“Like you do?”
He snorted softly and nodded. “Yeah, like I do.”
“I guess I’m really lucky and I don’t even realize it.”
“Oh, don’t go there,” Gage said with a coaxing smile. “Trauma affects every person differently. A car crash might make a person swear never to drive again. Another person will get over it and move on. Trauma is individualized, Alexa. No one can ever judge how it has affected you, how it has changed you, or how much you’ll heal up from it.”
“Becka said the same thing.”
“Becka is right. Most of us have to hear the same thing several times before we’ll change or learn from other people’s experiences or knowledge.”
“I hear you,” she admitted. “I guess there’s a part of me that’s very proud, and I’m afraid my family will think less of me. I worry Tal will see me as weak, or a failure …”
“Oh, baby,” he crooned, holding her tightly against him. “No one sees you in that light. They understand. Tal is concerned about you, just as we all are. But she sure doesn’t see you as a failure.” He kissed her hair. “In fact, Tal and I were both thinking of asking you to take some healing time.”
“Tal really knows people well,” Alexa agreed quietly.
“Look,” Gage said, “we all hit brick walls, Alexa. I hit a lot them at an early age. Tal hit her brick wall just recently, and is still just recovering when she almost bled out on that ridge in the mountains of Afghanistan. Every person on this earth hits hard walls and gets knocked down sooner or later.”
Lips quivering, Alexa said, “I guess it’s my turn.”
“We all get a turn, believe me,” he said, releasing her. “And now, it’s our turn to eat. Will you be ready in about thirty minutes?”
Stepping away, Alexa said, “Sure. And I want to talk to Tal after dinner and see if she’s okay with me taking a hiatus for a while.”
“Will you talk with your parents, too?” he asked.
“Absolutely. My dad believes that many heads are better than one when making a major decision.”
He smiled, pulling the plates down from the cabinet to put on the table. “And he’s a general.” The joke wasn’t lost on either of them. So much of the tension she’d carried in her face was gone. Alexa was easily moved one way or another, moment to moment. He wished he understood more about astrology. Were moon in Pisces people like that? Like thermometers in their surroundings? She had told him in that big warehouse in Bagram as they sorted out the charity clothing and shoes about her astrology signs. He found it curious that she used astrology at all, but darned if she hadn’t convinced him that there was something to it.
Laughing softly, Alexa said, “That he is, but to us, he’s Dad in Chief. He taught us how to work with people, how to draw them out to find out what they’re really thinking and feeling. He’s very astute at getting people to open up about their thoughts and ideas.”
“He’s a rare bird, pardon the pun, among the Air Force officers, then,” Gage said, teasing her.
“My dad is an incredible man.” She leaned over, kissing Gage’s cheek. “Like you …”
*
Two days later, Alexa was in the farmhouse by herself. Gage had stayed late at Artemis because a mission had suddenly popped up and it required him, Tal, Wyatt, and Matt to remain there to resolve the issue. She had come home early, around two p.m., the October sun shining and warming up the afternoon. It was her turn to cook dinner tonight, and she’d gotten out a roasting chicken and placed it on the kitchen counter. Looking out the L-shaped windows covered with ruffled white curtains, she felt a rush of pleasure as orange and gold leaves fluttered down to the ground from the red maple near their white rail fence.
Her mind was on the meeting earlier in the day, about the steps the family would take to avoid one of them being kidnapped, as she had been. Gage had suggested that, in their case, they get a dog. The dog needn’t be a combat assault type, like a Belgian Malinois, but perhaps a Lab or retriever that would excel as a watchdog.
Alexa liked the idea. The farmhouse felt empty without a dog. She’d grown up in her family with two black Labs as friends, babysitters, and guards for herself and her siblings. Gage had teased her that she needed something to nurture, give her own brand of mothering to, and she smiled faintly as she set the table for them. Alexa knew he was right: she had to “mother” something, and getting a puppy seemed like a great idea to her. That way, like today, she wouldn’t feel so vulnerable in the house by herself. Before her trauma in Afghanistan, things like this would never bother her. Now, being alone made her tense and wary. There was a threat, and alone in this house, she felt unprotected. It was a helluva fall from being a confident, brazen combat pilot in Afghanistan to her newly precarious position. Alexa didn’t like feeling weak or unsafe.
Only Gage made her feel safe, completely safe, and that was erroneous, too. He was human, and as much as he loved her and wanted to guard her, to give her that sense of protection, he couldn’t be with her 24/7. And right now he was fifteen miles away at a mission planning meeting.
Becka had told her that cortisol was the culprit, making her constantly feel raw and on edge. Her body was pouring cortisol continuously into her bloodstream, unchecked. It wasn’t always a bad hormone, but when a person’s life was threatened, it gave the individual heightened alertness, awareness, and an almost psychic sense of where an enemy was located so the person could avoid the threat and live another day. Cortisol worked hand-in-hand with adrenaline, which caused the “fight-or-flight” response when a person was under threat.
Frowning, she pulled out veggies from the refrigerator to make Gage and herself a salad for dinner. Just as she turned, she caught a flash of something dark out of the corner of her eye. Instantly, Alexa gasped, her heart going into a wild, pounding action. She dropped the vegetables. What had she seen?
Whatever it was, it was outside. She felt terror racing through her and stood immobilized, trying to think.
Was it someone sent by Rasari to recapture her? Her mind went wild and frantic, the urge to run nearly overwhelming. At the same time, Alexa was paralyzed by the unexpected situation, her heart pounding so loud she couldn’t hear anything else in her ears.
Hyper-alert, every sense blown wide open, she looked toward the front door, taking everything in from every possible angle. Her skin was chilled, her hearing heightened. Who had she glimpsed?
Alexa waited, hoping someone would knock at the front door. Had she locked the door? God, no, she hadn’t! Oh, why hadn’t she? What was she thinking? If it was a hit man from Rasari, all he had to do was twist the doorknob, waltz in, and recapture her.
Gun! Where was a gun?
Gage had a locked gun cabinet, but it was in their bedroom, behind the sliding doors of their clothing closet. Her mind calculated how long it would take her to get from the kitchen to the bedroom. Feeling helpless, her gaze riveted on the front door, Alexa tried to think.
She’d flown an A-10 combat jet and had never choked up like she was doing right now. She’d thought coolly and calmly through the fog of war to pickle her bombs on a target, or to swoop down out of the sky, using the .50 caliber Gatling gun in the nose of her fighter, to push back the enemy in Afghanistan.
She had never hesitated. Everything she did in her heavily armored cockpit was from thousands of hours of training that translated into smooth-functioning muscle memory.
Now, muscle memory was no longer within her. She wasn’t in the safety of the cockpit of her A-10. She was vulnerable, with no pistol on her, no weapon to defend herself with, should a man come through that unlocked door to capture her. A man who would take her away to Rasari to become a sex slave.
Revulsion twisted through Alexa, her breathing ragged and choppy. Why couldn’t she move? Frustration and terror wound through her.
She gasped, seeing a tall man in jeans and a white shirt walk past the window once again. Blinking, Alexa saw a patch on the black jacket he wore. It was a m
an from the local electric company! Only then did her cortisol charged brain realize he had his company truck parked in the gravel lot in front of their farmhouse. The man had read the electric meter and was returning to his truck to move on to the next house.
Oh, God! Alexa bent over, her hands on her knees, gasping for air, trying to separate her body from her dazed mind. She was shaking, chilled, and scared. As the adrenaline left her bloodstream, she felt weakness overcome her. She stumbled to the couch in the living room and sat down, her head between her hands, trying to slow her choppy breathing.
Humiliation blazed through her. The combat pilot she’d been and the weepy, helpless woman she was now were two different people. Would she ever return to her previous confident self? Her mind bounced around for another hour as every noise, every creak, even leaves slapping against the kitchen window seemed like mini-alarms.
If only Gage were home. She could talk to him about everything … anything. What would he think of her overreaction to the utility man going to read the electric meter?
Her brain saw everything as a potential threat. Everything!
Finally, Alexa forced herself to stand upright, her knees still feeling wonky. She straightened, mouth tight, forcing herself to focus through the cortisol ravaging her inwardly. Somewhere, somehow, she had to fight back, fight the hormone and get on with her life. She bent down, picking up the head of lettuce, the bag of carrots, celery, and a lone onion. There had to be something in the world besides medication that would stop the leaking of cortisol into her bloodstream twenty-four hours a day.
Placing the veggies on the counter, she saw Gage pulling into the driveway in their silver Kia SUV. Relief surged through her. Gage was home! He was here. He loved her. He protected her when she felt so raw and without a skin to protect herself.
Would he tire of taking care of her? He’d fallen in love with the confident A-10 combat pilot, not this fainthearted wimp who couldn’t defend herself. Wouldn’t Gage grow weary of always taking care of her? In her imagination, she saw him walking away from her, unable to deal with her violent emotional ups and downs. And if he did, she knew she couldn’t go on. She had nothing left inside to help her climb this mountain—one that seemed absolutely impossible for her to scale alone.
CHAPTER 6
Gage noticed how pale Alexa was when he entered their home. She was busy in the kitchen making a salad for their dinner.
“Hey,” he called, “we got done a little early on that unexpected mission.”
Alexa lifted her head and smiled a little as Gage closed the front door, locked it, and then turned, sauntering into the cozy, L-shaped kitchen. “Good. Did it turn out all right?”
Gage nodded. “Yeah, tempest in a teapot. Wyatt’s handling the rest of it.”
“It will be an hour before we eat. Is that okay?”
Gage came over, noticing a slight trembling in her hands as she cut into the head of lettuce. He leaned over, kissing her cheek. “Everything all right, baby?”
Alexa felt herself break inside. She put the knife aside as he slid his arm around her waist, standing there like the bulwark he’d always been to her. “I can’t fool you, can I?” she said, giving him an apologetic look.
“When you love someone, you become attuned to them,” Gage said simply, kissing her temple. “What happened?” There was turmoil in her eyes, and Gage, trained to be sensitive as a sniper, knew that Alexa often kept secrets from him. He knew she worried that he’d get tired of her behavior and one-day walk away.
He snorted—as if! Getting a firsthand look at PTSD and the pervasive damage cortisol did to someone only made him more committed to Alexa. There were times, though, when he wondered if she really believed that he was there for the long haul.
Wiping her hands on a towel, she moved out of his loose embrace, pulling a bright yellow ceramic bowl over for the chopped veggies. In as few words as possible, she told Gage what had happened earlier that day, watching for any signs of disappointment in him.
Gage leaned against the counter, his arms across his chest as she shared what had happened when the utility man had come to read the farmhouse’s electric meter. His mouth tightened as she finished. She was worried that she’d overreacted to the strange man who had suddenly popped up out of nowhere.
“Did you see him drive in?” Gage asked.
Shaking her head, Alexa whispered, “No. I should have looked, but I focused on that jacket I saw come past the window and I just … well … I overreacted as usual, Gage.”
He nodded and walked over to her after she’d put the bowl of salad into the fridge. “Come here,” he said, pulling her into his arms. She crumpled against him and allowed him to support her. She slid her arms around his waist, clinging to him like a frightened child.
“You did the best you could. Your brain probably thought it was Rasari or one of his men coming to get you.” She nodded, her embrace tightening as he guessed the truth. Alexa had left that out of her explanation, and Gage knew she was humiliated by her overreaction, but she couldn’t help it.
“I …” Alexa stumbled, her voice strained, her cheek pressed against his chest. “I … panicked. I thought he was a hit man from Rasari either coming to kill me or kidnap me again.” Alexa loathed feeling vulnerable 24/7. When would this end?
Gage embraced her a little tighter.
“And then I realized I hadn’t locked the front door, Gage. How stupid is that? My imagination blew up after that, and I was standing here in the kitchen, literally frozen in place. I couldn’t move. I knew the gun was in the locked cabinet in our bedroom closet, and that I should run across the living room and get to it, get a pistol out to protect myself. But I couldn’t think straight! I knew in some part of my brain what to do, but I was frozen. It was awful.” She pressed her face deep into the folds of his shirt.
“Did you know that when a fawn is lying in a field, hidden, and a predator comes by, the fawn freezes?” Gage asked, kissing the shell of her ear. “Freezing is one way that your mind works to save you.”
“I-I didn’t think of that.”
“It’s a survival mechanism,” he said quietly, easing Alexa away from him just enough to meet her confused gaze. “Your brain selected freezing instead of running for the gun cabinet. That’s all.”
“I couldn’t move, Gage. I felt trapped. I felt like that hit man was coming through the door and he’d see me.” Her voice became hoarse. “I-I thought he’d just grab me, put me in flex cuffs, and haul me out of here. I couldn’t stop my mind from thinking those things. I just couldn’t …”
“It’s all right to feel that way, baby …”
Just Gage’s low, calming voice helped Alexa stabilize, and she saw the patience in his shadowed face, felt his confidence in her, helping her to ramp down from her out of control feelings. “I hated myself, Gage. I hated that I was so scared I couldn’t move. I’ve been a damned combat pilot! I never froze on the job, ever!”
Gage nodded. “When we get fractured, we aren’t who we used to be. I know from the time I lost my sister and dad. I changed, too.”
“Did you ever get back to the real you?” she asked, her voice a ragged whisper.
How badly Gage wanted to tell her that everything would be all right. But it wouldn’t be. There was such hopelessness in Alexa’s widened eyes that he tried his best to reassure her.
“Every time we have a life event, it changes us,” he told her, holding her stricken gaze. “But it doesn’t mean we’re weaker. Sometimes we just have to break in order to become stronger. I know it seems illogical, but it’s what I’ve found for myself, Alexa. It took me years to paste myself back together again. It was painful, and it was slow. In time, I saw a pattern in my healing process. I’d have good days, and then I’d cycle down and have two or three bad days, where I questioned my sanity and wondered if I’d ever get better. Then the good days would come back and give me hope, and I’d see a glimmer down at the end of that long, dark tunnel.”
“Didn’t you get tired of all that cycling up and down?”
He smiled a little, his fingers grazing her hair. “Sure. All the time.”
“How did you get through it?”
“I concentrated on helping my mom. She was my focus. I just put everything I was feeling on the back burner.”
“My therapist, Becka, doesn’t want me to do that.”
“Well, our cases are different, Alexa. I was in shock. You’re experiencing PTSD. Now shock, as I understand it, can be like a mild case of PTSD, but eventually, most people work out of it. The older I got, the less cycling I experienced. My focus and concentration, although impaired, was not affected as yours is right now.”
“Becka says it will get better with time,” Alexa said wearily. “I just can’t concentrate like I used to.”
“That’s the cortisol effect,” Gage informed her. He saw fewer shadows and less terror in her eyes. Alexa was one of those people who could be talked down when the cycle was right, and at those times she responded readily. Gage was convinced that this ability would help Alexa heal faster than he had. And he hadn’t had anyone to talk him down.
Alexa clung to him, needing him desperately, and eagerly surrendered as he lowered his mouth to hers. She opened her lips, offering to give all that was within her while taking his love and the hope he offered her every single day. She relaxed as he did this again, absorbing her love, her pain, her trauma, and dissolving it with his tongue, his probing lips.
She was immediately lost in the delicious heat of his mouth caressing hers. She enjoyed kissing Gage as much as he enjoyed kissing her. Gage was always attractive to her, even during her down days. Now, as she was pulling out of them, she was hungry for his male scent, his taste, the moistness of his breath as he claimed her mouth. It was such a relief when Gage made the world go away, feeding her hopes for a better one. He pasted together the fragments of her fractured self, offering her the love that would help her heal those chasm-wide cracks within herself.
Dream of Me: Delos Series 4B1 Page 8
