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I’m about to reach for one when I see another scar on her right arm—long, straight, and about five inches long. I feel an almost painful wave of protectiveness for her.
“Do you still…have any pain?” Goddamn, my voice is raspy.
Gwenna smiles gently. “For the most part, no. It’s sweet of you to ask.”
“I’m not sweet.”
“I think you are.”
A moment later, she washes the soap off her chest and rises from the tub. She wraps a towel around herself, then holds one out for me. I tuck it around my waist, and she says, “Lean your head down.”
I hesitate only a moment before I do as she asks, and Gwenna covers my dripping head with another towel.
She rubs it all around, kind of violently. I’m trying to decide if it feels good or bad when she stops. “Barrett—oh my God! Your tattoo. Is this— I have the same one, this exact tat, just like yours!”
My heart starts pounding as I straighten up. My eyes go to the inside of her forearm. “I saw that the other day.”
I try to keep a neutral face as she looks from her arm up at me. “That is so insane! I wish I could put them beside each other and show you.” She holds her arm up by my neck. “Yours looks exactly like mine. Identical. Where’d you get it?”
“Miami.” My throat tightens around the word.
“I got mine in Breckenridge, the year before the wreck. Why’d you get yours? It doesn’t exactly fit your badass special ops theme.”
I blow my breath out, looking at the floor for just a second while I get my shit together. Then I look into her beautiful brown eyes. “I got it to jerk around with my friend Breck. He always wanted it to be colder out there in the middle of the desert. We called him our special snowflake.” I smile a little at the memory, even though the tattoo angle on the story is bullshit.
“Breck…like Breckenridge?”
I only hesitate a moment before I answer. “Yeah. He was from there.”
I see her eyes widen when she hears the word was—and for once, I’m glad she’s scared to pry.
TWENTY
Gwenna
“Can you step into the laundry room and get that giant salad bowl from the shelf over the washer?” I would grab it myself, but I’m grating cheese.
Barrett tilts the skillet against the sink’s ledge, dripping the last streaks of venison grease from the pan into the Tupperware bowl where the browned meat is.
“Sure,” he says quietly.
He sets the skillet in the sink and washes his hands. I watch the way he soaps his arms up to the elbows. I can’t decide what it reminds me of—but something. A moment later I realize: He does it like a doctor. God knows I saw enough of them scrub into and out of my room after the wreck. I think of teasing him about it, but I don’t think he’s close to his doctor father, so he may not appreciate me mentioning him.
He catches my eyes on him as he turns. He smirks.
I grin unabashedly. As he walks into the laundry room, I want to laugh. I’m not sure why. It’s just like…there’s pressure in my chest—old pressure, stuck there for these last few years—and suddenly I need to let it out, so I can breathe and just…be happy again.
I smile as he turns toward the shelves over the washer and dryer. I feel so much lighter when I’m with him.
I let my gaze linger on him, drinking in his masculine beauty. Which is why I notice when he stumbles back, bumping the back of his head into the doorframe. He whirls around and, with wide eyes and a flushed face, staggers back into the kitchen. He stops by the dinner table. His face blanches. His eyes widen, and he just looks…like he’s in trouble.
Shit.
His chest is pumping in and out and he’s still got that look of frozen terror on his face when I get close enough to wrap my arms around him.
The second I lock onto him, a shudder ripples through his body and I feel his chest inflate and hold there as he struggles to breathe deeply. I tug the sides of his shirt.
“Barrett—look at me.” His eyes open and close in that exaggerated way that makes him look like he might pass out. It’s a blink in my direction, then he’s struggling for air again, his big chest heaving as his eyes slip out of focus.
