“I prefer to think of it as providing emotional support with style.”
For the next twenty minutes, she told him about Afghanistan. About South Sudan. About the children in those stories who’d stayed with her long after the articles were published.
“There was this girl in a refugee camp outside Kabul.” Her voice softened. “Maybe eight years old, taking care of her baby brother because their parents had been killed in a bombing. She reminded me of me and Selah after Hannah disappeared—trying to be grown-ups when we were still children ourselves.”
“What happened to her?”
“Last I heard, she was in school in Germany. My article helped get her refugee status.” She smiled. The first genuine smile he’d seen from her all evening. “Sometimes the stories help.”
“See? You save people.” He leaned back, reaching for his wineglass. “And Marcus? What happened to him in the end?”
Her smile faded. “He left journalism. Became a corporate communications consultant in Los Angeles. Says he’s happier now.”
“But you don’t believe him.”
“I don’t know. Maybe he is. Maybe I just tell myself he’s not because it’s easier than admitting I destroyed something good.”
The waiter arrived to clear their soup bowls and serve the main course. The massaman curry was served in a traditional clay pot, rich brown sauce fragrant with cinnamon and star anise, tender chunks of beef and sweet pineapple visible beneath the surface. Alongside it came jasmine rice, fluffy and perfect for soaking up the sauce.
“This,” Skeet said after his first bite, “is why I’m keeping you around. Forget the brilliant investigative skills—you can order food.”
She laughed. But, “I just hope when this is all over, you don’t look at me and say, ‘Wow. That was a bad choice.’”
The words hit him, left a sting. A flash of something—rawness, fear—in her blue eyes.
“This is not a bad choice, Chloe.”
She drew in a breath.
“Hey. I came to get you, remember?” He reached across the table again and squeezed her hand gently. “Best decision I ever made.”
“That was before you knew what you were signing up for.”
“What I signed up for was keeping you safe. I didn’t know you were in the middle of exposing a medical-supply trafficking operation. What we’re doing now feels bigger than both of us.”
“Is it? Or is it just another example of me getting in over my head and dragging someone else down with me?”
“Chloe, look at me.”
She did. His chest hurt at the churning in her blue eyes.
“I don’t want you to get hurt because of me. Maybe I’m better off working alone.”
He studied her face. The careful way she held herself, as if she was ready to bolt if he agreed with her. “Do you believe that?”
Long pause. She looked away, then back. Something in her expression cracked open just enough to show him the truth.
“No.”
“Good. Because you’re stuck with me. I make excellent company in life-threatening situations, remember?”
She smiled—small, but genuine—and it hit him square in the chest.
“You think you’re dangerous to the people you care about.”
“I am. They try to save me from my own stupid decisions?—”
“Because they care.”