Learning to Breathe Again (15 page)

“
Wait, his best friend? I’m
assuming that would be another guy, right? Are you doing
okay?”

“
I’m fine, Maddie. I’ve had
a couple of panic attacks, but I’ve managed to sleep through the
night the last couple of nights. Oh, and I even walked into a
hospital the other night.”

“
Hospital? You said you were
okay!”

“
Jack’s cousin went into
labor and with the ice storm, we had to take her to the hospital. I
wound up in the delivery room with her because Jack,” his arm
tightened around her waist again, warning her against telling tales
on him. “Jack decided to wait in another room.”

“
Wow. I should have talked
you into going to Texas sooner.”

“
I wasn’t ready.”

“
So, this Jack guy. Is he
hot?”

“
I’m not going to answer
that right now.” Bayleigh shifted so she could at least turn her
head to check on Jack. She knew he was awake but he had his eyes
closed. His lips twitched as he listened to her side of the
conversation.

“
Is he there? You sounded
like I woke you up. Did you sleep with him?”

“
Stop, Maddie! We’re in the
middle of that ice storm, remember? A tree limb crashed through one
of the windows and we had to bunk together. That’s all!”

“
So you did sleep with him!”
her friend teased.

“
Jesus, yes, sleep being the
operative word! Now stop it!” she hissed as Jack opened his eyes
and winked at her.

“
Okay, Okay, I’m sorry. It’s
just, well, I’ve been worried about you.”

“
I know, Maddie. I promise,
I’m doing fine here. I may even start writing ballads
again.”

“
Wow, you are feeling
better! Call me later, when Mr. Hottie isn’t around.” Maddie hung
up the phone before Bayleigh could respond.

Turning her screen off, Bayleigh chanced a
look over her shoulder at Jack. His eyes were open and he was
laughing. “Mr. Hottie?”

“
You heard that?”

“
I could hear everything,”
he nodded as his fingers stroked her stomach, causing all kinds of
strange sensations to riot through her body. “So, how’d you
sleep?”

“
Amazingly well. How about
you?” she turned the question back to him as she rolled over so
they were face to face. Her movements forced the blankets to slide
down to her waist and she shivered at the freezing temperature in
the room. She yanked them back up, burrowing back into their
warmth. She could still hear the steady
ping
as the ice hit the windows of her
room.

“
Better than if I had slept
on that couch. Thank you for sharing the bed with me.” His voice
was still husky from sleep and his hair was sticking up in all
directions. Bayleigh hated to think what her own hair looked
like.

“
Who was that on the
phone?”

“
My best friend Maddie. She
owns a bar near Nashville. Her former fiancé was in the Army and
she followed him to his duty station near there
somewhere.”

“
Ft. Campbell,” Jack
supplied.

“
That sounds right. Anyway,
it didn’t work out and she grew up around bars, so she took over
running one there and when the owner retired a couple of years ago,
he left it to her. She happened to be in England when I hurt my
knee and I broke down and told her the whole story. She made me
promise to come home as soon as I could travel.”

“
I think I like Maddie. And
not just because she’s smart enough to know I’m hot,” he
teased.

“
I swear, I haven’t talked
to her or emailed her since I met you! She came up with that all on
her own!” Bayleigh felt her face growing warm.

“
Are you saying you don’t
think I’m hot?” he teased as he brought his hand up and cupped her
face, his thumb caressing her cheek.

“
Can I plead the fifth on
that?”

“
I’ll just take it as a yes,
you think I’m hot,” his thumb continued the gentle
stroking.

Bayleigh cleared her throat, restless and
looking anywhere but at him. “Is it getting warm in here to
you?”

“
Afraid to answer
me?”

Bayleigh stopped fidgeting and looked back at
him. “You scare the crap out of me, Jack Williams.”

Startled, he stopped stroking her cheek.
“Why?”

“
You are the first man I can
spend time with, alone, without going into a full-blown panic
attack, since everything that happened last year. Six months ago,
hell, six
weeks
ago, it wouldn’t have mattered if the closest hotel was three
days away. I would have chosen that drive over staying here, alone,
with a man. It wouldn’t have mattered who vouched for
you.”

“
And that’s a
problem?”

“
I don’t know what it is!
I’m just saying it’s not my normal, or what has passed for normal
for a long time! And being this off-balanced is a little bit
scary!”

Jack smiled and slid his hand along her
cheek, pushing a few strands of hair back behind her ear and
resting his fingers on her scalp. He pushed a few strands of hair
back behind her ear. “What would you like to eat?”

“
What?”

“
It’s after three pm, so I
figured we could get up and make something to eat and take a look
at the weather reports,” he slid his hand away from her face. “And
then, if you’re up to it, we can talk.”

Bemused, Bayleigh watched as Jack tossed back
the covers and left the bed. With a smile on her face, Bayleigh sat
up and pushed the covers back, shivering as her feet touched the
cold floor. Grabbing clothes out of the dresser, she stepped into
the bathroom to change. She had a thermal shirt on under her
t-shirt, jeans and two pairs of socks, and still felt the cold.
Adding a second long-sleeved shirt to the layers, she headed out to
the kitchen where Jack had already made the coffee.

Deciding on sandwiches, they made a plateful,
and Jack grabbed chips out of the pantry. With their hands full,
they headed for the living room so they could turn on the T.V. and
figure out what was going on with the weather. Jack flipped through
the channels until he found the local weather and turned the volume
up.

“…
crazy storm front that
moved into the Hill Country over night. Usually with this weather
pattern, we get that layer of ice during the night and then by noon
the next day, it’s all melted away.” The meteorologist clicked
through some viewer pictures that had been sent in through the day.
“But as you can see, this storm stalled out and the temperatures
never made it above freezing today. Combine that with the fact that
the freezing precipitation has continued all day and it looks like
it’ll continue for at least one more night, the state police are
advising everyone to stay inside, stay home, and stay safe. Most of
the major roadways have been closed, including Interstate 35 from
Waco to San Antonio. We should get relief as this warm mass of air
here moves across the state, pushing this storm out of the way,
sometime tomorrow afternoon…”

“
Well, that sucks,” Jack
muttered as he turned the volume down.

“
So now what?” Bayleigh
tossed her napkin on her plate and set it on the coffee
table.

“
Now, I’m going to go
outside and see if there was any other damage from that tree branch
falling earlier, before I lose what’s left of the daylight. And I
need to make sure I have enough firewood stacked on the
porch.”

“
Firewood?” she looked over
at the fireplace. She’d noticed yesterday there was a fire laid in
the grate, but hadn’t given much thought to it.

“
I’m surprised we haven’t
lost power yet. Being so far out from town, I tend to lose power a
lot during ice storms or heavy thunderstorms.” Jack got up off the
couch and walked over to the window, looking out into the
approaching night.

“
You’re not going to expect
me to cook over a fire, are you?”

He chuckled. “No, the stove is gas. And for
the record, I won’t expect you to cook unless you want to do it. I
have a generator that will kick in if the power does go out. But I
only have certain things wired to it, like the refrigerator. I
didn’t think I’d ever need one big enough to have to worry about
powering the whole house. And usually I only need it for a couple
of hours, at most. We won’t have any heat other than the fire. So
we should bunk down in here, where I can light a fire in the
fireplace.” He turned to stare at her as he said the last part.

“
Are you expecting me to
panic over that?”

“
I’m not sure what I expect.
I do want to make sure you’re okay with all of it, though,” he
stepped away from the window, moving back over to stand near the
couch.

“
I think I’m okay with all
of this, Jack. We’ve already shared a bed and I managed to avoid
screaming the house down.”

“
Honey, you can scream the
house down all you want when we’re in bed together, as long as it’s
my name you’re screaming. And for the right reasons.”

Her face flamed as he winked at her as he
walked past the couch. “I’ll be outside if you need anything.”

“
I think I’ll go run around
in the ice storm to cool off,” Bayleigh muttered, watching as he
walked out of the room.

“
Heard that!” he called back
over his shoulder.

“
Of course you did. Ears
like a bat, too,” Bayleigh muttered as she gathered up the
leftovers from their late lunch and headed for the kitchen. As she
glanced out the kitchen window, she realized that the sleet had
stopped for the moment. Well, she couldn’t hear it hitting the
window anymore, at least. Of course, with the layer of ice that was
covering the window, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to hear it
anyway.

Making sure everything was cleaned up and put
away, she was in the process of making a fresh pot when she heard
her cell phone down the hall. If they did lose power, she wanted
one last hit of caffeine. The phone could wait.

She hit start on the coffee maker and then
headed down the hall to her bedroom to retrieve her cell phone.
Swiping her finger across the screen, a frown crossed her face when
she saw that she’d missed several calls from her brother. And he’d
left a couple of messages, too.

Retreating to the kitchen, she put in her
code and pulled up her voicemail, listening to her messages. He was
just checking on her and Jack, and since neither of them were
answering their phones, he was more than just a little worried.

With a soft laugh, Bayleigh hit the call back
button and waited for her brother to answer.

“
Bayleigh, is that
you?”

“
Yes. It’s me. We’re
okay.”

“
Weather channel makes it
look pretty bad. And all the flights to Austin are cancelled.”
Jason sighed. “We were hoping to make it back there, but I-35 is
closed from Waco to south of Austin, so we can’t even drive
it.”

“
We saw that on the news.
The roads were bad when we were driving home this morning, so I’m
guessing they’re beyond horrible now. Jack drove on the shoulder
most of the way, even across a field or two.” Bayleigh smiled at
the memory.

“
I’m surprised he didn’t
make you guys stay at the hospital. Carly said her mom was staying
with her, and they’d offered the two of you beds as
well.”

“
Jack said he doesn’t like
hospitals.”

“
True, but he hates driving
in bad weather even more. I’m just glad you two made it home. Is
everything okay there?”

Bayleigh massaged her temple as she answered.
“I guess. He’s bringing in wood for the fireplace. We haven’t lost
power yet, but he seems to think it’s only a matter of time. Oh,
and he lost a bedroom window to a tree branch. He said he was going
to look and make sure there wasn’t any other damage to the
house.”

“
Well, at least you’re not
alone, I guess.”

“
You got a problem with
this, Jason?” Bayleigh’s eyes narrowed.

“
Christ, no. I had a problem
with you and that asshole Will. Jack is not an issue,” Jason
paused. “Well, one thing you do need to know about him, if you’re
going to be sleeping with, I mean, sleeping in the same room as
him.” Jason corrected himself, causing Bayleigh to
giggle.

“
Bayleigh....” Jason’s voice
had that ‘much older brother’ warning tone to it now.

“
Okay, I’m sorry. Continue.
What do I need to know if I’m sleeping with Jack?”

“
Jesus, Bayleigh. Those
words do not ever need to come out of your mouth again. I do not
need any type of mental images here. Got it?”

Bayleigh almost doubled over with laughter
and tears were running down her face. “Okay, Okay. I’m sorry. What
do you need to tell me?”

“
Jack has PTSD. I’ve never
known him to be violent, but I know he has nightmares and doesn’t
sleep well. Don’t approach him if he’s having a nightmare until
you’re sure he’s awake and with you, if you know what I
mean.”

“
Yes, I know what you
mean.”

“
Has something happened?”
Now she could hear the suspicion in his tone.

“
No, no, nothing like that.
I, uh, have some experience with this, but not with Jack,” Bayleigh
rushed to assure her brother. “Look, Jason, we’re doing fine here.
But I do need to talk to you when you get back to town. One on one
time.”