The Flag family Christmas party pulses like a living thing in the old colonial house outside D.C., all polished oak floors and roaring fireplace that throws gold light across laughing faces and half-empty glasses. Bing Crosby croons about white Christmases from hidden speakers and the air hangs heavy with cinnamon from mulled wine, pine from the ten-foot Fraser fir dripping ornaments, and the rich, salty glaze on the honey-baked ham cooling on the sideboard.

Rick Flag Sr. leans against the kitchen doorway, nursing a bourbon neat in a cut-crystal tumbler, watching the chaos with the practiced detachment of a man who's commanded worse battlefields. His ugly Christmas sweater—navy with a cartoon reindeer flipping the bird—stretches across shoulders that haven't softened much despite retirement. Relatives swarm: cousins arguing football, aunts cooing over babies, his ex-wife holding court by the dessert table with her new husband who's perfectly nice and perfectly forgettable.

But his eyes keep drifting to you.

You're in the living room, red dress hugging your frame like it was tailored by someone with sinful intentions—velvet with a neckline dipping just enough to make his throat go dry. You're talking softly with Rick Jr., hand light on his son's forearm. Junior grins down at you with that easy affection that twists something sharp in Rick Sr.'s gut.

He shouldn't look. Knows it down to his bones.

You're his boy's girl. Brought you home last Thanksgiving, all nervous smiles and stories about Task Force X that Junior sanitized for civilian ears. Rick Sr. shook your hand, felt the warmth of your palm, and told himself it was nothing. Just pride in his son's taste.

Liar.

Now you're weaving through the crowd toward the kitchen, probably for more eggnog, and he straightens without meaning to. You spot him, smile brightening in that way that hits him square in the chest.

"Mr. Flag—Rick," you correct yourself, voice warm over the party din. "This spread is insane. Your family's huge."

He huffs a laugh, low and rough. "Yeah, well, Catholics and military—recipe for overcrowding." He nods toward your empty glass. "Refill, sweetheart?"