Chapter 1: The Ride Home
Chapter 1: The Ride Home
The drive home lasted thirty-seven minutes.
It felt like three years.
Frank sat behind the wheel with both hands locked at ten and two, staring straight ahead at the dark Virginia highway.
Neither of us spoke.
The silence wasn't angry.
It was heavier than that.
It was the silence of two people realizing they had witnessed the same moment but experienced entirely different truths.
Streetlights flashed across the windshield.
Finally, Frank cleared his throat.
"Why didn't you ever tell her?"
I turned toward him.
"Tell her what?"
"Who you really are."
A laugh escaped before I could stop it.
Not a happy laugh.
A tired one.
"Frank, your mother has watched admirals call me 'Captain' for years."
His grip tightened on the steering wheel.
"That's different."
"No," I said quietly. "It isn't."
For several miles, neither of us spoke.
Then I looked out the window and said the thing I had swallowed for seven years.
"Do you know how many times your mother introduced me as your assistant?"
Frank winced.
"Kat—"
"Do you know how many times she asked when I was going to quit my little government job?"
He said nothing.
Because he knew.
He had been there.
He had heard every comment.
Every dismissal.
Every smile that carried an insult hidden inside it.
And every time, he had chosen peace over confrontation.
Tonight, peace had finally run out.
When we pulled into the driveway, Frank shut off the engine but didn't move.
"I should have stopped her years ago."
I looked at him.
For the first time all evening, he sounded honest.
Not defensive.
Not embarrassed.
Just honest.
May you like
"Yes," I said softly.
And that hurt him more than anything else.
