“I didn’t ask. I observed it. Not because I’m your therapist or want to be, but because I’m your… We’re…” She huffed out a breath without finishing. It made him sick to his stomach that he was desperate to know what she’d call them. What she wanted them to be.

Nothing. You can only ever be nothing.

“When you’re friends with someone,” she began again. “When you have a care for someone, you want to know what’s wrong.”

Gabe wanted to inure himself to that tremulous note in her voice, because there was no shield or armor, not when she was showing her emotions too plain. On the surface and vulnerable. He never, ever wanted to see her vulnerable.

“I don’t know, you want to be there. Understand. Offer a shoulder. And, yes, maybe I’d fix it if I could, but because I care.”

“Don’t need a shoulder or understanding. Definitely don’t want it.” He got to his feet and shrugged his coat on. He’d go out that door and shovel his way back to Revival with his two bare hands if he had to. Anything would be better than this hell where emotion clogged his throat and feelings ripped at his insides and this awful, stupid part of him wanted to give in.

To her. To the hurt. To the change.

He reached for the door, and she all but leaped between it and him. She swung out her arms, slapping them back against the door as if she could actually block him.

“You think you’re going to stop me? I could have you off that door in five seconds flat.”

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