Page 35 of Watch Over Me

Robert took a sip of his water before meeting his gaze."You probably know why I'm here."

"I have an idea, yes." And then, before he could stop himself, he added, "It's not like you do this a lot."

He probably shouldn't have said it, but to hell with it. There was no one but the two of them to hear it and judge.

Something flashed on Robert's face that Eddie wasn't sure how to interpret, but before he could figure it out, his brother started talking.

"I don't often have people come to my house and tell me I'm a target in some scheme to extort the government, either."

Despite everything, laughter threatened to bubble out of Eddie and he had to stifle it.

"Well, I'm glad to hear it's not a regular thing," he said, and Robert chuckled.

"So am I." Then he frowned again. "They told me you were the one who procured that information."

"I was in the right place at the right time."

"I thought you weren't a field agent."

"I'm not." Eddie leaned his head on his hand, his elbow resting on the back of the couch. "That's actually the first time I'm involved in a field assignment outside of the preliminary phase."

Robert rubbed his forehead.

"First time and you've already stumbled onto a conspiracy like this?"

"What can I say, luck runs in the family." At his brother's confused expression, Eddie raised his eyebrows. "Have you forgotten how you started your first combat tour?"

Eddie definitely hadn't. Before that horrifying week, he couldn't have named any of the Afghan provinces, and after, he knew them all by heart. Especially the one Robert's unit had gotten pinned down in and had to fight their way out of—this one Eddie could probably write a policy paper on, even now.

"That's… not at all the same," Robert told him, and Eddie sighed.

"I'm not really comparing this to your combat experience. I simply meant—"

"I knew what I was getting into and I was trained for it. You were not." Robert shook his head. "You shouldn't have been put in danger like that."

Eddie was rendered speechless for a moment, unsure how to react to this show of concern. He wouldn't have thought Robert's issue with the comparison would be about how Eddie's situation was worse, somehow.

Which was ridiculous.

"I wasn't really in any danger," he assured his brother. "I was at a party, mingling and sipping apple cider. When I overheard them, I was hiding out to catch a breather and they had no way of seeing me. I didn't see them, either. I recognized their voices, that's it."

"Still, you're a comms specialist, not a field agent."

"True. But I went there precisely because I'm a comms specialist. It wasn't like they were short a field operative and they thought, hey, let's grab someone from the comm center on our way out." Eddie sagged into the cushions. "We're not idiots, you know."

"I know you're not an idiot," Robert said, which was as close to a compliment as Eddie had ever gotten from his brother. "I've heard great things about your company, too, but the jury's now out on them as far as I'm concerned."

"Again, they weren't making me—or letting me, for that matter—do anything dangerous. I attended a party, that's it."

"If it was an innocent party, I wouldn't have had two men in suits knocking on my door on a Sunday morning," Robert told him dryly. "Anyway, I didn't come here to argue about this."

"What did you come here for, then?" Eddie asked.

Robert opened his mouth, then closed it, frowning as he looked to the side.

"This is fucked up," he finally said before taking a sip of his water.

When nothing else followed, Eddie prompted him. "What is?"

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