by Sara Daniel
“Yeah, last night you were snoring like a freight train. What about Friday? You’re all in my face wanting me to check in and let you know where I am. But do you think I wouldn’t wonder or worry where you took off to? You think I didn’t hear you sneaking in just before the exercise ladies came over?”
Becca closed her eyes. She’d screwed up again. “You’re right. If I’m going to be out all night, you deserve to know. I should have texted or called you. I was—”
He held up his hand, revealing some dirt ground into the creases around his fingernails but no obvious purple stains. Surely, if he’d scrubbed them off, his hand would be cleaner. “Please, I don’t want details of what you and Officer O’Malley were doing together.”
“It’s not what you think,” she rushed to reassure him. Not only had their time together been completely innocent, they had too many unresolved issues and differences to consider doing anything she’d be uncomfortable sharing with Toby. But she couldn’t tell the truth about her Friday night activities either. She’d sworn to Jake and Connor she wouldn’t mention the graffiti.
“Officer O’Malley’s cool. Didn’t you, like, date him in high school or something too?”
Her cheeks heated, and she felt like the teenager, instead of the responsible adult. “Or something. Things didn’t work out last time, which sets a bad precedent for attempting to rekindle whatever we had back then. We’re better off not trying to make it work again.”
“Uh-huh,” Toby said, clearly unconvinced.
She opened her mouth to insist but then closed it again. She’d save her arguments for herself, not Toby. “On Friday after school, I want you to meet me at the bowling alley and help me put together the rowing machine. Don’t worry about losing money by not working for Matt. I’ll pay you for your time.”
…
Connor’s heart sped up as Becca entered the diner for their cocoa session Tuesday evening. He’d been deluged with paperwork, poring over details of the open investigations. Knowing he had nothing to offer her, a few days apart seemed the best method to align his priorities.
But seeing her ponytail bouncing energetically around her shoulders as she made her way to the counter, he wanted her just as much as ever. If he gave in, she’d be the next person he’d fail to protect. Only this time it would be from himself.
“Okay couples, tonight we’re going to blindfold the men,” Pauline announced. “But unlike last week, you two are going to work together, and men, you’re going to have to trust your partner.”
Becca raised an eyebrow at him. “Will you have a problem with that?”
“No, of course not.” Hell, the stupidity of his teenage self was beginning to haunt him as much as his failure to protect in the military. He’d proven with his past actions he couldn’t be counted on to stand by her when the rumors started flying. And he didn’t have a way to prove he wouldn’t turn on her again.
“Females, you’ll guide your men to make a cocoa by telling him what to do,” Pauline continued.
“I’m your man, huh?” Connor tried to joke, meeting Becca’s eye.
“You were once,” she whispered. “Now you’re Kortville’s man. Even if I believed you trusted me, anything I could offer ultimately leads away from here.”
“What if we offered each other something temporary, something off-limits from high school that we’re both still curious about?”
“Sleep together and then go our separate ways?” she asked.
He frowned. Put that way, the idea sounded cheap and didn’t do justice to his feelings for her. But his nights and his empty home were reserved for his nightmares. He wouldn’t make anyone share in the price he paid for his own carelessness.
Pauline continued her drone of instructions. “The men are not allowed to see the cocoa they’re creating, and the women are not allowed to sniff or touch or taste anything. You can, however, touch him and guide his hand.”
“I look forward to the touching,” Connor murmured, doing his best to keep his tone light and inconsequential. They weren’t a couple and weren’t setting up any long lasting relationship, but he didn’t see why they had to pretend they weren’t attracted to each other.
“Then the audience will taste the results and determine which couple’s efforts created the best tasting drink. So, before you pull out any ingredients, ladies, tie up your men.”
The crowd snickered.
“Hunka-hunka-burnin’-love,” Harriet said, winking down the counter at Becca.
Her face flamed.
Interesting. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Connor asked.
Her cheeks brightened even more. “Saturday in the grocery store she easily concluded I’d been up all night. Since Larry didn’t tell her what we’d really been doing, she drew her own conclusions.”
Kudos to Larry for following the order. Maybe Connor didn’t have a rogue deputy on his force, after all. “She thinks we’re sleeping together?” He’d have preferred reality over the rumor, but the speculation itself made his ache for her burn stronger.
Becca shrugged. “Toby came to the same conclusion. Should I have worked harder to correct them?”
“You’ve had to deal with talk like this before.” The ache turned to a burning in his gut. Dennis had put her through hell, a hell he’d tripled by not standing by her. He wouldn’t bail on her and leave her to fend off the rumors on her own this time. “You tell me what you’re comfortable with.”
“I’m not comfortable with people assuming I’m a liar or a cheater. But I’m totally fine with the conclusion I’m having really great sex with you.” She kept her eyes on the black handkerchief as she folded it into a three-inch band.
“Not to brag, but ‘really great sex with me’ will be more enjoyable in reality than hearing about it from everyone else.”
“I believe you.” Although the smirk playing around her lips made him think she was tempted to goad him into proving it.
Knowing they were continually driving the stakes higher drew him to push his point even more. “Another thing I’m not bragging about and don’t want to feed the rumor mill with—my success rate with a condom is one hundred percent. So, you know abstinence doesn’t have to be the only solution.”
Her smile widened, and her eyes brightened. “Now I’m going to have an entirely different visual when you talk about protecting the community.”
Connor groaned. “That’s not—”
She laughed, cutting him off. “Relax. I’m in favor of your alternative solution. But don’t assume I’m ready to sleep with you even if the whole town, including my brother, thinks we’re already doing it.”
“Fair enough.” He looked forward to the effort to convince her she was ready. He lifted the precisely folded handkerchief. “Are you ready to blindfold me, and help me make a kick-butt cocoa?”
“Of course. Are you?”
“Tie me up.” His carefree words belied his apprehension. Relying solely on touch, he feared he’d forget they had an audience and cross a line of publicly appropriate conduct that would raise the eyebrows of any member of the community, never mind the person with a sworn duty to serve and, ahem, protect.
Well, he knew his weakness. He would focus on the cocoa, not on her touch, not on the fact that nothing but their own stubbornness and fear of getting hurt kept them from sleeping together.
Becca circled behind him and lifted the folded cloth to his eyes. “This okay?” she asked. She stood so close her breasts brushed against his back.
He bit back a groan and closed his eyes to avoid reaching behind him and squeezing her closer.
“Too tight? Not tight enough? Can you see anything?”
Tight enough that he couldn’t open his eyelids. Damn, it was dark. How stupid he hadn’t prepared himself for this aspect of the blindfold. Heck, he wouldn’t have even agreed to join the contest if he’d foreseen this. He resisted the urge to rip it off, as the fear of keeping his hormones under control disintegrated and the demons of his pa
st closed in around him.
A sliver of light filtered through one corner, almost like a beam of a headlight in the distance, but the rest of his vision remained dark—like his bedroom, like the city with the street lights busted out, like that night on the other side of the world—
He forcibly closed his mind. The nightmares would never touch the innocent people in this room, who’d never had a taste of true violence and never would as long as he had a say in it.
“Sit down.” Becca placed her hand on his elbow and guided him to a stool. He refused to cling to the lifeline she offered. He would not show weakness. He would not let the nightmares humiliate him.
She released him and shifted around his seat, stirring a light breeze and the faintest of floral scents, the tip of her hair tickling along the back of his neck.
“What are you doing?” His jaw ached from gritting his teeth so tightly. He needed to see. How could he protect his people if he couldn’t see a potential threat coming?
“I’m laying out all our supplies.” Her whisper filled his head with the same calm he usually discovered near the end of a ten-mile run, but the moment she stopped murmuring the memories came roaring back.
“Tell me what you’re putting where, as you set it out,” he said. He didn’t care what she actually gabbed about. He just needed her voice to battle the mounting attack inside his head.
“The mug is directly in front of you.” Becca took his right hand and guided him to it, her fingertips slightly calloused from punching the cash register keys all day. “Immediately to the right is a spoon for stirring. Next to that is a banana.”
“A banana?” His fingers connected with the smooth peel. What she intended to use a banana for in a cocoa contest he had no idea. But winning ranked far behind proving himself an integral part of every town gathering and deserving to live among them. Not go back to the wind and sand and landmines—
Nope, he wouldn’t go there now either.
“What are you planning to make tonight? Banana hot cocoa?” he asked.
“Precisely.”
“I was joking.”
“Think about it,” she said, her tone reasonable enough to assure him she really intended to go through with the unconventional flavor. “Chocolate-covered bananas are a delicious treat—one of my all-time favorite snacks, after turtles of course. Most people enjoy bananas and milk on their cereal. Banana hot cocoa is the perfect combination of both these things.”
“Sure, it is,” he said dubiously.
Becca socked him lightly, sending an unexpected jolt through the shoulder that still bore the scars of shrapnel, a constant reminder of the people who’d suffered much more than a flesh wound, of the comrade who never had a chance to suffer.
“Hey!” He tensed, unsure of which direction he might be struck from next.
“Sorry. I was just teasing.” She rested her hand on his shoulder, rubbing gently in soothing circles.
He knew she was, and if he’d seen it coming he wouldn’t have thought twice. “Let’s make the fastest banana cocoa ever, so I can take off this stupid blindfold.”
So he could walk out of the diner with his sanity intact.
“Okay, well—” He could almost imagine Becca biting her luscious lower lip as she reluctantly agreed. “We need to mash the banana really well. We should puree it with the hot milk, I think, so it doesn’t settle to the bottom of the drink.” She went back to directing his movements by guiding his hands to do everything she wanted.
His unease simmered to a manageable level as her voice and touch lulled him into relaxing. “I can’t believe you brought a handheld blender here. You really prepared for this contest.”
“You were prepared last week. I had to keep up my end of the deal.”
“You brought all the ingredients last time, like you have every week. I just got lucky you had the right ones on hand. Going up against competitors who came prepared with ice cubes and onions made me look like a freaking genius.”
“All right, genius, it’s time to pour the drink in a mug and taste it. It’s definitely thicker than normal cocoa, the consistency of a smoothie, but—”
The deafening crash of a blast through the front window drowned out the rest of her words. Connor yanked her to the floor behind the counter, covering her body with his. He could hear the chaos beyond but couldn’t see the blood and injuries on the other side.
“Connor, put your weapon away. Pauline just dropped a stack of dishes.” Becca’s fingers slipped the blindfold from his head.
He blinked at the sudden brightness. “Grenade,” he said hoarsely. “Through the front window. Stay down. Don’t move from behind the counter for any reason.”
“Connor.” Her voice carried more urgency but still registered as a whisper as her fingers dug into his shoulder. She was scared, of course.
But he couldn’t comfort her now. He had people to protect, people who were dying. Dying on his watch. Because he’d been wearing a stupid blindfold and hadn’t seen the attack coming.
“Put your gun away, Connor, before you scare anyone out there.” Becca’s voice rang with steel, not fear. “Someone broke a few plates and cups and spilled some food. It’s a domestic mess, not a national crisis. An accident, not an attack. Please, this is Kortville, not Afghanistan.”
He looked down, shocked to see his gun in his hand. He hadn’t really planned to shoot before he took off the blindfold, had he? He moved the gun toward his holster but kept his hand on it, ready to use if he had to. He shielded Becca with his body, as he shifted around the counter.
Zelda helped Pauline pick up pieces of broken glass and ceramic. Rochelle pushed her way through with a mop. Others moved feet and chairs clear of the debris and ensuing cleanup.
He’d mistaken a few falling dishes for a grenade and nearly shot up the diner to stop a nonexistent threat. He removed his shaking hand from his firearm and strode from the diner. He had to get out of here, away from everyone before he contaminated them.
“Connor, where are you going?” Becca’s feet pounded behind him down the sidewalk.
He wanted to ignore her, but he spun around because the sinister devil that controlled his nightmares insisted that a villain with a knife or a bomb strapped to his chest might have followed him. Of course, the bouncy ponytail and hazel eyes rounded with concern belonged to Becca. She reached for him as if she could soothe his troubles away.
He wasn’t a little kid who needed a hug to chase away a bad dream. She couldn’t fix this for him. All he could do was stop it from contaminating others, including her, especially her.
“Leave me alone. I can’t do cocoa right now.” He couldn’t do anything. He’d become such a head case he could barely function. He turned and began walking again.
She jogged until she fell into step with him, when by all rights she should have been scared of him and running away. “Broken dishes make you think grenade. When I tripped, you assumed a landmine. I know you don’t want to hear the words, but I’m going to say them again.”
“Don’t,” he whispered, begging. He couldn’t handle going there. Not now. Yeah, maybe he had it, but right now he needed time to get his brain oriented in the present and his memories locked away.
“Post-traumatic stress disorder,” she said without pause. “It’s not a death sentence. You don’t have to go through the nightmare alone. You can get help. I’ve been researching online, and—”
“And you think a Google search makes you an expert?” he cut in. “You think you can diagnose and fix me based on something you read online? I’m not Jake. You can’t tell me to run five miles and do fifty pushups every day and my problems will go away.” As suddenly as the fight and anger had welled inside him, it deserted him. “Believe me, I run from them every morning. It’s not enough.”
“I don’t think you need to run.” Becca stopped walking. “I think you need to stop running and talk to someone before Wilbur and the town council see you shoot up a pile of broken dishes and decide
you’re not mentally fit to serve on Kortville’s police force.”
He stalked another block and then sank onto a bench in the park, his body shaking too much to continue. He didn’t want her to be right. Worse, their assessment would be right. He wasn’t fit to serve and protect this town he loved, the place that offered him a bit of sanity and a normal existence.
Becca slowly followed, stopping a few steps from the bench. “Can I sit next to you?”
He hesitated, afraid to sully her with the poison inside him if she came too close. Finally, he nodded. He didn’t have the energy to keep pushing her away. He wanted her near him, wanted the good and real feelings only she could evoke.
Her thigh pressed against his as she sat, her perpetually swinging hair brushing his ear in an intimate caress. “Tell me about Kevin. Did he have a family? What did he like to do for fun?”
Connor squeezed his eyes shut. He’d expected her to ask about a mission, maybe even the details of limbs ripping from bodies or how landmines could turn a tank into bits of shrapnel. But she wanted to talk about Kevin the living person.
His eyes burned, and his throat clogged.
She took his hand and threaded her fingers through his. “Take your time.”
She didn’t tell him he didn’t have to answer her questions if he didn’t want to. No, she’d wait, she wouldn’t let him take the easy way and keep his memories behind a locked door. Even though the memories of death kept escaping, the living Kevin had been sealed in a tomb no nightmare had been able to penetrate.
“Kevin was a laugh a minute. He had a joke for every situation and never took anything too seriously. He was the guy everyone wanted to be friends with because he made life fun, or at least bearable. Even facing the most morbid horrible scene where we’re all about to puke our guts out because no one should ever do that to another human being, he’d make a crack and have us smiling at his sick, twisted bit of humor.”
“And you didn’t puke,” Becca said, aiming her own smile at him.
“Exactly.” Encouraged, he continued, the words rushing out. “Kevin enlisted just out of high school like I did. He had a girlfriend at first, but they broke up after a while. A long distance relationship with a soldier isn’t exactly fun, and when you’re nineteen years old, fun is pretty much all you’re looking for. But he had a sister who thought the world of him, who never gave up on him. Every year at Christmas, she still sends me a card with a long letter about how much she misses her brother.”