Half-heartedly I rolled my eyes but complied. I was too exhausted to fight, and it was what I instinctively did after my nightmares anyway. I felt ripped off and uneasy that one had just happened while I was awake.
“Stairs, green wallpaper, broken light, dead fly on the floor, obnoxious man,” I said, eyeing him. My breathing began to settle, and I pulled myself up straighter. Dax's mouth curved.
“There you are,” he said, rubbing the tops of my knees gently.
After helping me to my feet, I realised how drained I was. And the realisation of what just happened hit me like a school bus.
Oh God.
I’d had a full-blown breakdown.In front of someone.
I turned my head, face burning. He’d just seen more of me than any gynaecologist ever had. Like he’d peered into the cervix of my mind.
“That’s never happened before,” I mumbled.
I wished the ground would open and drop me back into London. Back at a café table, arguing with Rick over whose round it was.
God knows what Dax would do with this information. I’d say my days of giving him crap about his loud phone meetings were over.
“Two tours as a scout sniper in Iraq,” Dax said as he backed away to sit on the wooden bench in the hallway. “That stuff will come up whenever it pleases until you find a way to deal with it.”
He looked distracted as he leaned his head against the peeling wallpaper. The idea of that ever happening again—let alone in public—made me swallow hard.
“You’ve dealt with it?” I asked, moving to sit next to him, even though the benches made my skin crawl.
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Sort of. I was honourably discharged when I developed this.” He held up one of his shaking hands as if he were inspecting it. “I don’t know what affects me more—what I did over there or the humiliation of not being able to handle it.”
Dax pulled a round tin from the pocket of his jeans and held it out to me. “Here.”
“Isn’t it your job to teach people not to take candy from strangers?”
He smirked. “Lucky we’re not strangers then.”
I smiled as I took the tin of fruit drops he placed between us.
“I haven’t seen one of these in years,” I said, tracing my fingers across the surface.
“My gramps always had them. They still sell them at the hardware store in town. Something about having these with me makes me feel closer to him. Is that lame?” he asked, giving me a sidelong glance.
I took the lid off and let the scent swirl through my mind.
“Not at all.”
How could it be, when I’d had someone special who always carried them too?
Without question, every time he saw me, he’d drop to one knee and produce the tin from his pocket. The green ones were my favourite, and he always saved them for me. His square glasses framed blue eyes that crinkled with the smile he wore when he spoke to me.
Sometimes the tin would be empty, and instead, his hand would emerge with a fistful of round mints. They smelled of cigarettes, like the rest of his clothing, but I loved them. I’d sit and watch his mouth move, trying to catch every word of his Dutch accent as he showed me what he was working on. Throwing coals into the boiler that heated the radiators at school was my favourite one to watch. He was the caretaker, and his wife was one of the cleaners at the first school I attended after Bellamy Children’s Home. A tender warmth filled my chest as I remembered him, and I was glad that I still seemed to have full control over my tear ducts today so no pesky emotions could escape them.
Dax leaned his elbows on his knees, turning to glance at me. I was showing him my craziness on a rollercoaster scale today. The idea of anyone here knowing more about me beyond my name and that I owned this crap shack made me gag.
“Shall we go on?” I asked.
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you sure you’re up for it? I don’t mind doing this alone.”
“I’m up for it,” I said firmly, standing to prove my point.
“Al-righty.” He studied my face for a moment.
