Tawny Weber - Call To Engage

“And this has nothing to do with the heap of crap chickenshit gossips are trying to pile on you?”

Had he thought that wouldn’t get back to Savino? Elijah almost smiled. “Someone wants to take down Poseidon,” he said, sidestepping. “They’re using the convenience of gossip to accelerate that mission.”

“That doesn’t answer my question. Do you believe that anyone on the team doesn’t trust you? Do you believe anyone thinks you’re dirty?”

Yeah. He did believe that. “I believe there are some that might have questions,” he said carefully instead. “Since our job is not to follow blindly but to think outside the box, I don’t blame them for wondering.”

Savino frowned, but simply folded his hands on his desk instead of saying anything.

“At the very least, they’ve got to wonder why I hadn’t seen anything. Why I didn’t realize that Ramsey was dirty, that he was a psychotic traitor with a taste for greed and a hard-on to take down Poseidon.” Elijah rubbed his hand over his face, feeling stained, as if he’d never be clean. “I served with him and Adams. I partied with them. I roomed with them for eight fucking months. How could I miss something that ugly?”

“By that train of thought, you’d think I should have realized it, too,” Savino countered quietly, looking tired. “I served with Ramsey myself. I trained him, commanded him. Hell, Rembrandt, I signed his fucking DEVGRU recommendation.”

Knowing Savino’s use of the word fucking was permission to fall out, Elijah dropped to the empty chair in front of the desk, his boots clunking against the metal.

“I can’t get past it,” Elijah admitted. “The weight of it. The feeling of failure.”

“You’re going to have to. You’ve got enough weighing you down already. Don’t haul someone else’s crap, too.”

Made sense. Elijah knew it made sense. He’d told himself the same thing already, hadn’t he? But he’d seen the expressions on some people’s faces. He’d read the question in their eyes, the wondering. Was he in league with Ramsey? Was that how he’d survived the explosion? Did they think he’d missed that sniper last week because he’d meant to? That he’d fallen back on the command not to fire, had used it as an excuse to let his partner take a bullet? The questions swirled, ugly and sharp, scraping at his composure, tearing at his resolve.

“I need a break. I need to get away from it all,” Elijah murmured, finally meeting Savino’s eyes. “I thought I was ready to come back. I’m not.”

“I could order a psych eval, another round of physical therapy,” Savino said. “That’s what I should do. For your own good and for the good of the team.”

“You could. But I’m hoping you won’t. I just need a break. A real break. Away.”

A dumb-ass move, his brain warned.

Walking away now would only add fuel to Jarrett’s insinuations. To those who thought him guilty, it’d look like a retreat. Even to himself—who knew he was clean—it would feel like he was running.

“You’d be smarter to stay on base, take light duty until you’re ready to face fire again,” Savino advised, reading Elijah’s mind with his usual savvy.

“Yeah. I know.” He’d been going on eight months without leave when he’d been blown to hell. After that had been a couple of months in and out of the base hospital, a month easing back into training. For the last year he’d lived and breathed the Navy, SEAL Team 7, Poseidon.

Once he’d thrived on immersing himself in this world.

Now?

He didn’t know if he could live or breathe it any longer. He didn’t know how much longer he could before he simply cracked. And what would be revealed through the fractured pieces could break him beyond repair.

Savino must have seen some hint of that on his face because he rubbed a hand over his hair and sighed. “Okay. Yeah. I’ll green-light leave. But three weeks. No more.” Not a man to waste time, he snagged the request for leave again and scrawled his signature.

But he didn’t hand it over. “I’m temporarily relieving you from active duty, but as long as Operation Fuck Up is in effect, you’re still serving Poseidon. Clear?”

In other words, until they’d determined once and for all if Ramsey was dead or not, every member of Poseidon was on alert. “Is there something you want me working on while I’m away?”

Savino tapped his fingers on the desk once. Twice. After a third rat-a-tat-tat, he opened a drawer and pulled out a sheet of paper. “Codes, log-ins to access certain files that need to be decrypted. You going to have access to a secured computer where you’re going?”

“I’ll make sure of it,” Elijah promised, knowing as he reached for the paper that Savino was giving him more than an assignment.

He was handing over his trust. A show of faith that damn near changed Elijah’s mind about getting away.

Damn near. But not quite.

“Where will you go?”

Elijah hesitated, then shrugged. “Not sure yet. Just... Away.”

“You need somewhere to chill? My place in Monterey is sitting there empty.”

God. Elijah gritted his teeth against the wave of guilt pounding over him. “Thanks, but I think your castle is a little out of my league.” Trying on a grin, Elijah rolled his eyes at the idea of a middle-class guy like him chugging beer in that glass tower of a place that Savino called his home away from base.

“I expect you back here in three weeks. Excuses won’t be tolerated.”

“Yes, sir.” No problem. He could figure out the rest of his life in three weeks. Elijah headed for the door.

“Rembrandt?”

Hand on the knob and escape just a twist away, Elijah looked over his shoulder.

“You need anything, you let me know.” Savino’s brow creased for a moment, the shield dropping to show his concern. “Anything. We’re a team. We’re here for you.”

Not trusting his voice, Elijah nodded on his way out the door. Maybe that was the problem. They were a team. They were there for him. But did they trust him to be there for them?

Did he—could he—trust himself? No.

That was the bottom line.

Elijah couldn’t trust himself—or ask anyone else to—when his entire world was crashing down around him. His life—starting with his mind—was simply falling apart.

Until he figured it out, until he fixed whatever in the hell was going on, he simply had to accept the hard truth.

His life sucked.

CHAPTER FOUR

JEREMY PRESCOTT HAD been a man of great responsibility, deep pride and a quirky sense of humor. When he’d died, he’d left behind a devastated family, a tidy nest egg and a few special bequests to his only son, Elijah. Among them were sage bits of advice, mostly in the form of clichés handed down with a wink and a smile; the responsibility for an emotionally fragile widow with a propensity for drama outmatched only by her gift for nagging; and a cherry ’53 Corvette.

Chevrolet’s first attempt at what would become an icon. The red body was a rough testament to fiberglass, the white leather interior almost flawless with some wear and tear along the edges of the driver’s seat. Granted, at ten years old, Elijah had been too young to drive—hell, his feet had barely reached the pedals—but nobody challenged his right to the car. For a while, especially when he’d been deployed overseas, he’d kept the vehicle garaged at his mother’s. But two years ago a friend had convinced him to live a little, to bring it down to Coronado, take it out for a ride once in a while.

Given the cost of gas, he’d often joked that cruising the car was his guilty pleasure. The pleasure was dimming as he was cruising past hour seven on the drive from Coronado to his hometown of Yountville. Nestled in the heart of the gorgeous Napa Valley, the charming town was known for its fine dining, with restaurants like the French Laundry pulling in locals and tourists alike. Less well-known was the meddling prowess of the Prescott women. Elijah’s mother and sisters specialized in forming, sharing and debating their opinions on the lives of others. He loved them all, but damn, the idea of facing that after a long drive while his body ached was a lot to take.