“Guess so.”
“Where to?”
He wrinkled his brow. “You live in Bellingham?”
“Yeah.”
He shrugged. “Guess that’s as good a place as any.”
She opened the trunk, threw in her pack, leaving room for his stuff, and turned to him, keys suspended. “Want to drive?”
He smirked. “Cause you’re so bad at it?”
“You any better than I am?”
“Absolutely.” His smirk turned into a grin.
“Let’s go.”
They got in the car, where he adjusted the seat back and checked the mirrors, tsking when the central one fell off in his hand. “This thing is a mess.”
“I know.”
It felt strange to twist the key in the ignition, to accelerate and turn the wheel. The sensation of asphalt slipping by beneath him was so unfamiliar, he felt like a wild man or a boy raised by wolves, getting his first taste of civilization.
“You okay?” she asked after a few minutes of descent.
“Yeah.”
“You look a little stressed.”
He swallowed, letting himself feel the quick pulse in his neck, the heavy beating in his heart. “Yeah.”
“I can drive.”
He shook his head and flipped on the lights, illuminating a screeching monster in the middle of the road. Instinct took over and he jerked the wheel hard to the right, pumped the brakes, and just barely missed the flapping, beady-eyed nightmare.
“Jesus fucking Christ. What was that?” Adrenaline rushed through his veins, squeezed his eyeballs, and tingled in his limbs.
“I don’t—” She turned to him, glanced over his shoulder with a start, and screamed before slapping her hands over her mouth, and, if he wasn’t mistaken, sinking into a fit of laughter.
Beside them stood a cluster of animals, their laser-sharp focus pointed straight at the car.
“Oh…my…God! It’s the turkeys!” O’Neal wheezed, hiccupped, and slapped him on the arm. “It’s the goddamned turkeys they just released.”
He exhaled and sank deeper into the seat. Talk about a heart attack. “They look like they’re out to get us.”
“They look hangry.” She laughed again. “Come on, Kurt, get us the hell out of here before they peck their way in and eat us.”
He caught her eye and grinned. Jesus, she was cute.
Pretending the sight of her didn’t twist something in his gut, he cautiously turned the wheel and let the car roll down the mountain.
“For the record. You don’t drive any better than I do.”
“Did you see how scary those fuckers were?” After a pause, he went on. “Good thing I was the one driving.”
She made a half-hearted humphing sound, but when he shot her a look, she was smiling. Their eyes met for a second, and she spoke.
“Stay at my house tonight.”
His breath hitched and he slid his eyes back to the road.
Shit. He wanted to. More than anything, right now.
“I don’t… No. No, I need to do this on my own.”
When she didn’t respond, he flicked a glance her way and was surprised to see what he thought might be disappointment on her face.
“Give me your address. And your number and stuff. I’ll look you up when I’m ready.”
He could tell she didn’t believe him. Honestly, he didn’t believe it himself.
“You got a phone?”
“Oh, right. Got no charge.” He reached into his pocket and handed it to her. She plugged it into a charger and he had a frantic desire to unplug it again, to stay off grid, where he could ignore the hundreds of unread texts and voice mails he’d have to face shortly.
“Okay. I’ll stick it in your phone when it wakes up.”
Okay. Okay.
He steadied his breathing, relaxed his grip on the wheel, and found that he could do this. He could drive. He could act normal, despite the phantom walking his legs were still doing. When had he not walked? Even when he twisted his ankle, he’d hiked long and hard. Even then.
They rode in silence until lone houses turned into groupings and, finally, they hit the relative hubbub of Bellingham city limits.
“Where should I go?”
“Up to you.” Her voice was noncommittal, which turned his stomach sour.
They passed a cheap hotel, with a grocery store less than a block away. He pulled into the lot and parked.
Why’d he have to work up the courage to look at her? Just to look? It didn’t make sense, but he couldn’t dwell on the whys of what he was feeling right now.
“Thank you, O’Neal.”
She nodded, pressing her lips together.
“I…I…” I’m glad you were there? You saved my life? I’m still so fucked up, I can’t hang out? I don’t want my presence to ruin things for you? What the hell did he want to say to this woman? Take me with you felt like a big one, but he ignored the hell out of that.
“You don’t have to say anything, Kurt. Here.” She handed him his phone and leaned in for an awkward car hug. “Don’t be a stranger,” she whispered against his ear.
“Yeah.”
They got out, unloaded his shit, including the wheelchair.
He felt their last hug inside his rib cage—a spike to his innards that wouldn’t disappear as he walked off, alone, without the fate of his best friend to anchor him.
6
There was only so much time he could waste showering and watching crap TV before reality set in. What a dick.
He spent a day eating and washing and doing his best to catch up on the latest news and shows, before deciding it was the last thing he should be doing. After so many months spent putting miles on his body, keeping all his activities to a couple square blocks left him restless.
Toward the end of the day, he headed toward downtown Bellingham, O’Neal’s number and address burning a hole in his phone. He wanted to see her face, touch her, get her to make those soft sex noises again, but he shouldn’t. His brand of messed up was the last thing she needed right now.
No, he’d do the tourist thing, check out the ocean views. Maybe buy himself a fancy-ass dinner.
That’s what Sebio would have done.
As soon as the thought hit him, he stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, cars streaming past on one side, and stared at his empty hands. The empty space in front of him. For a few slow heartbeats, he waited, resisting the urge to head back for the chair.
It took a while to start walking again and even longer to reach that swift, steady ground-eating pace he’d adopted months and miles and a lifetime ago.
By the time he reached the more crowded downtown sidewalks, he’d adjusted to walking alone. The need for a mission, however, wouldn’t go away. He wandered for a bit, thought about grabbing an ice cream cone and then freaked out at the flavors: green tea, chai, fucking rose? Whatever happened to good old chocolate?
It was when he stumbled back outside that he saw the man begging on the sidewalk—filthy, stinking of booze, and utterly desperate.
“Gotta dollar, man?” The man’s voice had seen the burnt end of way too many cigarettes.
“Yeah.” He reached into his wallet, flipped through the bills and pulled out a twenty, which he handed over. After a couple seconds, he squatted down beside him. “You a vet?”
“Sure am. US Army.”
“Marines.” Kurt reached out for a hand shake. “Gunnery Sergeant Kurt Anderson.”
“Jerry Robie. Corporal.”
“How long you been out here, Corporal?” It was impossible to tell the soldier’s age. His skin was worn, his teeth looked like shit, but who knew? A guy in his forties, without medical or dental care, could look sixty pretty damned fast.
The man shrugged. “Few years, I guess.”
Kurt nodded. “You okay? Got a place to stay? Got what you need?”
Another shrug and then a vague wave. “Place to sleep down there. It’s a shelter for guys like me.”
<
br /> “Vets?”
“Homeless people.”
Those words and their hopeless delivery crushed Kurt’s chest.
“VA hospital around here?”
“Vet center right here in Bellingham.”
“Yeah? You use their services?”
“Nah.”
“Why not?”
Another shrug was the only response.
“The vet center people go to the homeless shelter? They work together?”
“Never seen any.”
Kurt took a look around before asking, “What do you need right now? What can I do for you?”
“Nothing, man. I’m good.” He didn’t look good, but it wasn’t Kurt’s place to argue.
He gave the guy his number, scrawled on a paper napkin from the ice cream place, told him to call any time, day or night, and took off in search of the homeless shelter, his steps surer than they’d been in a while, his back steeled by a new sense of purpose.
Hours later, as he left the shelter in the direction of his hotel, Kurt noticed the sea smell in the air for the very first time.
Though he’d only lived beside water once in his life, and that had been during the hellish weeks of boot camp, it struck an undeniable chord.
Home.
O’Neal had no desire to answer her door. It was midafternoon on Thanksgiving Day, and she wanted her friends to leave her the hell alone. She wanted to hide out, not celebrate with people who wouldn’t understand. How could they get it, when she still could barely come to grips with what felt like a long-ass hallucination. High school crush appears on the side of the road, shows her some sort of alternate dimension, and utterly destroys her in the process.
She’d been just fine before he came along. She’d been perfectly happy with one-night stands and surface-only relationships. But, God, why did that sound so sad?
A week out and she still had no desire to socialize. He’d ruined her.
The knocking came again, harder this time. She’d told everyone she was sick and couldn’t make dinner, so of course they’d brought it to her a couple hours earlier. It only made sense. So, why the hell were they back?
More irritated, she slid out from the sofa nest she’d built in the past few days, stomped to the front door, and threw it open, ready to tear them a new one.
Only it wasn’t Shawnee and Dave. It wasn’t a neighbor or a colleague or anyone else she’d expect to harass her on Thanksgiving.
“Kurt.” God, she sounded dumb. But he was beautiful there on her doorstep. Unexpected and whole and so terribly beautiful. Everything in her picked up at the sight of him. This was bad. This was very, very bad.
“You can have it,” he said, voice solid.
“What?”
“The story.”
“I…I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Here.”
He handed her an envelope and stepped back.
“What’s this?”
“Photos of me and Sebio. Our team in Afghanistan. I also wrote out names, addresses, treatment hospitals. All of it.”
She blinked at the envelope, then back to him a couple times, and watched, dumb, as he turned to leave. He’d made it about halfway down her front walk when she got her brain back.
“What the hell are you doing?” she called after him.
“Giving you my story. Sebio’s story.” He lifted a chin toward the envelope in her hands. “It’s all there.”
“I don’t… Why?”
“You were right. Our system failed him. I know that. I mean…I’ve blamed myself, but it can’t all be on me, right?”
Oh. Oh. That lit a little flame inside her. Excitement. A mission. A real honest-to-God story. “Definitely.”
“I want you to report on that.”
“What changed?”
Everything, from the look of him. She couldn’t take her eyes off of this man, transformed from the one he’d been a little less than a week ago. It couldn’t happen overnight, she knew that, you didn’t straighten out and fix your ailments. You didn’t obliterate a history of pain in just a handful of hours, but the man looked good. Clean-shaven, wearing what appeared to be new clothes. Without the puffy coat, she could see the strong lines of his shoulders. She wanted to run her hands over them, wished he’d hold her. Because he’d rocked her world, damn it. In less than twenty-four hours, he’d turned her upside down. She was a mess, and he looked like everything.
“Took Sebio’s chair to a downtown shelter a few days ago, donated it. You know how many homeless vets there are around here?” He paused. “I’ve got no idea what’s next, but you gave me hope. And purpose.” He waved a hand to the envelope she held. “That’s to say thank you.”
This was what she wanted, right? She should feel good about this. She should be jumping up and down and punching the sky. Then why the hell did it feel so wrong? The envelope was visibly shaking when she held it out.
“I can’t.”
He stilled, eyes narrowing.
“What?”
It felt like a betrayal, but damn it, she couldn’t make this about her career. She couldn’t because she liked him. And that came with its own wave of discomfort, so strong her cheeks heated with it. She went down the porch steps and walked right up to him.
“I can’t take your story.”
His face crinkled up. “But I want you to. Somebody needs to talk about this. You said it yourself. The way vets are underrepresented? The high instances of suicide. You said that was a story! I’ve been reading about the push to privatize the VA.” He turned away, ran a hand through his hair and cleared his throat before looking her hard in the eye. “Somebody needs to tell the story. I’m asking you to do this.”
“It’s not my story to tell, Kurt.” She reached for his hand. The rough skin sent a memory-laced shiver through her, along with an unfamiliar desire for something else, something more. The yearning felt odd, but right. “You tell the story. You write it.”
“I can’t write.”
“You’ve got more than ninety percent of the writers out there. You’ve got a good story. An amazing story. Here.” She put the envelope in his hand and folded his fingers over it. It was hard to drop her arm, to tear herself away from the feel of his skin. “I’ll help you if you want. I’ll find resources, I can edit. I…” She sucked in a breath. “I like you.”
“I like you too, O’Neal.”
“I want you to be happy.” Do it. Say it. “And… I’ve never said this to a guy before, but…would you stay? In Bellingham?” She waved at the house behind her. “Here, if you want, but I understand if you don’t because… God, I feel like I’ve never even met myself.”
His eyes flicked over her. “What do you mean?”
“You’re trying to give me a story and leave. That’s pretty much been my fantasy from day one. I mean…a no-strings fling with the hottest man I’ve ever met and then he hands me the story of a lifetime?” She rolled her eyes.
“So take it.”
“You’re gonna make me say it, aren’t you?” Frustrated, she reached out and put her hand on his chest, feeling naked—open and raw and aching for someone else—for the first time in her life. “I don’t want the story, Kurt. I want you.”
“I’ve got nothing to give you.”
She shook her head and smiled at him. “And I do?”
“You’ve got a house.” He glanced at the hand she’d planted on him, then back up to her face. “You’ve got a job and a life. I’ve got the stuff on my back. That’s it.”
They stood there, in limbo, for a good three seconds before she leaned in, inviting him to do the same, and whispered, “You don’t have any idea how hard this is for me, do you?”
“What?”
“Letting someone in. Wanting someone.”
“Is that what this is?”
“Yeah.”
“If I stay, will you take the story?”
Smiling, she shook her head and nuzzled his ear. “Absolutely not.�
� After a pause, she went on. “But now that you’ve showered, there are a whole lot of other things I’d be willing to do.”
Under her hand, his heartbeat picked up speed.
“What’d you have in mind?”
“Come inside and take a load off, marine. Maybe we can figure this thing out together.”
“Shouldn’t you be celebrating Thanksgiving somewhere with your family?”
It took only a tug of his hand to get him to follow.
“I’ve got turkey, condoms, and a couple days off. I can’t imagine a better way to celebrate. Can you?”
“Guess not.” He smiled and huffed out a half laugh, shaking his head, then snared her eyes with his. “Hottest guy you’ve ever met?”
“Did I say that?”
“You did.” He shut the door with one of his golden boy grins and kissed her breathless. “Happy Thanksgiving to me.”
“Is this how you celebrate? By showing up and turning a woman’s whole situation upside down?”
“Is that what happened?”
Serious now, she grabbed his hand. “You have no idea.”
“Oh,” he said, tightening his fingers on hers, his eyes serious and sweet. “I’m pretty sure I do.”
THE END
Also by Adriana Anders
UNDER HER SKIN
BY HER TOUCH
IN HIS HANDS
Acknowledgments
This story was inspired by real life. This summer, I witnessed a man pushing a wheelchair with a pack in it up the road to the Mount Baker ski area. For weeks, I couldn’t stop thinking about that man and wondering what had brought him to that place. I can only hope his pilgrimage ended with a love story.
Thank you to Emma, Olivia, Kelly, and Ozan for their invaluable feedback, to Tamsen, Ainsley, and AJ for getting this anthology up and running, and to Kim Cannon for her perfect edits. As always, thank you to Le Husband for being my real life HEA.
Finally, to my readers: You are an amazing crew! Putting out books is a pleasure with people like you reading them! If you enjoyed this story, please consider leaving a review—it makes all the difference to us authors.
I would love to have you join my VIP reader list at www.adrianaanders.com/newsletter and hang out in my reader group.
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