Page 8

Gabriel

I didn’t sleep much after Callie passed out in my arms.

Not because of her.

Because of me.

She curled against me soft and warm and so damn trusting. One arm was draped across my chest and her thigh hitched over mine like she wanted to hold me even in sleep. It should’ve felt good.

It did feel good.

And that was the problem.

The cabin was dark and still. Outside, the rain had quieted to a steady rhythm. Inside, the only sound was her breathing and the occasional rustle of Max shifting on the rug near the bed.

I stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours, the weight of her touch heavy against my skin. My mind wouldn’t stop replaying the way she had looked at me when I’d finally given in and taken her to my bed. She had looked at me as if I was something she wanted and someone she could trust.

But she didn’t know.

She didn’t know what I’d seen. What I’d done. What kind of man I’d become after the last tour.

My eyes drifted shut sometime around dawn, and for a little while, I let myself fall. The dream came fast, like always. It wasn’t a dream though; it was a memory wrapped in denial.

I was back in the desert. Heat was radiating off the sand like fire. The sky was a pale, blistering white. The smell of gunpowder was thick in the air. The silence after an explosion—the kind that left a ringing in your ears so loud it drowned out everything else.

My boots pounded the ground, instincts driving me forward, my unit fanning out around me. Except they weren’t. I turned—and they were gone. The men I’d trained with, bled with—they were gone. One second they were there. The next—

Nothing.

I stumbled over something solid. A body. A brother. His helmet was gone. His face barely recognizable. But I knew him. I always knew him. Not from memory. From guilt. Every time, it was someone else. Every time, it was everyone. I dropped to my knees beside him, pressing trembling fingers to a neck that had no pulse. He was still warm. Still there. Except he wasn’t.

I looked up. The sand stretched forever. Endless. And I was alone.

I woke with a gasp, my whole body locked in tension. My shirt clung to me, soaked through. My hands—fuck. My hands were clenched into fists so tight my nails had broken skin.

The cabin was cold. And so was I. That deep down, soul-killing cold that had nothing to do with the temperature and everything to do with my past. Callie stirred beside me. I tried to slow my breathing. I tried not to shake.

“Gabriel?” Her voice was groggy. Concerned.

“I’m fine,” I lied, swinging my legs over the side of the bed. My skin felt cold and clammy. My heartbeat thundered in my ears.

“Did you have a nightmare?” she asked softly, her voice threading through the fog.

I scrubbed my hand down my face. “Just a dream.”

She sat up and reached out to touch my back. “You’re trembling.”

“I said I’m fine.” The words came out harsher than I meant, and I could feel her recoil behind me. Regret hit me a second later and I blew out a breath, trying to pull the anger back in. She didn’t deserve that. She didn’t deserve any of this. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap.”

Her hand returned to my back, warm and steady. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”

That nearly undid me. Those words, spoken without judgment or pity. I turned, slowly, and looked at her in the dark. “We were ambushed.”

She didn’t say anything, just reached for my hand, somehow knowing I needed that physical connection.

“I still see it,” I admitted. “The blood. The sand.”

Her fingers laced with mine. “You did everything you could.”

“Doesn’t matter.” My throat tightened. “Men still died and I didn’t.”

“And now you punish yourself for surviving.”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t have to.

She leaned in, pressing her forehead to mine. Her breath soft against my lips. “You don’t have to carry it alone anymore.”

God help me, I wanted to believe her. But that kind of weight didn’t just disappear. It left marks on your mind and your soul.

I kissed her then. Soft, desperate. Needing to feel something other than the weight of that memory. She kissed me back without hesitation, like she knew exactly what I needed. But I pulled away before it could turn into more. I wanted her desperately, but not like this. Not after that dream. “I need a minute,” I said, reaching for my clothes and heading for the kitchen.

She didn’t try to stop me. She just watched me go, her eyes full of questions she didn’t ask.

I didn’t have the courage to tell her about the other part of the dream. The part where it wasn’t soldiers dying in the sand, but my sister. Hers was the ghost I carried deeper than any of the others.

There were nights I couldn’t tell which memory hurt worse—the battlefield or her. My sister hadn’t die screaming or bleeding in my arms. She’d died slowly. Quietly. One cell at a time, until the woman who used to steal my dessert and tease me mercilessly about my buzzcut faded into someone I barely recognized.

Both stories had ended the same because I hadn’t been able to save her either.

I remembered sitting by her hospital bed, her hand so small in mine, skin paper-thin and cold even though she never stopped pretending she was fine. She’d asked me once if I thought I’d ever settle down. If I wanted a family. I’d told her no, that the military was my life. Now, that thought kept rushing to the forefront.

She said I needed someone soft. Someone who wouldn’t take my silence personally. Someone who would see me—really see me—and stay anyway. Our last Christmas together, she’d given me a copy of White Fang . She said I reminded her of the wolf. The book was still by my bed.

I hadn’t touched it since the funeral.

And maybe that was the problem. I hadn’t touched anything real in three years.

Until Callie.

I stepped outside into the cold. The air was sharp, bracing. It cut through the remnants of the dream—but not enough. I closed my eyes, forcing in a breath. Then another. But the weight wouldn’t ease.

I gripped the porch railing, my knuckles pale as the screen door creaked open behind me. Callie padded out onto the porch, silent and barefoot, wrapped in one of my flannel shirts. She didn’t say anything. Just leaned against the railing beside me and looked out into the darkness. Her presence grounded me more than the cold air ever could. She didn’t speak, just waited. It was that waiting that broke me.

“I don’t sleep much,” I admitted. “Not really. This… with you… it’s the most I’ve slept in years. They come back when I do. The dreams. The ghosts. I see the desert. The faces. I see their blood on my hands, and I can’t—” I cut myself off, jaw clenched.

She was still quiet. Still there.

“I thought I could keep it away,” I muttered. “If I just stayed on the mountain long enough. If I didn’t let anyone in. If I didn’t feel anything.”

“That’s not healing,” she said, so gently it hurt. “That’s hiding.”

I turned and looked at her.

Her hair was messy. Her eyes were sleepy, but she looked at me like I was something worth saving. And that scared me more than anything else. I picked her up and carried her back to the bed. My bed. She looked up at me, then opened her arms. “Make a new memory, Gabriel. With me.”

A smile edged its way onto my mouth. Then, I stripped away our clothes, pressing her legs open with my thighs. “I don’t know if I can be gentle.”

She threaded her fingers through my hair. “Don’t you know? You can be any way you want with me.”

I didn’t answer, just took her mouth, hard and demanding, how I thought I needed to. How I thought I wanted to. But I was wrong.

About a lot of things. Wrong about needing the solitude. About the lone wolf persona I’d wrapped around myself.

Wrong, about needing her.