Page 117 of This Life and All the Rest
My head pounds. My body aches. Everything is spinning.
“You can’t just ship her off tomorrow, Trent,” my mom yells. “She deserves to know what’s going on and to make her own decisions. She’s not a child.”
“She ismychild, Andrea,” Trent yells back. “You heard what Macon said. You saw what those people can do. It wasmymistake that killed her mother. My inaction. My indecision. That won’t happen again. She’s going. That’s final.”
I hear something banging and turn my head in time to see my mom snatch a small pink suitcase from Trent.
“Let me do this,” my mom snaps. “You wouldn’t have any idea what to pack for her.”
My mom disappears up the stairs with the suitcase, and I watch Trent hang his head. I think he might actually cry, and this is all my fucking fault.
“Trent,” I grunt out, and he stands straight and walks to where I’m laid out on the couch.
“Macon.”
He drops to his knees next to me and looks me over.
“Not high,” I joke, “but in a lot of pain.”
Well, I’m a little high.
But whatever that dick gave me wasn’t strong enough to knock me on my ass this time. Just enough to take a bit of the edge off the hurt.
“You’re sending her?” I ask, and Trent nods.
“I’m deploying for six months. And until I can get some intel on that family, it’s safer for her to be in England.”
I give my head the smallest possible nod. I agree.
“She can’t see me like this. She can’t know yet. She won’t go if she does. You know that.”
Trent is quiet for a minute, looking me over with stoic eyes.
“I can’t keep this from her,” he says finally. “I’m already taking her choice away by sending her early. I can’t send her and keep the truth from her, too.”
I close my eyes and take shallow breaths. Deep breaths hurt.
“If she sees me beat to hell like this, she won’t get on the plane. You know she won’t, I can’t be the reason she doesn’t go to England.”
She’s wanted this for so long. As long as I’ve known her. I refuse to be the reason she passes up this opportunity. And then there’s...
“And I...I don’t know if I’m strong enough to stay at the facility if I know she’s here unprotected, while you’re off hunting down terrorists or whatever the fuck it is that you do.”
Trent huffs out a laugh, and I manage a small smirk before my lip resplits and I taste blood.
“I don’t know, Macon.” Trent hesitates, so I pivot.
“Get her on that plane tomorrow, but don’t tell her about me. Not yet. I’ll tell her once she’s landed.”
Trent raises an eyebrow in question.
“I’ll write her a note.”
“You can barely breathe. How are you going to write?”
I lift up my hand and wiggle my fingers, and he gives me a small smile. I put my arm down and open my mouth to thank him when the doorbell rings.
My whole body tenses, but Trent lays a calming hand on my thigh.
