Page 41 of With Every Breath

“I’m surprised she’s letting them run any tests,” I said dryly.

Dennis chuckled, the sound holding a sharp edge to it. “I know. She said she wants to be comfortable.”

“Alice already said she’d give her a ride home.”

“I like Alice,” Dennis offered. “She’s solid.”

“Solid?”

He grinned. “Yeah, solid. The kind of woman you want to settle down with.”

I cocked my head to the side, studying him for a few beats. “I’m not looking for someone to settle down with.”

“Yeah, I know. Because you’re a dumbass. The fact you wondered what I meant proves my point.”

I pressed my tongue into my cheek as a dry laugh rustled in my throat. “Oh, so you weren’t talking about me?”

“Yeah, I was, but my point is you thinking I was is what means something.”

I took a breath, letting it out in a quick sigh. “Dennis, I’m not cut out for romance.”

“Your Gram thinks otherwise. She said she saw you two kissing,” he pointed out.

I pressed my lips together and shook my head. “It was a kiss. That doesn’t mean I’m settling down or even thinking about it.”

I couldn’t even believe I was having this fucking conversation with my grandmother’s new husband. My grandmother was dying, but that clearly didn’t stem her tendency to nose into my business.

“I expected Gram to be nosy, but not you,” I pointed out.

Dennis shrugged, unabashed. “Why do you think we love each other?”

I chuckled. “Good point.”

Dennis was quiet as he finished off a piece of toast. After Alice had gone to work, I stopped by my place to change clothes before making my way over to check on Dennis with a minor limp. He was having toast and poached eggs for breakfast.

“I know you don’t like to talk about it…” he began.

“Talk about what?”

“The shooting,” he offered calmly.

My heart started pounding. For a second, I thought I was going to break out in a cold sweat right here in front of Dennis.

I took a slow breath, and the icy feeling inside started to dissipate. I had begun to notice the horrible feeling didn’t last as long whenever I thought about that day. “What do you mean?”

“I went to war. I know something about things you’d prefer to forget, things you’d prefer never to have happened. Some of my friends came home and got drunk for years. Some came home and buried themselves in whatever—work, life. Some of us came home and drank for a little bit and then figured out it didn’t help to get lost in it. I’ve been sober for forty years now. I know something about facing down bad memories. I promise you it gets easier. I’m not saying it’ll be the same way for you as it is for me, but Iamsaying the only way to get through to the other side is to stop running. You know that, uh, thing. Fear.” He circled his hand in the air.

“Fear?”

“I don’t mean the word. The acronym,” he clarified.

“What acronym?” I prompted.

“F-E-A-R,” he spelled out. “Fear. Fuck everything and run, or face everything and recover,” he said with a little shrug. “It’s one or the other, no matter how you go about it.”

I stared at him for a minute and then laughed softly as I shook my head. “Not a bad acronym.”

He flashed a quick grin before his gaze sobered. “Your Gram’s worried about you.”

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