I just shake my head. There’s nothing I can say to make her understand how emasculating it is. How much it fucking sucks to have a weakness like this one.

“What are you doing about it?” she asks hesitantly. “What’s the treatment?”

I shake my head again. “I declined treatment when I came home. I mean, I saw a shrink a couple times, but I didn’t do the extensive program that Brand signed up for. It’s called CPT. It stands for cognitive processing therapy or something like that. Brand told me that it fucking sucked, but still thought I should do it. I said no way in hell. I’ll deal with it on my own.”

“And how’s that working out?” Maddy sounds doubtful.

“Shitty,” I admit. “But it can’t be worse than CPT.”

“How long does the CPT last?” Maddy asks curiously. “Can you still do it?”

“I could,” I answer carefully. “But I don’t want to. It’s supposed to be a week of pure hell. I’ve had enough of hell.”

“OK,” Maddy answers uncertainly. “But do you remember what you told me yesterday? You said you could see that I’m afraid to face my demons, that until I do, I’ll always be hung up in the past. Those were pretty wise words, Gabe. And I think they might apply to you too.”

I shake my head. “Your past is different from mine, Maddy. People died because of me. It’s not the same.”

She stares at me doubtfully, but doesn’t push it.

“I’m sure you know what you’re doing.”

I don’t.

But I don’t say that.

Instead I look at her again. “Do you think I’m a crazy asshole now?”

She stares at me like I’m actually crazy.

“Gabe, I saw you melt down in Chicago. Trust me, my imagination was way worse than reality. When you didn’t say anything about it, I thought you might actually be crazy. But you’re not.”

I stand up and hold out my hand to help her up. “Do you hate me now?”

“For what?” She’s incredulous. “For doing your job? For coming home devastated? For losing your friend? Um, no. I respect you even more for what you’ve been through.”

“Maybe you’re the crazy one,” I mutter as we walk down the pier.

“We shouldn’t rule that out,” she agrees. I chuckle, a low sound in the night, before I tuck her into her car. “Meet me at my house,” she suggests. “Stay with me tonight.”

I tense up automatically, out of sheer habit. “I don’t think so,” I tell her. “I don’t think I should.”

“But I know what to expect, right?” she answers. “Nightmares, tossing and turning? Trust me, I’ve seen it already. I saw it that first night and I saw it last night. You woke me up from the couch. It’s not that big a deal.”

I picture that girl in Kabul. The blood running down the side of her face. She would beg to differ, I’m sure.

But that was almost a year ago. Surely I’ve come a long way since then.

Surely.

I finally nod. “All right. I’ll meet you at your house.”

Maddy grins beatifically. “Perfect. See you there.”

I get into my car and sit there for a second. I can’t believe I just did that. I might not have told her everything, but I told her some of it and she didn’t run.

I take a shaky breath in. Then out.

Is it possible that everything might really turn out OK?

Is it possible that like Maddy, I can face what happened and move on with life?

It seems too much to hope for.

Yet that’s exactly what I’m doing.

Hoping.

I start my car and follow Madison’s taillights to her house. In the dark they almost seem like glowing red eyes watching me.

The bad thing caught you.

Fuck the bad thing.

Chapter Fifteen

Madison

Driving to my house, I think about what Gabriel said. And it all makes perfect sense.

No wonder he freaked out in Chicago when our taxi exploded. It was an explosion, for God’s sake. It must’ve seemed just like the bomb in Kabul.

I swallow hard.

Hearing him talk like that, so vulnerable and hurt, touches me in a place that I’ve never been touched, a deep-down place where wives and mothers keep their protective instincts.

It makes me want to wrap my arms around him and hold him where I can protect him, as if I could. I know that I can’t, just as I know he would never allow it. He’s as alpha-male as they come.

I pull into my driveway, get out of my car and meet Gabe as he’s stepping out of his Camaro. I drag his face down to mine, kissing him hard. He’s surprised, but wraps his arms around my waist, pulling me closer, returning my kiss.

Finally he pulls back. “What was that for?”

I shake my head. “Just for being you.”

He looks at me skeptically, but doesn’t push it. He simply follows me into the house. Knowing what happened to him puts me in a sentimental mood and all I want to do is sit around and stare at him, marveling at his bravery. Or hold him tight. Or drape myself in his arms. All of these things would make me look crazy, so I don’t do any of them.

Instead I suggest that we sit in the hot tub.

“You have a hot tub?” He raises an eyebrow. “How did I not know this?”

“It never came up before.” I shrug.

“I don’t have a swimsuit,” he warns me, his dark eyebrow lifted. I smile.

“You don’t need one.”

I tug him by the hand until we reach the sunken hot tub on my veranda. Gabe eyes it in surprise.

“I didn’t even notice it was here that first night that we… well, I didn’t see it.”

I laugh as I step out of my shorts, then peel off my top. “We were a little distracted that night.”

I take off my bra and then step out of my panties, standing in front of him completely nude. He eyes me in appreciation, his gaze doing a slow sweep up and down my body.

“I’m a little distracted right now,” he admits, undoing his own pants and shedding his clothes.

He pulls me to him, my skin against his, his hands running up and down my backside.

“Have I ever told you that you have the sexiest ass in the world?” he asks quietly.

“No, you haven’t,” I chuckle. “But feel free to.”

“You do,” he announces against my lips. “I could keep it in my hands all day.”

“Why don’t you keep it in your hands over here where it’s warm?” I suggest, as I move away from him and toward the hot tub.

Gabe slips out of his clothes and follows me, and true to form, he does grab my ass as I step into the steaming water.

Once I sink down in the water, I climb onto Gabe’s lap.

The feeling of his skin against mine instantly turns me on and I kiss him hard. For a reason that I can’t explain, I need to feel close to him tonight. I want to absorb his pain, all the pain he’s been hiding. I want to take it away so he doesn’t feel it anymore.

I want to drown in him. I want him to drown in me. My body and his body and nothing in between.

And there’s only one way I know of that I can do that.

I slide my hand along his stiff cock, listening to the way Gabe sucks in his breath as I touch him. I love the way his voice sounds in the dark, I love the way he feels against my hand. I love the way he responds to me.

I love the way he opened himself to me.

The way he trusted me with himself.

I love the way he feels beneath me, his thighs under mine.

I kiss him again, muffling his full-throated groan with my lips, and it’s like he knows my thoughts, he knows all of these things that I love about him.

And I don’t even have to say it.

Without another word, I lower myself on him in the water, burying his cock deep inside me, and he throws his head back, gripping my back with his large hands.

“Don’t you want a condom?” he manages to say, lifting his head and looking at me with stormy eyes. I shake my head.

“I’m on the pill. And I trust you.”

“Fuck, Mad,” he groans, as I lift myself up and down the length of him.

The water makes it easy to take more of him in me, to sink fully down on him. I can tell it’s driving him crazy. But it’s driving me crazy too. The way his skin slides against me makes me want to cry, my nerves are so feverish, my emotions so raw.

I want him to come, though. I want to absorb him into me, I want to take everything he can give me. Take and take and take. All of it.

“Come for me, Gabe,” I whisper against his throat, since his head is tipped back. I kiss it slowly, licking the wetness from his skin, tasting him. “Come for me.”

He groans. “You’re killing me.”

I laugh, a low and husky sound because I’m so turned on. “That’s the point,” I tell him. “I want you to come. I want to feel it.”

I move faster, slipping up and down his length, until he does groan and grab at me, and I know he’s coming. I feel him throb and pulse. I feel the heat of it inside me and I smile.

“Now was that so hard?” I ask with a smile as I curl onto his lap. He grins.

“No. That’s the problem,” he answers. “It wasn’t hard at all. But you didn’t come. We need to take care of that. Fair is fair.”

Even as I protest and tell him that he doesn’t need to, he flips me onto my back and holds me against him as he slips his fingers into me. Moving fluidly, he deftly and quickly brings me to my own climax and I come and come, twisting and writhing beneath his hand.

“You’re good at that,” I finally tell him when I can breathe again. He grins.

“Thank God. You’re insatiable.”

“Whatever,” I chuckle. We lie in the hot tub until our fingers start to prune.

“I think we’re going to have to drain this, sanitize it, and refill it,” I mention as we climb out and wrap ourselves in towels. Gabe chuckles.

“Why? Is anyone else besides us going to be using it?”

He has a point.

We order Chinese and curl up on the sofa to eat it. We watch a movie until we’re sleepy enough for bed and then it’s finally my favorite time of day.

I love the night because I love snuggling against Gabe’s hard chest. I love it when his arms close around me and he holds me close. I feel safe and secure, as though nothing from the real world can touch me.

And tonight he won’t be leaving. He’ll stay with me all night. It’s a thought that makes me smile.

As I lie inside the crook of his elbow, I listen to the crickets chirping outside my window and the lake crashing against the shore, lulling me to sleep. I listen to Gabe’s rhythmic breathing and the sounds of his light snore when he slips even deeper into sleep.

I don’t know how long it is before I follow him.

I don’t know how much time passes until I’m awakened.

But it only takes me a brief second to realize that I can’t breathe.

Gabe’s hands are squeezing my throat, his fingers curled around my neck like a vise grip.

I startle completely awake, thrashing against him as I try to breathe, but his arms are wiry steel bands and I can’t budge them.