Fragile

by Shiloh Walker

  He already knew the answer.

  Devon gave a halfhearted shrug. “Nah. Not hungry.”

  “I’ll make some for you anyway. If you don’t eat them, I might eat them later.”

  “Maybe a couple bites. I need to go in to work a little early today.”

  Glancing at her over his shoulder, he asked, “Anything wrong?”

  “With work?” Devon shook her head and folded her hands around the thick white mug, staring into the coffee. “I just need to leave early, and I want to get everything done.”

  “Why are you leaving early?”

  She looked away.

  With slow, precise movements, he set down the glass bowl and the batter. After he wiped his hands off on a towel, he crossed the kitchen to stand next to her. Reaching out, he caught her shoulders and waited until she looked up at him. “What’s going on?”

  Her tongue slid out, damped her lips. “I . . . uh.” She blew out a breath, focused her gaze somewhere in the vicinity of his throat. “I’m going to see Lydia.”

  The counselor. Okay. He’d figured she should have gone to talk to the woman for a while longer anyway. But something was off. Luke couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Devon had made her dislike of counselors and the like clear. Damn clear. Part of him understood it. He knew she’d spent a great deal of time in counseling when she was a teenager, and she’d been more than glad to leave that behind.

  “Probably not a bad idea.” He smiled at her, ran his thumb across the delicate skin under her eyes. “You’re not sleeping well.”

  Her gaze darted off to the side. Something cold skittered through his belly. That look in her eyes, on her face, it bore a rather strong resemblance to guilt. “Harder to sleep without you here,” she said, shrugging. Then she made a face. “Forget I said that. I don’t expect the hospital to work around my neuroses.”

  “You’re not neurotic,” Luke said darkly. Cupping her chin, he forced her gaze up to his. Squeezing gently, he repeated, “You’re not neurotic. Shit, Devon, do you have any idea how many people would have snapped if they went through what you did? A lot of them.”

  Her smile was brittle, false. “Snapped.” She shook her head. “Don’t be so sure I haven’t snapped, Luke. Sometimes I think I’m going crazy.”

  “You’re not going crazy.”

  In a small, haunted voice, she whispered, “Don’t be so sure.”

  “YOU’RE not going crazy, Devon,” Lydia said, her voice gentle, calm, and confident. The perfect response for a counselor.

  Smirking, Devon replied, “And if I was, would you tell me?”

  Lydia laughed. “In those words? No, probably not.” Then she leaned forward and took one of Devon’s cold hands. “But you’re not going crazy. You’re just having a bad time. That’s natural.”

  Linking their fingers, Lydia squeezed and waited until Devon looked up to meet her gaze. “You realize that so much of this can be attributed to the attack, don’t you? The sensations that you’re being watched, followed . . . You were being stalked, and it was going on for months before you knew. It’s natural to feel this kind of apprehension.”

  Tears burned her eyes. Lydia’s voice was so gentle, so understanding. The compassion on her face, in her manner, was real. It was genuine. Lydia was good at her job, and she believed in it. She’d helped a lot of people, but Devon had a feeling this was a waste of time. No matter what Lydia said, Devon was terrified that her grasp on reality was slipping.

  “I do know that. But what about these dreams? Why do I keep having these dreams about Luke? He wouldn’t hurt me; I know that.” She tucked her chin against her chest and wrapped her arms protectively around her body, unaware that she’d started to rock, ever so slightly, back and forth. This morning, when he’d touched her, it had taken everything she had not to pull away.

  She wasn’t afraid of Luke, but part of her didn’t seem to understand that. “Why do I keep dreaming that he hurts me? Why does part of me want to hide from him?”

  Lydia squeezed Devon’s hand. “Perhaps, on some level, you blame him. After all, he’d promised he’d take care of you. You let yourself believe that, even though you knew it would be impossible for him to stay by your side twenty-four/seven. When Curtis Wilder attacked you, nearly raped you, it wasn’t Luke who stopped him. It was you.”

  Devon cringed. Yeah, that part was really weighing on her. She’d killed a man. No, she didn’t remember it, and no, she wasn’t sorry he was dead, but to know that she’d taken a life, even in self-defense, that knowledge was a leaden weight inside her. Shaking her head, she said, “It’s not that. It’s not.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Swallowing, Devon tried to say, “Yes. Yes, I am sure.”

  But the words wouldn’t come. As fucked up as it was, something about Luke . . . no, something about those insane, horrifying dreams had her so scared, she couldn’t even breathe past it at times. It was like her throat was closing up on her, like some invisible band was squeezing the air right out of her.

  “It’s natural to want to blame somebody. You know that.”

  Devon scowled. Shoving out of the chair, she started to pace Lydia’s office. It was done in soothing tones of cream and blue, but it might as well been bloodred for all the good it did her. Blood . . . no. “Don’t think about blood,” she muttered, rubbing the back of her hand over her mouth.

  “Yeah, I want to blame somebody.” Spinning around, she glared at Lydia. “I do blame somebody. I blame that sick fuck for hurting his son, for forcing me to take a boy away from his only parent. I blame him for being a cruel monster and for having that kind of evil inside him. I blame him, Lydia. Curtis did this to me, not Luke. Luke didn’t do a damn thing wrong . . .”

  Her voice broke, and her knees started to give out. Collapsing onto the floor, she whispered, “So why am I so scared of him?” Burying her face against her knees, she whispered, “When Luke’s there, after he’s been around awhile, it’s like that scared part of me relaxes, realizes he wouldn’t hurt me. But after he’s been gone, or I have, or after one of these dreams . . .”

  “The mind can play tricks on the body, Devon.”

  Lydia’s voice was closer, and Devon lifted her gaze to watch as the counselor settled down on the floor next to her, smoothing down her burgundy skirt with an automatic gesture.

  The woman probably spent half her time here either on the floor or standing in the corner by one of her scared, screwed-up patients. Devon absolutely despised the fact that she’d become that again: a scared, terrified, screwed-up victim.

  “You don’t get it,” Devon said hoarsely. “It’s not my mind that’s afraid of him. It’s my body. My head tells me to stop it, that Luke wouldn’t hurt me. But my body wants to run. Especially . . .”

  “Especially after one of these dreams. It’s your subconscious mind, Devon. Somewhere inside you, I suspect you have a great deal of pent-up anger, rage, and blame. We have to deal with it.”

  Bitterly, Devon said, “Isn’t that why I’m here?”

  With a sympathetic smile, Lydia replied, “You tell me. Is that why you’re here?”

  “Why else would I be here? It sure as hell isn’t because I want to be.”

  Chuckling, Lydia patted Devon’s shoulder. “Oh, I’d pretty much figured that out.” Cocking her head, Lydia pinned Devon with a direct, honest stare. “Tell me, though, why did you come back? What do you expect to get out of seeing me?”

  Devon swallowed. Lydia wasn’t asking because she didn’t know the answer; she was asking because she wanted Devon to understand the reasons, to acknowledge them. To stop hiding. Damn it, she hated therapy sessions. Hated therapists, counselors, psychiatrists—all of them. Hated that she had to be here. “I want these dreams to stop. I want to understand why I’m having them and figure out how to make them go away.” Closing her eyes, she added, “And I want to stop feeling so scared when Luke touches me.”

  She opened her eyes and looked at Lydia. “I want my life bac
k.”

  “And are you willing to do what you need to do to get it back?”

  “I’m here, aren’t I?” Rolling her eyes, she moved to her knees and stood up. Lifting one hand, she shoved her hair back from her face, but as she lowered her hand, she stopped, stared. Startled, she stared at her bony wrist. Damn it, she looked like a skeleton. She knew she’d lost weight; she’d seen it in her reflection that morning after she’d climbed out of the shower, and she could tell by how loosely her clothes fit.

  But for some reason, it really hit home just how thin she’d become. Luke had called her beautiful that morning, and she’d laughed, told him he needed to get his eyes checked. But maybe Devon should as well, because although she’d looked, had seen, she hadn’t seen enough to make her do something about it.

  If it wasn’t for Luke, she wouldn’t be here.

  But that was a skewed way of looking at things. Trying to fix it because of him wasn’t the way to fix things. She needed to fix things for herself.

  Fisting her hand, she lowered it back to her side and looked up, watched as Lydia stood up. “I’m scared. All the time, I’m scared. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep unless Luke’s with me. When he’s gone, that’s when the dreams happen. It’s like my body, my subconscious realizes he isn’t there, that he can’t hold me and keep the dreams away. And when he comes back . . . Is this some weird way of punishing him for not being there all the time?”

  Lydia lifted a brow. “Entirely possible. Do you expect that of him?”

  “No, I don’t expect it. But part of me, a huge part of me, wants it.” She shivered, suddenly cold. Rubbing her hands up and down her arms, she moved to stare out the window. Night was falling. She’d been in Lydia’s office for more than an hour. When she’d called to set up an appointment, Lydia had rearranged her schedule so that Devon would have the last appointment of the day, giving her as much time as needed.

  Devon suspected she could stay there until midnight every night for weeks, and it still wasn’t going to be enough.

  “I don’t feel safe when he isn’t with me.” Looking back at Lydia, she asked, “But isn’t that a weird way of blaming him? If I blamed him, if I held him responsible, couldn’t it be interpreted that I don’t trust him to keep me safe?”

  Lydia made an incomprehensible little “Hmm.” Then she answered Devon’s question with one of her own. “I’ll ask you again. Do you blame him, Devon?”

  In a whisper, Devon replied, “I don’t know.”

  “Then I’d say that’s a question we need answered.” Lydia settled back in her seat and smoothed her skirt down.

  “And if I find out that the answer is yes, that I do blame him? What then?” She closed her eyes, thought of all the times she’d seen such guilt on Luke’s face, all that self-directed anger.

  He was dealing with his own guilt, his own self-blame. But could he deal with it if she threw her blame onto the fire, as well?

  “Then we work past it. If you love this man, and I suspect you do, isn’t he worth it?”

  “He’s worth it.” She opened her eyes and looked at Lydia, a sad smile curling her lips. “But I have to wonder, am I? I’ve already put him through hell.”

  “No.” Lydia shook her head, her gaze sympathetic. “You didn’t put him through hell, Devon. A brutal, cruel man did that. He did it to both of you, and it wasn’t your fault, wasn’t Luke’s fault.”

  But even as she left Lydia’s office a few minutes later, Devon had doubts. So many of them, she could feel their weight pressing down on her, weighing heavier and heavier as she went.

  SWEARING, Luke lowered the phone back into the cradle and leaned back against the wall in the doctors’ lounge. It was nearly eight. He still had nine hours left in his shift, and he was so damned anxious to see Devon that it had become a chore to focus on the job.

  He’d thought maybe if he could talk to her, he’d feel better.

  Hear her voice. That was all he wanted. All he needed.

  But she wasn’t at home, and her cell phone had directed his call into her voice mail. A call to Lydia’s office didn’t tell him anything. The counselor’s phones had been turned off, and all Luke could do was leave a message with her answering service.

  She shouldn’t have gone back to work so soon.

  A very large part of him, the macho, possessive, protective part, kept telling him he should make Devon take more time off. The slightly saner, slightly more rational part of his mind guffawed at the idea of telling her that.

  Devon needed her work. While he suspected she didn’t love her job, it was cathartic for her—or rather, it had been. Helping kids escape hellacious lives was her way of dealing with the hell her own childhood had been. She was good at it. She got through to kids, and Luke had no doubt that a lot of that was because of her own experiences.

  She’d been doing okay. The week after Christmas, she’d seemed happier. More at peace. Like she used to be. Even though she’d hated it, she’d made the appointments with Lydia, saw her three times. Devon had admitted that the counselor suggested a few more sessions, but Lydia hadn’t insisted, and she’d given Devon the all-clear to return to work.

  Then she returned to work, and that was when all hell broke loose. That was when she’d stopped sleeping unless he was with her. That was when she started jumping at shadows and starting at every sound. That was when she’d started to pull away from him again.

  She tried to hide it. But Luke was a trained observer, and he’d seen it clearly enough. It wasn’t all the time. And there were times when she seemed just fine. The past few days had been the worst. The nights he’d been working.

  This morning, although she’d said nothing, although she’d done nothing, he’d seen it. The signs of another sleepless night and the stiff way she’d stood in his arms before finally leaning back against him.

  It was normal, wasn’t it? Being scared after what had happened. She’d been like that the first couple of weeks after the attack, and it shouldn’t send alarm bells screeching when it happened.

  Except why had it stopped . . . then started again?

  Why did he have this gut-deep dread that it was him that Devon was afraid of? As much as he’d like to write it off as his own imagination, he couldn’t do it. His gut wouldn’t let him.

  The door to the nurses’ lounge swung open, and one of the other physicians came in. A new guy whose name escaped Luke, followed by one of the residents. Reluctant to get into a conversation, he slid past them and left the lounge. He wasn’t in the mood to talk to anybody other than Devon, especially not some enthusiastic resident eager to impress or a new guy equally eager to impress the cute young resident.

  The door swung shut behind him as he headed down the hall. He spared another glance at his watch, even though he’d just checked the time.

  8:01.

  Great. He’d managed to pass a whole four minutes.

  When a nurse called out his name, he was almost relieved. That tone of voice, followed by the ensuing tension as other nurses started to rush around in a familiar fashion, meant only one thing. A trauma en route.

  Before he had another chance to kill a few more minutes and check the passage of time, his gloved hands were covered with blood, and he was too busy barking out orders for the nurses to think about Devon.

  That trauma was followed by another one, this one a self-induced. The patient had gone up on the roof to take down Christmas decorations and had slipped, fallen. In addition to the broken arm, he’d also managed to break his ribs when he landed on a small lawn statue. The broken ribs had punctured a lung, and the guy’s wife, trying to help him, had wasted precious time.

  Getting him stabilized wasn’t too hard, but Luke got the short end of the straw and was elected to go out and talk to the hysterical wife. The teenager with her was in better control than her, and it took a good twenty minutes before Luke could get her to calm down and listen.

  That was how the rest of the night progressed: a drunk driver involved
in a one-car accident, a possible suicide attempt, three kids with fevers, ranging from 100 degrees to 104.3 degrees. Ended up that the one with the lower temp was the troublesome patient. The toddler with the 104 degree temp had a nasty case of strep. The older child with the 100 degree fever was asthmatic, and what had started out as a mild cold ended up putting him into a full-blown asthma attack. By the time his mother had realized he needed to see a doctor, it was late, and she’d thought the boy could wait until morning.

  No. Instead of a trip to the doctor’s, the boy was getting admitted.

  The asthmatic was followed by a false labor, and when Luke finally convinced her she wasn’t getting ready to have the baby, she’d broken into tears.

  By the time his shift ended, Luke was dragging. He hadn’t slept worth shit the past couple of weeks, and he didn’t see that changing anytime soon.

  Traffic was light, and when he pulled into the driveway, the lights in the house were still off. He found Devon asleep in the living room, cuddled up on the couch with her head pillowed on the overstuffed armrest. He dropped his coat right where he stood and went to her, settling down behind her.

  Devon started a little. “Shhh,” he murmured, nuzzling her neck.

  She hummed under her breath and then sighed, settled back against him.

  Wrapping an arm around her waist, he closed his eyes. Sleep dropped down on him like a leaden weight.

  SHE was surrounded by warmth.

  At her back, there was a plush wall, and along her front, a hard, warm body. She recognized his scent even in her sleep, and with a happy sigh, she snuggled against him. His hand stroked down her side, and it never occurred to her that maybe she should be afraid.

  Content, warm, safe, she settled deeper into sleep. And that was where fear waited to strike. In reality, she lay on the couch, wrapped in Luke’s arms, but in her dreams, she wasn’t pressed up against Luke but pinned under him. His voice, familiar but not, was a low, ugly whisper in her ear, and when he told her what he planned to do to her, she wanted to scream.