by Lori Ryan
“That hasn’t happened in a while,” he said, his eyes meeting Ernie’s as frustration and anger swamped him in the wake of the emotional beating of the flashback.
“They should come with less frequency over time, but one of the most important things will be for you to learn to pull yourself out of them if there isn’t someone there to do it for you. You’ll need to coach yourself to do the things we’ve done together. Focus on your surroundings. Deep breathing. Some people find it helpful to do some tactile exercises, such as touching your thumb to each finger slowly, as you take a breath.”
Logan nodded, but his jaw was clenched in frustration. Over the past three weeks, he’d felt like his sessions with Ernie were helping, like he was getting better. He’d started driving to work at times that were slightly closer to typical commute times. Not peak, but closer.
Hell, he’d even thought about asking Samantha to go on a real date with him. He thought maybe he was ready to take a chance on them. On them being together, finally. They’d continued to spend every lunch hour together and he’d even hung out at her house with her after work a few times, but he hadn’t kissed her again because he’d known he needed to do better by her before he let that happen.
And now this.
Ernie handed him a fresh bottle of water and took a seat across from Logan on the couch.
“Tell me again about Dopey’s flag burning speech,” Ernie said, in the start to what Logan was recognizing as a repeated pattern. Ernie had asked Logan to bring him back to that discussion again and again over the past few weeks, even having him describe things like the smell of the room, who was sitting where, who wore what clothes, and so on. Every detail he could remember was relived over and over again.
Logan launched into the recital now and realized, again, that it got easier in the retelling of it. The ache at again hearing Dopey’s words in his head lessened each time.
When he finished this time, though, Ernie went on to ask him to do something much harder. “Now tell me about the memory you just lost yourself in a minute ago.”
Logan looked up at him in horror. He couldn’t go back there. No freaking way.
Ernie acted as though he weren’t asking for anything difficult. “Tell me where you were.”
Logan looked at him a long time before he eked out an answer, his voice tight and stiff with tension. “Classified.”
And it was. He wasn’t just using that as a bullshit excuse.
“No problem. Just paint the picture for me. Not a country or province. Just the setting. The woods? A dirt road? Jungle? Sweltering heat or dead cold of winter?”
Logan took a deep breath through his nose and held it in, only releasing it when he felt his lungs begin to burn. As a former SEAL, that was quite some time.
“Dirt road. Dust storm. Hoofing it out of—” He stopped. He couldn’t say.
“Tell me about the smells,” Ernie’s low voice prompted.
Hell.
Logan rubbed a hand down his face and braced himself. Then he took one more deep, cleansing breath, and pushed on. He knew with certainty that the next few weeks would be spent with Ernie asking him to retell this story to him again and again. He stood and went to the pool table, racking the balls and began his story as he did.
“It’s a smell that never goes away,” he said as Ernie joined him. Ernie didn’t comment. He just picked up his cue and rounded the table, waiting for Logan to break.
Chapter Eleven
“You okay? You’ve been quiet the last few days,” Sam said as she hip-checked Logan. They stood in the backyard at Jack and Kelly’s at another barbeque. The couple was famous for barbeques. Even at five months pregnant, Kelly seemed to bounce around the yard, loving her role as hostess and chasing after not only her own daughter, but the other kids at the gathering as well.
Logan nodded and gave her a smile, but she didn’t buy it. She narrowed her eyes at him. He wasn’t okay and she knew it. He’d seemed to be doing so much better but something was happening in the last few days and she was afraid he was sliding down hill.
“I don’t believe it, babe,” Sam said, knocking into him again.
“Babe?” He laughed as he raised a brow at her and hip-checked her back. The sound of the laughter coming from deep in his chest was genuine and it lightened Sam’s own chest in return. It felt good to hear that sound.
“Yeah, babe,” she said and smiled cheekily at him, happy she’d gotten a rise out of him. But, then he quieted and his gaze latched onto hers. Her breath caught in her chest as she waited to see what he would say.
“Shit’s just been getting, uh…a little more intense at the counselor. It’s just been a little tough lately.”
Sam slipped her hand in his and squeezed. “I think it’s pretty great that you’re doing that. That you’re putting yourself through something that has to be incredibly hard, to get better. It sucks that you need to, you know?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well.” Sam brushed her hair back and looked at him with rounded eyes. “If you think about it, it sucks that you have to fight this battle here, now, after fighting so many battles for us overseas. You did your part, you know? You should be able to come home and live in peace. Instead, you’re having to fight all over again to get your life back. It’s not fair.”
Hell if something didn’t catch in his chest, his throat. If he didn’t know better, he’d think he was fighting…tears? Oh, hell no.
“You know I might not ever be one hundred percent again, right? I might not ever be able to go out in crowds or sit in a crowded restaurant and be comfortable. You get that, right?”
She nodded. “I get it. I’m okay with that.” Sam looked across to where Chad and Jennie were and nodded toward them.
“You know, Chad still has problems every once in a while. He has nightmares sometimes, things Jennie has to pull him out of.” Sam grinned at Logan. “She told me if I ever have to wake you up from a nightmare, I need to stand way across the room and call to you. She said it’s safer than trying to wake you while we’re lying in bed.”
Her words had the desired effect as Logan’s eyes darkened and sparked to life in front of her, his look heating in a heartbeat. He tugged her hand closer to him, using it to turn her and pull her body flush to his. They hadn’t stood like this since that kiss in her office weeks ago, but her body recognized his immediately and warmed to it. Heck, warmed was an understatement. It melted and she fell into him, leaning against the hard planes of his chest, her thighs pressed to his.
“Do you want that, Samantha?” he asked and the growl in his voice, the way he used her full name and let it fall off his tongue, sent heat and moisture between her legs. It felt as though he caressed her from head to toe. “Do you want to lie in bed with me?”
“Oh God, yes,” she said and then gasped at how desperately needy and downright horny she’d sounded. She laughed nervously but he dipped his head to hers and brushed his mouth to her lips. His kiss was soft and light, teasing and taunting her.
“Soon,” he whispered. “Soon, Samantha. I don’t think I can wait much longer for you.”
Sam couldn’t say a word as he watched her intently, and then he was kissing her again. This time, he took her completely, controlling her every move with his mouth, his tongue, his hands on her body, molding her body to fit his. She’d all but forgotten where they were and gladly would have torn her clothes off and let him take her right then and there, but he pulled back and cleared his throat, looking around.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have let that get out of hand. Not here with everyone,” he said.
Sam wanted to suggest they could remedy that by going to her place, or his place, or the closet for that matter. But he’d said soon and she knew she needed to wait for him to be ready. He’d said he wasn’t ready yet and she needed to honor that. She shivered in anticipation as he bent to whisper against her ear.
“Soon, Sam. I promise.”
Chapter Twelve
And, he was right. Another couple of weeks and Sam could see Logan was feeling better and better. He’d told her he was still seeing his counselor twice a week and she could see the difference it was making. She thought just the fact that he told her about it meant something. She had a feeling not many tough-as-dirt, former special operators would readily admit they needed help to just anyone.
Jack and Chad had ended up having a lot harder time tracing the bugs than they’d thought they would. Whoever it was, they were using pretty advanced equipment, which made Sam more uneasy but also seemed, to her, to point toward a competitor. Competitors of Sutton Capital would have the funding for the kind of technology that had been planted on her.
Sam smiled at Logan as they walked into her favorite Mexican restaurant together. It was their first date outside of the house and they’d waited until after the dinner rush would be over to arrive. The restaurant wasn’t overly full and Logan had called ahead and asked for a specific table to be reserved for them. He was fairly confident he could handle a meal out if he sat with his back to the wall close to the rear entrance to the restaurant when there weren’t many people dining.
Sam had told him if he ended up feeling panicked, they’d just get their food to go and head to her place to eat. She meant it, too. She didn’t have any problem making accommodations for him. And, honestly, she would have been happy dining on takeout as they usually did at her house, but something seemed to have shifted in Logan recently. She had a feeling he needed to do this.
She’d read once that what made special ops guys so special was, not just the determination never to give up, but the inability to give up no matter what they were faced with. One person had said they were too stupid to give up, but she knew Logan and the guys he’d served with were far from unintelligent. In fact, she would bet their ability to think quickly and change things up in an op, based on any contingency, was part of what made them so special. Still, she thought she understood what that person had meant. Too stupid to give up in the sense that a special operator would go on, no matter what, no matter the odds. And she had a feeling that was what pushed Logan now. Not only did he want to get back some semblance of a life without panic attacks and the stress of living with a body that thought it constantly needed to be in fight-or-flight mode, but he simply didn’t have it in him to give up.
“Hungry?” he asked as they walked toward the entrance, his hand on her lower back and his other hand reaching to open the door for her.
“Starved,” she said with a grin, but she noted the way his eyes scanned their surroundings and she hoped he was right that he was ready for this. She had no way of knowing if his scanning was simply a habit he wouldn’t ever get rid of after his years in and out of combat situations, or if it was hypervigilance that was harmful and a sign that he was still struggling.
“You’re sure you’re all right with this?” Sam looked at Logan as they stood waiting for the hostess to show them to their table.
“Absolutely,” he said with another smile for her, and her heart kicked because she believed him. It felt good to realize he was getting better. If anyone deserved it, he did.
And she still believed him an hour and a half later when they left the restaurant with his arm around her waist and her head tucked against his shoulder. He hadn’t seemed to panic once the entire meal and she felt like a princess the whole time.
Sam had never really had the experience of feeling like a princess. She’d always been bigger than her friends and sisters. Guys tended to want to be her friend, not her lover. Logan didn’t make her feel that way at all. She felt desirable and near sexy with him.
“You are my sexy princess,” he whispered in her ear as he tugged her into his arms in front of the passenger door to his car.
“Damn,” she said, looking up at him.
His laugh was deep and easy and it hit her straight in the heart, just like it always did.
“Yes, that was out loud,” he said, dropping a kiss to her nose. His look went from amused to heated in a heartbeat as he looked at her, and then his hands cupped her face and he leaned in and kissed her. Her body tingled as his hands swept down her cheeks and his fingers laced in her hair as he pulled her closer and deepened his kiss. His tongue tangled with hers and his lips moved over hers with just enough pressure to make her want more.
But he froze and stopped, long before she wanted him to. Sam could feel his body tighten, not with the need and heat of a moment ago, but with something else. A soldier’s guard.
He kept his hands where they were and dipped his head next to her ear, whispering close.
“Do you feel that?”
Sam nodded. She’d wondered if he would notice the sensation of being watched. It unsettled her to know that he did because it meant it wasn’t just the fact that she knew her purse and coat carried the listening devices Chad and Logan had asked her not to remove yet. They were still trying to track where the devices were transmitting to and she’d been chalking the eerie feeling that overcame her from time to time up to the bugs, and nothing more.
“Have you felt it before?” He skimmed his mouth across hers as he asked the question, but the feeling was different. Right now, he was in cover mode, using the kiss to cover their conversation from prying eyes. They still spoke at a whisper and she hoped it was enough to prevent whoever was listening through her purse and coat from hearing.
She nodded again. His eyes flared, angry for a moment before he reached behind him to open the passenger door of the car. He opened it, deposited her inside and then scanned the area as he walked around to the driver’s side before getting in. Logan didn’t ask before he rifled around in her purse, pulling out the jamming device and clicking it on, before growling at her through clenched teeth.
“You mean to tell me you’ve felt eyes on you before tonight and you didn’t think to tell me? Or Chad? Or any freaking one? What the hell, Sam?”
She shrugged, but it was a weak shrug because what she really wanted to do was crawl under the seat to escape the dangerous glint in his eye.
“I thought it was just because of the bugs I knew I was carrying around. It seemed to make sense at the time.”
He must have realized he was scaring her because he took a few deep, purposeful breaths and when he looked back at her, his gaze had softened. He shoved the car in gear and pulled out of the parking lot.
“Let’s get you out of here,” he said.
Sam was quiet for a bit before deciding to break the strained silence in the car. She really had been happy about where their evening had been going, but she also couldn’t ignore the reality of what was happening now. For whatever reason, someone was watching her.
“Could you see anyone back there?” She wanted to turn and look behind them but fought the urge.
“No. Nothing. But, I know that feeling, it’s not something we can ignore.”
He pulled the car into her parking lot and pulled it right up in front of the door rather than over in one of the guest parking spots.
“Wait.” His tone was brusque and no-nonsense, and even though she bristled about being given the command, she followed it. She wasn’t an idiot. If Logan thought she was in trouble, she needed to listen to him.
She watched nervously as Logan stood outside the car, his body placed strategically near her door as he scanned the area. He opened the door and reached a hand in.
“Keys.”
She handed the keys to the house to him and watched as he went to unlock the door, then returned to escort her from the car to the door. Inside the door, she punched in her alarm code, locking the door behind them and resetting the alarm to active. Then they went through the same routine they’d gone through when he’d cleared her home for her after the bugs initially showed up. It seemed that now he knew there was more of a threat, he’d gone into full-blown protection mode.
Maybe that shouldn’t have sent an erotic thrill through her, but it did.
When he finished his search of the house
, he returned to Sam and tugged her into the living room to the couch, pulling her down to sit next to him.
“You doing okay?” He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, eyes boring into hers.
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
She didn’t know why she was, to be honest. She just felt safe when she was with him. Like nothing could get through him to get to her. It might not be precisely true, but it was how she felt.
“I’m going to call Zach and have him send someone over to watch the house while I run home and grab my things.”
“Grab your things?” she asked. Her heart rate seemed to jump a few beats per minute when she realized what he meant. He planned to stay with her. Here. In her house.
He must have realized she’d made the connection. “Is that all right? If not, I could see if one of Zach’s guys could stay in your guest room.”
Sam laughed. She had to admire him for trying to get that out without growling. She could see the tension in his jawline. She reached out and ran her finger over the small tick that had begun just below his right eyebrow.
“Take it easy, big guy. I’d rather have you here with me than any of them.”
He growled at her then, and swooped in to take her mouth with his, stealing the laughter, and taking her breath with it. She leaned into him and moaned.
When he pulled away and let her catch her breath, his gaze was heated and her whole body felt achy and needy again. He had that effect on her so quickly it frightened her a bit, but she shoved away any thought of hesitating with him. She wanted this. Wanted him.
“I’m not going to stay in the guest room, Samantha,” he said as his teeth nipped her bottom lip and she moaned again for him. Her arms came up to wrap around his neck and she all but crawled in his lap at that point, kissing him back with all the frustration she’d built up at waiting for him. God, how she wanted this with him.
When she’d first spotted Logan at Jesse and Zach’s wedding, she never thought, in a million years, she’d be here with him. That he’d want her this way. She had no doubts now. He’d shown her how much he wanted her. If she’d had any doubts left, the erection pressing into her bottom as he tugged her fully onto his lap put any doubts to rest. It also caused her to press her thighs together as the sweet ache between her legs increased to maddening proportions and she felt herself go wet and swollen for him.