“They say hard times define you, and I’ve found that to be true. Before Afghanistan, I believed what I believed. I now know that I wasn’t the man I believed myself to be. I’m someone else. Capable of different things. Good things, still, but different. I also know that if I don’t divorce Emily, she will stay tied to me for life. That’s her. And if she does that, she’ll never be happy. I cannot allow myself to rob her of her happiness, to live every day of my life knowing that I’m preventing her from fully living hers, that I’m responsible for her unhappiness.”
“These things about you that aren’t what you thought...what are you capable of now?”
“Duty, loyalty and protection. Those are the things that have always been there.”
“All good husbandly character traits.”
The woman couldn’t force him to stay married. Even admirals divorced now and then. He wasn’t going to engage further on the subject.
“So, Petty Officer Hannigan...tell me what your version of the future with you and Emily and your baby looks like.”
In the first place, it was Emily’s baby. He didn’t choose it. The man who’d made the choice to have a child with her had died in the desert.
The child...biologically was his. He’d take full responsibility for that.
That wasn’t what she’d asked. And the brunette barracuda would sit there and stare at him for the last half of their hour, without a word, if he didn’t answer her question.
He knew this from experience. One he preferred not to repeat.
The future. Other than Emily apart from him and happy, and him in the naval police, being financially responsible for the child, he hadn’t given it a lot of thought.
She was asking beyond his end goal.
He glanced at the clock. Twenty-nine minutes left on his hour.
Then twenty-five. Twenty.
“I hope we’ll be on friendly terms,” he nearly blurted. So unlike him, that awkward delivery. “I’m supposing we’ll be in cont
act regarding the child. Frequent contact. I’d prefer that to be between the two of us, and I’d think she would like that, too. So, yeah, friendly. Easy. Pick up the phone and call without having to think about it. Or worrying that there’d be tension on the other end.”
“And this friendliness...would that only encompass the child? Or could she call you if, say, she had a bad day at work and just needed to tell someone who’d understand?”
“Of course she could. She’d know that.”
“What about if there was a death in her family? Could she call you then?”
Was the woman deliberately trying to get his goat?
“She could call me any time she damn well pleases, day or night, about anything she wants to talk about,” he said, to make his meaning clear and end the ludicrous line of questioning.
Adamson nodded, her chin pursed in that way that set him on edge. Like Mrs. Kelly, the English teacher he and Emily had had in tenth grade. The thought had him wishing for a second that Emily was there, seeing what he was seeing, because she’d look at him and they’d both laugh.
Except that if he was still the guy who laughed with Emily, he wouldn’t be here with Adamson.
“Why haven’t you told Emily about the woman in the desert?”
“Because it would hurt her needlessly. She can see enough change in me to end the marriage without bringing that into it. I already feel her pulling away. Where’s the harm in letting her go of her own accord, because it’s what she wants, without forever bludgeoning her belief in love everlasting? Let her blame it on war and leave the rest out of it.”
“You’re sure you aren’t holding back so she won’t hate you?”
“I am absolutely positive about that one. I do not want to hurt her unnecessarily, and that’s the only reason I’m not telling her.”
Adamson glanced out the window, then back at him and stood. “I think we’re done here for the day.” They still had eleven minutes. “You’re a good man, Petty Officer Hannigan.”
Winston had no idea what to make of that.
Chapter Sixteen