Free Secret Dream: Delos Series, 1B1 by Lindsay McKenna

difference between Susan today and yesterday was jarring. Right now, he had an opening with Susan and he was going to take advantage of the opportunity if he could. For Lia’s sake. For her sake. He didn’t want Susan seeing him as the villain here. Or a killer who was stealing her much-loved daughter from them.
    Susan stirred the eggs with her fork, frowning. The silence hung in the kitchen for a few moments. “Cav? Why did you join something like the Navy SEALs?”
    Here it came. The killer aspect she saw in him. He was going to be brutally honest with her. Sometimes, the truth was bitter medicine, but it was the best thing that could be shared. “I guess I was looking for a family who could love me, Susan. I heard that the SEALs were like that: a team, a family.” He laid down his fork, his hands on either side of the plate, his appetite gone. “My father beat the crap out of me and my mother. We both had broken bones to prove it.” Instantly, he saw Susan’s face fall with utter sympathy, her eyes widening with pain. Cav pushed on. “When I joined and made qualifications for BUD/s, my mother had just died. I was in an angry, emotional state. Every SEAL that makes it through those six months gets a sea daddy. That’s an older SEAL, usually a chief, who will choose one of the graduates. His job is to be like a father figure to help guide the younger SEAL. Chief Jacoby, who had been in the SEALs for thirty years, picked me out of the twenty men who managed to make it through that class at BUD/s.
    “I didn’t like him at first because he got in my face about my anger. He pushed me hard in every way—physically, emotionally, and mentally. He was never abusive toward me like my father was. Instead, he treated me with respect, he demanded courtesy in return, and he taught me what a real father would be like for his son.”
    “Oh,” she whispered, “that’s such a gift for you.”
    He nodded, feeling the tightness in his gut. “I had so much anger. Looking back on it, Chief Jacoby must have known I’d been badly abused by my father, because one day, he pulled it out of me. I’d never talked about what my father had done to me and my mother. I remember sitting in his little office, the door shut, and sobbing my brains out. I’d never cried growing up. I just sucked it up and pushed it down deep into me. My mother cried for both of us. And I hated when she cried because it made me feel helpless. I couldn’t take the pain she carried away from her. I couldn’t ease her hurt or hold her like I wanted. We were both trapped by my father. And neither of us saw a way out of it.”
    Susan frowned and sat back. “You’ve suffered so much. And your poor mother . . . Does Lia know all of this?”
    “Yes, she does. There are no secrets between us, ma’am.”
    “Call me Susan, will you?”
    Cav nodded, feeling hope. “Chief Jacoby guided my life as a SEAL for the years I was in. He told me to get a degree, and I did that. He held me accountable, taught me about honor, truth, and loyalty. There were many times when I’d get off duty, and we’d be back at our base in Coronado that he’d invite me home with him. There was an extra bedroom, and that’s where I stayed. He had two sons. He and his wife were very much in love with one another. That’s where I got to see that not all families were like mine. It was his way of showing me that a family is something you can have, you can work for, and it can be a good thing, not a bad thing like mine was.”
    Susan shook her head. “You’re lucky you turned out so well coming from a hell like that, Cav.”
    “Don’t I know it.”
    “Lia’s never, ever had a hand laid on her.”
    “I know. Your family is similar to Chief Jacoby’s family. There’s a lot of love in the household. There’s no abuse; no one is hitting anyone else with a belt or their fist.”
    Rubbing her brow, Susan murmured, “You’re old beyond your years, Cav.”
    “Some days, I feel