immediately, and Molly was hopeful this would snap Jason out of the funk he’d been in since they’d returned. It seemed like he’d shut himself off from her. He hadn’t said what the doctor’s prognosis was, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out that it hadn’t been good.
Lynn was fun and very used to being in charge. She arrived on the ranch with her assistant and spent three days at the location where the facility would be built. Jason was with her every moment, and when they came back for dinner on the first night, Molly was pleased to learn they, NASA and Axiom, wanted to name it the Mick Tanner Cronus Training Facility. She was really touched they’d named it after her dad.
So why wasn’t she sleeping now? She was walking that long dark hallway again, but this time there was no Jason out here to join her. She realized that was what she was waiting for. When had she become so cowardly? She should just go and knock on his door...but she was unsure he would want to see her. She had the feeling he was fine with being alone, but she wasn’t.
She didn’t embark on affairs lightly, and this was the most intense one she’d allowed herself to have in a really long time. She just felt...well, very adult now. Her parents were both gone. She had no close relatives. She was alone in the world except for her extended ranch family. It had taken her a little while to get used to that feeling.
She walked to Jason’s room and stood there staring at the door.
The answers to her questions were on the other side. All she had to do was raise her hand and knock. She could do that.
Hell, she would do that.
She was a Tanner. They never backed down. Maybe she should get that tattooed on her body to remind herself.
Molly rapped on his door and waited. Heard the bedsprings creak and then the heavy sound of Jason’s footsteps before the door opened a crack. He looked through, saw her and opened the door wider. He’d pulled on a pair of jeans and had zipped but not buttoned them. The fatigue written in every line of his face made her heart ache.
“Can I come in?” she asked, but she’d stepped forward as she’d posed the question, and he moved back to allow her in.
He closed the door and leaned back against it. A small night-light illuminated the room and she thought about how most of the conversations they’d had so far—the heavy ones—had taken place in the near dark.
“What do you want?” he asked. There was no belligerence in his tone at all, just weariness.
“What’s going on with you?”
“Nothing.”
“Jason, enough of this. Based on your reaction from the moment you came back from the doctor’s office in Houston, I can only guess that the medical exam didn’t go as you’d hoped.
“So?”
“So. Your life isn’t over. You talked me into this Cronus program and I need you to be present and help me with it. I know you’ve been inspecting the site with Lynn for the last three days, but I’m your partner, too. And I’m out of my depth here.”
He rubbed the tattoo on his side. To boldly go.
“If this is something you can’t do—train others to go on missions when you’re grounded—then say so now. There are decisions that have to be made if you’ve changed your mind about being involved in this.”
“I’m not going to change my mind, Molly. I’m a man of my word.”
She took a deep breath.
“At this moment you don’t seem like the Jason I know. You seem like you’re defeated. If you need to take some time, then do it,” she said. “Maybe it’s not my place to tell you what to do, but I don’t know what else to say.”
He pushed away from the door and stalked over to her like a predator coming after his prey. She mentally shook herself. She’d come in here and poked at him until he’d reacted. She wasn’t sure if she was prepared to handle whatever he dished out.
“I needed to hear that. I am dealing with the fact that there is little I can do to improve my bone density. I’m also a bit freaked out that after spending the last few years training to be the first commander of the Cronus missions, I might not be in that position.”
She sat down on his bed and looked up at him. “I get it. I really do. I was completely thrown when Dad died. I figured that my life would take one path and all of a sudden I was faced with something I hadn’t anticipated. Sure, I knew Dad would die one day, but I thought... I never imagined it would happen so soon. I never pictured the ranch without him.”
“Dammit, Molly, you make me feel like an asshole,” he said, sinking down next to the bed, resting his head on the mattress. “I am feeling sorry for myself.”
“I know. I did the same thing. The situations are as different as they could be, but our reactions—the heartbreak we feel at not having life go the way we want it—that’s the same.”
He leaned over, putting his head on her knee and hugged her leg to him. “I’m sorry. I haven’t been handling this very well at all.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I can give you more time to adjust, but I just need to know that you are going to be back here with me soon. I need your guidance when it comes to all this space stuff.”
* * *
JASON HAD BEEN brooding since Dr. Tomlin had given him her rather vague but still grounding prognosis. He hated it. And he had been acting like a brat. But it was hard to mourn the probable death of your dreams. Maybe he should have stayed in Houston and talked to people like Dennis, who’d made the move from active astronaut to program manager successfully.
But he hadn’t been able to because of everything he’d put in motion with the facility. He was stoked that the training center was going ahead. Who wouldn’t be? The opportunities that would come from it were numerous. And while he’d been thinking all along about how generous he was, saving the day for Molly, maybe he should have been thinking more about what it meant for him.
She was right. She couldn’t do this on her own and he was pretty sure Mick was trying to figure out a way to kick his ass from the beyond.
Her words had been humbling. He knew she’d meant them to demonstrate that she understood where he was coming from.
“It’s hard to remember that you are still dealing with your grief. You always seem to have it together,” he said.
“Ha. You know me. I’m a big mess and I always have been. But no one is going to put up with that kind of attitude here. Rina would probably make me scrub the floors or something until I straightened up.”
He smiled. That sounded a lot like Rina. “I should probably volunteer for a few days of floor scrubbing.”
He felt her hand on his head, just rubbing gently. “You can have a rain check on that. We need you to liaise with Axiom.”
He laughed, but it sounded hollow even to his own ears. She was trying. Too hard, he realized. She wanted to know what was happening with them. He sensed it. He’d been avoiding anything personal from her.
“I’m sorry. I know
