Ask Me If I Care

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  His shoulders went a little less stiff, but he didn’t open his eyes.

  That stiffness once again ratcheted up when another firework went off.

  In desperation, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, keying up the latest audiobook I had downloaded on my phone.

  It was one of my favorites. One I listened to on repeat when I didn’t have enough money to buy more credits, or when I was in a reading funk and just wanted something that I knew would be good.

  I was about a quarter of the way through the very last book in the series, and I was at a fight scene.

  It was a sword fighting scene, so I hoped that it wouldn’t also cause his PTSD—and I knew that this was post-traumatic stress disorder rearing its ugly head—to worsen.

  Hitting play, I sat it next to his head and hoped that the story would help.

  And, miraculously, it did.

  The fireworks kept coming, but the book kept playing.

  And one muscle at a time, he finally became unlocked.

  “You okay?” I asked softly.

  He swallowed hard but nodded. “Yeah,” he croaked.

  He wasn’t okay. Not even a little bit okay.

  Not for the walk back to his truck. Not for the car ride home. Not for the minutes that it took for us to sit there in awkward silence as he tried to decide how to proceed.

  In fact, I would say he was so far from okay that it was downright depressing.

  “Can I come with you?” I asked softly, breaking the silence. “To your place?”

  He jerked.

  “No.” he said. “No.”

  I sighed and shifted in my seat, reaching for the door handle as I did.

  When I got out, I looked at him through the open passenger door.

  “Listen, Hayes,” I said quietly, crossing my arms over my chest. “I’m a big girl. I know that you’re not perfect. More so, I can handle you saying ‘you’re not ready’ and ‘you don’t want me to come home with you.’” I paused. “What I can’t handle is you shutting down, going hot and cold, and pretty much ignoring me for two days and then turning into a happy person. Only to turn back into an ogre at the end of the night when I invite you to stay the night.”

  Hayes didn’t say anything.

  So I took that as an ‘I’m not going to say anything’ on his part and walked into my apartment and closed the door.

  I kind of expected him to stay. To tell me I wasn’t reading too much into it.

  But he didn’t stay.

  He went home, and I went to bed pissed.

  Not because he wouldn’t stay, but because I knew something was wrong and he wasn’t telling me what it was. Or, more importantly, admitting that there was something bothering him and telling me he had a problem, but didn’t want to discuss it.

  You know, like a motherfuckin’ adult.

  Still, that night, I researched PTSD.

  Oh, and I also might or might not have contacted a few agencies that had PTSD awareness dogs that helped people in the case of a PTSD attack.

  Chapter 12

  Sorry, I don’t do quiet.

  -Ares’ secret thoughts

  Ares

  “When can I come get him?” I asked.

  The young woman on the other end of the line laughed.

  “Your boyfriend will have to be registered as…” she started, but I interrupted her.

  “I already have that happening as we speak,” I said. “Officially, he can get one.”

  “You’re on top of things, I like it,” she said.

  I was on top of things because I’d had plenty of sleepless hours over the last two days to think about what had happened. To plan, and to initiate my plans.

  “Now, about Trigger,” I said. “When can I come get him?”

  The woman sighed. “Trigger is my favorite.”

  My lips twitched.

  “How about today after school?” I pushed. “I can bring him with me. Like it says on your website, we can see if Trigger and Hayes get along.”

  The woman made an agreeing sound. “That sounds perfect. Though, he might not want Trigger.”

  Oh, I knew Hayes would want Trigger.

  The moment that Hayes saw him, he’d see the broken in Trigger and feel an immediate kinship to him.

  That was what had drawn me to Trigger, and to Dottir Service Dogs in the first place. They specialized in dogs that were either unwanted—pound puppies they called them—or war dogs that were no longer useful. Or, like Trigger, abused dogs that would never even be considered by normal people.

  Trigger was a two-year-old Poodle. He’d been very severely mistreated by his former owners, former owners that were now in jail for animal cruelty. He was missing one eye, had a half of a left ear, and had scars all up and down his body.

  Though, you couldn’t tell when his hair was allowed to grow.

  “What time would be good for you?” I asked.

  Once the time was confirmed, I contemplated my next step when it came to getting Hayes to go there with me when he hadn’t talked to me in two whole days.

  However, before I could so much as consider this dilemma, a throat cleared at my door.

  I jumped, startled to find someone standing in my open doorway.

  “Ms. Downy?”

  I turned to find a young woman staring at me with her hands crossed underneath her arms, staring at me with excitement.

  “Ummm, hi.” I smiled. “How can I help you?”

  The woman bounced on her toes.

  “Well, my husband came home from deployment early, and he wants to come see his sister at school. Right now, he’s visiting with his parents at his mother’s job. But I decided to jump in my car real quick and come over here to let you know what’s going on. And I found you because Abilene has been really talking about you lately. She’s had a lot of great things to say.”

  I smiled, loving hearing that.

  Abilene has had a rough time of it lately, and I really hated that she had to suffer at this school at all.

  “That’s wonderful,” I said. “Come in. Let me write my number down for you. When you get close, give me a call or shoot me a text and I can get you inside hopefully without being seen.”

  The woman followed after me into my office, smiling when she saw my calendar.

  “I got one of those,” she paused. “I guess I’ll have to take it down now that Boston is home.”

  “Boston is Abilene’s brother?” I guessed.

  She smiled and nodded. “He is.”

  I quickly wrote my number down on a Post-it note and then handed it to the young woman.

  “How long has Boston been gone?” I asked curiously.

  “Almost nine months,” she answered. “Abilene and Boston are so close. They’re six years apart, but there’s no separation there that you would think you’d see with that age gap. They’re best friends. Sometimes even I get jealous of them, and I’m Boston’s wife.”

  I snickered. “My brother and I have a bit of an age gap, too. But you wouldn’t think it. We’re really great friends. Maybe it’s because they’re brother and sister. If they were sister and sister, it probably wouldn’t be the same.”

  She nodded her head in understanding. “I agree. That’s how I feel, too.”

  Walking out the door back to the front entrance, I watched her go, so excited that she could barely contain her skips as she hustled back to her car.

  When I turned, it was to find Principal Bailey standing there looking at me with narrowed eyes.

  “Who was that?” he asked shortly.

  I explained who that was, and what was about to happen.

  And, since Principal Bailey was showing his true colors lately, he wasn’t nearly as excited as I was.

  In fact, he was opposed.

  “We can’t have that kind of disruption at the school,” he said.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “It’s Friday. There�
�s a holiday on Monday. Trust me, they’re not going to interrupt anything.”

  Principal Bailey, I could tell, wanted to rip me apart with his words. But the school nurse had come out moments after I’d explained and sided with me.

  “I think this is so sweet,” Calloway, better known as Nurse Calloway, said. “I just love seeing all the soldiers coming home videos when they come to the schools to surprise their kids. The videos always make me cry.”

  Speaking of another person that Bailey didn’t like…

  “I don’t think we asked your opinion, Ms. Alvarez.”

  My lips twitched as I saw Calloway’s eyes narrow on Principal Bailey.

  “Well, you might not have, but I gave it anyway,” Calloway supplied, smiling sweetly.

  Principal Bailey went to argue, but Calloway walked back into her office, likely not wanting to get into it with the moron.

  Calloway and Bailey fought like cats and dogs.

  Mostly because Calloway had gotten the job when Bailey hadn’t wanted her to have it.

  Though, that wasn’t something that we ‘officially’ knew. It was something we’d found out when we’d overheard Bailey and our superintendent talking outside of school one day.

  Needless to say, after that, Calloway hadn’t even bothered trying to be nice to Bailey.

  And Bailey couldn’t do a damn thing about it.

  “She’s not messing with my classes,” he growled and walked away.

  I acted like I didn’t hear him and planned on doing what I thought was right. Which was letting him come.

  I just needed to go talk to Mrs. Teague before it happened.

  Five minutes later, after discussing the possibilities with Mrs. Teague, I went back to my office and saw that I had a message.

  I frowned when I read it.

  Hayes: You done being sassy?

  I looked at the text message and considered deleting it altogether.

  I was pissed.

  At first I thought that maybe what I’d said would sink in, and he’d come to me.

  Except, he didn’t.

  Not for two whole days. And then he sends me a text like this?

  I think not.

  But then I remembered that I needed to get him to Dottir Service Dogs after school and I thought better of my refusal to answer.

  Ares: No.

  And, if I was being one hundred percent honest, I missed him.

  I missed him more than I was pissed at him.

  Hayes: What if I said that I brought you a cookie?

  I scrunched up my nose.

  Ares: Need more.

  Hayes’ laughter had my head jerking up in surprise.

  He was right there, a few feet away from me, leaning against the frame of my door looking at me as if he missed me.

  And hell, maybe he did.

  I crossed my arms over my chest. “I’m sorry, sir. Can I help you?”

  His grin flashed and he walked inside, heading straight for my desk with an armful of stuff.

  He’d just sat down the sweet tea in front of me when Calloway came barreling into the office, looking as if she was about to spit nails.

  “He called my boss!” she snapped. “Said I was insubordinate! Can you believe him?”

  Hayes’ brows rose as he stared at my friend.

  “He what?” I gasped. “What did your boss say?”

  “My boss said that I need to ‘try to make things work’ because he was ‘very influential’ and that my mom and dad’s name could only get me so far,” she hissed. “I swear to God. I’m going to call my Uncle Max and have him throat punch him. I’d call my mom and dad, but they’re away on a cruise.”

  Calloway’s parents went on a month-long cruise around Australia. I was honestly jealous as hell as I heard where they were going. I’d always wanted to go.

  That was when Calloway finally realized that I wasn’t alone in my office.

  Hell, she hadn’t even taken her pissed-off eyes away from me to notice the large man standing a few feet away. Hayes was really good at blending into the background, though. I’d witnessed him do it a lot over the time that I’d known him.

  “What’s going on?” Hayes asked, sounding concerned.

  I recounted the last hour with Principal Bailey, causing him to growl. “I want to say I told you so, but that’s just cruel. When’s the soldier coming?”

  I looked at my watch. “In about an hour.”

  “Here’s what we’re going to do…” Hayes said.

  A half hour later there were news crews at the school ready to record the homecoming. Then there were the multiple members of the SWAT team.

  “What the fuck are you doing here?” Calloway hissed.

  I blinked, so surprised by Calloway’s outburst that at first I didn’t know that it was someone I knew who had her hackles raised.

  When I turned it was to find Louis sneering at her.

  “I’m here because I’m a part of the SWAT team, which you fucking know,” Louis whispered. “What’s wrong, Way? Did you miss me?”

  Way. Calloway hated being called Way by him, and Louis knew it.

  “What the hell is going on here?” Principal Bailey boomed.

  “Just showing our presence, sir,” Ford said. “We heard a soldier was coming home. We’re not technically on school property.”

  And they weren’t. They were on the street next to the school. But they might as well have been in the school parking lot with how close they were.

  It was actually quite genius on Hayes’ part.

  The news crew was parked right next to them, filming from the gas station across the street.

  Which was about when the soldier pulled in with his wife who’d called to let me know that they were on their way.

  “They’re not coming in here.” Principal Bailey braced his legs and crossed his arms over his chest, staring at me as if this was all my fault.

  It was, of course. But he really didn’t know that.

  “You can’t stop them from picking their ward up,” Hayes offered his two cents. “Which, from what I’ve heard, is what they’re doing.”

  It was.

  “It’s not time for school to let out,” he snapped. “It’s only noon.”

  “You can’t tell someone when they can and can’t pick their kid up,” Hayes pointed out. “That’s their right as a parent. And you’re not a prison. You’re a school.”

  Principal Bailey looked as if he was about to lose his ever-loving mind.

  I stepped in just as the soldier got out of his truck and started to head toward us.

  That’s when I realized that I knew the kid that I now realized was no longer a kid.

  “Boz!” I cried out. “Since when did you start going by Boston?”

  Boz was a man that I’d graduated with, and honestly, I was surprised that I hadn’t put two and two together before. But, admittedly, Boston ‘Boz’ Deeds didn’t have the same name as Abilene Scree. Their parents had gotten married in middle school, from what I remembered.

  Boz grinned at me, hooking his arm around his wife’s shoulders and pulling her into him as he came to a halt next to our half-formed circle.

  “Still do,” he admitted. “Except this one calls me Boston.”

  I smiled at his wife. “You’re ready to pick Abilene up?”

  Boz nodded.

  “You can’t enter the school.”

  At first I thought he was talking about Boston, but then I realized he was talking about all the other officers who were now forming a half-circle at Boz’s back.

  “We won’t,” Ford said salaciously. “We’ll wait right here.”

  Principal Bailey looked disgusted as he gestured for Boston to follow him inside, and my eye twitched.

  “I hate him,” Calloway hissed. “I wish that he would get a toenail fungus that made him lose his foot.”

  “Harsh,” Louis muttered under his breath.
r />   I left them to their bickering and walked inside, feeling Hayes at my back.

  I didn’t bother telling him he couldn’t come, because Hayes did what he wanted.

  “I’ll inform the teacher that you’re here…” Principal Bailey said.

  “I already called her,” I lied. “Thank you, though.”

  He curled his lip up at me, causing me to smirk inwardly.

  “You just think you’re so smart, don’t you, Daddy’s girl?”

  I didn’t bother to ask him what he meant by that.

  He thought I got this job because of who my father was. He liked to point out that the only reason I was hired was because my dad was a smooth talker and had passed his skills on to me.

  Which he hadn’t.

  But Bailey liked to think that he was right, so I never bothered to correct him.

  I rolled my eyes at his retreating back.

  Once he was in his office with the door closed, I turned to Mrs. Teague and said, “What class is Abilene in?”

  I heard Boz and Hayes chuckle behind me, causing me to shoot them a grin over my shoulder.

  Mrs. Teague only shook her head and gave me directions.

  “So I don’t get in too much trouble,” I said, “I’ll go get her and bring her to you. Is that okay?”

  Boston grinned. “Perfectly.”

  Abilene looked nauseated when I pulled her out of class. Even more so when I told her to grab her stuff.

  A couple of the boys who were in her class gave her ‘ohhh, someone’s in trouble’ comments, but mostly they all watched her go in silence.

  I silenced the ones that gave her the comments with just a glance, causing Abilene to quietly thank me after we were walking away.

  “Boys are jerks,” I told her teasingly. “I…”

  Whatever I was saying was inconsequential in that moment in time because the moment we rounded the corner of the hallway, Abilene saw her brother standing there.

  She dropped her backpack and started to run, straight into her brother’s arms.

  After picking up Abilene’s discarded backpack, I put it to one shoulder and kept walking until I was standing next to Hayes.

  We stayed there for a good ten minutes until the bell rang, and then Boz dropped his sister to the floor with a smile and turned to me.