Vulnerable.
Those piercing, intense eyes were shuttered. His lips were soft and slightly parted and she could hear his soft, even breaths. Even the furrows at the top of his nose had softened. Anna willed herself not to move. She didn’t want to wake him. Heaven knew, he needed the sleep. Nobody could keep up the kind of pace Luke did without coming to physical harm. It was no wonder he snapped at the people around him occasionally.
So she stayed awake. Holding this man she was coming to feel more deeply for every day. Wanting to protect him and give him the healing rest that only sleep could provide. That was probably why she felt the moment the nightmare started. The way the muscles beneath her hands and arms became so tense. She could hear the way his breathing became shallow and rapid. His heart was pounding beneath his ribs and she could feel the rumble of his moan even before it reached his lips.
‘No-o-o-o …’
‘Luke. Wake up.’ Anna held him more tightly. ‘It’s all right. It’s just a bad dream.’
She couldn’t hold him now. The strength in his body was frightening as he twisted and fought whatever demons had come in his sleep. Anna could see the sheen of sweat on his body. His breath came in choking gasps now—as though he was suffocating.
‘Arghhh!’ The sound was one of agony.
The covers were hurled back from the bed and Luke swung his legs over the side. He was almost crouching there and he covered his face with his hands.
Anna scrambled to her knees and across the bed. Kneeling behind Luke, she wrapped her arms around him.
‘It’s all right,’ she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t betray how shaky she was feeling. ‘I’m here, Luke. You had a nightmare.’ That’s all, she wanted to add, but bit the words back. This wasn’t something that should be belittled in any way.
His breathing was slowing now. For a moment he leaned back into Anna’s embrace but then he lurched to his feet.
‘I need some fresh air,’ was all he said. He began dragging on clothes. Fleecy track pants. Running shoes.
She couldn’t make him tell her anything about the nightmare if he didn’t want to. Anna closed her eyes. Waiting. Hoping.
‘You …’ Luke paused as he got halfway across the room but he didn’t turn round. ‘You weren’t … I didn’t want you to see that.’
‘It was a nightmare, Luke. Don’t go. You don’t have to run away from it.’
The huff of sound from him was angry. She knew nothing. And he wanted it to stay that way.
‘Would you rather I went home?’
‘Up to you. I won’t come back to bed. I’ve got some work I may as well do now that I’m awake. After my run.’
And with that he was gone.
Anna didn’t want to wait. There was no moon tonight so she wouldn’t be able to see him down on the beach. She didn’t want to watch either. Luke had his own way of dealing with whatever was bothering him and it didn’t include her.
What was she to him? With a sinking heart Anna found her clothes and then the keys to her car. Was this just about the sex?
Distraction?
When she arrived home to her cold cottage, Anna put an electric heater on and made a pot of tea. It was nearly 4 a.m. and she was far too wound up to go to sleep again. She missed Crash.
Opening her briefcase, she got her laptop out and connected to the internet. With no emails that caught her interest, she idly clicked on a search engine and stared at the flashing cursor.
‘PTSD’, she tapped in on impulse.
So many sites. She opened the one that had been given first place in the queue and within minutes she was totally engrossed.
Post traumatic stress disorder was a syndrome that could develop following any traumatic event. Things like natural disasters and car crashes, violent assaults or even medical procedures, especially for children. Top of the list, however, as she’d known quite well, was war.
Traumatic experience put the mind and body into a state of shock, she read, but most people could make some sense of what had happened, process the resulting emotions and come out of it eventually. In PTSD, the person remained in psychological shock. There was a disconnection between the memory of the event and how the victim felt about it.
Anna read on, almost feverishly, skipping a few paragraphs to the heading of ‘Symptoms’.
Nightmares.
Flashbacks.
Difficulty falling or staying asleep.
Irritability or outbursts of anger.
She found herself nodding at that one. She hadn’t said anything about the way Luke had snapped at that poor theatre nurse the other day but other people were talking about it. And about the way he had avoided all social invitations outside the hospital over the Christmas and New Year period. Some were keen to remember his odd behaviour at the one event he had attended and the way he’d stormed out of the canteen.
Her eyes drifted further down the list. Not that she needed any more information to confirm what she was already convinced of.
Depression was common. So was guilt. People often attempted to numb themselves through substance abuse. Luke obviously avoided drinking but wouldn’t his exercise regime fit into the same category? How numb would you get, running or swimming in the middle of winter? And physical pain could override mental suffering.
The victim could also feel detached from others and emotionally numb. They would have a sense of a limited future and wouldn’t expect to live a normal life span or get married and have a family. PTSD would harm relationships, the ability to function and their quality of life.
There were treatments suggested, of course, but they came with the background rider that the sufferer had to be willing to confront it and not see the admission as a sign of weakness. Luke had been brought up in a military family. Was it the kind of thing that didn’t get mentioned? That he wouldn’t be able to allow himself to admit? He’d denied having flashbacks. Pushed her away in the wake of that nightmare. He ‘hadn’t wanted her to see it’. Had he ever, in fact, gone to sleep before when she’d been in the same bed?
Maybe her intrusion into his personal life was making it worse. Removing opportunities he might have otherwise had to sleep. Putting stress on him by making him think he had to factor her into a future that might already seem too difficult.
It was so clear to her that Luke was suffering from PTSD. It was also very clear that the only way to conquer it was to confront it. Somehow he would have to learn to accept it as part of his past. Numbing it or pushing the memories away would only make it worse and it was more likely to emerge under stress.
The sound of a distant beeping finally intruded on Anna’s thoughts and she realised her alarm clock was going off. Her huff of laughter was ironic. It was time to get up and get ready for work. With a heavy heart she went through the motions, but she couldn’t stop thinking about the pieces that had finally fallen into place and created a picture so much darker than she had feared.
As far as she was concerned, she was a part of that picture. She was in far too deep to escape. She didn’t want to.
For better or worse, she had fallen in love with Luke Davenport.
She wanted to help him.
But how?
CHAPTER NINE
‘WHAT’S this?’ Anna had stooped to pick something up from the floor of Luke’s office.
He glanced at the scalloped, gilt-edged card she was holding. Damn, he hadn’t noticed he’d missed his aim.
‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘It was supposed to go in the bin.’
‘But …’ Anna was reading the fancy calligraphy and then she looked up with a stunned expression on her face. ‘Luke … this is an invitation to a medal ceremony, isn’t it? Returning Heroes. With a ball to honour the recipients of the medals.’
‘I’m not going. I hate parties.’ Luke swivelled his desk chair so that he could drop a file into the cabinet behind him. ‘Was there something you wanted to talk to me about?’
‘Yes.’
Another f
ile tab caught Luke’s eye and he pulled it out. It took several seconds to register the silence. Anna wasn’t going to talk to him until she was confident he was listening.
Fine. He swung the chair back around. ‘What do you want to talk about?’
She was still holding the card and looked down at it again. ‘This.’
‘That’s not why you came in here. You didn’t know it existed.’ He could feel his eyes narrowing as he sighed. ‘What was the real reason you came in?’
‘This isn’t even an invitation. It says you’re “required to attend”. That sounds pretty official. Will you get into trouble if you don’t go?’
Luke gave a huff of laughter. ‘What can they do? Kick me out of the army? Give my medal to someone else? That’s fine by me. I don’t want the damn medal.’
‘Why not?’ Anna sank into the other chair in his office but her gaze was unwavering. Fixed on Luke. She wasn’t going to let this one go.
He felt trapped. Angry. The way he had ever since he’d woken from that nightmare to find Anna in his bed. This was becoming a problem. OK, the sex was great. She was great. He loved seeing her like this, at work, in her neat clothes and with her hair all scraped back. Being completely professional in their interactions while all the time they both knew what it would be like after, away from work.
When the clothes came off and the communication came through touch and not words. When they could both escape to a place that promised only pleasure.
But maybe it had run its course. It wasn’t going to work. Not long term.
She was already too close. Had seen too much. She didn’t represent a rope that he could use to help him into his future any more. She was starting to resemble a roadway. With traffic in both directions. He didn’t want to go back. He couldn’t. Because if he did, he would be taking Anna with him and she would see who he really was and then she would be the one to go.
And that might finally destroy him.
Anna could see the play of emotion on Luke’s face. The annoyance that she was pushing when he’d made it clear he wasn’t interested in either going to this ceremony or talking about it. She knew perfectly well she was stepping over a boundary here. She could almost see him weighing up whether she was worth the trouble.
Would he tell her to get out? Push so hard she had no choice but to leave? He’d been holding her at a distance ever since that nightmare. They hadn’t been to bed together for three days now. They hadn’t even spent that much time together at work. He was avoiding her because he didn’t want to talk about the nightmare. Probably didn’t want to admit how often he had them. Or that they happened at all, like the flashbacks. Talking about this medal ceremony and what it had to remind him of might tip them over the edge and it would all be over, but it was a risk Anna had no choice but to take.
Maybe Luke needed a push himself to recognize that he had PTSD. He had to be willing to confront his past. She was quite prepared to help him and be with him through any rough patches but only if it was part of a healing process. Otherwise she would just be locking herself into a miserable cycle of watching the man she loved suffer. Getting pushed away and hurt herself and then crawling back for more of the same.
She wasn’t going to do it. If she did, she would only be allowing Luke to stay locked in that dark space permanently and he was worth more than that.
‘Why not, Luke?’ she asked again. ‘Why don’t you want to get the recognition you deserve? It’s your name that’s right at the top of that list. Does your family know about this? Will they be there, hoping to be part of the honour?’
‘I don’t want the damned medal.’ The words burst out in an angry rush as Luke leaned forward on his desk, both hands clenched into fists. ‘I haven’t told my family because I don’t want to celebrate what happened. Or to glorify war. To pretty it up for the media with everyone in nice, clean uniforms and rows of shiny badges. Dancing, for God’s sake! That’s about as meaningless as everything else in civilian life.’ He lowered his voice and it became rough. Totally compelling. ‘War is about blood and guts and people. People who can be terrified they’re not going to get back to the ones they love. Who can die, in agony, a thousand miles away from the people who love them.’
He tipped his head back, closing his eyes. ‘Yes, I survived. But what about all the others?’
Slowly, he brought his gaze back to Anna’s. His eyes were dark. So shadowed they were blank of emotion. Like the rest of his face. ‘I don’t want a prize for being one of the lucky ones.’
Anna swallowed. Hard. She was part of his civilian life. Meaningless.
The silence stretched on. Tense and horrible. She had to say something. To try and defuse this awful distance escalating between them.
‘Yes, war is about people,’ she said finally. ‘That’s how they generally start, isn’t it? You have a group of people, including innocent children, who lose their lives or have their rights as human beings threatened or taken away. Most people have to try and close their minds to the atrocities that go on because it doesn’t affect their lives and they can’t do anything about it, anyway.’ She drew in a breath, the words coming more easily now. ‘But some people are brave enough to put their hands up and say, I’ll help. I’ll go into horrible places and endure terrible things. Not because I might end up getting a medal for it but because it might—eventually—help to make the world a better place.’
Was he listening? Anna couldn’t tell. She was talking hard and fast now, barely forming the thoughts before the words tumbled from her mouth. Desperately trying to let Luke know, somehow, that it was all right to have this as part of his past. That she accepted it. And if she talked enough, maybe by some miracle she could say something that would get through to him. Stop him from shutting her out and pushing her out of his life.
‘If enough people didn’t avoid even thinking about wars, maybe something could change without people having to die,’ she continued. ‘And maybe the publicity that comes from something like this is what makes them take notice. It’s the heroes that people can’t help taking notice of. That they listen to.’
Luke was staring at her now but his face was still devoid of emotion.
‘Maybe the people who take the most notice are the ones who’ve lost someone they love. Because they have to try and make sense of it all.’
Which was exactly what Luke needed to do himself, wasn’t it?
‘Or maybe it’s the people who will feel lucky for the rest of their lives because someone they love has come home. Thanks to one of those heroes. I’ll bet the families of all the soldiers you saved would love to give you a medal, Luke, but they don’t have to, do they? The army is going to do it for them.’
Still no reaction. Anna felt a flicker of anger. ‘How do you think they’ll feel if you can’t be bothered to show up?’
That did it. Luke’s face finally moved but it was only to turn away from her. ‘Are you finished?’
‘No.’ Anna’s mouth had gone dry. This was it. She had failed. He wasn’t going to let her into this part of his life. Her breath came out in a ragged sigh. She closed her eyes in defeat. ‘The party wouldn’t be so bad,’ she said dryly. ‘At least nobody would be wearing reindeer horns.’
Opening her eyes, she found Luke had turned back to face her. For a heartbeat her flippant comment hung in the air and then she saw a change in Luke’s eyes. A lightening of those shadows. A vaguely incredulous expression that took her back to …
Oh, help. Back to that day when Luke had come to her cottage and discovered Anna instead of his colleague, Dr Bartlett. When she’d made that stupid joke about unlikely dogs using a staircase to become mates. So she was no good at cracking jokes? Did he have to look at her as though he was seeing someone he didn’t even recognise?
Someone stupid, maybe, who said meaningless things that made him wonder why on earth he’d ever been attracted to her?
But Luke’s lips were moving now.
Good grief! He was smiling. Virtually g
rinning.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘I’ll go. On one condition.’
‘What’s that?’ The relief that he wasn’t shouting at her or physically throwing her out of his office was enormous. It was making her feel light-headed. Ridiculously happy.
Hopeful, even.
‘That you come with me.’
Anna’s head cleared astonishingly quickly. An image of a military ball sprang into her head. Men in dress uniform. Luke in dress uniform. He would look impossibly gorgeous. And she would have to be dressed up and feminine. No way would she be on ground where she could feel like an equal. But they weren’t equal, were they? Even here. Not on emotional grounds, anyway.
She would be so proud of him if she went. She would be getting herself in ever deeper.
But wasn’t that what she wanted? Needed? Or was it that she knew she should fight it but just couldn’t help herself?
Anna shook her head, trying to clear the confused jumble of her thoughts. Luke misinterpreted the gesture as reluctance.
‘You think I should go,’ he said. ‘And you’re probably correct.’
Another memory was niggling at Anna now. She’d persuaded Luke to attend the staff Christmas function by telling him that heads of departments would be expected to attend. Look what had happened there. How much more likely would a flashback be when he was surrounded by army uniforms and by people wanting to talk about why he was being honoured as a hero?
‘I won’t go unless you come with me,’ Luke said quietly. ‘Please, Anna. I … need you.’
Three little words. Possibly the only three she’d ever hear from Luke but maybe they were enough.
‘All right,’ she said with a catch in her voice. ‘I’ll come with you.’
Why had he been so determined not to attend this event?
So bad-tempered about having to put on his dress uniform ‘Blues’ and act like a soldier? Gritting his teeth as he’d accepted all the congratulations that came with the medal now pinned to his tunic.
Hating it all so much he’d barely spoken to Anna, even though he could see how much effort she’d put into this on his behalf. Buying a new dress and having her hair done in some fancy way. Putting up with his foul mood for the whole of their drive to London. All those long stretches when the only sound in the vehicle had been the windscreen wipers trying to cope with the sleet of the January evening.
St Piran's: The Brooding Heart Surgeon Page 12