Before There Was You

by Denise A. Agnew

  Cruz snorted. “Nah. She can kick their asses just fine without my help.”

  Aaron laughed, enjoying old memories and Cruz’s unfailing friendship. “That must make you feel good.”

  “Not really. I still have the shotgun.”

  They laughed some more, and after chewing on old stories, they hung up. Cruz still lived in California and was sticking with the marines a bit longer. Another few years at least.

  He hadn’t told Cruz much. He’d preferred to pretend that a few weeks in group therapy would fix his issue, whatever it was. How could he explain it to anyone when he didn’t understand it himself? It was then he got a reckless idea. Really fuckin’ stupid reckless. He’d felt comfortable and uncomfortable at the same time around Lana. The desire to protect her from jerks like Magnus hadn’t faded. Maybe he could help Lana and help himself at the same time.

  When Tuesday came around, he’d consider the possibility of a little harmless friendship with Lana Burns.

  * * * *

  Aaron strode into therapy early on Tuesday, wanting to arrive before anyone else. He sat in the room in the circle, straddling a chair and leaning his arms on the back. Lana entered a short time later. She came to a dead stop, mouth open as she saw him. He savored the few moments, watching her react to him. She always seemed shocked to see him, as if he was a ghost materializing. He’d have to ask her why. Today she wore a pink wolf T-shirt that was too big for her slim frame, and plain jean shorts that came down to her knees. Her thick hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She looked young and innocent as hell.

  “Hey, Lana.”

  “Hey.” She continued walking and settled in a chair straight across from him.

  She smiled, but it was a feeble, almost scared smile. Damn it. He hated the idea she might fear him in any way.

  “Sit next to me,” he said impulsively.

  She blinked. “Why?”

  “Might keep Magnus away from you.”

  Her eyes brightened. “Good idea.”

  She hurried over as if she expected Magnus to show up that minute. She plopped into the chair to his right. He returned his chair to a normal position, no longer straddling it. He turned slightly toward her.

  “Listen, I had an idea,” he said. “You know that problem you have with driving? I might be able to help you.”

  Once more those eyes widened, but this time real curiosity filled them. “How?”

  “Look, I’m just hanging around in my retirement, not being much use to anyone. I’d like to help you get used to driving again. How about tomorrow? I can stop by your apartment, and I’ll try some ideas that worked for this marine I knew once. He was scared to drive big trucks. I got him through it.”

  “Really? A big, bad marine afraid to drive a truck?”

  “Really. Something happened to him in Iraq. He couldn’t drive his monster truck when he returned home.”

  She bit her lower lip and held on to it, and his gaze landed on that soft mouth. His groin stirred. He jerked his attention back to her eyes. Down, sport. Now isn’t the time. He could see how indecision held her silent.

  “You can call Jillie and tell her what we’re doing and where we’re going. She’ll know where you are at all times.” When she hesitated, he continued with reassurance. “Or you could invite her to come along.”

  Before she could answer, Roxanne walked in along with Magnus. Roxanne’s usual expression of outright mean-spiritedness came through clearly.

  A general hello went around the room. Magnus eyeballed him like the enemy. Which was fuckin’ fine. As far as Aaron was concerned, he had all the friends he needed. Roxanne settled in a chair far away from all of them.

  Aaron turned back to Lana. “What do you say?”

  She glanced at the others, but her attention turned back to him. “All right. If Jillie can come with me.”

  Magnus cleared his throat, but Aaron ignored him. “Great. Do you need a ride tonight?”

  “No. Jillie will pick me up.”

  He nodded, knowing he couldn’t push it too far. He didn’t want to come off like some freaky stalker.

  He couldn’t argue with the rest of the evening, which went smoothly. Even Magnus and Roxanne seemed amiable enough. In his experience this meant the other shoe would drop. People like them didn’t stop being who they were on a dime. Addy had them share frustrations again, and he managed to find one as innocuous as possible.

  “What about you, Aaron?” Addy asked, pushing a pair of glasses high on her nose. “Did you have frustrations or challenges this week?”

  He almost twitched. Sharing emotions. No, he so didn’t want to do it. But he needed to play the game, or the judge would know why.

  “Yeah. My SUV got a flat tire Saturday. Tried changing it and nearly got run over by a drunk driver the cops were chasing,” he said.

  Lana covered her mouth with one hand, her brow furrowed. Did she care if he got flattened on the road? Would she miss him if he did?

  “That’s awful,” Addy said.

  “Did you get the tire changed, or did you have to call the auto club?” Magnus asked with a snide tone.

  Aaron stared at him long enough that the idiot almost squirmed. Aaron leaned forward in his chair and smiled. “Yeah. I had to call the auto club. But my manhood doesn’t depend on whether I can change a tire or not. I didn’t have an impact wrench. The nuts were twisted down tight. I suppose you wouldn’t need an impact wrench though, right?”

  Elliot chuckled, and Richard smiled at Aaron’s quiet question.

  Magnus’s mouth went flat. “I thought marines didn’t quit. You should be able to take a tire off and replace it.”

  Aaron sighed. “Well, Magnus, looks like you got me there. I guess I just thought it would be quicker to call the auto club because I pay good money for it.”

  “That’s what I would do,” Elliot said. “No machismo for me.”

  “I can’t fix a car. I don’t change the oil,” Richard said with a shrug. “I take it to my mechanic.”

  Guess there are a lot of pussies in the room, Magnus. No, he wouldn’t say it out loud.

  Was Magnus’s lower lip sticking out?

  Magnus couldn’t dent him again—unless the asswipe messed with Lana, and then all bets would be off. A wave of possessiveness slid through Aaron and almost choked him. Oh, hell no. He’d never been possessive of a woman or even jealous. He didn’t do jealousy.

  When the session ended, he walked out slowly alongside Lana. As the rest of them retreated down the stairs to their cars, Lana scanned the parking lot. Again, no sign of Jillie.

  Aaron stopped a couple of steps down and looked up at Lana. “No Jillie, eh?”

  “No.” She sighed, looking beat up and tired.

  Concern slid through him. “You all right? You look tired.”

  “I am. I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

  “Why?”

  “Nightmares.”

  He returned to the top step and leaned against the railing. This spot had started to be a habit. “Want to talk about it?”

  Once more he saw hesitation in her eyes, but that cleared in a heartbeat. “I can’t really remember much about them. I’ve tried keeping a journal by my bed. It’s sort of like night terrors. I wake up sweating, my heart pounding. But I don’t remember anything about what I dreamed.”

  He drew in a deep breath. “Damn. I’m sorry.”

  “I journal about it. I draw pictures. Maybe someday I’ll remember.”

  Curiosity hit him. “Did you say there are parts of your captivity you don’t remember?”

  She tucked her hair behind her ears, but the strands defiantly dropped forward again. “Yes.”

  “Is it hard to talk about?”

  She glanced up at him, and he fell down…deep, deep down into those eyes.

  “Sometimes. The only person I’ve told is my therapist,” she said.

  “Not your family?”

  “No. I don’t think they could handle it, honestly. I’
ve told them tiny bits around the edges. Mom thinks I was…raped. She says that’s the part I must have forgotten. Dad just doesn’t talk about it. He’s a cool character. Always has been. He just talks about something else and continues working on the farm.”

  “Montana, right?”

  “Good ole conservative Montana.”

  Ah, a clue. “Your parents are conservative?”

  “In a lot of ways.”

  “Does that bother you?”

  “They were extremely restrictive. They didn’t let me read or watch anything they considered objectionable when I was a kid.” She shrugged. “That isn’t any different than a lot of parents. But my parents found almost everything objectionable. And I mean everything.”

  “Do you think that hurt you?”

  “In some ways it did. I married to get the hell out of Dodge. I was eighteen when I married. I wasn’t innocent, but I was…”

  He guessed what she’d almost said. A virgin. He didn’t want to embarrass her, so he didn’t say it. “You loved him?”

  “I thought I did. We were high school sweethearts, but my parents didn’t know it. We snuck around. Jim was a nice guy, but that was only at the beginning of our relationship.”

  Ah, shit. He didn’t like the direction this tale was going. “What happened?”

  “I followed Jim here to Colorado. He was attending Colorado College. I did the old-fashioned dutiful thing and was a stay-at-home wife at first.”

  He couldn’t help but say, “That’s a little unusual.”

  “It was. At the time I thought it was the right thing. My mother and father always adhered to some old-fashioned ideas about male and female gender roles.”

  “Your parents are religious?”

  “Very.”

  His gut did a check. “What about you?”

  She shook her head. “I thought I was. But as I got older, I realized I wasn’t the type of religious they were. I didn’t want to stay at home, pop out kids, and be a traditional housewife.” She lifted one hand. “I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it, if that’s what people want to do. It just wasn’t right for me.”

  “Let me guess. Your husband didn’t like that.”

  “No. He wanted me passive. I started to get too assertive for him. We had a lot of arguments. I decided I was going to college whether he liked it or not and convinced him it was a good idea. I did…I have the loans to prove it. I got my Bachelors and Masters in English and got my teaching certification. At first Jim seemed like he was starting to be okay with it. He really wasn’t.”

  Aaron saw she was getting into the story, and he didn’t want her to stop now. “He didn’t like your independence?”

  She played with the edge of her T-shirt, her fingers performing a nervous routine. He didn’t think she realized it.

  “I guess he thought I’d fail and go back to being a full-time wife. When I started teaching high school, he tried sabotaging me in a lot of ways. He told his parents and mine I was losing it. Going crazy.”

  Disgust rose inside him. His fists clenched at his side for a moment, and he had to hold back an expletive. “Damn.”

  “Exactly. Luckily my parents didn’t believe it, but his did. You don’t even want to know the conflict that caused.”

  He remembered that she’d mentioned at group therapy that he’d crashed his car into a tree. “You didn’t divorce him?”

  “No.” She closed her eyes for a moment, and then opened them. She stared into the distance. “When I was twenty-eight, he lost his job as a software engineer. Downsizing. He couldn’t take the blow.”

  “That’s when he drove his car into a tree going a hundred miles an hour,” he said in understanding.

  “Right.”

  He couldn’t think of anything to say immediately, but he thought he saw grief filling her pretty eyes. On impulse he reached out and cupped her right shoulder. “God, I’m sorry.”

  She shifted just a tiny bit, enough to dislodge his touch. “It was awful. I had a lot of guilt from that.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, it was misplaced guilt. Jim had issues I didn’t even know about. His parents blamed me, and on a certain level I think even my parents did. And after he died, I realized I’d fallen out of love with him at least five years before he died.”

  Anger settled like a burn in his gut, an ulcer that screamed she hadn’t deserved the treatment she’d received from her husband, his parents, and her parents. “How could your parents blame you?”

  “A bunch of different reasons. They never specifically said so, but there were subtle statements. Once my father said that Jim must have felt I wouldn’t stand by him and that’s why he committed suicide.”

  Aaron was shocked. “That’s crap.”

  She smiled weakly. “I know. At least I was old enough to realize what sort of twisted psychology I’d grown up in. I’ve gone from passive to assertive, and now I’m back to passive again.”

  He winced. “You’re not passive.”

  She kept the smile. “Well, I’m growing back into the assertive person I was before Costa Rica. I haven’t dated since he died. I knew I needed to get myself together and find out what I wanted in a man and in life.”

  Intrigued, he asked, “So have you figured it out?”

  Her smile remained doubtful. “I did. Then came Costa Rica.”

  “Shit storm of the universe.”

  This time when she smiled, it was genuine. “I agree.”

  He let silence grow between them before he pulled out his cell phone and opened the contacts. “Can I have your cell phone number?”

  “Why?” A suspicious tone entered her voice.

  “You still want to relearn how to drive?”

  She made a sound of self-derision. “Oh. Right. Sorry.” She gave him the number and he gave her his. “When did you want to meet?”

  “What’s convenient?” he asked.

  “Eight o’clock in the morning tomorrow?”

  “I’ll be there. Wait. What if Jillie can’t be there at that time of the morning?”

  Again she chewed a little on that full, fucking sexy looking bottom lip. “Then I’ll just do it alone.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “I’m sure.” Just in time, Jillie’s car drove up. “There’s my ride.”

  He watched her until she entered Jillie’s car and then headed home. As he drove away a few moments later, satisfaction filled him. No one had trusted him with anything in the last few months. Yeah, he wanted to get to know her better, and tonight had proven that she was willing to trust him, and that felt good. Very good.

  * * * *

  “How is lover boy tonight?” Jillie asked as they drove out of the parking lot.

  Lana stared at her friend. “What?”

  Jillie smiled, but she kept her gaze on the road. “Aaron MacPherson.”

  “He wants to help me with my panic so I can drive again.”

  Skepticism crossed Jillie’s face. “How’s he going to do that?”

  “I don’t know. I told him I’d let him help me if you came along. But I don’t know if it’ll work into your schedule.” She bit her lower lip. “Eight o’clock tomorrow?”

  Jillie threw her a look filled with disbelief. “You know that won’t work for me.”

  Lana threw up her hands. “Then I can’t do it.”

  “Why?”

  “You know.”

  Jillie’s expression turned alarmed. “You’re afraid of him?”

  “No.” Lana hastened to explain. “Of course not.”

  “Then why can’t you go with him without me?”

  “I…” Lana struggled for words. “You know. I don’t trust men much anymore.”

  “But you have to try sometime. All men aren’t ogres.”

  “I understand that intellectually. Emotionally…” Lana shrugged.

  “Are you sure you didn’t use me as an excuse?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You have a
good idea of my schedule. You knew I couldn’t help you tomorrow morning. Yet you set it up with him anyway. You hoped you’d have an excuse to say no to him tomorrow morning. Were you going to let him get all the way to your apartment and say no then?”

  Irritation built inside Lana. “Of course not. That’s rude. I can call him. He gave me his phone number.”

  “I don’t know, Lana. He might be a real catch.”

  “I’m not trying to catch a man.”

  “From the way he’s treated you, he obviously likes you.”

  “That doesn’t mean he’s an okay guy.”

  Jillie made a groan ripe with frustration. “Really, he’s an okay guy. Better than okay.”

  Suspicion rose inside Lana. “Jillie? What have you got up your sleeve?”

  Jillie heaved a sigh. “All right. I had Brian check him out.”

  Jillie’s husband was a former law enforcement turned corrections officer. “You didn’t.”

  “Yep.” Jillie’s smile was heavy with satisfaction. “He’s a war hero.”

  Stunned, Lana stared at her friend. “He was in the marines, but he never said anything about being a hero.”

  “He’s modest. Apparently as modest as they come. He’s a highly decorated Marine Corps Sergeant Major.”

  “Retired.”

  “You know what they say, once a marine, always a marine.”

  “It’s just a saying.”

  Jillie laughed. “Hope he doesn’t hear you say that. Anyway, Brian dug deep. The guy has a chest full of medals. He doesn’t even have a speeding ticket to his name, if you can believe that.”

  Lana believed it. “When he drove me home last week, he didn’t speed.”

  Jillie tapped the steering wheel. “There you go. Hero material.”

  “Just because Brian approves doesn’t mean he’s good dating material. He’s got PTSD and he did get arrested for punching that man. God only knows if he’s killed people in war, done violence. I just can’t…”

  Jillie snorted. “God, aren’t we getting uppity? There’s some classified stuff in his background Brian couldn’t look up, but it was all related to military special operations. He doesn’t have a criminal record other than the incident that happened when he punched the guy. You said he was protecting you against Magnus, right?”