Page 18 of Embattled Ever After

“Uh, it’s Hank. Hank Fryman.”

“Nice to meet you, Hank. What can I help you with?”

The silence expanded and Duncan thought for a moment he had hung up, but eventually he heard breathing. “Take your time, buddy. I’m not going anywhere.”

Then came the sound of muffled, gasping sobs, and Duncan swore to himself silently.Fuck. He looked at the screen and searched for the number, jotting it down. Then he wrote Hank’s name down. Dad’s laptop sat beside him so he powered it up, shaking his head as he typed in the same password his dad had used for at least ten years. Then he started searching.

“I know this isn’t the way a man should act,” Hank said.

“Now hold on a minute,” Duncan told him firmly. “This isn’t going any further than you and me, so you just do what you need to do to talk to me. I’m not passing judgment on you foranything. I’m just here to listen.”

There was a gasp on the other end, like Hank was trying to control his emotions, but it wasn’t working well. Duncan rocked back in his dad’s office chair, forgetting about his own aches as the man on the other end of the line fought for his sanity.

“I’ve been where you are right now, in the depths of the night, wondering what the hell I’d done wrong in the world to be given such a shitty hand. It took me a long time to realize that I could make my reality better or worse. My body will always be fucked up, but I can train my brain to be better. It took a while, likeyears, but my brain is finally back on solid footing. It sounds like you’re still scrambling, looking for that rock.”

“Yes,” Hank hissed, emotion making his voice shake. “I thought I had my rock, but she left. It’s fucking Christmas and she walked out the door.”

Well, hell. The puzzle pieces fell together and despair settled in his bones. This could be wind up being very bad.

“Hank, tell me what’s going on. Are you okay?”

He choked out a laugh, but didn’t confirm or deny anything.

“Hank, are you feeling like hurting yourself?”

“I should, then I’d finally be out of my misery. You know? Even dogs get put down when they go rabid.”

“Hank,” Duncan said firmly. “You are not rabid. No man is. Don’t even compare yourself to a dog. That’s not okay to even think.”

There was no agreement from the other end of the line, just clicking like he was doing something that occupied his hands. Kind of sounded like he was clicking the safety on a gun.

“Hank! Tell me where you are and I’ll come talk to you. Can we do that?”

“No, don’t worry about it. I shouldn’t have bothered you on Christmas. Sorry.”

And he hung up.

“Fuck,” Duncan growled. Scrambling, he searched for the website he used to do background checks at work, even as he pressed redial. The phone rang and rang as he waited for the website to load. He signed into the site and entered the phone number. Sometimes it paid to be in the snooping business.

Movement drew his eye and he looked up to see Alex’s dark-auburn head slipping around the edge of the door. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, can you get your coat and boots on real quick? We need to go.”

“Will do!”

Forty-five seconds later when he limped out to the entryway, she was ready to go and holding out his coat to him. Damn, that was impressive. His mom and dad stood to the side, worry lining their faces. “I’ll call you guys later, okay. Something’s come up with a veteran I need to deal with.”

“Okay,” his mom said, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Call me later.”

His dad patted him on the back but didn’t say anything, just cautioned him to be careful going down the drive.

Duncan slipped his coat on and headed out the door, Alex right behind him. He slipped twice on the packed snow going down to his truck, both times managing to catch his balance before he crashed. Pain slammed through his body each time and he couldn’t imagine actually landing on the unforgiving ground.

Growling, Alex snugged her arm through his. “Humor me for two seconds before you fall and bust your butt.”

Though it chapped his ass to do it, he gave in to her support. She walked him to the driver’s side of the truck, then circled the hood to her own side. “What’s going on?”

As he started the truck and backed out of the drive, he gave her the gist of the information he had, handing her the Post-it he’d scribbled Hank’s address on. “Can you GPS that?”

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