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I grunted my agreement, feeling a twinge of guilt. I wouldn’t be there for the next mission.
After two hours, Danny and JD took our places and we headed inside to get some sleep. The inside of the house was even darker than the outside. I picked my way carefully up the stairs, feeling as much as seeing, then along the upstairs hallway. I stopped outside the third bedroom on the left.
Olivia was in there. I’d seen her go in just as Colton and I headed out.
I could just go in there, wake her and tell her how I felt. But then what? Lie to her about some perfect future together, back in the US? What would happen when we got back to the airfield in Quito? Just tell her to wait here, I’ll be right back, then slip through the hole in the fence and disappear forever, leaving her standing there like a jilted bride at the altar?
I couldn’t do that to her.
It took all my willpower, but I turned away. The room next to hers was empty. I unrolled my sleeping bag on the bed, pulled off my boots, and crashed out.
I was just closing my eyes when I heard something: a creak and a huge intake of breath, then ragged panting. I’d heard that kind of breathing before, but I couldn’t think where. It prickled at my spine, hard to listen to because it was so shockingly vulnerable: the sound of someone in full-on, hysterical fear.
It was coming from the other side of the wall: Olivia’s room.
I was up and moving before I was even aware of it, groping for the door handle and feeling my way out into the hallway, then finding Olivia’s door and stumbling inside. I homed in on her labored breathing: she was on the bed, and I figured out she was sitting up. “Olivia!” I said urgently. “It’s me.”
No response. Her breathing got worse: she was hyperventilating now.
The hell with light discipline. I felt in a pocket and found a chemical glow stick. I snapped it, shook it and brought the dim green glow in front of her face. “Olivia!”
She was sitting bolt upright. Her eyes were open but she was staring off into space: she didn’t seem to see me or the light. She was having a nightmare, and she was still in it.
Now I knew where I’d heard that kind of panicked breathing before. I’d heard it in tents and barracks and the backs of trucks, anywhere soldiers slept. It was the sound of the bad stuff that gets inside your head and won’t come out, for weeks or months or the rest of your life.
“Olivia!” Still nothing. I gripped her shoulders with both hands.
She made an unearthly noise, a high-pitched shriek of fear that made my chest ache in pity. She flailed, trying to push me away, and I took a hit across the face. Then her eyes focused and she looked around in wild panic.
I quickly brought the glowstick up to my face so she could see me. “It’s me,” I said quickly. “Olivia, it’s me. You’re with me, it’s okay, you’re with me.”
She stared at me uncomprehendingly for a moment. Then she threw her arms around me and clung to me with all her strength, burying her face in my neck.
I crushed her to me. A huge, hot throb went through me, stronger than anything I’d ever felt, primal and fiercely protective. I tried to speak but it choked off my words, so I just squeezed her tight, wrapping my arms around her like I was blocking the entire outside world from touching her. She quaked against me and I felt silent tears wet against my neck.
I rocked her there gently until her breathing settled. Then I eased her gently back so that I could look at her.
She stared up at me in the ghostly green glow of the glowstick. “God. I’m sorry.” She shook her head. “I think I’m going crazy.”
“No,” I said urgently. “God, no. With everything you’ve been through?”
She gave a bitter laugh. “You’re all so brave. You just handle this and I’m having nightmares and—”
I took her firmly by the shoulders again. “Olivia. You might just be the bravest person I’ve ever met.” I stared into her eyes and suddenly the words just started spilling out. “And you’re good, and you’re kind and you’re—”
I managed to stop myself speaking but that just made the words pile up in my head. Beautiful. Adorable. Smart. Special. Everything I’d been holding back welled up inside me and I wrestled for control. My mouth opened but nothing would come out. I shook my head and just gazed at her…
And then, with a superhuman effort, I stood up.
I’d been doing the wrong thing my entire life. However much I wanted her, however much she wanted me, for once, I had to do what was right.
