He glanced at his family, sucked it up, and did what they’d brought him here to do. “Can I get a leg up?” He bit the words out through his locked jaw. He asked, but he didn’t have to like it or the need for him to have assistance to get on his damn horse.
Without a word, she waved Trinity over to take the puppy. Jamie dropped into a lunge. He reluctantly put his foot on her thigh, much lower than the stirrup he couldn’t reach with the injuries to his hip and leg. She grabbed hold of his ankle and calf to stabilize him. He dropped his cane, grabbed the pommel and saddle, and hoisted himself up, swinging his other leg over the saddle as she lifted him by his leg.
Pain lanced up and down his thigh, up his hip, and into his lower back. He grimaced and let loose a muffled curse and groan. Every little movement hurt, but getting up on Thor was excruciating.
He settled into the saddle and stuffed his feet into the stirrups, hoping the pain would subside, but knowing it would remain unrelenting.
“Better than last week?”
“Sure,” he bit out.
“You need to get back to regular physical therapy.”
“Uh-huh.”
She walked over to her fiancé, Ford, and kissed him for a long moment, their connection and love evident. It seemed so easy between them.
Drake had hoped he and Melanie would be like that again. He accepted her initial shock to his scars. The damage was a lot to take in, but he thought she’d sympathize, then see the guy she loved no matter what had happened to him.
He expected too much.
He wasn’t that guy anymore. And what she saw in him now wasn’t what she wanted.
He wanted to blame her, but he hadn’t made it easy for her to stay. Her reaction made him mad. He didn’t hide his disappointment. And when he tried to make up with her and couldn’t, he got even angrier.
She walked away without really trying to understand all he couldn’t put into words. She gave up on him, and them, without ever trying to prove to him what they shared mattered more than the changes in him.
Jamie gave Ford a blinding smile and mounted her horse. “We’re out of here.” Jamie kicked her mount to walk down the lane.
Drake followed, mostly because Thor wanted to follow her mare. He tried to block out the pain and overwhelming feeling of danger that wasn’t there and concentrate on the ride and the beautiful landscape around him. He used to love being outside in the sun and wind and open space and tried to find that feeling inside him.
Jamie gave him a good twenty minutes to settle into the ride before she came at him again. “So, if you don’t want to talk about what happened in Afghanistan, then tell me about Melanie.”
Of course Trinity spilled that piece of his past to Jamie. His sister, and his brothers for that matter, should stay the hell out of his life.
Jamie narrowed her gaze. “We’re not going back until you talk about something.”
Like he couldn’t turn Thor around and head back to the ranch anytime he wanted. Even though riding hurt like hell, and he’d pay for it all night and days to come, he liked being on horseback, seeing the land and feeling the wind on his face.
Jamie ignored the fact he remained on high alert. He tried to fight the urge to head for cover.
“When’s the wedding?” Women liked to talk about such things. Better to let her talk about that than him trying to explain something he couldn’t come to terms with or articulate. He hurt. He raged. He wanted to know why all those good men had to die. He wanted to know why he’d been spared only to live in agony.
It was worse than hell.
Jamie ignored his question and asked one of her own. “Did you love her?”
He had no idea anymore. He liked knowing she was home waiting for him, that when he walked in the door she’d smile and his heart would feel light and he could focus on her and not what he’d done. What he’d seen. What haunted him.
Jamie shared a little more of her life. “When I came home, I couldn’t wait to see the people I left behind. But at the same time, I didn’t want them to see me.”
That about summed it up. He wanted Melanie to see only the man she fell in love with. He wanted things to be exactly the same as before a bomb blew up his life. “I’m not the person they remember. They don’t want to know me now.”
“It took me a long time to figure out that once I accepted what happened, grieved for all I’d lost, and found a way to live again, I’m not that different.”
“I am that different.” He didn’t recognize anything about himself anymore. He used to be so laid-back, focused but fun to be around. He never used his size or strength to intimidate or hurt anyone. Now he couldn’t control himself.
“I lashed out. I shot Ford in the arm. Tried to kill him twice. Well, not him, but what I saw in my mind.”
Drake shifted in the saddle and looked at her. The truth was in her eyes. She’d been that out of control. And lost.
He sometimes couldn’t find his way out of his head.
“And he stayed with you?” Obviously. But Drake couldn’t imagine the person he loved trying to kill him—twice—and sticking around for more.
Melanie got out before any of his real mental problems touched her.
He was oddly happy about that.
Jamie brought her horse up close to his. “He saw the pain inside me. He saw how much I was suffering. He wanted to fix me. Your family wants to fix you. But the only person who can fix you is you.”
“I’m not damaged, Jamie. I’m broken. I can’t be what they want anymore.” He couldn’t be the man Melanie, or any woman, deserved. The life he’d dreamed of having after his military career would forever remain a fantasy.
“Ford believed in me. He supported me even in the worst of times. Your family wants to do that for you.”
Melanie bowed out before things got really bad.
“I know.” His family had his back no matter what. But he also knew their bringing him here two weeks in a row meant their patience was wearing thin.
How long before they gave up on him, too?
“You will find someone who sees the pain, the suffering, and the man buried beneath all that.”
Was it crazy to think that sounded like a prophecy?
Wishful thinking. That’s all.
He was grasping at smoke.
But God, what he wouldn’t give to hold a woman in his arms and feel her wrapped around him and let the smell of her, the feel of her, and the well of pleasure fill him up and push out the bad.
That’s what he’d hoped would happen with Melanie. That somehow her love would eradicate the nightmares.
But that was too easy. Too much to ask of one person.
Chapter Five
Exhausted, finally numbed out on the pain meds he took the second he got back to Rambling Range after his ride with Jamie, Drake barely kept his eyes open in the front seat of the truck on the drive home.
Jamie got him to open up and tell her about Melanie. Mostly because it was the only thing in his head. He never wanted to think about her again.
He regretted the way he acted. He’d given her reason, and then some, to stop trying and walk away. He wasn’t the man he used to be, and he’d given her little reason to love, let alone like, the new him.
It made him think about something Ford’s Grandpa Sammy said during his and Jamie’s engagement announcement last week. The words echoed in his head.
Love is too precious to waste, too good to let go, and too wonderful not to enjoy.
Sometimes, though, love wasn’t enough and it walked right out of your life.
Or walked right in.
That stray thought popped into his mind the second a beautiful woman walked out of the stables headed straight for him.
Them.
His heart stopped, and for a second he couldn’t breathe.
“I call dibs,” Tate said from the backseat.
Declan stopped the truck, threw it in Park, and shut off the engine. “I’m older. I get her.”
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Trinity smacked both of them. “Keep your hands to yourselves. She’s my new business partner and I won’t have you drooling over her.”
Brown cowboy boots, faded blue jeans, a simple V-neck white T, soft curves, clean face, and long golden hair all made for one hell of a package, but her blue eyes held Drake spellbound. In their depths he caught a deep sadness, hurt, shyness, and compassion. Trinity practically tackled her in a hug that made her take a step back before she held on to Trinity. Two golden heads together in a hug that showed how close they were to each other.
He wanted that moment for himself.
He wanted that woman to hug him like that. Like it mattered.
“Let’s go say hi to Adria.” Tate jumped out to do that, but Declan stayed put. “Trinity hasn’t stopped talking about her, but she never said anything about her being that pretty.”
Pretty?
Her heart-stopping beauty punched him in the chest. Adria was nothing short of knockout gorgeous.
And not for him.
Drake grabbed the door handle, but didn’t even get the door open before the puppy his brothers and sister refused to take off his hands woke up beside him and pounced on his chest and Declan went on about Adria.
Pretty name.
“She’s staying here for a while. You okay with that?”
“Whatever.” Drake didn’t remember Trinity talking about her coming. He blanked on a lot of what happened these days. He used to be so on top of everything. Now he felt like he was losing time along with his mind.
“She’s had it rough lately. Her sister OD’d a couple days ago. Adria brought her here to the rehab you got Chase Wilde into last month.”
He didn’t want to think that he’d wind up like Chase, popping pain pills to get through the day. Even the next minute. He needed his meds, but he didn’t use them to escape. But he was getting worried that he’d need them the rest of his life if this unrelenting pain didn’t subside.
“She and Trinity are going to set up shop in town.”
What shop? “What are you talking about?” How did he not know about this?
Declan rolled his eyes. “Get your head out of your ass and start participating in our lives instead of expecting us to be solely caught up in yours.” Declan turned his back, dropped out of the truck, and slammed the door.
Drake pushed aside his immediate denial and anger that his brother would say such a thing and admitted Declan spoke the truth.
Declan shook Adria’s hand, said something that made her smile and nod, and held on to her hand just a few seconds too long for Drake’s comfort. Why? He didn’t know. At least, he didn’t want to think about it.
Adria suddenly glanced at him. Their eyes locked. Her lips turned up in a slight smile.
And all of a sudden it hurt to look at her and remember that he wasn’t someone she needed or wanted to know.
He slid out of the truck. Even that small movement hurt like hell. Even worse, he needed the damn cane to balance his weight and not fall over. At the last second, he remembered the puppy, plucked him off the seat, pushed the door closed, and carried the wiggling little thing as he left his family at his back. He didn’t greet Adria, who should stay well away from him, and headed for the cabin and solitude.
His family didn’t know he went there all the time. Or maybe they did. But right now, he needed to escape them, his past, his thoughts, the pain . . . Everything.
The long walk only increased his simmering anger and amplified the pain in his hip and back.
Frustrated by it all, he climbed the steps and walked into the cabin, bypassed the open living room and kitchen, and headed for the bedroom and some peace and quiet. But when he walked in and spotted the open duffel bag, a white negligee hanging out of it, reminding him of what he’d never have again, rational thought escaped him, and he went ballistic.
He dropped the puppy on the bed, grabbed the offending piece of satin and lace, and ripped it in two, tossing it left and right, then sent the duffel flying off the bed with one swipe of his hand. It crashed into the dresser, sending the lotion, perfume bottle, and makeup bag scattering in a hail of eye shadows, lipsticks, and pencils raining onto the floor.
The sound of them hitting the hardwood like bullets and the puppy’s incessant yapping sent him into a blind rage and into the nightmare he couldn’t keep at bay any longer.
Chapter Six
“Come up to the house for a beer.” A spark of interest lit Tate’s eyes.
Adria already turned down saddling a horse and going for a sunset ride. She liked Tate, appreciated the flirtatious grin and his attempts to get to know her better, but right now she needed to focus on getting Almost Homemade up and running and her sister well.
She’d skip whatever this thing was that Tate was trying to initiate.
After her disaster date a few days ago, she put men and finding Mr. Right in the things-that-will-never-happen-to-me column along with being able to belt out a tune like Adele.
She just didn’t have it in her to try again right now and see it fall apart before it ever really got started because she didn’t respond to men the way other women did.
Exposing her issues to one of Trinity’s brothers would only make things difficult for her and her new business partner before they ever got the store off the ground.
Trinity smacked Tate in the gut with the back of her hand. “She’s had a hell of a day. Let her get settled in the cabin before you show her what a pest you can be.”
Adria appreciated her friend stepping in to make this a bit less awkward. Or more. Adria really couldn’t tell at this point. All she wanted to do was grab something to eat and spend a quiet night in, watching TV or just sleeping. Anything to take her mind off Juliana and the emptiness in her heart. She missed her sister terribly and it had only been a few hours.
“Thank you for the invitation, but Trinity and I are going to look at the storefront spaces early in the morning.”
Tate nodded. “Sorry to hear about your sister. Another time.”
She didn’t respond to that one way or the other. “Thanks for understanding.” She gave Trinity a hug. “You and me. Tomorrow. We will find an amazing space for our store.”
Trinity beamed with happiness. “I can’t wait. Your sister is so generous for giving you the money. I can’t believe we’re really going to open our own business.”
“Roxy believes in us.” And right now, Adria needed something to take her mind off Juliana. She needed to focus on something other than whether her sister would leave the rehab before she ever really gave it a chance.
Adria waved goodbye to Trinity and Tate and headed over to the cabin. She rolled her shoulders, easing the ache from feeding and watering all the horses in the stables before the family got home. In exchange for a place to stay, she’d promised to help out on the ranch.
Roxy taught her well how to care for the horses at Wild Rose Ranch, so she had that covered. She’d leave the cattle to Declan and Tate. Both capable and cute.
Drake intrigued her. Especially because he came with a warning. All three siblings ordered her to steer clear of the ex–Army Ranger. She wondered if he had a tattoo that said, Do Not Engage. Because his family made it clear his volatile temper could explode unexpectedly like an erupting volcano.
That thought evaporated when something thudded and crashed against the wall in the cabin. The barking puppy had her running up the steps, straight through the door, and into her bedroom. A lamp flew past her, inches from her head, and crashed against the door frame.
“What the actual fuck!”
Just as she got a glimpse of the destruction in the room—her torn clothes scattered everywhere and the bed in shambles, the mattress off-kilter—Drake came after her, diving and knocking her to the floor. His big body slammed into hers as they slid across the hardwood.
“Stay down.”
She tried to get free, but he outweighed her. By a lot.
Just like that, she was nine years old i
n a dingy apartment with a man she didn’t like, who wanted her to do things she didn’t understand.
Pinned beneath Drake, terrified and unable to move, her nightmare came back full force. Ice-cold fear raced through her veins and froze her.
And just like then, she recognized the only way to save herself was to go along because he could overpower her.
Drake rose up, hooked his arm around her waist, drew her to his chest, and dragged her back into the room, slamming the door. “I’ve got you, Chappie. Hold on.”
Chappie?
The past took over his mind, just like it had hers at odd moments. She knew how trauma could drag you back into the nightmares of what had happened, sink you in depression, make living hard, and force you to fight to find even one good thing in yourself and life again.
The flashback showed Drake a world only he could see. What set him off? She didn’t know. But he was lost in a reality where she couldn’t reach him.
Drake acted like something threw him off balance and he fell on his side, taking her with him. Drake screamed, but protected her head. Or in his mind, Chappie’s.
That protective instinct and the care he took with her—Chappie—helped ease her mind. He was trying to save his friend.
She breathed a little easier and the intensity of her fear washed away, but she remained cautious and alert.
Drake grabbed his left leg and moaned. “I’ll get you out of here. Don’t you die on me, Chappie.” Desperation filled those words.
He dragged her across the floor, shoving everything out of their way: clothes, a drawer he’d pulled from the dresser and tossed, the sheets and pillows. They reached the corner. He slid himself up and into it, pulling her up between his legs and holding her against his chest. One arm banded around her waist. The other lay on her chest as he wrapped his big hand around her throat and squeezed. “I won’t let you die. Hold on. They’re coming for us, Chappie.” Drake leaned his head against hers and tightened his hold on her neck. “Come on, Chappie, don’t do this to me. They’re all gone. Not you, too!”
In the next ragged breath, Drake’s whole body went lax behind her. Every part of him went loose, except his grip on her neck.
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