The Men In Uniform Collection. Barbara McMahon

      ‘But I can’t stay if that happens.’ The fracture in her voice echoed the one in her heart and salty tears seeped into her throat through the microscopic fissures. ‘I have to think about Leighton. He’s all I’ve got.’ He could take whatever risks he wanted to with his business but she was not risking her son.

      Clint’s eyes fluttered shut. He nodded, his voice thick. ‘You should go. Take him far away from here. From me.’

      She just nodded. Unable to speak a word for the rigidness in her throat. Knowing what was coming. And what she had to tell him.

       Don’t ask…don’t ask…

      He lifted tortured eyes and an invisible sword suspended perilously, aimed at her chest. ‘I know what this will mean to you so I wouldn’t ask lightly. He’s my little brother, Romy. My Leighton.’ He took her icy hands in his. ‘So I am asking. Will you trust me to deal with this in my own way? Will you let it go?’

       For me.

      If she said yes she would have to take Leighton away from WildSprings. And if she said no Clint would never forgive her. Her breath shuddered. The Colonel’s cruel laughter filled her brain, tight and hysterical.

      Either way she was going to lose Clint.

      Nausea washed through her in thick waves. As it happened, it was entirely irrelevant. She clenched the timber balustrade behind her for courage. Then she took a breath and fell forwards onto the invisible sword.

      ‘I’ve already emailed Customs.’

      Clint closed his eyes. Dropped his head as though he couldn’t tolerate its weight a second longer. As though he’d expected her betrayal. ‘Of course you have.’

      Panic started to flare deep in her chest. Her voice cracked. ‘I had to do what was right—’

      ‘I know.’

      His quiet words ended it all. Awful, irreparable stillness fell between them. What else could she say? What else could she expect? They were brothers. And betraying the one that meant nothing to her had betrayed the one that meant everything.

      Her voice, when she finally spoke, was deadened with pain she hoped he couldn’t hear. ‘What do you want me to do?’ she whispered.

      The night crickets swelled in volume. His dead eyes lifted to lock on hers…and her heart broke.

      ‘You should still go.’

      Romy’s chest felt as hollow and ancient as the caverns Clint liked to explore. As though everything in it had been suspended in time, waiting for the right man to shine his light and reveal its wonders. As short as it had lasted, it had felt spectacular.

      Stupid of her not to have considered what would happen when he climbed on through and out of the cavern.

      She swallowed the ache, let it scab over into numbness. ‘You still want me to leave?’

      He shook his head from side to side slowly, sadly. ‘Yes.’

      Her voice thickened with unrealised tears. ‘Because I exposed your brother?’

      ‘Because you had to.’ He lifted gleaming green pools and met her pain head-on. ‘I don’t want to put you in that position, Romy. Having to choose between me or your values. I’ve been in that position and I knew what it does to you, long-term.’

      Her stomach clenched.

      ‘I can’t guarantee we won’t be in this position again. My life’s pivotal moments are framed by bad decisions.’ He spoke more to the night than to her. ‘Justin’s near-drowning. Not stopping the LT from killing that kid. Dogging on him to Command. Letting my dad leave, alone…’

      ‘You have a flaming star on your wall, Clint.’

      He turned hard eyes on her. ‘Do you have any idea what I got that for?’

      Romy took in the ugly way he held his body. Like it no longer fit him.

      ‘I was shot three times just as my unit was bugging out of a village hot zone. I tied myself to the front of the Humvee and I just kept firing as we reversed at high speed back into the desert.’

      ‘What’s unworthy about that? It sounds extraordinary.’

      ‘I strapped myself in with the rifle straps of my dead buddies so I wouldn’t be left behind if I passed out. To die at the hands of—’ He lurched out of his seat and crossed the porch. ‘To die alone.’

      The numbness wasn’t working. Wasn’t doing its job. Pain for him leaked through and pooled deep in her chest. ‘That just makes you human, Clint.’

      He swung back to her. ‘I’m supposed to be superhuman, Romy. Protector of the realm. I’m supposed to look out for others, not myself. I failed Justin, I failed that kid in the desert and now I’m failing you.’

      ‘How?’

      ‘I have an opportunity to be there for Justin. To make up for what happened to him when I was too busy hitting on some teenagers to watch for his safety. To make up for the slow start he got on education and how behind he was when our mother dragged him halfway around the world. I owe him that.’

      Anxiety shook her voice. The stakes were just too high. ‘Justin’s made his own choices, Clint. As a child and as an adult. We all make choices and have to live with the outcome.’ She glanced inside as though her outcome would come trotting down the stairs any second.

      ‘He’s my little brother, Romy. And he’s in trouble. If it was Leighton wouldn’t you do everything in your power to help him? Regardless of what path he’d taken?’

      Leighton. The idea of her baby in trouble…

      She sighed, knowing that Clint had no more choice than she did about who he put first in his life. ‘Yes. I would.’ Then she remembered something. ‘But you told me yourself that part of every boy’s journey is to stand on his own feet. Make his own mistakes. That I can’t protect Leighton from everything.’

      ‘It’s not the same.’

      ‘Isn’t it?’ Gut-deep sorrow sapped her courage. ‘Maybe it’s time for Justin to grow up.’

      Hard as that would be for Clint to allow. Hard as that would be for her when it was Leighton’s turn. Clint was a classic example of what happens when you can’t let go. He was just too close to see it.

      His eyes darkened. He pushed himself to his feet. ‘I should go.’

      This was it. The last time she’d see him. Anxiety surged up like a flock of birds exploding to flight. ‘You’re going to warn Justin?’

      ‘I have to, Romy. Please understand.’

      ‘I meant what I said, Clint. I can’t keep Leighton here, near danger.’

      He swallowed hard. ‘I meant what I said, too.’

      Talons tore through her. ‘That I should go.’

      ‘That you both should. Go somewhere that you can be happy. Where my darkness won’t engulf you.’

      Romy had lost too much in her life to let this break her. She stiffened her back, faced him and spoke between strangled breaths. ‘You love Justin that much?’

      Clint turned tortured eyes back to her.

      She pushed. ‘Enough that letting us go is easier than letting him go?’

      Neither one of them pretended there wasn’t something between them. ‘It has to be. It’s not about me.’

      ‘What if he’s not worth it?’

      ‘He’s my brother.’

      And there it was. She’d been in his life mere weeks. What chance did she have against the boy Clint had spent a lifetime trying to atone for. Against family.