He looked down at his knife, shamefaced.
“I could have worn my damn denim jacket for a few days! I could probably have taken off the splint long enough to get my hand through! I could have bought another jacket to use for a while! I could have done all kinds of things that it was my choice to do or not do, but you’re the damn man, so obviously you got to ride right over me!”
Like he’d ridden over her life, damn him. And wouldn’t even admit he’d done it.
“Damn it.” All that stubborn will had folded into remorse. “I’ll buy you another one.”
Oh, yeah, like she could just open up another restaurant in Texas or Washington? Since he’d smeared Au-dessus for some freaking operation he wouldn’t admit to?
“What, do you think just any leather jacket will do? That you could find in a store in July? Do you think the problem is that I can’t afford to buy my own damn clothes?”
“No,” Chase said, big shoulders sagging. “I’m sorry.”
“I hate you,” Vi said. “And you’re not driving my motorcycle, and you can get the hell out of my apartment. I don’t ever want to see you again.”
***
Riding the Métro to the hotel was miserable. All of her strength and belief in herself got crushed down there, until she was reduced to one of the masses that crowded into the cars, no better or more special than any of the other eleven million people in the city. Some guy sang songs behind her about her butt, and she couldn’t even hit him, because she needed to have at least one functioning hand for the rest of the day.
It was horrible to face her meeting with the owners feeling so small. A knot swelled in her throat like it was absorbing too much water, all those tears she couldn’t possibly let herself shed again. Not here. Not now.
She fought down the sting in her nose and at the backs of her eyes. She swallowed down the knot.
She took a hard breath.
And then she lifted her head and just faked it—overdoing the aggression, overdoing the performance of confidence, overdoing everything. But at least doing it, as she made herself stride in.
And down the street, hiding in a doorway, Chase’s heart squeezed tight and he kicked the wall because he couldn’t actually figure out how to kick himself.
Chapter 13
“Yeah, you screwed up.” Jake flexed his shoulders, balancing upright on a narrow chimney, gazing at the rooftops of Paris. The sun was angling down in the afternoon, and it was actually a pretty nice day. Maybe Paris in July wasn’t always rainy and cold?
“Fuck, yeah.” Ian hauled himself through the skylight and found a balancing point on the narrow point of the roof, also pausing to take in the view. Elias was out ahead of them, moving like a black panther across the rooftops. A little light urban jungle training, since they still had no word to move on Al-Mofti.
“I know,” Chase said. “I know. I can’t believe I fucking did that. What the hell?”
“I would have kicked your ass so bad.” Jake shook his head, vicariously pissed off already. “If you’d ruined my gear like that.”
“I know.” Chase winced into himself. “Fuck.”
“I mean, seriously.” Jake grabbed the clay chimney tops, vaulted over them, and ran along the ridge of the roof to leap without pause across a narrow gap to the next one. He glanced back. “Seriously kicked it.”
“I know!!” Chase leaped after him, slid down the zinc slope of the roof, landed on a flat rooftop below, rolled and came to his feet. A couple of pigeons scattered. Ian dropped beside him. In the distance, they could see the Eiffel Tower and Notre-Dame. Behind them the Sacré-Coeur. The sounds of the city echoed up from the street, the noise of cars amplified by the particular acoustics of the straight buildings.
“And right when she needed it,” Chase said, low. “When she was facing the worst day of her life. I wish we didn’t have to delay the ‘test results’ for the salmonella so long.” Yeah, if they could just catch that bastard Al-Mofti, all kinds of things about the world would be better.
“That’s the worst day of her life?” Jake’s freckled nose crinkled. “Having to deal with getting blamed for some bad eggs or something?"
“She’s a civilian,” Chase reminded him. “Their lives are different.”
“Yeah,” Ian muttered, heartfelt.
“Plus, it’s her rep,” Chase said. “It’s like she lost a weapon or…I don’t know, was a coward or something. It’s bad. It’ll follow her for all her career. It could even end her career.” A pit opened in his stomach even saying it. Because she clearly loved her career.
What if he had fallen that time he was hanging upside down and slipping in BUD/S and broken his arm? He would have been out, his whole life derailed, and he would never have become who he was.
Knowing what was at stake, he’d been able to draw on one last desperate burst of strength to make it over the top.