“Sometimes it’s easier than you think. If someone threatened you, your immediate family, your blooded kin? You’d be surprised what you can do in that moment. Civilians can turn into soldiers pretty damn quick in those circumstances.”
“You definitely see things like a military man,” she murmured.
“Always. And I will defend me and mine against all comers. It doesn’t matter who they are or how otherwise virtuous they may be. If you are a danger to me? To my brothers? To those I serve? You will submit to me. I will take the payment for your indiscretion out of your flesh. And when I am finished? I will never think of you again—not because I am troubled by what I have done, but because you do not matter to me and neither does your death.”
A cold fear curled in Jo’s chest. “I cannot fathom those deductions. That conclusion. I mean, a life is a life.”
“Then you haven’t looked into the eyes of someone who is going to kill you solely because you are not like them. Because you do not believe the same things they do. Because you are living a different kind of life. Wartime is not the same as peacetime.”
Jo shook her head. “Anyway, so you said your cousin got you into the military? What branch? Or was it, like, Special Forces?”
“Yes, something like covert ops. We fought for . . . years over in the Old Country. Then the focus of the conflict changed course and I came to America with the leader of my squadron. After some . . . reorientation . . . we fell in line with the powerful male I work for the now. And that brings us up to date.”
Jo thought of the flash of attraction she had felt when she had seen him in all that leather, with all those weapons on his body. He had seemed so thrilling and mysterious. Now, she confronted the reality of what the guns and knives were used for. What they did. What his body had done to other bodies.
“What would you be doing with your life if the war hadn’t happened?”
There was a pause. “I would have been a farmer.” He shifted in his seat. “I would have liked to have a plot of land I could cultivate. Some animals to care for—horses to ride, cows to graze and milk. I would have liked . . . to be one with the earth.”
As Syn seemed to become steeped in sorrow, he lifted his palms and stared down at them, and she imagined he was picturing his hands in good topsoil, or traveling down the flank of a healthy horse, or cradling a newborn calf.
“A farmer,” she said softly.
“Aye.” He put his palms down on his thighs. “But that is not how things went.”
They were silent for a while. Then she felt compelled to say, “I believe you. Everything you said, I believe.”
He leaned to the side and rooted around inside his leather jacket. Taking out a slim wallet, he presented her with a laminated card.
“Here’s my driver’s license.” When she shook her head, he put it up in front of her. “No, let’s do it all. That’s who I am, but the address is an old flophouse where I stayed with my brothers.”
She glanced at what he held out. The name listed was Sylvester Neste. And the street was like “Maple Court,” or something equally all-American.
He took the license back. “As I said, I’m living with the male—man, I mean, and his family. I’ve got no wife, no kids, and never will. So you know everything about my current status.”
Jo opened her mouth to say something, but he cut her off. “And here’s my telephone number.”
He recited seven digits. Twice. “You want me to write it down for you? There’s a pen right here.”
Taking her Bic out of the drink cup holder, he bent down and fished around the Slim Jim wrappers at his feet. Wrote his number on the back of a Hershey’s wrapper. Tucked the number into the drink cup holder and put the pen back where it had been.
“Any questions for me?” he said evenly as he tucked his wallet away.
Jo looked over at him. “I’m not going to pretend to be comfortable with some of the things you stated. But it’s . . . they’re the reason I think you’re being honest, though.”