The Damaged Heroes Collection [Box Set #1: The Damaged Heroes Collection] (BookStrand Publishing Mainstream)

by James, Sandy

  “You weren’t there to meet a flight or take one,” Josh pressed on. “I just never figured out what you were doing up there.”

  Honesty. Now was the time for honesty. But the shame still lingered, nibbling at her conscience. What would Josh think if she told him the whole truth?

  “Sarah? If you don’t want to answer...” The soft understanding tone of his voice helped her find some courage.

  “It wasn’t too long after Charlie died. I...I just didn’t want to face another day alone.”

  “You weren’t alone, Sarah. You had Hannah. You had—”

  Sarah lifted her head, turned to face Josh, and laid a gentle finger to his lips. “This is really hard to talk about. Please let me get through it. Then you can ask your reporter questions.” He grinned, kissed her finger, and nodded.

  The bad memories washed over her and she swallowed hard. “Hannah and I have never been close. After Mom and Dad died, it only got worse. But I had Charlie.” Sarah took a deep breath and let the rest of the memories come. “When he died, I just...didn’t care anymore. I didn’t have the will to do anything. Some days, I couldn’t even get out of bed. I just lay there crying. Charlie was everything to me. And I...I let him die.”

  Josh shook his head and opened his mouth. Sarah wouldn’t let him interrupt. “No, Josh. It was my fault.” She dropped her chin so she wouldn’t have to look him in the eye. “I decided I didn’t want to be alone anymore. Not without Charlie. It was just too...hard. I went there to...die the way Charlie did. To jump. To kill myself.” Although she was afraid of what she’d see reflected in his eyes, Sarah allowed herself to glance back at Josh.

  Relief flowed through her when she saw the affection in his gaze, not a hint of aversion or pity. She plowed on, relieved to finally tell someone the whole story. “I figured there wouldn’t be anyone around the top floor. Most people park on the lower levels by the skybridges. I knew I’d need some time to...to work up my courage. And it was high enough.”

  Josh reached out and pulled her back against him. She rubbed her cheek against his chest, savoring his smell and his warmth. “But before you could jump,” he said, finishing the tale, “you were struck by lightning.”

  “Yeah. Freakiest thing ever. Not a cloud in the sky.”

  “You thought it was a gift from God.”

  She gave her head a gentle shake. “Not right away. I hoped for a few moments He was striking me dead. Saved me finding the nerve to jump.”

  “That’s not funny, Sarah.”

  “Wasn’t meant to be. You know, I can remember the paramedics working on me. It was like...like I hovered over my own body. They had to shock my heart a few times to bring me back.” The shocks had felt like fire racing through her, almost as bad as the lightning. Her body had twitched violently, drawing her back from a calm she hadn’t known in a long time—if ever. Back to the pain of living. “I was so pissed at them.”

  “God, honey, you were... If they hadn’t...” Josh kissed the top of her head. The action was so endearing, it brought tears to her eyes. “When did you find out you could heal people?”

  “The day I walked out of the hospital. A lady was carrying a little girl in the front doors. Couldn’t have been more than two years old. I can still remember everything about her, especially the aura.”

  “The aura?”

  Sarah relaxed against him, relieved he wasn’t condemning her as she’d feared he would. If he wanted to hear the whole story, she would oblige him. She shared something she’d never told another person, including her sister. “Everyone who’s sick has a sort of glow around them. Like a halo shining on their faces. The brighter the aura, the sicker they are. This little girl was really, really sick. I couldn’t stop myself from going to her. I talked to her mother for a minute and asked if I could hold her.”

  “And she let you? You didn’t even know them and she gave you her kid?”

  “Yeah. I know, it was weird. She never even hesitated. Just handed Tiffany over to me. Somehow, I knew what to do. I held her against my chest and spread my bandaged hand over her back. And I healed her. Then I passed her back to her mother and collapsed. Spent another night in that stupid hospital too because they didn’t know what was wrong with me.”

  Josh put a finger under her chin and raised her face to his. Then he laid a gentle kiss on her lips that didn’t last long enough to make Sarah happy. He lifted her left hand and kissed the puckered scars. “I’m glad you didn’t do it. I’m glad you didn’t succeed.”

  Sarah burst into tears of relief that helped her finally put the whole thing behind her. She hadn’t really wanted to die; she had just wanted the pain to end.

  “Don’t cry,” Josh said, rocking her against him when she laid her head back on his chest. “It’s over. Just promise me you won’t ever do anything that stupid again.”

  Sarah couldn’t help but let a chuckle escape. “I sure hope I don’t get struck by lightning again.”

  “You know what I mean. I can’t lose you, Sarah.”

  She kissed him. Instead of the simple, comforting kiss he’d given her, she gave him all she felt in her heart. Her relief, her passion, her love.

  Oh, yes, she loved him. And it took more than anyone would ever know for her to admit it, even if only to herself. Everyone she’d ever loved had gone away. She could only pray Joshua Miller would be the first love to endure because she wasn’t sure she could ever be without him.

  Wrapping his arms around her, Josh pressed his chest against hers. He kissed her long and deep, his tongue heightening the exchange, making flutters of delight run roughshod over her. Everything in her wanted him, needed him, demanded him. His hand reached up, plucking the hairclip from the back of her head. Sarah’s hair spilled to her shoulders. Josh didn’t let his lips leave hers as he laced his fingers through the tresses.

  “Um... Are we interrupting?” Libby’s voice cut through the magic spell Josh had woven around them.

  Sarah sat back, her face on fire. At least the darkness hid her embarrassment. Libby’s chuckle seemed to signal an acceptance, but to be caught necking with the girl’s father was humiliating.

  “Looks like you’re the one who needs the chaperone, Pop.”

  * * * *

  Josh gave Sarah one more lingering kiss before he let her slip into her bedroom. Damn, that was one of the hardest things he’d ever done. But it was after midnight, and she couldn’t stop yawning. She needed some rest not some wound-up man pawing at her. No, when he made love to Sarah, it was going to be something special.

  A virgin. He was still having trouble getting over that piece of news. Not that he didn’t believe her. Just a shock, to say the least. There sure weren’t too many thirty-year-old virgins left in the world who hadn’t taken some sort of vow of celibacy.

  If he was going to be her first lover—and her last—Josh swore he would plan something extraordinary. Something romantic. Candles and rose petals and soft music.

  And then there was Libby. What a hypocrite I am. Chaperoning his daughter on an innocent “date” to the movies while he secretly plotted a thousand ways in his head he could get Sarah in bed. Of course he and Sarah were adults and Libby just a child...

  Back in his own room, Josh stirred his laptop back to life. Thrilled that Sarah had finally opened up, that she’d given him the missing piece of the puzzle of her life, he wanted to investigate. Sarah obviously still felt responsible for Charlie’s death, and Josh figured it was one of the reasons she continued to heal people despite the risk to her own health and possibly her life. She might not be taking a dive off a roof, but her behavior still bordered on suicidal.

  There was someone he knew who could help him understand all this and help Sarah get past her grief. Someone whose insight he trusted above all others.

  Josh fired an email to his cousin, Dr. Laurie Kennedy.

  Chapter 13

  Sarah tilted her head back to let the sun caress her skin. Even though the chaise was comfortable enough to n
ap on, for once she didn’t feel like falling asleep. She could enjoy the sunshine without trying to steal a few precious moments of rest.

  Montana had been good for her. Spending time with Libby had been good for her. Joshua Miller had been more than good for her.

  She had to keep reminding herself this wasn’t real. She would have to go back to Indianapolis sometime soon, back to healing those who needed her. But for the first time in a very long time, Sarah wasn’t sure what she was going back to. How much more did she owe on the cosmic balance sheet?

  The love blossoming between her and Josh felt so strong, so healing that Sarah drew power from it. Just being with him those last few days had changed her. Whether they simply sat on the sofa with his arm around her or walked hand in hand down the long tree-lined drive, she absorbed his energy and his strength.

  Despite the guards she’d tried to raise against him, she’d fallen in love with Josh. She thought he was falling in love with her as well. Sarah wondered if his love might give her enough strength that for the first time in a long time, she might learn to love herself again. And then maybe, just maybe, she could forgive herself for what had happened to Charlie.

  Charlie. The unwanted memories she’d tried so hard to bury deep enough they could never surface again flooded her mind—vivid enough she gasped, wishing to force them aside. The harder she fought remembering, the stronger the recollections became. It had been so long since she’d allowed herself to ponder that horrible night and what had happened to her best friend, the person she was closest to in this world. The images played like a movie in her thoughts.

  * * * *

  “C’mon, Princess,” Charlie called as he jerked his loafer off and dropped it on the patio.

  Sarah always thought it was a shame a man that good looking, from his thick black hair to those hypnotic brown eyes to that muscular physique, couldn’t be her boyfriend. Hell, he couldn’t be any girl’s boyfriend.

  Sarah giggled at him, enjoying the lingering buzz left from the last swig of the bottle of Asti Spumante they’d shared. Tipping the dark green bottle, trying to capture the last precious drop, she realized that elusive last drop was long gone. “Well, poop. Hey, Sweet Prince, we’re outta Asti.” She tossed the bottle where the trash can used to sit. It bounced off the red brick of the garage wall and settled in the grass next to the back door. “That was dumb.” If the bottle had broken, the stupid realtor would have seen the mess and known it was her fault, that she’d come for a moonlight swim with Charlie. Pushy old broad. Well, this was still Sarah’s house, damn it. Hers and Hannah’s—at least until they signed the closing papers in a couple of days.

  Why had they been forced to give it up? Was it their fault they couldn’t keep up with the bills anymore? They needed to sell the place, to take the profit, pay their debts, and start fresh. Then they would finish the move into the pathetic house their parents used to rent out close to the crappy side of town. At least they had a nest egg left from their parents’ life insurance money. They’d be all right. They just wouldn’t live in the Taj Mahal anymore.

  Hannah was going to marry Doug Fanning, and since he was a worthless waste of a human being, he’d be moving into the rundown house with them.

  Sarah loved this house. She’d grown up here. The pencil lines the painters had covered on the kitchen wall had marked her growing from a child into a woman—inch by inch. Her pink bedroom was the one overlooking the pool. Now the walls of her room were beige. Neutral tones made the house easier to sell, so the realtor claimed.

  Staring out that window, Sarah had been the one who figured out she could jump from the enormous patio wall and land in the pool. Her mother had screamed in fright the first time she saw her younger daughter make the twenty-foot drop. But Sarah wasn’t afraid of anything, a trait that often found her high school years spent as much in detention as in the classroom.

  There were just too many fun things to do, too many people to see, too many places to go. School wasted her precious time. Charlie had told her so as he sat beside her in that stifling hot room no bigger than a walk-in closet the principal used for in-school suspension. Charlie always told Sarah she was special, that she was meant to make an important mark in the world. He told her she was more than the damned homecoming queen. And he loved her simply for who she was. Sarah would have followed him anywhere.

  People didn’t understand their friendship, often mistaking it for a sexual relationship. Sarah had always laughed at the notion. Charlie’s boyfriends always did too.

  Charlie Baxter was the one person she could talk to, the one person who shared her highs, her lows, and her dreams. Even if those dreams were turning to dust. One by one.

  She’d graduated high school. Barely. Her parents had enough pull and money to get her into University of Indianapolis. She’d only attended classes sporadically, figuring she wasn’t meant to be a kindergarten teacher, despite what her parents wanted. After three pathetic semesters, Sarah kissed the college goodbye. Then her parents had up and died. Her father never could hold his liquor, and he sure as hell had caused enough accidents while drunk. But this one wasn’t his fault. Her parents had been hit head-on by a semi. Their deaths had left her unprepared for being an adult.

  Sarah had always figured there would be time. Time to show her father that she was something other than a loser—that she was smart, that she could work hard. Time to get her mother to notice her. For once. Time to heal her family.

  But without a single warning, time ran out. She’d been devastated she couldn’t mend those broken relationships. Without Charlie to lean on, she wouldn’t have survived.

  Now they were taking her beautiful house away. Sarah would have to let some other family make memories there. Good memories. Like Christmas Days and birthdays. Bad memories. Like her dad coming home drunk, turning mean and sullen, and telling his daughters they were his biggest disappointment in life. Choking back tears, Sarah tried to push aside the guilt she sometimes couldn’t bear. If she’d been someone good, someone smart, maybe her dad wouldn’t have drank so much. It was her fault, despite what everyone said. The guilt had wrapped itself around her heart and refused to let go.

  To bring about blessed numbness, Sarah drank too much. Just like her Old Man. She partied most weekends, and she’d gotten into a spot or two of trouble. She’d completed her community service for the DWI arrests, and no one had ever been hurt except for a few mailboxes and one very large dumpster in that alley behind the dance club. Her mother had never said anything about any of Sarah’s legal troubles. Sarah just hoped her silence wasn’t because the woman hadn’t cared. But then again, Sarah had grown used to being ignored.

  Her father had responded by calling her a few foul names and telling her she was exactly what he always thought she would be—a chip off the old block.

  Just thinking about her parents dulled the Asti buzz. Sarah wanted another drink.

  Charlie pulled off his other loafer and tossed it over his shoulders at the pool more than a story below. He chuckled with the delayed splash. Then he stood up and jerked his polo shirt over his head. “C’mon. I wanna skinny dip.”

  “I’m not skinny dipping with you,” she said before snorting a laugh. “It’s too damn cold. Besides, you wouldn’t care what I bared anyway. I’m missing all the right equipment for your taste. And Derek would get pissed and think I was trying to get you to bat for the other team.”

  He laughed at her as he undid his belt-buckle. He whipped the leather belt out of the belt loops and waved it around like a limp sword. “If anyone could, it would be you. You know I love you more than Derek anyway.”

  Sarah smiled at him. “You said the same thing about your last boyfriend. And the one before that.”

  “Doesn’t make it a lie. They come and go, but you’ll always be there. I love you, Princess.”

  “I love you too, Sweet Prince.” God bless him, Charlie was the only person in the world who made her feel good about herself. He always brought a b
ottle of happiness with him, and he always made her smile.

  “You swimming with me?”

  Sarah hugged herself and rubbed her upper arms. “Brr. Too cold. And I need another drink.”

  “Fine, Miss Prude.” He threw his belt over the wall and started to peel off his pants. “Keep those gorgeous ta-tas all to yourself. I’ll keep my boxers on so I don’t shock you with something you’ve probably never seen before. Something really big.” He wiggled those black eyebrows as her. “You know, a penis.”

  “Quit making fun. I’m a virgin. So what? I just haven’t found the right guy yet.” At least Charlie believed her. She’d been homecoming queen. With the title came the bad reputation, undeserved though it was. She knew the guys always talked about her because they got pissed she held them at arm’s length. Drinking was one thing. Sleeping around was an entirely different story.

  College hadn’t been much better. And at every party, some guy pawed at her. Did all guys just want to get laid? Didn’t anyone want to fall in love anymore? Or was it just that no one would ever fall in love with someone like her?

  “I could take care of that little problem for you, you know,” Charlie said with another of his wonderful chuckles and a wink. “I could break right through that virginal barrier and light up your world and we could move to the suburbs and have six kids and... Oh, wait. I forgot. I’m gay.”

  “Smart ass.”

  “Don’t you know it. All right, I’m going in.” Standing on the top of the enormous wall overlooking the swimming pool, Charlie pounded his chest and gave a Tarzan yell.

  “Don’t jump from there,” Sarah scolded. Since she grew up, she’d realized jumping from that far up wasn’t a good idea. Doing it drunk was doubly stupid.