Page 76 of Surviving in Clua

“The date and time I enlisted.” I touch the cracked pocket watch on my forearm.

Her eyebrows tip up in the middle, eyes on mine. Surprised. “It’s broken.” She presses her lips together and she drops her gaze. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

My jaw ticks, the thought of telling her, even just this, thumping my throat with shame. The fact that she’s afraid to ask about it thumping it even harder. “I never wanted it. Any of it. I resented it from day one.”

Her lips part and I can practically see her mind working. “But you were the top of your class.”

“I said I never wanted it, not that I wasn’t good at it.”

“I’m sorry.” Her gaze flicks to my arm again. “I had no idea. I—”

My snort is humorless. “Every time someone thanks me for my service it feels like I’m lying to their face. Feels like I’ve been lying my whole damn life. I don’t deserve their thanks.” Memories of my last tour—of how royally I fucked up and how many lives it cost start crawling beneath my skin again. I shake my head. Tap my thumb to my forefinger.

“Stop.” The coolness of her fingers on mine grounds me. Pulls me back before the sickly blackness of that day can really take hold. “They’d thank you even more for doing it even though you didn’t want to.”

I blink down at her from beneath my scowl. Her eyes are clear. Her head free of horrors, her memories easy.Civilian. I can’t—Iwon’ttake that from her. “This one’s when I was diagnosed.” I twist my arm so she can see the two pocket watches on the underside of my bicep. “The one next to it’s the date and time I was given the all-clear.” My chest lifts with my deep fucking breath when her fingers brush the face of a watch I won’t—can’tshare and keep my head above water.

She nods when I finally force myself to meet her stare. “Mylo…

I swallow but make myself go on. “And the guy from last night on the beach really was a case of mistaken identity.” Jaynee would have called me if he’d gone AWOL. Besides there’s no way he could even know I was here. I force my lips into a smirk I can only hope is easy. “A guy I used to know that couldn’t be here.” Her face sobers, but she doesn’t look away.

“What?” I frown down at her.

“You’d tell me if you were in some kind of trouble, if—”

“I would never keep anything that could affect you or your safety from you, Kenzi.”

Her nod starts slow but finishes in a quick up down of her chin. “Okay.”

“I swear.” I hold her stare and wait for the next question, for it to be the one I can’t answer, the one that blows us clear out of the water. “I’m not good at this.”

“Understatement of the year.” She puffs out a laugh, her lips curving up for the first time this morning.

“I don’t work like you, Kenzi. You move at a million miles a minute, always planning, always questioning. It’s one of the things I love most about you.”

“Just not when it comes to you.”

My chest lifts with my sigh, and I drag my hand over my mouth.“Just not when it comes to me.”

“I get it, I do. I’ll back off. Last night I…”

“I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”

She chews on the side of her lip and her gaze moves back to my scarred arm. “You shouldn’t have.” Her sigh is long and, I really hope I’m making this up,resignedbefore she blasts me with a smile that’s too big, too brittle. “But I get it. I know this is hard for you—”

I’m kissing her before she can say anything else. One hand cupping her neck the other taking the glass from her and putting it back on the table.

“Mylo, it’s your first day at the Surf Shack—”

“Fuck my first day.”

“Mylo,” she laughs against my lips, but I can still feel the tension in her, the distance. “We’ve got to—”

“No.” I kiss her again, harder, my hands dropping to her waist, desperation to keep her here, to show her it’s okay, thatwe’reokay making me selfish, determined, fuckingneedy.

Her hands slide around my neck and finally,finallyshe kisses me back and the distance I put between us fades until I can almost kid myself into believing it’s gone.

Kenzi

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