Chương 1
""The empty coffee cup struck the center of my chest hard enough to slosh the last cold mouthful across my hand.
“Refill that,” Chase Maddox said, smiling as if twelve people were waiting for the punch line.
He tipped his chin toward the kitchen and added, “It’s probably the closest you’ve ever come to serving in the Navy.”
The room went quiet in a way family rooms rarely do, with forks suspended, ice settling in glasses, and somebody’s chair giving one small wooden creak.
I looked down at the brown streak running between my fingers.
Across the Thanksgiving table, my husband Evan met my eyes.
His expression was familiar.
Please don’t make this worse.
He had worn that expression at Christmas when Chase asked whether I alphabetized officers by rank.
He had worn it at Graham Maddox’s retirement anniversary when his aunt introduced me as “Lauren, the Navy secretary.”
He had worn it at a barbecue when Chase explained carrier operations to me using facts he had learned from a documentary.
For two years, I had let those moments pass because correcting people who enjoyed being wrong was exhausting.
My work did not need defending at a dining table.
Tonight, however, Chase had moved from ignorant to physical.
I set the cup beside his plate.
“Get it yourself.”
His smile widened.
“Well, there she is.”
“Chase,” his mother, Diane, said quietly.
He ignored her.
“Come on, Lauren, don’t get sensitive.”
“I’m not sensitive.”
“You look sensitive.”
“I look like someone with coffee on her hand.”
A retired Marine seated near the end of the table coughed into his napkin, though I caught the flicker of amusement in his eyes.
Chase saw it too.
That embarrassed him.
People like Chase could tolerate cruelty better than embarrassment.
He leaned closer.
“What exactly do they have you doing these days?”
“Work.”
“That classified?”
“Some of it.”
He laughed.
“Administrative training isn’t classified.”
I reached for my napkin.
His fingers closed around my wrist.
It happened quickly enough that Diane gasped only after he had already tightened his grip.
Evan pushed back from the table.
“Chase, knock it off.”
I turned my wrist toward the opening between Chase’s thumb and fingers, stepped sideways, and redirected his arm.
There was no dramatic throw.
No punch.
No heroic movement.
Just leverage.
His balance broke.
His hip struck an empty chair, and the chair skidded backward into the sideboard.
A wineglass toppled.
Red spread across the white tablecloth and dripped steadily onto Graham’s polished floor.
Chase stared at me.
His face went red before the rest of him caught up.
“You put your hands on me?”
“You grabbed me.”
“You could’ve broken my arm.”
“I didn’t.”
“You tried.”
“No.”
Graham rose from the head of the table.
At seventy, he still had the posture of the Marine colonel he had once been, though his right shoulder had begun to sag slightly in the last year.
“That’s enough.”
Chase pointed at me.
“Tell her.”
Graham’s gaze shifted between us.
“I said enough.”
“She just attacked me.”
Diane closed her eyes.
“Oh, for God’s sake, Chase.”
He turned on her.
“You saw it.”
“I saw you grab her.”
“She embarrassed me.”
The retired Marine near the end of the table made a small sound that might have been a laugh and disguised it by drinking water.
Chase heard that too.
His anger sharpened.
He looked at Evan.
“You’re just sitting there?”
Evan rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“I told you to stop.”
“That’s your wife.”
“Yes.”
“She’s been lying to this family for two years.”
That landed differently.
Evan’s hand dropped.
I looked at Chase.
“What have I lied about?”
“What you do.”
“I’ve answered every time anyone asked.”
“You say training.”
“I work in training.”
“You say operations.”
“I work in operations.”
“You never say what kind.”
“Because most people hear that answer and understand it means I’m not discussing the details.”
Chase laughed again, but nobody joined him.
“You’re a desk officer, Lauren.”
I wiped the coffee from my hand.
“Believe whatever helps you sleep.”
“No.”
He stepped around the chair.
“Not anymore.”
Evan moved between us.
“Chase.”
“What?”
“Back off.”
It was the first time in two years I had heard my husband say those words to his brother without cushioning them with a joke.
Chase blinked.
Then he looked past Evan at me.
“Tell them what you actually do.”
I folded the stained napkin once.
“I’m Commander Lauren Maddox.”
Graham’s face changed slightly at the rank.
He knew I was an officer.
He had apparently never asked Evan how senior.
I continued.
“My current assignment involves advanced aviation training and operational planning.”
Chase made an impatient gesture.
“See?”
“Before that, I spent six years at Naval Air Station Fallon.”
The retired Marine at the end of the table stopped moving.
I noticed because everyone else was still shifting, breathing, looking from face to face.
He alone had gone perfectly still.
Chase did not notice.
“Doing paperwork?”
“No.”
I looked directly at him.
“Teaching advanced strike-fighter tactics.”
For half a second, nothing happened.
Then Chase barked out a laugh.
“You’re saying you taught TOPGUN?”
“I did.”
His laughter grew louder.
“You?”
“Yes.”
He looked around the table, inviting the others to share the joke.
Nobody did.
Graham stared at me.
Evan stared at the floor.
That bothered me more than Chase’s disbelief.
He had known.
He had always known.
He simply had not wanted the inconvenience of correcting his family.
Chase noticed the silence and mistook it for hesitation.
“Prove it.”
“I don’t have to.”
“That’s convenient.”
“It’s Thanksgiving, Chase.”
“You’ve let everybody think you’re some little office officer for years, and now suddenly you’re Maverick?”
“I have never called myself Maverick.”
The retired Marine finally smiled.
That one escaped him.
Chase’s jaw flexed.
“Show me something.”
“No.”
“Because you can’t.”
“Because my career is not a party trick.”
May you like
His eyes dropped to the leather folder hanging from the back of my chair.
It contained nothing classified.
