Cherish and Protect

by Lori Ryan

  “James,” she whispered, her hand going to his hair, brushing over it with a touch so light he had to reach for her hand, pulling it against his mouth for a hard kiss. He needed to prove to himself that she was really there. That he was really there.

  That he really had left the hole. That he’d been pulled out and was safe. He was home.

  He pulled his eyes away from her, turning his head and burying his face in her sweet stomach. He clung to her, arms wrapped around her as she ran her fingers through his hair. He didn’t know how long they stayed that way before she knelt to face him and wrapped her arms around him.

  He wanted to cry but there wasn’t anything in him. He was empty and hollow and only Presley could fill him. Only she could fill the blackness of his soul long enough to make him feel, to make him believe that maybe someday he could be whole again.

  He lay back, and pulled her down on top of him, running his hands over her, finding the spots on her body that made her moan, that drew the soft mewls of pleasure from her. He made it his mission to make her tremble in his arms. And then he used his mouth and his hands to make her cry out his name.

  Somehow in that, he felt anchored, if only for the briefest moment. He knew he would come loose again, floating in that in-between space where he was never sure what’s real and what might be imagined. Where he couldn’t quite convince himself that the pain is over, that his tormentors are gone, dead, or just too far away to hurt him any longer.

  She loved him there on the floor of his loft. Not with her heart or her mind, he knew, but with her body. She stripped him bare, body and soul, and loved him. And he let her, because it was all he could do to keep the pieces of his soul from shattering then and losing himself forever.

  19

  Hours later, they had moved to the bed. Presley lay in James’s arms, running her hands up his arms where they wrapped around her. She had the feeling he was with her now, more so than he had been when she’d first arrived. When he brought her to the loft, there had been a desperation to the way he took her. Not the kind of desperation that said he wanted her and couldn’t hold back.

  This was a soul-deep need to be held by someone. A soul-deep need to feel. To touch. To connect. To connect, even though she would swear he wasn’t entirely with her earlier. Wasn’t entirely there.

  Right now, she was with James and he was there with her.

  “Tell me about the spaces you looked at today,” he said.

  She did. She told him about the little house and the larger building. About the windows Seth had talked about cutting into the brick.

  “That sounds like a good plan. The bigger space will be nice.”

  “It will be,” Presley said. “And I don’t think it will be too big. It should be just right.”

  “Seth is someone you know?”

  Presley wished she heard a note of jealousy or tension in him. It was foolish, but she wished that this was something more than it was. His voice was steady, though, holding nothing more than the basic curiosity of a man wanting to know who all the players in the story were.

  “Yes, he and his brothers own a building company in town and they own a few properties. He thinks his brothers will be open to selling the building instead of leasing it. If they aren’t, I can always lease it and hope they want to sell later.”

  “Or lease it and buy another space after your business is established.”

  Presley smiled and let her head rest on his warm arm. The thought of her business being successful made her smile. Would she be thriving and growing in a year?

  “Presley,” he said, and something in his tone made her still.

  “Yeah?” She tried to keep her tone light. Tried like hell to protect herself for what she knew was coming.

  “You know I can’t give you anything more than this, right? I won’t be able to let this be more than just this, what we’re doing right now.”

  Presley nodded, still feeling the warm heat of his skin against her cheek. She didn’t need more than he could give her right now. Because, for once, the man she was laying with was being brutally honest with her. He wasn’t trying to pretend to be something he wasn’t. He wasn’t trying to make her believe in something more. He was only telling her exactly what he could offer and what he couldn’t.

  That meant something to her. No, not something. It meant a lot. A hell of a lot.

  20

  Presley padded down the stairs in her bare feet. She must have fallen asleep, but it hadn’t been for long. The sun was going down when she woke to find the bed empty beside her.

  She could hear James in the barn below, the sound of some kind of saw or sander or something reaching her.

  She pushed open the door at the bottom of the stairs and stood watching him. He bent, no shirt covering the muscles of his lean form, running a tool over the top of a bookshelf. She didn’t know what the tool was, but she didn’t care. The ripple of his skin as his muscles bunched and pulled beneath was entrancing. His arms had started to tan and she guessed it was because he was coming out more. Getting up on Tess and riding in the sun was probably as good for him mentally as it was physically.

  Presley stood back, watching from a distance. Somehow, she knew if she walked up to him with the sound of the tool drowning out her approach, she might find herself on the receiving end of a very scary, defensive James.

  Instead, she waited, more than happy to enjoy the show.

  Lulu stood, leaving her spot next to James, and walked to Presley, inviting petting with a nudge of Presley’s hand. That small movement was enough to draw James’s attention. He shut off the tool and turned, looking at her as Lulu begged for more petting.

  The nerves that danced in her belly under James’s gaze threw Presley off and she flicked her eyes to his side to avoid the intensity of his stare. That’s when she focused on the shelf he’d been working on.

  “It’s gorgeous,” Presley said, moving forward to inspect the piece. There was nothing typical about it. He’d used wood that wasn’t cut into planks with even surfaces and squared-off corners. The wood moved and buckled and flowed with the grain. The front of the shelf had the bark still on the wood. “How do you do this? I mean, how do you get the wood to look like this?”

  Tall, dark, and silent guy took her hand and pulled her to a large log laying on its side in another corner of the barn. James lined her up in front of the wood, then wrapped himself around her, his face resting near hers. She could feel his breath whispering over her cheek, and almost had to close her eyes against the sensual assault.

  He lifted a chisel and mallet and set the chisel into the wood where a crack already existed. He put the mallet in her hand, then helped her raise it and bring it down on the chisel, splitting the wood with a satisfying crack. He pried the chisel out and moved it further along the crack, repeating the process, until they’d broken off a long piece of the wood.

  “It’s not very accurate,” he said, and she shivered at the feel of his lips on her neck, “but the results are more unique than what I can get if I buy wood that’s been run through a mill.”

  Presley nodded, not really trusting herself to speak.

  James held her locked in the teasing trance another moment, then stepped back, breaking the spell and offering a grin.

  She shook her head at him. “Tease.”

  His smile widened, and the lack of remorse was evident.

  She moved to another piece he was working on. This one was going to be a large rectangular table, but Presley couldn’t figure out how the top of it was going to work. The table frame was wrought iron, welded together in a rectangular shape with sturdy legs. Set into the tabletop were three large logs that had clearly been split in the method he’d just shown her.

  The bottom of the logs was rounded and still held the bark of the tree on them. The tops of the logs—the portions that had been split—had been sanded smooth, but still held the ripples of the wood where it had split. They were anything but flat. And they’d been set do
wn in the table by a few inches.

  James came up behind her and ran his hand over the top edge of the table. “After I get them smooth and stain them to draw out the pattern of the grain of the tree, I’m going to fill this in with resin to give the tabletop the flat surface it needs. You’ll still see the grain of the tree through the resin.” He shrugged. “I think it will work.”

  Presley looked at him, stunned to see that he didn’t think much of what he was doing. “This is incredible, James. It’s stunning.”

  “I think Laura will like it.”

  “It’s for Laura?”

  He nodded. “For her greenhouse.”

  Presley looked back at the shelf and the table, then turned to him. “Would you build my display shelves for the flower shop? The way you keep the wood looking so natural, but adding a finished look to it would be perfect for the shop.”

  He held her look for a minute before glancing down. “If you can bring me pictures or videos of the space, take the measurements for me. I can’t go there with you, Presley.”

  The tears that pressed at her eyes surprised her with how swiftly they came, how fast the pain hit her. It killed her knowing he couldn’t do something as simple as taking a drive with her into town to tour her building. Laura had told her James didn’t leave the ranch, but this was the first time she’d had to face it.

  She pasted a smile on her face, knowing it was entirely too bright, too big. “No problem. I’ve got tons of pictures and videos already and I can get more if you need them.”

  James stepped away, pretending to study something on the table top, examining one of the corners and running his thumb over it.

  She stood still for a minute, not at all sure how to handle this. He knew she’d been feeling pity for him and she hated that. It wasn’t pity, exactly. It was anger and pain and hopelessness. She was hopeless to know how to fix this for him, but that’s what she wanted. And she realized then that that was foolish. She could never fix this for him. All she could do was accept him as he was and be there for him when he needed her.

  She stepped over to him, slipping between his body and the table. Her hands ran over his chest and up to rest on his shoulders, and his eyes met hers, pain and a bleak emptiness evident.

  “James,” she said, looking back toward the table then back again, “these are incredible. They’re unique and special and perfect in their imperfection. I would love it if you would make something like this for me for the flower shop. Please?”

  Something in his gaze filled and the emptiness wasn’t complete any longer. It was still there, but it was no longer all that was there. He nodded and then he lifted her and brought her back to his loft.

  When he made love to her this time, Presley clung to the hope that maybe she could fill the empty space inside of him a little bit, at least for a short time. If she could give him that, she gladly would. Even if it meant she would walk away from this, leaving a piece of herself behind. A piece that would hurt like hell when she had to walk away. But she’d give him that if that’s all she could do for him.

  21

  “Okay,” Ashley said. “Phoebe is making the margaritas and Katelyn is bringing the cookies in in just a minute.”

  Phoebe Joy was dating Laura’s brother-in-law, Shane, and Katelyn Davies was married to Sheriff John Davies and owned one of the artist studios in town.

  Ashley set a tray with chips and queso dip on the coffee table that sat in front of the couch Laura and Presley shared. The doorbell rang, but before Ashley could answer it, her sister Cora popped the front door open and called out. “It’s just me!”

  Cora was trailed by her other sister, Emma, and a smiling Lily Winn, the town veterinarian who was married to one of the deputies who worked for Katelyn’s husband.

  The group of women was tight-knit, and Presley was always glad Ashley had brought her under her wing and introduced her to them all. Presley was always the quiet one in any group, probably a result of the fact she’d been home schooled all her life, but she didn’t feel like an outsider with these women anymore.

  As the group settled in around her and Phoebe came out of the kitchen passing margaritas around, Ashley called out to everyone from the head of the room. “Okay, ladies. I’m going to do the announcing for Pres because, well, we all know she won’t brag and I will. On that note, let me be the first to introduce you to the new owner of Petals and Posies, a new flower shop that’s going to be located in the old convenience store building downtown. Presley just found out the Hart brothers have accepted her bid to buy the building.”

  Ashley raised her glass in a toast and the women all turned to congratulate Presley, making her cheeks flush. Despite her embarrassment, it felt good to be surrounded by friends who she knew would be cheering her on through the whole thing. These women would have her back.

  “Tell us everything,” Katelyn said.

  Presley laughed. “Everything?”

  “Her business plan is solid,” Lily said. “I’ve seen it and she has everything covered.”

  “When do you plan to open?” Katelyn asked.

  “I think in two months. I still need to finalize the buildout with Seth, so I might build in a little cushion and make it three months.”

  “You know,” Katelyn said, “that building is so close to the artists’ studios, we could probably include you in the artists’ walk map. Do you have any blank wall space where you could feature an artist each month or every other month? It might bring people in who might end up purchasing something or coming back to you when they need flowers for an event.”

  Presley set down her drink. “That’s a great idea. And, yes, I think I could leave some space for that. I have one wall devoted to the refrigerated display cases that will hold pre-made bouquets and stem flowers. James is going to make me some floating shelves to go on some of the other walls, but there’s certainly space to install a few pieces.”

  Ashley pointed to Presley. “And that brings us to the next thing I wanted to ask about. Tell us all about James,” she said, drawing out the word all. “What’s going on between you two?”

  Cora laughed and clapped her hands. “We want details.”

  Laura stuck her fingers in her ears. “We really don’t. We really, really don’t.”

  Cora tossed a pretzel at Laura. “Speak for yourself. Some of us have no dating life. We need to live through others.”

  It was well known in the group that the only person Cora was interested in dating was Justin Kensington, Laura’s former brother-in-law through her first marriage. Sadly, although he now lived in Evers and worked with Laura, the man seemed determined to live like a monk.

  “James is my brother,” Laura said, throwing the pretzel back with a laugh. “I don’t need any details. Or even vague information. I need to know absolutely nothing whatsoever about his dating life.”

  Presley raised her hands. “We’re not dating. Not at all. He’s really not in a place for that, guys.” They didn’t need to know about the sex. What was happening with James was complicated. It wasn’t really something she could explain to them.

  The room quieted. What had happened to James in South America was no secret.

  “How’s he doing?” Ashley asked, looking to Laura for her answer.

  Laura looked like she was struggling with how to answer. She finally went with, “He’s getting a little better each day I think?”

  She looked to Presley, who nodded. “He has good days and bad. I think it’s the kind of thing where he takes a step forward then a step back and so on, but I think he’s getting better.” She nodded again at Laura, as though if she nodded enough, she could reassure her friend.

  She didn’t say that James still couldn’t leave the ranch, except to go to therapy. That he woke shivering in the night. That he sometimes blacked out in the middle of a conversation and didn’t seem to come back to himself for hours at a time. She knew Laura knew some of that. Obviously, she saw that James didn’t leave the ranch, but she didn�
�t know how much of the rest of it Laura knew.

  “He told me he feels like a failure,” Laura said. “He feels guilty for not keeping me away from Patrick, for not realizing what was happening.”

  Emma spoke, then. “What I’ve never understood is how you didn’t know where he was. Why didn’t you know James was in the military at all?”

  Laura had only found out James was in the military when Phoebe and Shane had tracked him down three months before.

  “Emma!” Cora said and Ashley laughed. It was usually Cora and Emma who scolded Ashley for saying the wrong thing or asking forward questions.

  Emma folded her arms over her chest. “What? It’s not like you all didn’t want to ask.”

  Laura sighed and tucked her feet under her. “I haven’t talked to James about it, but one of his friends he served with sat down with me when James was in the hospital.”

  “Jeff Hunt?” Presley asked, remembering the man who had visited James.

  “Yes, he was really great. I know most people who served in the kinds of places they’ve been to don’t want to talk about it, but Jeff reached out to me to see if I had questions. He seemed to know James wouldn’t be able to talk to me about that kind of stuff.”

  “They were in basic together,” Presley said, more to the group than to Laura.

  Laura nodded. “They went into special forces together afterwards. Jeff said in special forces they had a minimum of three years of training, some of the guys had more. The training exercises were all over. He and James basically left basic and their Army Individual Training, and went right into their Q course together. It’s the qualification course for special forces. They split off from there, each going into specialized courses, but then came back to the 7th Special Forces Group together. They were shipped out of the country for training ops that could last months at a time. James would keep up with me through email on the occasional times he had access to write, but I never saw those. By that time, Patrick had taken over my account and was responding to James for me. I think that’s one of the reasons James is so hard on himself. He didn’t realize it wasn’t me writing back to him and he thinks he should have.”