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It was undoubtedly a military town because everywhere they walked, she saw men and women in uniform. She was sure Neo looked incredibly handsome in his, although she wasn’t sure what a SEAL actually wore. With his broad shoulders and a powerful back, he’d be a mouthwatering sight in anything at all. He had defined arms and muscular, thick thighs. She could feel the toned muscle corded beneath her when he’d held her in his lap last night. “So far, I really like Virginia. I wasn’t sure about the move, but I’m glad we came. Are you happy here?”
She couldn’t see Jacob’s face as she pushed him, but his head turned, and the high curve of his cheek told her he was grinning. As they walked inland, the smaller shops became sparse, replaced by historic residential buildings constructed of brick. The sidewalk was shaded by the canopy of towering sycamores, and black cherry bushes hung ripe with fruit. Showy pink and white magnolia blossoms hung from glossy green leaves, permeating the air with their sweet floral fragrance. According to her map, they were nearly at the school.
Movement to the left caught her eye. She turned, but no one was there. An uneasy feeling skated down her spine. She took a calming breath and continued on. The whole reason they were on this walk was to visit the school; she wasn’t going to let her paranoia deter them. Cold hit her chest as they continued to move forward, as though every cell in her body was telling her to turn back. There was a rustle in trees across the street, and she halted in her tracks.
“Jacob, I’m so sorry. We need to turn back. We’re in an unfamiliar place, and I’m starting to feel anxious. It’s almost noon, and we can ask Neo if he’d drive by the school with us. Maybe he even has some news on the house.” She scanned the area and turned; the sensation of being watched filled her with dread. Maybe it hadn’t been wise to go over her trauma in such detail. She was in a new place with new people; if she tried, she could find fictional danger in every corner. She was suddenly aware of her heartbeat, racing and pounding in her chest. She glanced over her shoulder—still nothing. A branch cracked behind her, but she refused to look. She pushed Jacob faster until she was in a full-blown run. Typically Jacob would be laughing. But he wasn’t laughing right now.
He was good at reading people and could sense her heightened anxiety. Maybe she was being irrational, but the sudden urge to get away and back into the safety of the apartment was too strong to ignore. When she heard her name, she pushed faster. Her brain was tricking her, making her hear someone thousands of miles away. Knowing that she was on the verge of a panic attack did nothing to ease the sensation of danger. She didn’t slow even when her lungs began to burn.
She could hear someone scuttling along behind her and glanced over her shoulder. Her foot caught on an uneven brick and she came down hard. She grabbed the rim of Jacob’s chair to stop his forward momentum, banging her face against the ground. There was pressure on her back, and she scrambled forward to escape. She turned, shielding her face to protect herself, when something wet lapped across her cheek. A large dog towered over her. She couldn’t get a good look at it with its stout nose and bullish jowls so close to her face. The animal whimpered, then plopped down on top of her. Relief flooded through her, clouding her eyes with tears. On a long, shaky breath, she sat up, wiggling out from under the weight of the dog. The crazy thing was wagging its tail like it had just found the world’s biggest Milk-Bone. It could use a whole box of them and a few months’ worth of decent meals. While the dog’s head was massive, its body was rail-thin to the point it looked almost unsteady on spindly legs.
“I’m so glad it was you chasing me. I feel like a total idiot,” she muttered, running a hand over the dog’s head. Its coat was so filthy it was hard to tell what color it was. Maybe a light brown or gray. The dog attempted to lap the blood off her hands, but she pulled away. “I’m okay, Jacob,” she called up to him. “But I hope Neo isn’t allergic to animals. I think we just found ourselves a tagalong.”
The dog walked with a limp to the front of the chair as she struggled to her feet on unsteady legs. Jacob was cackling with a fervor she’d never heard before as the dog nudged his hands and put a paw on his lap. “Well, now that you’ve caught up to us, we better start walking. I need to get cleaned up.” Blood was seeping from the cut on her knee, soaking her jeans and dripping from her lips. She kept wiping it away from her chin with the back of her hand. The dog walked at Jacob’s side, its ginger gait becoming more pronounced with each step. They continued past the shops and restaurants until the apartment came into view.
She wasn’t sure about the dog policy, but there was no way she would leave the animal on its own, especially after it walked all this way with them. She pressed the assistive door opener and pushed the wheelchair through. The dog followed dutifully behind them, not even backing away when the elevator doors slid open. He walked ahead of them and plopped his bottom on the floor, wagging his tail in exhausted ticks. She pressed the button for Neo’s floor. They had taken one step down the hall when Neo’s apartment door burst open.
“Oh my God. What happened? Are you okay?” He rushed down the corridor and inspected Jacob before rounding the wheelchair and putting his arm around her. “You’re hurt. Bleeding.” He took over, pushing the wheelchair with his free hand while guiding her down the hall.
“I thought I heard someone following us, thought I heard my name, and panicked. I started running and tripped only to discover it was actually a dog chasing us. Jacob’s fine. He didn’t fall.” They walked over the threshold and into the apartment. “I couldn’t leave the dog outside. He looks to be in such rough shape.” For the first time, Neo seemed to notice the animal standing in his kitchen. “He’s been nothing but friendly.”
“Okay.” He eyed the dog suspiciously. “I’m going to get Jacob out of the chair and settled on the couch. Then we’ll take a look at those wounds and figure out what to do about the dog. Wait for me in the bathroom, yeah?”
Instead of going to the bathroom, Brynn made her way to her bedroom and rifled through her bag of belongings for her bicycle shorts. Attempting to roll up her straight jeans over her knee was no good, not to mention it would hurt. Part of her was relieved that she had told Neo about her scars the night before. She didn’t want to imagine what he’d think when he saw liar on her thigh and other old deformities. The other part of her was still hesitant. She wanted Neo to see her as a desirable woman, but how could he see past all of her scars?
Jeans and long pants were her best friends. You’d never catch her in a skirt or dress, and she only wore the shorts when alone with no chance of a visitor. She shut her bedroom door and peeled off her pants, hissing when the rough material rubbed over the new cut. She turned to grab the shorts off the bed and nearly tripped over the dog. For such a massive animal, he moved silently. He must’ve snuck in the door behind her. The dog tilted its head, and she smiled.
“You’re a silly guy, aren’t you?” She patted him on the head, and his fur was soft beneath her fingers despite the dirt covering him from head to toe. When she left the bedroom, Neo was already waiting for her.
“Why don’t you hop up on the counter, sweetheart?” To his credit, his gaze didn’t linger over the scars below her knees. He turned toward the bathroom closet and withdrew a first aid kit. She hoisted herself up, and the dog sat by her dangling feet. Every so often, his wet tongue flicked her ankle in reassurance.
“Looks like you have a new buddy.” Even though his tone was carefully controlled, the current beneath rippled with anger. Was it because he’d caught a glimpse of the results of her childhood trauma or something else? Neo opened the case and began laying out packets of antiseptic, ointment, and long Q-tips. His movements were jerky, and his expression tight. “I have some chicken thawed in the fridge. Plain rice in the closet. His stomach won’t be able to take much, so a bland diet for a few days would be best.” Here was a man who’d seen bloodshed, caused it even, to safeguard people he’d never met. One who was worrying over a sick animal’s diet and enraged by decade-old scars. “Then we can work on transitioning him to real dog food.” He tore one of the packets open and pulled out a towelette. “This is for cleaning the wounds.”
“You’re going to let him stay?” The hope was audible in her voice.
Neo offered a tense smile. “We’ll have to do some digging and make sure he’s a stray, but I don’t hate the idea of a big mutt around when I’m overseas.” And there it was again. Neo was a protector to his core, and he’d decided at some point that she fell under his umbrella of fortification. But she didn’t want to be thought of as someone he needed to protect. She wanted him to see her as a woman, an equal. Yet, sitting up on the countertop as Neo tended her wounds, she’d never felt more damaged. Embarrassment prickled over her skin, leaving her neck, face, and ears white-hot.
“What was that look?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t hide from me.”
“Bossy.”
“Yep.”
“I hate my scars. They make me feel…damaged. Undesirable. Less.”
Fury flashed across his face, and he dropped the towelettes, gripping the edge of the counter. “Wanna know what I think of when I see those scars?”
“No.” She couldn’t bear to know what he thought. Didn’t want to see the pity in his eyes.
“Too bad,” he bit out, and her gaze snapped up to his. “They make me ballistic on your behalf. Seeing what was done to you makes me fucking irrational. But when I look at those scars, sweetheart, the thing I see most is your grit. Your will to survive. Mystified that you became a nurturer, a healer despite being tortured and rejected by your family. When I think of you, of everything you are, undesirable and damaged don’t make the list. Not even fucking close.”
Holy shit. All she could manage was a breathless “Oh.” He’d just given her words that were cool aloe soothing a blistering sunburn and that was the only thing she could get past the threshold of her lips. Neo tore open the package of a new towel and went to work on another scrape.
“Can I ask you something?” She fidgeted on the stone countertop but stayed in place. If she moved, she’d tumble off. Neo’s close proximity was doing funny things to her insides, making her light-headed and breathless. He reached into the cabinet below the sink and returned with a bottle of what appeared to be more antiseptic. Apparently, the towelettes hadn’t done the job he’d hoped for.
