Page 165 of California Wild

Heath didn’t move.

Didn’t blink.

Just waited.

Jesse exhaled through his nose. “What do you want me to say? That I wake up in a cold sweat thinking about what happened? That I hear that kid’s voice every time I close my eyes? That I keep waiting for the moment it fucking breaks me?”

Silence.

Jesse’s fingers curled into a fist against his knee.

Heath’s voice was calm, steady.

“That’s what I was expecting.”

Jesse huffed out a dry laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah, well. I’m not that guy anymore.”

Heath didn’t flinch. Didn’t let him dodge.

“You’re still human, Navarro.”

Jesse finally looked up, meeting Heath’s too-knowing stare.

“You don’t get it.”

Heath’s brows furrowed. “Then explain it to me.”

Jesse’s jaw locked.

He couldn’t.

Couldn’t explain why that kid ripped something open in him.

Couldn’t explain why it sent him straight back to his own childhood.

Couldn’t explain why the only person he could ever talk to about this shit was a homeless man in the darkest alleyways of the city.

Kwilé understood.

Kwilé knew what it was like to grow up in war.

To never escape it.

Heath, though?

Heath would try to fix him.

Jesse didn’t need fixing.

He needed to keep moving.

So he gave Heath what he needed to hear.

“I’m good.”

Heath studied him for a long moment.

Then, finally, he nodded.

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