Page 102 of Silent Threat
“Back to the same old same old?”
“I don’t think so. I’d like to think I’ve learned while I’ve been here.”
Ambrose offered an easy grin. “We certainly hope so.”
Cole hesitated a moment before he asked the question that had been bouncing around in his head for the past day or two. “Does PTSD have a memory-loss component?”
“It can. Why do you ask?”
“I keep feeling lately that I should be remembering something that I don’t. It’s right there under the surface. I can almost see it, but then I can’t.”
Interest glinted in Ambrose’s eyes. “Stay. Then we can work on that together.”
“I’ll probably remember on my own. Lying in bed last night, I almost had it. It might come to me if I do some meditation.”
They talked about that, then his meds. He didn’t want to renew his prescriptions, but understood that some of the meds couldn’t be stopped abruptly if he didn’t want withdrawal to knock him on his ass for the next couple of days, even weeks. So they set up a schedule to wean him off the drugs. Ambrose made a pitch that needing pills didn’t mean Cole was weak.
Something Annie would say.Cole tried not to think about the fact that Annie hated his guts now. He’d return. He’d grovel. He’d do whatever he had to, to earn her forgiveness.
Ambrose’s advice on Cole’s future treatment plan took longer than Cole thought it would. Next thing he knew, a full hour had passed.
He thanked the psychiatrist one more time, shook the guy’s hand, and went to pack.
He swung by Annie’s room on the ground floor. Knocked. She didn’t open up. Maybe she had a session.
He pulled out his phone to text her.Can I see you before I leave?
Frustration shot through him when he remembered that she’d lost her phone. She hadn’t given him her new number. He had no way of reaching her before he left.
Maybe it was for the better.
He deleted the message as he headed upstairs to his own room.
She needed time to process everything he’d told her yesterday. He would contact her later. Her e-mail address was up on her animal sanctuary’s website. That’d work.
Cole had lunch at the cafeteria, then drove to the airport through sheets of rain. He dropped his rental and checked in. By the time he made it to gate twenty-seven, the sign was up that his flight had been delayed due to the weather.
He went to grab coffee. He had his friend Derek’s thriller in his suitcase. Maybe he’d finally get to finish the book.
He didn’t. As rain slammed into the terminal windows and the sky darkened, another announcement flashed onto the display screen next to the boarding gate, updating to a longer delay. Cole was fine one second, then knocked sideways the next by the sudden flashback of him running up an Afghan hillside with Matt across his shoulders.
We walked three hundred miles, because the nearest US Army base was in Bagram.
Cole blinked hard, reaching out to steady himself on the armrest of his chair.Who said that?
Then the voice continued.Officially, there are no special ops stationed there, but it’s an unofficial staging base for black-ops missions.
He blinked. Shook his head.Who would know that?
He did.Hehad said those words.When?He had no memory of the conversation.
He pushed up from the gray plastic chair, strode to the window, and stared into the roiling clouds of the approaching hurricane. A military plane might take off in weather like that, but no way a civilian aircraft was going to. Nobody was flying out of Philly tonight.
Looked like Hurricane Rupert has just made landfall at Chesapeake Bay, coming fast this way.
He paced along the window. The flashbacks wouldn’t leave his head. When had he talked about Bagram? He didn’t discuss Bagram with anyone, ever.
He ran his hand over his shaved head. Why would he say something like that? To whom? He couldn’t untangle the jumble in his mind.
