Page 46 of Keeping Knight

She nods. “Jester because he used to play pranks on people.”

“Yes. So, sometimes the nicknames would come from stuff like that. Little quirks people had. It might be something about their appearance. It might even be ironic. Like Grump wasn’t grumpy at all. He was really cheerful, actually. Like overwhelmingly cheery. So the guys jokingly called him Grump.”

“Grump? Was he on your team, too?”

“He was. It was me, Rogue, Jester, Houdini, Wraith, and Grump. On our Delta team, I mean. Wraith left a couple of years before we did to join the CIA. Then Grump joined. When Rogue decided to separate from the Army to start Fox & Falcon, he asked all of us if we wanted to join. Me, Jester, Houdini, and Wraith said yes. We were all ready for a change. But Grump was younger. He wasn’t ready to leave yet.”

“So he’s still in the Army?” Ruby asks.

“He is. Still kicking ass and taking names. But he knows he has an open invitation to join F&F whenever he wants.”

Ruby nods thoughtfully. “So, Knight. Was it because you were always being a gentleman?”

I let out a dry laugh. “Not quite. The guys who originally gave me the nickname didn’t do it to be nice. It was their way of reminding me I wasn’t like them.”

Her forehead wrinkles in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“As I’m sure you’ve guessed, my family has money. My dad founded Sutton Aeronautics. They have contracts with the US government and private corporations all over the world. So he’s done well for himself.”

“Okay?”

I hesitate, trying to think of the best way to explain without making myself sound like an ungrateful ass. But there isn’t a good way to do it, so I just jump straight into the unvarnished truth. “When I was young, I was resentful of my family’s money. It sounds ungrateful. I know it does. But I didn’t like the way people treated me. I didn’t like the way the kids acted at my private school. I grew up in Bethesda, and I got into playing club ball—baseball, that is—with a bunch of local kids. Kids who went to public school and thought private school kids were a bunch of snobs.”

Ruby rests her hand on mine. “That doesn’t sound ungrateful. It sounds like you were a kid, and you wanted to fit in with your friends.”

“In hindsight, yes. And really, I don’t think they were wrong about the kids at my school being snobs. When my classmates found out I wanted to enlist, they made fun of me. They said I was stupid for throwing my life away like that when I could just work for my dad. They looked down at the guys I played ball with and called them losers, too.”

“That’s stupid,” she says fiercely. “Enlisting isn’t throwing your life away. It’s brave. Honorable.”

“I know that now,” I agree. “But as a stubborn teenager, I just got pissed instead. And I rebelled against my parents for a while. Told them I didn’t want to have anything to do with their money or the company.” I chuckle. “Clearly, I changed my mind. Or I wouldn’t have this condo. It was my parents’ originally. They’d had a thought of moving to Manhattan but didn’t like the cold weather. So it was just sitting, and when I moved here to join F&F… It probably makes me sound like a hypocrite.”

“It doesn’t.” Ruby squeezes my hand. “My dad bought me my apartment after college. It’s not as big as this place, but still. I’m in no position to throw stones. And if your parents are anything like mine were, I bet it made them feel good, being able to help you like that.”

“Probably,” I agree. “But anyway. To make a long story short, when I was eighteen, I didn’t like talking about how much money I had. Or my parents had. I just wanted to be one of the guys. I wanted to make my own way instead of relying on my dad’s success.”

“That makes sense,” she replies.

“But one of the guys in Basic found out about my family. He was kind of an asshole, so as soon as he discovered it made me uncomfortable, he started messing with me. Talking about how I could buy my own army, how I couldn’t know what hard work meant because everything had been given to me. Shit like that.”

Ruby scowls. “What a jerk.”

I shrug. “It happens. But then he found out that my dad had been knighted.”

“Knighted?”

“By the British royal family. My dad was born in London, but moved to the US for college. He has a branch of the company over there. So they knighted him for his contributions to the country.”

“Micah, that’s cool. Why would someone make fun⁠—”

“Because the guy was a jerk,” I remind her. “And it was another way of pointing out how different I was from everyone else. But that was a long time ago. I don’t care anymore. And my friends don’t use the nickname to be jerks. It’s just how they know me.”

Ruby goes quiet. Her brow pulls into a little scowl. Then she huffs. “Well, that guy was a jerk. But your nickname? I think it’s perfect. Not because of your dad. Or his money.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. Because—” She kisses my cheek. “You are like a knight. A real one. Knights back in medieval times were heroes. They were courageous. They were chivalrous. All those things? They describe you.”

My heart thuds hard. “Ruby.”