by Rachel Lee
She clapped her hands like a kid. “That’s a perfect idea.”
“Hop in, Coach.”
She bussed his cheek as she slid inside the 1965 Mustang and onto the newly reupholstered white leather seats.
When he got in the car, he returned a light kiss on her lips, then turned on the definitely updated radio, which happened to be playing a Black Eyed Peas song, “I Gotta Feeling.” In her mind, it already was a good night. A great night.
An hour later, after driving around with the top down, listening to upbeat music and stopping for ice cream, they headed out of town. They drove past prime farmland, smelling pungent onions and sweetening strawberries, through walnut and orange groves with their citrusy scent and up a winding road in the Serena Vista hills to a panoramic view of the Whispering Oaks valley. Though her hair was knotted and messy from the wind, she didn’t care—she was with Lucas. Everything was good and today had already been one of the best in her entire life.
He parked, and they both hopped out of the car to take in the impressive view.
“I forgot how beautiful it is up here,” he said, gazing across the entire valley.
“Remember when we had our prom in that airplane hangar over there?” She pointed to another hilltop across the way, with obvious signs of some sort of party going on right then.
He gave a sullen nod, having hated his prom. The only thing on his mind that night had been getting inside his date’s pants. Then he’d left town for boot camp right after he graduated and never looked back. Not very noble, but that was who he was back then.
She took his hand in hers. “I held out to the last minute before accepting my date, hoping you might ask me.”
He laughed and shrugged, though he felt both touched and melancholy at once. Hindsight was sometimes a bitch. “Believe me, you would have had a terrible time with me. I only went because Mom and Dad made me. Gave me the old line about ‘this will only happen once in your life.’” He drew her into his arms and rested his chin on her head. “I remember seeing a picture of you afterward, and you looked pretty.” He kissed the top of her smooth hair. “Very pretty in pink. Just like today. Did I tell you I like that dress?”
She hugged a bit tighter and glanced up at him. “Yes, you did. Thank you.”
He kissed her before she could finish thanking him, and warmth bled through him, forcing ideas about permanence and giving his new life a fair chance. Maybe Jocelyn could help him get things straight again.
As always, whenever they kissed, his body reacted, craving more. He held her hips close to his growing response and let her kiss him deeper and longer. Hell, these days, with her fingers roaming over his scalp, he even had hair to mess up. The thought made him smile.
“What,” she said across his lips.
“What do you mean, ‘what’? I’m kissing you.”
“You’re smiling. I can feel it.” She kissed around his lips; he chased her kisses. “Admit it,” she said.
He pulled back and looked into her eyes, enjoying her coy game. “That I’m hot for you? That’s an understatement.”
She lightly slapped his chest, a self-satisfied gaze in her beckoning eyes. “That you like being home.”
He took her cue and dug his fingers into her hair, kissed her like he was leaving town first thing tomorrow morning, then pulled back to watch her recover. Damn, that dewy-eyed look never got old. He loved how she always answered his touch, egged him on for more. The ever-tightening package in his jeans reminded him how he never failed to react to her, too. “I like being with you. I know that much.”
She sighed, as if he’d said the most perfect answer in the universe, and they held each other and enjoyed the view, watching the setting sun shift the sky into the color of peaches, then bright orange just before turning deep red.
A vibrating boom, quickly followed by scattershot sounds, cut to his core. He jerked and held Jocelyn tighter, scanning the horizon for the source of fire. Except her gasp was one of joy, and she felt like butter in his arms.
“Look,” she said. “Fireworks. It’s from the party going on over there. Maybe it’s a birthday or a wedding or something.” She pointed to the airplane hangar again, where there were more explosions followed by bursts of color, splattering and dripping down the evening sky.
Lucas took a deep breath, glad he hadn’t freaked out at the sudden noise and the blasts of ongoing fireworks. The sound was too close to gunfire, reminding him of far too many encounters over in the sandbox. Sounds that ensured injury and loss of life. He needed to relax. Focus on Jocelyn.
She rubbed his back and dropped her head on his shoulder as they stood and watched the entire show. He willed her mood to rub off on him, to take away the peripheral images threatening to become center stage in his mind.
“I talked to my parents today,” she said. “Told them all about the track meet.”
“How are they?”
“Great. They’ve decided to stay on the road in their RV another few months, so looks like I’ll be your next-door neighbor awhile longer, just me and the dogs.”
“I like that plan.” Though he didn’t honestly know where he’d be in the near future. He hadn’t made up his mind yet.
“You can stay over whenever you want.”
“Whoa, whoa, we’re just getting to know each other.”
She stepped in front of him and took his face in her hands. “Lucas Grady, I’ve known you my whole life.”
“You’ve got a point there.” After an initial tensing, he got to thinking how much more privacy he could have at Jocelyn’s house than in his old bedroom under his parents’ constant scrutiny. He’d be right next door if they needed his help. But what would Mom and Dad think about his shacking up with the girl next door?
Jocelyn seemed suddenly quiet. Wisely, she’d let the subject drop. How could he commit to frequent flyer status with her when he hadn’t yet made up his mind about what he wanted to do with the rest of his life?
She turned back around and he snuggled with her in his arms because that felt so much better than thinking about the future or the plans he’d yet to nail down. After a while, he let down his guard and enjoyed the near-fourth-of-July display. With his mind focused on the big show, and with her body pressing close to his, another kind of fireworks twined through his thoughts—the kind he made with Jocelyn.
“What do you say I take you home?” he asked when the flashy display finished.
“Will you stay with me?” she whispered.
“I’ll do anything you want as long as we’re naked.”
* * *
In the middle of the night, with Jocelyn tightly spooned against Lucas’s back, a subdued growl coaxed her out of deep sleep. His body stiffened and jerked. She held on, trying to soothe him away from his fitful dream. He settled for a few seconds, then tensed again, legs kicking, arms flailing, a muffled yell starting from what seemed like the soles of his feet worked its way up to his tightly closed mouth. His arms flew up, his elbow catching Jocelyn in the face as he bolted out of the bed, still completely out of it.
Shocked by the hit to her cheek, she rolled off the bed, turned on the light and stayed out of his way. His lids flew open. Sweat glistened on his chest, fear and panic plagued his unseeing eyes. Torment etched his face. His breathing was a ragged mess. So was hers as she stood pressed against the wall in the corner, waiting for him to quit fighting ghosts and wake up.
She wanted to hold him, to somehow comfort him, but it was too dangerous. The coppery taste of blood proved she needed to stay out of his path. Wait for him to come around.
The lighted bed lamp must have filtered through to his brain because he came back to consciousness, his wide-open, terrorized eyes finally seeing. He stood completely still, the only movement being his eyes darting back and forth, as if clicking back into reality one breath at a time, slowly comprehending what he’d done.
She couldn’t help it—she trembled and licked the corner of her mouth, where fresh blood conti
nued to gather. He looked so damn distressed. Tears filled her eyes as she finally saw firsthand the anguish Lucas dealt with. She’d had no idea. How could she?
“Joss? Oh, my God, I’m sorry.” He rushed around the bed. “I’m so sorry.”
Overcome with the sudden outburst she’d witnessed, her knee-jerk reaction was to bolt, but he was awake now—she could stop shuddering.
“Joss, baby.” He reached for her. She recoiled involuntarily but caught herself and took his hand.
“Please. I’m awake. I’m okay, now. God, I’m so sorry.”
She chanced another look into his eyes. He was completely alert. Remorse etched deeply across his twisted features.
“Baby—” He stepped beside her. “Forgive me. I’m so sorry.”
Hating feeling scared, she let him touch her. “It’s okay,” her voice quivered. “You must’ve had a honking-bad nightmare.”
He enfolded her in his arms, and she leaned into him, realizing he still trembled and needed something to hold on to as much as she did. “Maybe all the gunfire at the track meet and the fireworks tonight got to you.”
“Maybe. Who knows.” He brought her back to the bed and left her there while he walked to the bathroom, ran some water and returned with a cold washcloth to dab at her lip.
“Now do you see?” he said. “I’m no good for you.”
More tears brimmed and washed over her lids. “You’ve been through a lot, Lucas.” If only she could get her voice to sound normal. “You can get help.” She let him doctor her lip, then took hold of his hands again, an attempt to let him know she wasn’t scared anymore.
Or was it an attempt to convince herself?
Once he was satisfied her mouth had stopped bleeding, he gently kissed her lips. “You’re the only help I need right now.”
Then, slowly and meticulously, he made love to her. Beginning with her neck and breasts, he touched and sampled every inch of her skin, helping them both forget the nightmare he’d lived and she’d just witnessed.
As his damp stomach pressed into hers with each slow and thorough thrust, she completely gave in, realizing how precious sex was with him. With her hips answering each of his lunges, she did her best to show him she loved him, and as her reward shuddered through her, she could have sworn she’d heard him say, “I never want us to end.”
Chapter Eleven
Lucas rushed through the front door Sunday morning, only to find his mother wearing her big yellow bathrobe and standing with a cup of coffee in her hand, open-eyed and observing his every move.
“Hey,” he said and continued to walk down the hall. Anything to get away from her scrutiny.
With his mother being as intuitive as she’d always been, there was no way she’d miss that something was seriously wrong. And she’d basically caught him on a walk of shame, to boot. Yet she had the good sense to keep her mouth shut about it. “And good morning to you, too,” she answered after taking a sip.
He strode to his room, closing the door harder than he’d intended. After turning on his computer he fired off an email to one of his army buddies, Jake, back in North Carolina. They were two peas in a pod: made it through a couple of tours in Afghanistan together, lost a friend to an IED, suffered from PTSD. Jake had left Lucas with an open invitation just before he came home, and it was time to take him up on it.
Is that offer to be roommates still on?
If he was serious about becoming an athletic trainer, he could do it anywhere because many of the classes could be taken online with a mentor. Ditto for PA school, and that would only take three years because he was medic trained. As soon as he’d gotten a degree and these PTSD issues settled down, once he had something to offer Jocelyn, then he’d consider being her roommate and a hell of a lot more.
If she’d wait for him.
Regardless, until then he’d bite the bullet and break the news to her, then take the heat. Or, he could forget the whole thing, reenlist, go back to the desert, stay out of people’s hair. But they were drawing down the troops, now.
He was damaged goods. The last thing Jocelyn deserved was another wing nut like her ex-fiancé interfering with her life, and Lucas wasn’t going to do that to her. Period.
It wasn’t like he was walking away forever—he was just postponing Jocelyn’s “let’s be roommates” plan.
The big question was—would she understand his reasoning? Not likely.
When she called Sunday evening, he made an excuse that he was exhausted and needed to get some sleep, then cut the conversation short. He couldn’t bear the thought of seeing her swollen lip and knowing he’d given it to her. On Monday afternoon, he left a message at her house before she got home from school that he was taking a ride into L.A. on business. He wasn’t lying, either. He’d contacted his old high school buddy from auto shop, David, and discovered he had his own auto body business in the valley.
Because Lucas’s mind was whirling in a thousand different directions, he discussed an apprenticeship to take his love of renovating cars one step further. Then Lucas spent the rest of the week hanging out and learning new techniques in auto body repair.
They were all options. Nothing was set in stone. If he was serious about being a man Jocelyn could love and respect, he needed plans. He needed time and space to process what direction he’d take his life. He couldn’t very well be a soldier in a civilian world. Hell, he was twenty-eight. It was time to figure things out.
His mother’s inquisitive eyes grew more intense as the week progressed, and he’d obviously been dodging Jocelyn. Are you afraid of intimacy? she seemed to convey with her watchful glances.
Who, me?
Friday evening, after tearing his brain apart all week weighing the choices, Lucas decided to man up and face Jocelyn to tell her exactly where he stood. He took a shower and shaved, even dabbed on some new aftershave. He threw on some jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt his mother had bought him with some designer’s name stamped along the bottom. He at least wanted to look nice for Jocelyn when he broke the news he’d finally figured out.
* * *
Jocelyn had run out of patience with Lucas. This incommunicado business stunk to high heaven. She sat at the kitchen table wearing baggy sweats, nibbling at a totally unappealing salad and staring out the window at the rolling brown hills. He’d avoided her all week, after they’d reached a new level of closeness, and it hurt like a knife in the liver.
If she hadn’t had school midterms to deal with, she would have been in his face by Wednesday. But she had a job to do, and she didn’t take her teaching career lightly, so she sucked up all her worries and fears about Lucas pulling back from her and forced herself to get through the week. Once the weekend came, she’d confront him and force him to talk to her.
But in the meantime, she couldn’t avoid wondering what in the world was going on in Lucas’s mind. Sure, he’d scared her, and she’d been shaken up, but she knew the difference between being bullied and being an innocent bystander to an ex-soldier’s nightmare. He had PTSD. In her heart, she knew he’d never hurt her.
He’d promised he’d never hurt her that night. Over and over he’d begged her forgiveness before he made love to her so thoroughly that she’d have to be crazy not to forgive and forget. He’d touched her everywhere as if she were a delicate flower, driving her crazy with desire for him, and then he devoured her with his passion, sweeping her away to places she’d only ever been with him. No one could be that tender one moment and out of control with desire the next without feeling something special right down to the core. Obviously, he was only promising to never hurt her physically, not cause physical pain, but the emotional kind of pain, the kind that ate deeper through her heart each day he stayed away, felt much harder to bear.
Her stomach cramped, but she forced herself to eat.
She was tough and adaptable; she could handle their situation. If he’d just give her a fair chance.
She took a tasteless bite of salad leaves. The question of all
questions being—did Lucas believe himself? Did he really think he could harm her? More important, could he believe in himself the way she believed in him? That was something only he could do for himself.
She heard a tapping at her front door. After rinsing her food down with water, she folded her napkin, flipped it on the table and marched to answer it, quelling her quickening heartbeat on the way.
She opened the door and found Lucas looking like a god—clean and dressed to kill in tight jeans and a form-fitting black knit shirt. Her pulse zigzagged in her chest. Why hadn’t she changed out of the gray sweats? His broad shoulders and narrow hips never ceased to amaze her. But she was mad at him, damn it, and she couldn’t let him off the hook just for looking hunky. “Hi, stranger.”
“Hey. Can I come in?”
Without another word, she opened the door so he could pass. Both Daisy and Diesel had come to meet him, and they licked his hands. He bent down to greet each of them face to face, looking so damn cute and making sure his sexy behind was on display. Nope. She was not going to fall for his “I’m good with animals, how can you resist me” bit, either.
She didn’t offer him a seat, but he went to the couch anyway. Though her hospitality instincts pushed to click in by asking if he wanted a drink, she kept her mouth shut. Instead, she took a long, quiet breath.
He sat, legs wide, an ankle resting on the opposite knee, trying to look comfortable but far from it. He’d pushed his sleeves up his forearms and the muscles distracted her...briefly.
“So you’re probably wondering where I’ve been all week.”
She plopped down on the far end of the couch and wished she had put on makeup after her shower. “You got that right.”
His lips made a straight line and he nodded.
Damn it, she could smell his tangy scent all the way across the couch, and he’d obviously just gotten out of the shower because his hair was damp and combed sexily back. She wanted to take her sweatshirt hood and cover her head.
