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“Was it Siri or Alexa you had on call?” she asked with a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.
“The soul of Steve Irwin at times,” he said shaking his head. “I never called her, every time it was a video chat. She wanted to show me things she was working on in school. A new toy or book.”
His face fell a bit and he pulled in on himself.
“Those stopped?” she spoke the words he couldn’t, put the facts of the change out there for him to face head on.
“Part of me wished I hadn’t dedicated myself to my career in the Navy and I could have been there more in Syd’s life, more now than before.”
“You’re here now for her,” Porsche consoled squeezing his hand a bit as they dipped down into a valley where the stream curved and cut through the ranch. “She is only eight-years-old and she’ll be okay I promise.”
“How do you know she’ll be okay?” Mike stopped walking again causing a hard jerk to yank on Porsche’s shoulder.
Porsche wasn’t sure if she should tell him everything, she hadn’t spilled to Doc and that was a safe space. Her life and experiences were her own, but the pain narrowing the man’s eyes had her stepping in close and using her free hand to cup his jaw before trailing her fingers down his chest and then clasping his hand between hers.
“It won’t go away totally, it will be a disability in many ways for her, but like any injury your body and eventually your mind adapts and recovers enough for you to function.”
“I know more than my fair share of PTSD sufferers, shell shocked whatever they want to call it now soldier,” he said, his voice a low growl. “There’s a difference between having a leg blown off and six months as a POW.”
“Yeah,” she said, a strength building as her shoulders broadened and she stood up to him. “People can see the fake leg and abnormal walk. For Syd it will be what she is able and willing to share with a person if she lets them in. They will see the scars and decide if they are a war wound or if she is too far gone. When she’s grown and finds a man willing to hold her when she wakes up screaming from a nightmare coming from left field and take on the rage she can’t control, then they’ll see the scars.”
“And if she doesn’t.”
“Then she doesn’t,” Porsche said. “But that doesn’t mean she can’t find a place in the world.”
“And you? Have you found your place?”
“You know, I didn’t want to get into it with you, but my life hasn’t always been roses. Most who live here have seen pain in one way or another,” she explained. “It’s why more than I took note of Syd’s behavior over the few interactions we’ve had.”
“People have been talking about my daughter?” he growled.
“No, they’ve been watching, her, you, gauging who the threat was and why she was acting the way she was,” Porsche continued. “You can see that as a negative, but trust me, actually being seen and acknowledged as having something going on is huge to the victim.”
“And you know this because of personal experience, not just the rescue network you’re all a part of.”
“I suffered abuse when I was little, growing up it was bad. Teachers either had their hands tied or straight up ignored signs that might as well of been neon. Every relationship I’ve found since I was a teenager until I fell in with the Steels was abusive. I’m okay now, I just had to work through it. I’m still working through it, I see Doc, not as much as I should,” she admitted and realized she was laying out a positive future when she’d barely scratched the surface and did the work Sydney would need to do. “She’s helping me and I know she’ll be good for Sydney.”
“Didn’t you have anyone to protect you?” Mike clenched her hand and held onto it tightly.
“No, I didn’t. And guess what my Mom and Dad were together, still are, but never cared enough about me to see the signs or give me a safety net to fall into,” she said, trying to not think about the emotional abuse they doled out like a pasta salad on a warm day. “Being there, with this Sassy lady isn’t a catch all. I didn’t have anyone out there that cared enough for me until I met Dell from the New Mexico Steels. She was the first person to show me unconditional caring.”
“What about this club?”
“They protect me and are good to me. I work for them at the Roadside in town, help out around the clubhouse and they provide me with a safe place to live, a salary and a sense of protection.”
“What do you need protection from?” he questioned, his eyes taking in the scenery and vast open space. “Coyotes? Charging moose down from Canada?”
“Fun fact, about two years ago I was kidnapped,” she said, and Bugs stilled. “I wasn’t scared in the moment of Clive, he was my ex that came for Dreamer and saw me as a bonus. Even found men stupid enough to believe he’d pay them for their help in the abduction.”
“Your ex kidnapped you?”
“I lived in fear for nearly six years,” she said, a memorial shiver tearing through her body causing Mike to pull her in close as if to stop the tremor. “Aftershocks.”
“That was more than an aftershock,” he said as his hand glided up and down her back. Building an invisible shield with his touch, before he cupped her jaw and tilted her head up. “It’s little consolation now, but once everything is installed a flea won’t be able to fart without setting off alarms.”
“It really is a memory,” she said. “The little traumas I relive from time to time. Like I said for six years I did all I could to be a ghost, now I don’t need to.”
“If you were taken once from here—” he protested.
