Page 26 of Beckett
“He never told me any of this,” she said softly. “Just said his time overseas was hot and boring.”
“That was Todd. Never wanted to worry anyone. Especially you, since your parents weren’t around anymore.” Their dad had passed away when they were young, then their mother not long after Todd had enlisted. I scratched behind Chaos’s ears, remembering. “He kept your picture in his helmet. Said you were his reminder of why he needed to make it home.”
She made a sound like all the air had been punched from her lungs.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “I didn’t mean to?—”
“No.” She shook her head firmly. “No, I want to hear it. All of it. The good and the bad. It’s just… It’s been eighteen months since anyone’s talked about him like he was real. Like he existed.”
“Grief doesn’t have a timeline.”
She studied me then, those hazel eyes seeing too much. “Speaking from experience?”
Rodriguez’s face flashed through my mind. The weight of his body in my arms. The promises I’d made and couldn’t keep.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “Different kind of loss, but yeah.”
I could see her recognizing it—the trauma we carried, different in detail but similar in weight. Warriors who’d seen too much, lost too much, survived when others hadn’t.
The cat barn door banged open, making us both jump. Jet bounded out, all gangly legs and enthusiasm, making a beeline for us. Or, more specifically, for the kitten in my arms.
“Jet, no,” I commanded, but the German shepherd was already there, tail wagging furiously as he sniffed at Chaos.
The kitten hissed, back arching into a perfect Halloween cat pose. Jet play-bowed in response, butt in the air, clearly delighted by this tiny, angry new friend.
“Jet, easy,” I warned, though Audra didn’t even flinch. She’d been working with him all week.
“He thinks everyone wants to be his best friend, including tiny attack kittens who?—”
Chaos chose that moment to launch himself at Jet’s face, all eight ounces of fury. The dog yelped more in surprise than pain, dancing backward. The kitten landed in the grass, immediately puffing up to twice his negligible size.
“Play,” we both finished at the same time.
Jet approached again, belly almost on the ground, but this time, he went straight to Audra first, pressing against her legs before investigating the kitten. She absently stroked his head while Chaos evaluated this new, much larger threat. When Jet got close enough, he very gently touched his nose to the kitten’s head.
Chaos swatted him.
Jet’s tail wagged harder. He glanced up at Audra as if asking permission to continue playing with his new tiny friend.
“This dog might be broken,” Audra observed, but there was clear affection in her voice as she scratched behind Jet’s ears.
“He’s definitely broken. Failed security dog who thinks kittens are friends.” I watched Jet’s tail wag harder. “Though he seems to have good taste in people, at least.”
“Or he’s just really bad at reading social cues.”
Chaos, apparently satisfied by this show of submission from the much larger dog, marched over and began attacking Jet’s ear. The German shepherd held perfectly still except for his constantly wagging tail, letting the tiny kitten gnaw with determined ferocity.
“That’s…actually kind of sweet,” Audra said.
She crouched down for a better view, one hand still resting on Jet’s back, and something about her posture—balanced on the balls of her feet, ready to move—triggered a memory. Todd used to move the same way, trained into him by years of patrol work.
“Did your brother teach you that?” I asked without thinking. “The way you position yourself. Ready to run but not obvious about it.”
She stiffened, the moment of ease evaporating. “Teach me what?”
“Tactical positioning. Keeping your weight centered, exits in peripheral vision.” I kept my voice neutral, conversational. “It’s cop training 101.”
“He worried about me living alone in the city.” The answer came carefully, each word weighed. “Gave me some tips.”
