Page 40 of The Forgotten SEAL (The Real SEAL #1)

Ultimately, Carina is right. “I want you to know,” I reply. I pass her back her mug. She places her lips where mine just were. She looks at my eyes over the rim of the cup, knowing, taunting.

“Right before they said good night and hung up the call, his wife remembered to thank him for the flowers he sent her the day before. She was upset she didn’t mention it earlier in their conversation,” I say, recalling this memory that’s been buried for so long.

“At that point I thought about putting my headphones back on, but call it curiosity, I listened instead. She gushed about how beautiful they were and how special they made her feel. Henry was excited that she loved them. He told her he would be home before the roses died.”

I shake my head, and Carina looks out of the large, dark window. I have to finish.

“He promised her that they were the last flowers he’d have to send.

The next gift she’d get to unwrap was him.

Marie laughed. A true belly laugh so joyous I couldn’t even make fun of Henry for the lame joke.

” I smile when I remember how happy it made him to hear her laugh.

Carina wipes a tear from underneath the eye that isn’t wounded.

“Marie laughed so loudly she woke their baby. Henry cooed and told him how much he loved him, promised he would see him soon and rock him to sleep and tell him cool stories about how awesome his daddy was. Marie told him how much she loved him and then spoke a little more loudly to wish me a good night.”

“No,” Carina whispers.

I ignore her. “I told her goodbye, and he hung up the call.”

“Then the mortar hit?” she asks, eyes wide with horrified curiosity.

“No,” I say, giving her word back to her.

“He asked me about Megan. I told him she didn’t like flowers much because they died so quickly.

Flowers were best suited growing in the ground.

That’s what she always told me. He asked if I was happy.

I said I was. He told me the key to happiness was always being completely honest—that’s what makes a relationship work.

It made a lot of sense. Henry always made a lot of sense.

A young Buddha,” I say. My chest tightens.

“He sent Marie flowers because he promised to always remind her how much she meant to him. True to his word. Always.”

Carina is crying, wiping her eyes with the hem of her shirt. It does nothing for my willpower. Her taut stomach is visible.

Sucking in a breath, I close my eyes and focus on Henry’s words.

It feels like an oxymoron to be here right now telling his story and the reasons for my actions.

“He loved Megan, thought we were perfect together. He made me promise to make her happy, Carina. Because our careers would fade away and the only thing left will be the person sitting beside us. Wouldn’t we want to treat the one constant in our world with the utmost care and love?

Wouldn’t you honor your words given to the person who will stick by you through thick and thin?

You take the moral high road, always. In my career path, many men don’t take anything close to the high road with regard to their relationships.

They cheat and take what they want. Henry never did that to Marie.

He made me promise to never do that to Megan. ”

“Oh my god. Just stop, Smith. Stop. Please,” Carina whispers. Her sobs are so loud they’re moving her chest up and down. “I can’t take this.”

“You need to know why I made the decision I did.”

“I don’t. Not at this cost. This depressing, life-altering cost. It’s unbearable to know this.

Okay, go be with her. You don’t owe me anything.

I get it. I understand now. There was never any other woman for you.

It will always be Megan. Even if it’s not.

You made a promise to your best friend. You honor your word to a fault. To a deficit even.”

“Carina,” I say. She shakes her head. “I never expected to fall in love with you.”

She stands from the sofa in a brisk movement and paces to the window, her back to me. “Henry told you that before he knew your circumstances,” Carina whispers. “You honestly think if he were here right now he’d tell you the same thing?”

“I sat back in my bed, the top bunk, and closed my eyes. I’d loved Megan for so long that I wasn’t sure what it meant to do anything except that.

I would never cheat on her. I thought I was already on the moral high road with my engagement to my high school sweetheart.

Watching him with Marie made me question things.

To the point where my promises to Henry made me feel like an impostor in my own skin. ”

Carina turns from the window but stays silent, her eyes rimmed with red and the hem of her shirt soaked with tears.

I go on. “It was because we had the big mission the next day. I’m sure of it now.

He had no idea what was going to happen in mere seconds.

He was putting his ducks in a row just in case.

Henry asked me to always be an honorable man regardless of circumstance.

He used those words, Carina. I never thought much of it because I remembered him saying that after my accident, but it was before I remembered Megan. ”

Carina wilts. She sits on the floor, on her knees. She can’t bear my words any more than they sear me leaving my mouth. “He doesn’t even know me,” Carina whispers.

“He doesn’t,” I say, holding my hands out to the side and then clasping them over my knees. A clock ticks somewhere in the background, and Poppet approaches Carina on the floor, nudging her head into her hand. “And it’s criminal he doesn’t.”

“I love you so much,” she says. “I always will.”

“I agreed and told him to mind his own business. I was joking, of course, and then the mortar careened into the housing trailer,” I say.

I lay my head down on my knees. “It was the last thing he said to me. He was my best friend.” Cruel reality seeps in and makes everything inside my body ache.

It’s wave after wave of grief and regret. “I promised him.”

“You should go,” Carina says. I hear her quiet footsteps as she crosses to me. I hear her stop the tape recorder. She places a hand on my shoulder. “Promise me something,” she says. This gets my attention. I chance a look up to find her pain-seared face grimacing.

“Anything,” I reply.

She sniffles. She closes her eyes as tears fall gratuitously down her face.

“Be happy with her. Truly happy. That’s what he wanted.

It wasn’t about honor or morals, Smith. It was about your happiness.

Her happiness. I don’t even know him, but I could gather that much from your story. Promise me you’ll be happy with her.”

I want to tell her that I could never be as happy with Megan as I could with her, but I don’t.

It seems a moot point in this time and place.

It wasn’t a favorite promise, it was about honoring my first promise.

My engagement to the woman who first stole my heart.

Not the one who holds it now and probably will for the rest of time. “I promise,” I lie.

“As the author of the book about your life, thank you for that. As your former girlfriend, I can’t look at your face anymore. We’ll be in touch.” She walks to the door and opens it as wide as it will go. Carina still has an ice pack in her hand, and she presses it to the side of her face.

I leave without another word, my hollow promise lingering in the air like a rotting body.