Blurb

Gideon Cross doesn't lose sleep over soldiers.

He's a high-ranking military officer. Strict. Disciplined. The kind of man who doesn't tolerate excuses and never gets attached. That's the rule he's lived by for years.

Then she showed up.

A common soldier who infuriates him for reasons he refuses to name. Who looks at him like his rank doesn't matter. Who gets under his skin and stays there—no matter how hard he pushes back.

He tells himself it's about standards. About performance. About making her a better soldier.

He's lying.

When a mission goes wrong and she's left behind—eleven minutes, two hundred meters of mud, a bullet through her shoulder—Gideon loses something he didn't know he had. Control. Composure. The careful distance he's maintained for years.

He finds her in the medical bay. Grabs her arm. Yells at her for being reckless.

And underneath the anger, underneath the fear, there's something else entirely.

Something he still won't admit.

Fort Bradley, 2012. He's supposed to be in charge. But for the first time in his career, Gideon Cross has no idea what he's doing.

She almost died.

He almost broke.

And he's not sure he can put himself back together