were in the hospital, Gio. You have a service dog because of your condition. Things aren’t the same as they’ve always been.”
“I know that,” Gio muttered, picking at some invisible lint on his pants.
“Weren’t you the one who said you were going to slow down?” Colton asked. “Weren’t you also the one who promised to take better care of himself?”
Gio frowned but didn’t reply. That was pretty much what Sacha had asked him.
Colton folded his arms over his chest. “So what you’re saying is, you planned to keep going, working yourself to death, expecting Joker to just stand by and watch as someone he clearly cares a lot about ends up in a hospital or worse.”
Gio opened his mouth, then closed it, his best friend’s words taking hold of something inside him. If the roles were reversed, would Gio have stood by while Sacha needlessly put himself in danger, risking his health and his life?
“He came to me for advice, you know,” Ace said.
Gio met Ace’s gaze, his heart skipping a beat. “He did?”
“Yeah. He wanted to ask me how I did it. How I navigated Colton’s world. Why do you think he wanted to know that? My guess is he thought you wanted him to be for you what I am for Colton.”
“I never asked him to be that. I don’t need him to be that for me. In fact, he distracts me when he’s there because I’d rather be with him than working.”
“Did you tell him that?” Colton asked.
Gio stared at him. “No.” He’d never asked Sacha to be anything he wasn’t, and he never would.
With a heavy sigh, Ace motioned to Cookie. “Gio, the guy got you a dog. Not just any dog, a service dog trained for your condition. None of us got a dog from him. I didn’t get a dog. Red didn’t get a dog. Shit, not even Jack got a dog. Do you have any idea what that means? For him to share that part of himself with you after what happened with Echo?”
The name was familiar. “Echo. That was his dog back in Special Forces, right?”
“Yep. Echo was his best girl. When she wasn’t strapped to him or he wasn’t carrying her on his shoulders, she was at his feet. She was his pillow, his confidant, his best friend. Facing the shit we faced, having each other made all the difference, but having that dog…” Ace shook his head. “She didn’t just keep us safe; she kept us sane.”
“What happened to her? Sacha doesn’t talk about her.”
“When we were ambushed and half our unit was killed, Echo…” Ace swallowed hard and blinked back the wetness in his eyes. “They never found the body. To this day, Joker’s haunted by the fact he couldn’t bring her body back home, but the most heartbreaking part? That’s the narrative he’s chosen to believe because the truth is too painful for him to accept.”
“What truth?”
Ace met his gaze, his eyes glassy. “She took the brunt of the explosion. There wasn’t enough of her to bring back.”
“Jesus.” Gio put a hand to his chest over his heart and rubbed the spot, tears welling in his eyes. He couldn’t begin to imagine the pain Sacha must have felt. Losing his brothers-in-arms and Echo.
“Yeah. It took him a long time to heal, and when he was ready, Chip helped with the rest. So you see, him gifting you Cookie, someone to love you, look after you, and enrich your life… That right there is Sacha Wilder proclaiming his love to you, and let me tell you, that guy has never, ever given such a gift to anyone in his life.”
Gio closed his eyes and let his head drop into his hands. “I fucked up.”
“I think you both did. Do you know why Colton and I work? Because we don’t assume, we talk. I don’t pretend to know what he’s thinking. If I’m not sure, I ask. He does the same. Do we still have arguments? Of course. But it doesn’t break us. Are we different? Fuck yeah, but like I said, we talk, work through things.” He took Colton’s hand in his, adoration in his eyes as he gazed at his husband. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him.”
“Thank you,” Gio told his friends. He didn’t know what he would have done without them. “You’re right.” He picked up his phone.
“What are you going to do?” Colton asked, getting up.
“Talk to him,” Gio replied, sending Sacha a text. He