Page 34 of Prognosis Temporary

Callie grimaced. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I think the fact he was forty before I was born probably didn’t help. I wasn’t just born or even a kid during those war years, so he didn’t have a connection with me pre Vietnam.’ He shrugged. ‘It could have been worse. And my mother did the best she could but she didn’t know how to cope with any of it.’

Callie nodded. Why would she? Wedding vows didn’t come with PTSD manuals. ‘I notice you didn’t draw any parallels in your paper between the Vietnam experience and your own more recent experience overseas.’

Sebastian dropped his gaze. ‘I didn’t want to dilute the paper’s focus. But rest assured, PTSD is alive and kicking among our military personnel.’

He took a deep pull of his beer as the skin on his scalp and at the back of his neck crawled. An image of an explosion flashed in his mind’s eye. He gripped the bottle tighter hyper aware of Callie’s gaze on his profile.

‘Don’t the defence forces have their own psychs? I didn’t think they outsourced.’

Sebastian kept his gaze firmly planted on the Yarra. ‘They do.’ His lips twisted into a bitter smile. ‘But my reputation preceded me.’

She frowned. ‘Sebastian?’ She reached out her hand and covered his. ‘Are you okay?’

He nodded. ‘I’m fine.’

‘You know,’ Callie said her thumb absently rubbing over his knuckles, ‘someone very wise once told me that sometimes it’s easier to talk to a person you don’t know that well.’

He looked down at her hand. A hand that had touched every part of his body. A hand that knew him pretty damn well. Each pass of her thumb felt like a stroke to his belly. ‘Really.’ He glanced at her and smiled. ‘I’m okay.’

She didn’t look like she believed him but she did drop the subject. Not his hand though. ‘It must be a bit of an anticlimax, working at Jambalyn, after all that adrenaline.’

Sebastian’s breath grew thicker as her touch continued. Working at Jambalyn had been a godsend. ‘Jambalyn has been a fantastic experience. After the Middle East I needed...I wanted ...to be somewhere where positive outcomes were tangible. To see that mental illness can be managed and people can go about their lives. I didn’t want to be the Sebastian Walker, PTSD guru. I wanted to get back to the basics.’

‘That seems like a very reasonable aspiration,’ she murmured. ‘It isn’t always a picnic in the community, though.’

Sebastian was mesmerised by the circular motion of her finger against his skin, his gaze glued to the action. ‘No, I know that. But it’s good to see, to know that there is hope.’

Where he’d just come from, there hadn’t been a lot of that.

She nodded, absently stroking the pad of her thumb down his fingers now. ‘It can be very rewarding,’ she agreed.

Sebastian almost groaned out loud. He was trying really hard here but a man had limits. ‘Callie...’

––––––––

The thick plea in hishalf whisper/half groan scorched right through to Callie’s womb and brought her attention to the liberties her thumb was taking.

What the hell?

She’d moved this into personal territory. Sebastian had been perfectly content talking about the conference and she’d gone and dragged them in to murky waters.

Talking about his father and then his stint overseas. She was touching him, for God’s sake!

Callie withdrew her hand as if she’d been rapped on the knuckles and stood abruptly. ‘You better go.’

He stood too. ‘No. Wait.’

‘No, really,’ she said as she crossed to the sliding door between the balcony and the room. ‘I have to get ready for tonight. Wash my hair. Do my...’ She stepped inside the room, faltering momentarily as the bed beckoned. ‘Nails.’

‘Callie.’

She headed towards the door, desperate to get him out. ‘I guess I’ll see you there,’ she threw over her shoulder as she flayed herself mentally for such a serious lapse in judgement.

Just because she could empathise with him, it didn’t negate the facts of their supposed to be platonic relationship.

He caught up with her at the bar fridge, snagging her arm and spinning her round, pulling her up hard against his body.

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