“You fuckin’ stay with me, Buck,” I mutter.
He groans again, and I feel my stomach lurch, knowing these are his last seconds. He’ll die out here, and for what? They won’t know he had a wife. A daughter he’s never met. That he loves the Detroit Lions and Bud Light. They won’t know that when all of us are tired he tells us the stupidest fuckin’ jokes, just to keep our spirits up, until someone starts throwing shit at him to get him to stop.
Numbness spreads through my right leg and I do my best to stay awake as the song continues, and the guardian dove keeps a watchful eye.
“Stay … please stay,” I whisper to it, fighting to hold on. Peace spreads through me just as I realize that I have no idea what my internal injuries are. I could die any time now, but I’ll hold my focus for as long as I can, talking to Buck or no one and focusing on the dove as long as I can. It’s not until I feel the gust from the chopper that the dove finally takes flight. I close my eyes and let the darkness swallow me as the lyrics echo around us …
“Sean.” I blink and see her eyes just as the dove flies overhead. She’s reaching for me but I can’t sit up. The pain is too much.
“Sean.” I feel a hand on my arm and adrenaline rushes through me as I rear up, ready to kill whoever is touching me.
“Sean!”
My eyes snap open, and hers come into view, only she’s under me now, and I’m pressing my forearm against her throat. It takes me a second to realize this is here and now. I’m not in the desert. We’re naked in her bed. I let her go right before I cut off her airway completely and I bend down to kiss her. My whole body trembles. I don’t even know what I’m saying besides, “I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry,” as she struggles to get her breath back.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Sean
“You were … calling my name,” she rasps. Her eyes are wide with fear and she’s panting. “I just tried to wake you and then you were on top of me.”
She takes a deep breath as her body starts to steady. I’m shaking like I do in my dream. I’m right back in the desert; I can feel the shock taking over my body. Layla backs up on the bed, clutching her throat. I give her space, though my hands are desperate to touch her.
“If that happens again, don’t try to wake me up, just get out of bed,” I bite out.
Fuck. This is why I sleep alone.
“W-where’d you go just then? Was that a nightmare?” she stutters.
“Layla. You’ll get out of the bed,” I reiterate. “It’s non-negotiable. I never want to hurt you, and when I dream like that … sometimes … I just don’t have control—”
“Yes, I promise,” she agrees quickly, tears glistening in her eyes in the dim room, her knees clutched to her chest.
I reach out to touch her, and she flinches. I pull my hand away.
“I’m sorry, it just scared the hell out of me,” she offers. “Touch me.”
I do, hesitantly grazing my knuckles over her leg before sitting up on the edge of the bed and running a hand over my head. It’s been a long time since I’ve dreamed in that kind of detail about those moments.
“There were demons in your eyes when you opened them.” Her voice is shaky and I know I owe her something, because I’m sure that scared the shit out of her. I stand and move toward the window, staring out at her sprawling backyard.
“There’s more to it … the way I felt when I first saw you. There’s a reason I know you’re the one for me, and it’s because of that day, the flashback I just had.”
“What happened?”
“When I was on my last tour, I was part of a simple run. Move embassy staff from one city to another. It was supposed to be routine. My Staff Sergeant was with us, but my job was to protect the men in the Humvee with me. Wolfe was there, and two others.” I turn and face her. “I told you we drove over an explosive device en route. It blew our Humvee to shit. Wolfe and I were on the left side, our doors blew out and we were tossed. That’s how I fucked up my back and broke my arm. The glass is how I got my scars.”
She nods and sits up a little more, wrapped up in the white sheets, and in the moonlight her beauty stuns me.
“Wolfe was in the best shape, but Buck, my bunkmate, he was … let’s just say there wasn’t much left of him. I lay there with him thinking he was going to die, not knowing if I was going to die too.”
“But you were calling out my name … I don’t understand,” she whispers as I come closer, crawling into bed with her. I lean back on the headboard and pull her close, my breathing settling and my body finally relaxing as I stroke her shoulder and down her arm.
“My Staff Sergeant drove me fucking crazy.” I smirk in the dark. “He only listened to Eric Clapton, and when we detonated, the music never stopped. It played on a loop, the same fucking song over and over until the chopper came, but it gave me something to focus on and I needed that. I figured if there was something logical in all that carnage maybe I was still alive.”
“That makes sense,” she whispers, kissing me on my chest.
“But I was fucking tired. I just wanted to close my eyes and let the darkness take me. That’s when a dove landed on top of the Humvee. It watched me, just sitting there oblivious to all the destruction around it. That bird and that song on repeat are the most vivid parts of that memory. They’re what kept me awake, kept me talking to Buck. They’re what kept him alive until the chopper came for us. The thing is, the song that kept playing … it was ‘Layla.’”
