When he hooked a finger under my chin to lift my gaze to his, my eyes widened. Definitely gulped this time.
He had some silver in his scruff. Beautiful laugh lines around his mouth. Crap.
“I make you uncomfortable,” he murmured. Bastard. A smirk tugged at the corners of his mouth. “There’s a streak of defiance buried somewhere, though. I can see it.”
I scowled, embarrassed and flustered, and moved away. The stairs were the inevitable next route, so I began heading up. All while cursing a fighter pilot to the fiery pits of hell. I remembered Cameron telling me Colt was a Sadist, and that was becoming abundantly clear.
“One more thing,” he said, following me. “I assume you know you don’t have to call Luke and me Sir.”
“Don’t take it personally,” I blurted out irritably. “I call a lot of people Sir.”
He laughed. “There might even be a brat in you.”
He frustrated me so much!
Gritting my teeth, I reached the landing and didn’t even bother pointing out the rooms on this floor. I had a feeling he didn’t give a crap. I took the next set of stairs instead and didn’t stop until I was outside my bedroom.
I opened the door, revealing a tidy room in blue and white. Rosa had made the bed and removed the bowl of grapes I’d had on my desk.
“Okay, now you’ve seen my room,” I said. “Would you like to see the basement?” I figured that was as far away as one could get from my rooms.
“Hold your horses.” Colt entered the room, looking around with a pensive expression.
I scratched my arm absently and waited. He studied my school pictures on the wall, then looked over at the shelves above my desk. I saw his eyes narrow at the one model plane I had on display on the top shelf. A beautiful F-15 fighter jet I’d spent two weeks painting to perfection. It wasn’t often I was so satisfied with a project.
“You built that?” He nodded at the plane and walked closer to my desk.
I bit my tongue and made a conscious choice to refrain from calling him Sir. “Yes.”
It was difficult not to fidget when he merely stood there and stared at the plane, hands clasped behind his back. His posture screamed of his profession. I’d never met anyone from the armed forces who didn’t stand in a certain way. Feet aligned with their shoulders, back straight. Definitely no fidgeting.
Growing up, I suffered through a lot of banquets and functions with my parents. I hated those. What I loved were the private dinners they’d hosted at our house. Majors and generals and other military personnel had sat at our table, and I’d always struggled to stop staring. They oozed composure and discipline, two things I’d craved since I was little.
There was a calm to them as well. A straightforwardness. A “what you see is what you get” kind of feeling, with a big side of “but I’m also trained to end you.”
“You use an airbrush, I take it?” Colt inquired.
I nodded once.
So did he. “A buddy of mine… His kid brother did this—model craft or whatever. His room was its own war zone—shit everywhere. Paint, brushes, stacks of these things boxed up, glass displays.” He slid his gaze my way and smiled. “Somethin’s missin’ from your room, Kit.”
Crap.
I jutted my chin and steeled myself to—
“Show me, boy,” he stated. “I tend to get what I want.”
Arrogant freaking—gah. I was not confident enough to duel him. I could picture it, him in his F-16 and me with a squirt gun.
I deflated with a sigh and gestured down the hallway.
He followed me once more, and then I was opening the door to my hobby haven.
Shelves upon shelves with planes, tanks, submarines, helicopters, my stash of models that were still in their boxes, paint jars, and all sorts of supplies. There was no furniture in here except for a desk that stretched from one end of a wall to the other. That way, I could have more than one station, more than one ongoing project.
“Now we’re talking,” Colt murmured, looking around. He stopped at the shelves where I kept my books. There was at least one for every model I’d built. “This is how you learn… Interesting.”
“Pardon?”
“You learn by doing.” He turned back to me. “I’m the same way. The information doesn’t stick if all I get is text.”
Oh. I hadn’t thought of it that way. He was right, though. I loved learning about the vehicles and aircraft armed forces around the world used and produced, but I needed to see them for myself. It was where the models played a part.
It was also the best distraction when one didn’t have a life.
I winced at my own bitterness. I actually loved building model planes for several reasons, one being that I found it soothing. It was a wonderful hobby for me, and I was grateful for the people I’d met online who were into the same thing.