Her Wounded Warrior (2 page)

“Hurry, I want to get up, too.” He grunts when I punch him in the gut.

I slide out of bed, pulling the sheet with me. Hank pulls back when I’m three feet away, my bra and panties are just out of reach. I give a firm tug and meet resistance. Hank still has the pillow over his eyes, but is it enough? Will he look? I snap the sheet in a hard tug and let go when he resists. The fabric floats back, covers his head, and I dash to scoop up my panties and bra. I have one leg in my jeans when another knock at the door startles me, and I fall back onto the bed. When the doorknob rattles, I roll onto the floor and try to crawl under the bed, but bump my head on the frame. I don’t fit.

“Hank, here’s coffee,” his mom calls.

Hank jumps off the bed and snatches up condom wrappers. He puts his pants on with amazing speed, tucking the wrappers into his front pocket. I jump up and hop toward the closet as I pull on my pants, stopping only to gather my shirt, purse, and boots. I ease the folding door closed. The closet is empty save for a few Rubbermaid bins. I dress with deliberate movements, careful not to bump a wall, pausing, one arm in my shirt, the other midair, when the low creak of the bedroom door opening paralyzes me.

“Oh, you’re getting dressed. Good. I thought you might be having a hard time waking up. You got in pretty late. Did you have a good time last night?”

I cover my mouth with my hand to keep from snorting. He’d better say he had a fabulous time. I press my head into my palms. What is wrong with me? I’m talking about Hank. Yes, last night I experienced alter-my-psyche, toe-curling sex with him, my best friend’s brother. It’s the last part that makes me want to hurl. If our acquaintance was recent, not a familiar one with the baggage of a past, if I wouldn’t have to hear about it for years to come from my family or his sister, if I knew he could walk away after a few more encounters wanting nothing more, I wouldn’t hesitate to repeat last night. Often. This is wrong on so many levels I can’t even wrap my mind around it.

The last thing I should care about is whether or not he enjoyed last night. I should care about leaving without doing any more damage. Still, I wonder—what did he think of last night?

“Yeah, it was fun. Tell Dad I’ll be ready in a minute.”

Fun? He closes the door and I resume dressing. My bra is on inside out, but I don’t care, I want to leave. I put my purse on messenger-style and reach to pull on my knee-high socks.

Hank opens the closet door. “You can come out. She’s gone.” He has a mug of coffee in his hands and a grin on his face.

“Remind me why we came here?” I look up from the closet floor. Neither of us lives here, in Lakeland. We spent last night at a concert in Orlando and could have gone north to my house instead of coming south.

“I’m helping Dad balance his business accounts this weekend. You said you thought it’d be fun to come with me.”
“Yep, fun.” I say. There’s that word again. Fun. Clearly, it’s synonymous with stupid.
“I’ve had fun. You haven’t?” He offers me his hand.
“You would describe last night as fun?” I pull on my boots, forego his hand, and scoot past him until I can stand.
“Yeah, fun. What did you have?”
“I don’t know.” Maybe I had my mind blown, a fantastic night, or experienced a whole different level of pleasure. Whatever I had, Hank had fun.
“Never mind. Help me with this.” I walk to the window and ease up the blinds.
 

Hank doesn’t move, just stands by the closet with his coffee. His dark hair is so short it hardly looks mussed and last night’s smooth face and jawline are now covered with the shadow of a beard. When we first kissed, yesterday, I held his face between my hands. Today, I want to stretch across the space, hold his face again, and compare the touch, to commit both to memory. My palms itch with need.

“You’re really doing this? You think this is a better option than going through the front door and saying you crashed here because you drank too much?” he asks.

“Yes, I do.” I ease up the well-oiled window and pop out the screen like a pro. Ten years later and I still have skills. Gigi and I used to sneak out of her room without even waking the dog. I lean over to lower the screen to the ground and check to make sure no one is outside. The desk chair is the perfect height to get me up onto the windowsill, and Hank steps aside to let me drag it over.

I whisper, “I’ll hand you the screen, you can put it back, and then you’ll need to go distract your parents.” I climb up and lower one leg over the sill.

He sips his coffee, makes a face, and puts it on the desk.

“Did you hear me?” I ask in a loud whisper. If I wasn’t sitting on a windowsill, half in, half out, this moment would be like all the others I’ve shared with Hank: comfortable, easy, laughable at one point or another.

“Yeah, yeah. I heard you.” He shakes his head with what I’m sure is disbelief. After all, I’m a twenty-five-year-old sneaking out a bedroom window like a fourteen- year-old.

“Just do it,” I tell him then jump off the sill onto the ground. I hold the screen and wait for his head to appear. When it does, I hand it to him.

“Don’t forget to distract your parents.”
“How could I?” he mumbles and fixes the screen.
When he turns away, I pull out my car keys. My SUV sits on the road between

Hank’s parents’ house and the neighbor’s. It’ll be a run since Hank parked it on the far side of the house. At least I have an escape method and won’t have to walk a street over to where my sister lives. She would never buy any story that brought me to her doorstep, without my car, looking like I do.

I stay crouched below the window, fidgeting with my keys until the bedroom door gives its telltale moan. I count to ten before I take off like a shot straight across the yard toward my Pathfinder. Like the dummy I am—sleeping with Hank proves that point—I press the unlock button on my keyless entry. When the horn gives two loud beeps to indicate the lock releasing, I stumble, almost wet my pants, and hit the ground.

I roll over, look at the houses, and wait a breath. Nobody comes out, including Hank or his parents. Relieved, I pick myself up and sprint to my car. I fling the door open, jump in the driver’s seat, throw the key in the ignition, and take off, letting acceleration close the door as I floor the gas.

I do quick calculations. Should I make an unscheduled family visit or haul ass home, leaving no one the wiser I was in town? With a groan, I remember this is the weekend my sister is hosting a family dinner. Having begged off with a poor excuse, I’ll have to recant if I stay.

A look in the mirror shows circles of mascara under my eyes and a rooster tail on the back of my head. Clearly, it’s not wise to see my family in this condition. Mothers are perceptive, at least mine is, and she would know in an instant how I spent my night.

I pull into the lot of the local quickie mart, and make a mental list of necessities as I walk in. My bladder gets top priority. I wash my hands, splash lukewarm water on my face, and pat it dry with a scratchy brown paper towel. It’s a start, and it helps clear my head. I make my way to the toiletries. After grabbing a bottle of saline solution off the shelf, I rip off the security tab and do a continuous squeeze of solution into my eyes.

“Ahh. Boy, that feels great,” I tell the clerk. Blinking rapidly, I enjoy the saline as it sluices down my face in cascades of pure relief. The clerk, who’d been staring at me as if I were a three-headed freak, begins running a total of my damage in the cash register. I snag a package of tissue off the shelf to wipe my face and head toward the fridge, where I grab a Yoo-hoo. On my way to the counter, I pick up a box of Krispy Kreme Doughnuts and eat one while I pay.

“Paisley?” someone behind me says.
I close my eyes in dread. Maybe, if I stand here long enough, they’ll go away.
“I didn’t think you were coming to town this weekend. Thought you were running a 5 K or something....”

I turn and look up at my sister’s husband, Dan.

I’m cold busted.
 

Of all the rotten, stinking luck.

“Hi, what are you doing here?” There’s a box of Krispy Kreme Doughnuts in his hands.
Damn those irresistible doughnuts.

“I think the question is what are you doing here?” he says.
He pays and follows me outside. He’s parked next to me. I guess he came in while I was in the restroom.

“I was in Orlando and figured I’d come on in.” My voice quivers.

“Mmm-hmm. Reckon we’ll be seeing you for dinner,” he says.
“Uh, yeah. I’ll let Sarah Grace know.”
He nods and moves toward his truck.

“Hey, Dan,” I call. “I would appreciate you not telling anyone you ran into me.”
 

“See you later.” He waves, gets in his truck, and drives away without a backward glance.
I sit in my SUV. My only real option is to go to Gigi’s. I need a shower and a change of clothes. I’m not up for any more run-ins with people I know, so that rules out Target and a glance at the clock tells me the mall is closed. I’m pulling into traffic when my phone rings. More focused on avoiding a collision than checking my caller ID, I bring it to my ear.

“Hello?”

“You’re in the clear,” Hank says. His voice catches me off guard and I fumble my phone and drop it between my legs. The irony.

With trembling hands, I switch the call to Bluetooth.

“Paisley?” he says.

“Sorry, I dropped the phone. Does anyone know I was there?” Honestly, this is the first time he’s had me twisted up in knots.

“Nope. Not a clue. I still think you should have stayed for breakfast.” He yawns.

The simple sound brings forth the sensation of our naked bodies nestled together, the comfort of our sleep entwining us, and I suppress the urge to fan my face.

“Are you crazy? Was I supposed to walk out in your shirt and join your parents? Morning, Poppy. Morning, Ms. Becky. Your son and I had sex all night long and I’m famished,” I mimic and Hank laughs.

“Well it wasn’t
all
night. We did sleep the last few hours.” His voice is like chocolate, rich and creamy, and I kick myself for not staying around for a second helping.
 

“Hank Lancaster.” I pull into a strip mall parking lot, unable to concentrate on driving while talking to him.
 

“Where are you right now?”

“About to get on I-4,” I lie. I don’t want him to know I’m staying in town. If we get together again, I’ll probably want a repeat performance, and then I won’t be able to call our night of sex a mistake. He’ll accuse me of wanting more.

He’d be right, but there is no need to have
that
conversation.
“You know not to head home without me, right?”
Bam! It’s like being slapped upside the head. The aftermath of this impulse doesn’t ever seem to end. “What? Why?”

“Because my truck is still in Orlando and you are my ride to get it.”

Stupid me. Telling him last night I wanted to go to Lakeland, too. If we’d gone to my apartment in Daytona Beach, I would not be in this predicament.

“It was stupid to come here.”
“It was stupid to climb out the window,” he retorts. “It was stupid to hook up.”

“Face it. What happened between us last night was bound to happen at some point. Heck, look what happened last week when we met in Cocoa Beach for the surfing competition. We’ve been gearing up for this since high school.”

“We have not.”

Liar. Liar. I know he speaks the truth. If I admit it, I’m breaking some unspoken friendship rule between Gigi and me, even if this is her fault for canceling on us and not attending the surf competition. She’s directly responsible, leaving us unchaperoned.

When I accepted the invitation, I was excited to hang with an old friend. I never imagined we’d spend the evening on the beach, under blankets, learning each other’s body.

I drop my head onto my steering wheel. Something about being with Hank makes me not think things through.

“In my opinion, hot weather and too much booze are the root cause of these slipups.” I toss out the lie and hope it sticks.

“OK, you keep telling yourself that.” He chuckles. “I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow? The folks leave for church at eight.”

“All right. Listen, are you planning on seeing your sister today?”
“No, should I?”
“No, I’m heading to her house. I need a change of clothes before I visit my family. You cannot tell your sister what we did.” I hope he gets the severity of my words through my tone. I rub the space between my eyes.

“Roger that,” he says, his smile coming through the phone.
 

“Promise?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Say it.”

“I promise, Paisley McAllister, to never tell my sister we made hot-monkey love in her childhood bed.”

I groan. I can tell this is going nowhere fast. “I gotta go.”

“I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Gee, I can’t wait.” I end the call.
I pull out of my parking spot, travel around the backside of the strip mall, and decide to take back roads to Gigi’s house since I’m having attention issues.
I need a cover story, and a good one at that; otherwise she’ll see right through me.

I dread facing her. I know I have to at some point. Why not today?
The consequences of my actions plague me. It’s quite possible I may have set in motion the end of my friendships with Gigi and Hank. It’s ironic, this is exactly what I promised myself I would do once my divorce was final. Not sleep with Hank, but start getting a life. Married the summer before my last year of college, I veered off onto a path quite opposite my friends. While they were enjoying life after college with extra cash in their wallets, I was supporting a medical student. Now it’s my turn. Of course, I’m doing a bang-up job so far.

What if he wants something more? I’m not interested in going there. My journey is just getting started. What if our families find out? They are entwined enough for me to know it would be damn near impossible for my mother not to exaggerate our one night and push for a permanent union. Because I’m the only divorced person in my immediate family, pairing me off with someone as fantastically magnificent as Hank Lancaster—my mother’s words, not mine—would go a long way toward putting the blight behind us.