He nodded. The shadows playing across his face in a way she could not look away from. “After the war, he kind of…” Jacob had this one kind of nervous tic, He’d bob his head while he was thinking about something. Just a quick nod, like he was snapping his thoughts back together. Into place. “He was lost. And he was hurting. They didn’t talk about PTSD, but he suffered from it. And he drank to try and make his head right and it only made things worse.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Me too,” he said. “Mostly for my mom. But after Iraq and then Afghanistan and then…all the other places I can’t talk about.” Again that sharp nod. The quick snap of his thoughts. Putting everything back in place. “Well, I was scared of not being at war. Of not being a marine. Of turning into my dad.”

“I don’t think you’re like your dad.”

“I’m not,” he said. “I’m not because I made sure I wasn’t like my dad. I created these rules about how I live my life. I did jobs I didn’t care about. I worked for people I didn’t care about. And I never cared about someone who I would end up hurting.”

The blood stilled in her chest. In her brain. It pounded in her wrists. Between her legs.

“I really tried with you,” he said. “I tried not to care and I really tried to keep you from caring.”

“Kissing me and then leaving for three days?”

He nodded.

“Breaking into my apartment and teaching me how to fight?”

“I just wanted you to be safe when I wasn’t around.”

“Because you never meant to be around.”

“I didn’t know how to be around,” he said. But then he stepped forward on the rug. “I couldn’t have you and have my rules.”

Downstairs Little Drummer Boy was coming to an end. Jacob was a living version of that song. Reduced to the way he could keep people safe by killing other people. By being sharp and cold and staying as far from love as he could.

She was suddenly breathless. Weak. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying you are more powerful than my rules. You are stronger than my will. The way I feel about you is more real to me than anything I’ve ever known. And I only want what you want.”

“What I want?”

His eyebrows furrowed. “Did I fuck you into a parrot.”

Her jaw fell open and a laugh exploded out of her. Breathless and unbelieving. “Are you…making a joke?”

He lifted his arms from his side and she saw right into him. Past all his strength and distance and rules. Past everything he used to keep himself safe. He let her see everything. All the way into him.