Page 31 of Shadow Strike
He crossed the room and opened the door.Regan stood in the hallway in an oversized t-shirt and pajama pants, her hair loose, her feet bare on the carpet.
She lifted her chin.“I can’t sleep,” she said.
Did he dare wonder why?“Me, either.”
A beat.
“Can I ask you something?”
He stepped back from the door.
She came in and sat in the chair by the window.He returned to the edge of the bed.The room was dark except for the ambient light from outside, enough to see by, not enough to feel exposed.
“Do you regret it?”she asked.
“Kissing you?”
Her lips twitched.“Leaving.The gang, the life.”A pause.“Your father.”
He dragged his attention away from those lips he wanted to taste again and turned the question over in his mind.It was one he’d asked himself plenty of times in the past ten years.
He was silent long enough that she shifted in the chair.“Sorry.That’s too personal.I don’t know why I?—”
He held up a hand.“It’s okay.I regret that I couldn’t leave in a way that didn’t put up walls between my father and me.”
She eased back in the chair, her face lit with curiosity.“I assume he didn’t take it well.”
“He didn’t.Our relationship has never been the same.After Mom died, it got worse.But,” he said, “the Army was the right call.It liberated me from the gang.Unfortunately, it estranged me from my dad, but I stand by what I did.The Army, becoming a Ranger…” He smiled.“It was an incredible part of my life.I don’t regret any of it.”
“I bet you were good at it, too.Why did you leave?”
“Iwasgood at it.”He rested his elbows on his knees, recalling his favorite moments.Getting through RASP, the brotherhood he had with his teammates, the special reconnaissance missions he’d excelled at.“I left because of Dad’s stroke.”
She gave a slow nod.He sensed the journalist in her wanted to know more about that, but he wasn’t sure if he could talk about it with her.
“Shadow Point is the right call, too,” he said.“The work I do matters to me, and just like being a Ranger, I’m good at it.”
“I can see that.”She picked at threat on the hem of her shirt.“What was your mom like?Was she a handful like mine?”
Her wry smile was good to see.“My mom made the best apple pie you ever tasted.A country girl, through and through, she gardened, canned, and cooked constantly.”He missed her every damn day.“She believed in me, and I let her down.”
“How?”
“She died while I was deployed,” he said.Flat.Factual.The only way he knew how to say it.“We were on an assignment across enemy lines.Deep cover.A hostage extraction.My unit was unreachable for weeks.No communication in or out.It was standard protocol for the operation.”He stopped, his chest tight.Started again.“When we got back to base, my CO pulled me aside.Mom had died suddenly while I was in the field, and by the time I found out, she’d already been buried.”
Regan made a small sound, sat forward.“Clive, I’m so sorry.”
He stared at his hands, trained to handle weapons, fix vehicles, provide medical care in the field, and yet, incapable of saving the one person he’d loved more than anything.“I came home on emergency leave.Dad had already had his stroke—the doctors thought it was the grief, the shock of it.He was alive but diminished, and he needed someone to look after him.”CB laced his fingers together.Unlaced them.“I put in for early separation.Came back to take care of him.”
“And found Ryder heading up the Outlaws.”
His hands fisted.“He was running the Outlaws, running the house, sitting in the kitchen like he’d always been there.My dad calls himson.Not in a general way.In a—” He stopped.
“Like he said it to you.”
The night pressed in around him.The anger he hadn’t quite acknowledged dug in under his ribs.That feeling of betrayal sat bitter on his lips.“Yeah.”
“Were you and Ryder close growing up?”
