Page 179 of Things Left Unsaid

“Condoms. Mum and Clyde should have used them more often.”

His smirk is unrepentant. “Are you dating your wife, Colt?”

“Why are you home?”

“Because I initiated the release process.” He coughs. “A few months ago.”

“What?!”

“It was time.”

Gaping at him, I sputter, “Time?!”

“Yeah. I’m getting old and I don’t want to ride a desk.”

“You wouldn’t quit. Not unless you were pushed.”

“Another hospital stay sealed the deal,” he admits dryly. “Spent so much time in a hospital room that if I never see another, it’ll be too soon.”

“So, it wasn’t a car crash.”

Not a question.

His gaze is amused. “Not unless the car was worth three hundred million dollars.”

“You crashed it?”

“Excuse me. I’ve never crashed a plane. Some fuckwit over the Baltics decided to steer into me.”

“The Baltics, huh?”

He arches a brow at me. “Hotbed of tension.”

“War’s brewing?”

“Isn’t it always.”

“You don’t want to be involved this time?”

“Probably makes me a coward, but no.”

“How are you a coward? All those medals you have weren’t given to you because of your ugly face.”

He pulls said face.

“Nor was it because you’re a Korhonen. The name means dick in the CAF?*.”

He plops his sandwich on his plate. “True dat.”

I watch as he rubs the back of his neck. “I thought you had to go through a bunch of interviews?—”

“I did.”

“And you didn’t think to tell us about being injured?”

“What was the point in worrying you?”

“You’re an asshole, do you know that? I have a father who sneezes and wants me at his bedside, but you crash a plane?—”

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