Page 67 of Beat of Love
His hands closed over her wrists, his grip hard, as if she were his lifeline, his tether to reality. “This,” he croaked. “Just … this.”
The warmth of the autumn sun settled over them like a blanket, and she held his stare. A breeze moved through the grass, cool and steady, tugging at the hem of Brandy’s shirt and ruffling his hair
The tension eased from his body, the wild edge in his eyes ebbing, revealing something quieter, rawer beneath. Her thumbs brushed gently along his cheeks, and still she said nothing, letting the silence and sunlight do their work.
His grip on her wrists lessened, and his breathing evened out.
And then he stole her breath, his hands gliding over the backs of her fingers before curling gently around them, pressing a soft kiss to the inside of each hand, one by one. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“You’re welcome,” she whispered back, her heart thudding against her ribcage.
He lowered his arms but didn’t release her. “I’m totally messed up, eh?”
His self-deprecating words irked her. “Not at all,” she snapped.
“Aw, come on, Red.” He let go of her hands and took a step back. “Be honest. I’m a fucking emotional wreck,” he bit out, adding a short, hard laugh. “Can’t even fucking walk under a canopy of trees without falling apart.”
She narrowed her gaze. “You survived a harrowing experience that would’ve killed a lesser man. You’re allowed a few wobbles.”
But she also understood how desperate he was to conquer what he saw as weakness. Tossing her head back, she met his eyes and threw down the challenge: “So what’s it gonna be? You letting a few fucking trees take you down, or are you going back in?”
His eyes flared. And for a moment she thought he’d tell her to go to hell. Then he turned to face the trees. “Not letting a few fucking trees take me down.” Yet he remained rooted on the spot.
She reached for his hand, lacing her fingers through his. “How about we face this together? Yeah?”
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the subtle movement of his throat as he swallowed hard.
“Yeah.” He took a step, then another, and another, and together they ducked beneath the old low-hanging branches and into the shadows. Shoulders squared, jaw clenched, holding her hand as if his life depended on it, Rafferty stood and looked around. “Sometimes … I can still smell the noxious fumes from the marinating coca leaves.”
Her sniff was involuntary — just a quick pull of air through her nose. The scent of leaf litter and damp bark rose thick from the ground, laced with the sour tang of decaying acorns and something sharper — green, bitter, almost chemical.
Her gut tightened. She didn’t know much of his time as a prisoner — Branna had been vague on those details — only that he’d been held in a coca farm somewhere deep in the Amazon Jungle. She leaned her shoulder into his and placed her free hand gently on his upper arm. “You’re not there,” she said quietly, slowly running her fingers along the inside of his arm.
He didn’t speak, but his entire body was a tight coil of muscle, drawn taut like he was bracing for something that wasn’t coming.
Then, gradually, his shoulders dropped beneath her touch. His breath shuddered out, not quite a sigh, more like something he hadn’t meant to let go.
“I know,” he said at last, voice rough. “I just … sometimes, it creeps in before I can stop it.”
“How can I help?”
Another deep sigh from him. “You are already. Immensely.”
His voice was stronger, more like himself.
She gave his arm one last, grounding stroke, then stepped back just enough to meet his eyes. “Come on,” she said, her voice soft but sure. “Let’s get up there.”
He gave a small nod, still pale but steadier now, and she turned toward the ladder. She placed a foot on the bottom rung, then glanced back. “You okay to follow?”
“Yeah,” he said, his voice low. “Yeah, I’m good.”
She climbed first, slow and careful, the creak of each wooden rung sounding louder in the quiet. Below, she could hear him begin to move, following her into the trees.
Continuing up, she stepped onto the leaf-littered platform. A corrugated metal roof sheltered half of the roughly fifty-square-foot space, while two solid wooden walls braced the back and side. The open edges were lined with a sturdy railing. “Wow.”
She moved aside as Rafferty climbed the last few rungs and stepped onto the platform behind her. “It’s all new,” he said. “Maybe Aidan fixed it for his boys.”
“Hasn’t been used in a while,” she commented, noting the thick layer of dust.
