Page 42 of Steinbeck
“Hey, I’m just saying I get it,” Con said.“Penny is exactly like that.Smart and maybe a little impulsive, and it drives me to my last nerve, and yet I can’t look away.Or stop myself from wanting to protect her.She makes me feel invincible.”He made a wry face.“Okay, that was a little much.”
“No.It’s perfectly stated,” Jack said.“Harper looks at me like I could find her in the dark with my hands tied behind my back.It makes me want to be everything I see in her eyes.”He lifted a shoulder.“Please do not tell her that.”
Conrad let out a huff, shook his head, gave him a wry smile.
Stein stared at them.
“Is that panic on your face?”Jack raised an eyebrow.
Steinbeck ran his hand across his mouth.“I just know that nothing had felt right for three years, and something just...clicked when I found her in Portugal.And maybe before that, in Cuba, when we were trying to survive.”
“Maybe we can figure out how to get past survival together?”
“I think maybe I’ve been in survival mode for the past three years.Survive my injury, get back on my feet.Find my way.And now I have a chance to do something...patriotic?—”
“With the woman who makes you feel?—”
“Necessary,” Conrad said.
Stein stilled.
“And, goal,” Conrad said, raising an eyebrow.
Aw.Stein looked away.
“Bro,” Jack said quietly.“You’ve never beennotnecessary.”
“I don’t need a hug.”
“But youdoneed truth.Running from one high-adrenaline mission to the next is not going to heal you from the loss of being a SEAL.”
“I’m fine.”
“We see you, Stein.You’ve always been the One Most Likely to Get It Done.And then you got blown up and sidelined, and you’ve put on a tough face, but...we get it.”
“Being a SEAL is just a job,” Stein said.
“Right.As if the warrior ethos wasn’t scrubbed into your DNA,” Jack said.
Stein lifted a shoulder.
“But you’re not on the teams anymore.So there has to be something more—otherwise God would not have brought you here.”
The words were a knife, and for a second, Stein couldn’t breathe.“You’re saying God derailed my life?”
“Not derailed.Redirected.I’m saying that nothing happens to us that doesn’t pass through the hands of the Lord.And he is good.And not to quote my little brother or anything, but eight months ago, you said that God has a plan for my life.And that even I can’t screw it up.”
“You remember that.”
“I do.And you should too.”
Steinbeck sighed.“Listen, I’m not worried about screwing it up.I’m worried that...I’ll end up chopping wood for family campfires for the rest of my life.No offense.”
Jack shook his head.“None taken.Mostly because chopping all that wood means I’m in better shape than you.”
Even Conrad smiled.
“Listen, little bro,” Jack said, “Dad always says a person’s steps are directed by the Lord.How, then, can anyone understand their own way?”
