Page 35 of Darla's Christmas Knight
She nodded.
“Not at first. But then, when the lies piled up—”
“Hang on.” She turned to face him. “Lies? Youliedto your family, too?”
Bollocks. “Till last year, they had no idea I was even in the USA. Never mind Texas.”
“Where did they think you were?”
“Australia.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Seriously?”
He nodded. “Working on a remote cattle station.”
“But you had contact with them?”
“Sporadic video calls masked by multiple VPNs so my location could not be pinpointed.”
She stared at him, long and hard. “Have they forgiven you?”
“Mostly, yeah. They haven’t admitted it, but I think Mum and Dad knew all alongwhatI was doing, just notwhere. Four of my sisters are still nursing their hurt, but Ilse, the one closest to me in age, won’t even acknowledge that I’m alive.”
“That’s … hard. You have a brother, too?”
“Yeah. Stuart. The youngest of us seven. We’re cool.”
“Seven,” she murmured, giving a slight shudder.
He grinned. “Never a dull moment growing up.”
“I bet.”
Bobby risked the next question. “How many kids do you want?” It was something he’d been thinking of recently. Having another.
She tilted her head and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “Seriously?”
“Being an only child could be lonely.”
She exhaled softly and stared down at her lap. “Maybe we should get this one born first.”
“Fair enough.”
A brief uncomfortable silence followed his reply. Had he pushed her too far? Opening his mouth to speak, Bobby closed it again when Darla cleared her throat.
“Do you regret … coming here?” she asked. “To Texas.”
He took his time answering. It was a double-edged sword. “I regret thereasonthat brought me here. Losing Edmund …” He trailed off, the loss, even fifteen years on, was still painful. “Edmund took a bullet protecting the woman he loved. I understand what drove him to do it, but his death meantI’dfailedmyduty.”
At first, he and several other members of the Royal Guardhad been hauled before a committee and accused of dereliction of duty. But Edmund’s instinctive actions had been caught on multiple cameras, and they’d been cleared.
“Tell me about him.”
“He was my best friend, Darla. We grew up together. Knew each other’s secrets. Hopes. Fears. When he joined the army, it was a no-brainer for me to go with. To have his back. Be a brother. Same reason I took up the position in the Royal Guard.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
Her soft-spoken but sincere words touched him on a visceral level. His throat, already thick with emotion, closed, and it took a couple of hard swallows to clear it. “Nobody’s ever said that to me.”
