Chapter 21

CHAPTER 21

B ella

The sound was jarring. So much so I jerked up from a deep sleep. Something inside told me I’d been in a nice slumber, but the darkness in the room was instantly terrifying. Had someone broken into the house?

“Jagger. There’s someone inside.” Fear tore through me as I struggled to unearth my arms from the tight covers, immediately reaching over to his side of the bed.

Even though I was starting to see shadows in the room, I had to feel his pillow to realize he wasn’t in bed. Maybe he’d heard the intruder.

Oh, dear God. Cally!

Still fighting the covers, I managed to jerk my feet from under them, placing them quietly on the floor. If someone was in the house, I would need to remain very quiet. Where was Jagger? Inching into the bathroom, I resisted turning on a light. Half my clothes were still outside, the towel he’d used to wrap around me when carrying me to his bedroom thrown somewhere against one of the walls.

Maybe I’d get lucky and he was the kind of man to wear a robe. A slight breath escaped my lungs when I felt one on the back of the door. I slipped into it, fighting the terrified girl inside even more. I’d never been this way, forced to take care of my own battles my entire life. Joel had taken too much from me and that was going to stop right now.

I took cautious steps toward the door, hopeful he would dash in and tell me everything was okay.

But I sensed that wasn’t going to happen. My stomach was in knots as I opened the door, slipping into another wave of shadows as I made my way to Cally’s room. Very quietly I turned the doorknob, grateful Cally had to sleep with a light of some sort on. The lamp on the other side of the room had a low wattage bulb, which allowed a slight view of my sleeping baby.

Xena lifted her head, but as soon as I placed my finger across my lips, she lowered it again. There hadn’t been any disturbance in the room I could see. Since I’d left my phone in the kitchen, I couldn’t call 9-1-1. That meant I had to find out what I’d heard.

As soon as I closed the bedroom door, I heard another noise. This time I sensed it was something being tossed against the wall or on the floor. Where the hell was Jagger? Why wasn’t he hearing this?

I remained as quiet as possible as I made my way to the top of the stairs. I only had a limited view of downstairs, able to tell the fire in the fireplace was mostly embers at this point. But with every light being off, I could barely make out the furniture. Maybe I was being foolish, but I started to descend the stairs.

When I’d walked down four of them, another noise startled me more this time. But it wasn’t a thud. The sound was a deep, haunted moan.

Jagger.

I hurried down the rest of the stairs, waiting on the landing as I tried to figure out where the sound had come from. There were several rooms on the bottom floor including a study toward the back I’d peeked my head into.

He wasn’t in the kitchen or the living room. My gut told me Jagger was suffering from a nightmare he’d experienced. I moved cautiously down the hallway, passing two darkened rooms and a bathroom. The door to the study was partially cracked, a source of light streaming from underneath.

I was still cautious as I approached, unsure what I could do for him. When I pushed open the door, my heart broke a little. The moment he tossed two heavy books across the room, I cringed deep inside. I should have heard him having a nightmare.

He ripped at his hair before plopping down in one of two leather chairs, dropping his head in his hands. On the table to the side was a bottle of booze and a glass that only had a swig left in it. From what I remembered of the bottle from before, he’d had one too many in trying to exorcise his demons.

For the first time since we’d met, he didn’t sense my presence, which was almost as concerning as the fact various items had been tossed around the room, several books with broken spines laying haphazardly on the floor.

“Jagger.” I didn’t dare take a step inside. I’d had a few psychology classes, but that in no way made me qualified to deal with PTSD. It was obvious he was suffering from the horrible deeds he’d seen and been forced to do during both dangerous occupations.

A mercenary.

I hadn’t allowed myself to think about what he’d done until now. He’d killed people for a living. Yes, maybe bad people who others believed deserved to die, but that didn’t change the fact he’d used them for target practice. A sudden cold shiver slammed down my spine.

Whatever organization he’d worked for had likely lied to him or worse.

Left him without support.

He jerked his head up, his entire face contorted from an extremely heightened level of anger.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he asked and he immediately reached for his glass, finishing off the last of his bourbon. It didn’t take him two seconds to refill his glass.

“Don’t, Jagger. Just don’t.”

His laugh sounded bitter. “What don’t you want me to do, sweetheart? Drink myself to death or pull out a handgun?”

Was he trying to terrify me with threatening to kill himself? If so, he was doing a damn good job. But I was also angry, furious in fact.

“Both.” I walked toward him, folding my arms. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“What do you think? Finding an escape.”

I had two different ways of dealing with this. Coddling him or telling him exactly what was on my mind.

I chose the latter for good or for bad. I wasn’t in the coddling mood. “How fucking dare you.”

His eyes flickered with confusion at first, but his mask was firmly shoved back into place. “How dare I do what?”

“Act like you don’t give a damn about anyone else but yourself. You’re a fraud. An asshole. A jerk and I thought you were completely different.”

“I guess you thought wrong.”

“Bullshit, Jagger. You risked your damn life to go on that mountain to locate my daughter. You kept me from falling off a goddamn cliff. In my mind that shows you have grit, a salt of the earth kind of man. It also tells me that you have integrity. You have the entire world at your feet. Money. A fabulous resort to work in. A town of friendly fucking people who think the sun rises and sets on your ass and… And a woman who gives a damn about you, but you’d prefer to wallow in self-pity. I call that bullshit.”

I held my breath, waiting to see what he would do. As anticipated, his rage flared once again and he jerked to his feet. A part of me was momentarily on edge, but my gut told me and the inner voice whispered that he would never dare raise his hand to me. Not once. Not under any circumstances.

He fumed, his chest rising and falling and his face turning red. I saw hatred in his eyes. All for himself. But he remained quiet, just the little bit of ice rattling in the shaking glass creating any sound.

We glared at each other until I was certain I had to try yet another tactic.

“Fine. Have it your way, Jagger.” I turned to leave and as I’d hoped, he refused to allow me to get out of the room. He planted his flexed hand on the door, slamming it closed before picking me up. “Let go of me.”

“No.” His single word was filled with agony. He sat down again, planting me on his lap. The single act told me he’d survive this panic attack.

But there would be more. How would I be able to handle the next one? And the next.

The man was a bundle of nerves, the cords on the side of his neck thumping from his increased pulse. My doctor side almost took over, but I tamped her down. What Jagger needed right now was someone to listen. Not to bark orders or tell him how he should be feeling. While he’d admitted his previous job, information most people wouldn’t understand, there was much more to what he’d endured. Something more personal.

He had one arm around the base of my back, keeping me in place while allowing me to know his intentions weren’t harmful. Sadly, his eyes were dilated as memories plagued every thought. “Let me help you, Jagger.”

“I don’t think anyone can.” He took another sip of his drink as he stared off into space.

I wrapped my fingers around his and the glass, stretching them out so I could rub the tip of my index finger back and forth across the top of his hand. He allowed me to take the glass from his hand, finally able to look me in the eye as I took a sip of his drink.

He was starting to come down from the fog that had hardened his mind and his heart. But not enough that it would mean anything the next time he had an episode.

“A nightmare?” I asked.

His nod was so forlorn. “Nothing unusual except I thought you were…”

“Someone who hurt you.”

“Yeah. I can’t do this to myself any longer or to you.”

“You’re not going to hurt me.”

“You don’t know that!” The right corner of his lip curled.

“Yes, I do. It will never happen. You won’t allow yourself to do that.”

He retrieved his drink, laughing more bitterly than before. “I wish I had your confidence.” In an unexpected move, he kissed my cheek. It was also a slight dismissal. He wanted to try to shove his experience under a rug.

“I don’t know any longer.” He placed his glass on the table. Every time he looked at me, I could see another layer being peeled. He’d been so caught up in hating himself that he’d forgotten it was okay to live. To enjoy.

As he slid a strand of hair from my mouth, his face contorted and he looked away. “Few people could ever understand what it’s like to be a prisoner of war.”

Oh, shit. Another reason he hated the world. He’d experienced the worst of mankind.

“I wouldn’t want my worst enemy to try and fathom what it’s like to be deprived of sunlight, food, and water. I’d never wish the kind of torture I’d endured on anyone no matter what they’d done in their lives. There are fates worse than death. All you do is pray that death will take you, and a part of you is lost in the darkness forever. But I’ve come to understand what I had to face was nothing in comparison to the loss experienced by the families of those I killed. I deserved the months in captivity.”

He made the statement in such a cold, calculated way that I wasn’t able to come up with a decent response. At least not until I was able to process what he’d told me.

“No one deserves to be tortured, Jagger. Some, however, deserve to die for the terrible things they’ve done to others either for fun, financial or political gain. What you did as a soldier was make the world safe for others, keeping democracy alive. What you did as a mercenary was the same, only you were forced into even more dangerous situations because you were very much alone. It wasn’t your fault you were captured by some terrible people either. But do you want to know something?”

His eyes were glistening as he studied me. “What?”

“You’re not alone right now. I’m here. And unless you have other plans, this is where I intend on staying.” He was holding back some of the details, but I couldn’t press him. My heart was heavy for him yet grateful that he’d shared his horrors with me.

He’d opened himself up, making his needs and anxiety vulnerable to me, someone he barely knew. Some might not understand how special that was. Maybe my thinking was twisted, but I’d been the one to discuss murder options with my best friend so who was I to justify myself?

There was no real cure for anyone suffering from the mental turmoil he was going through, but there were support mechanisms, people who could help ease his anxiety. Right now, his first task was acceptance of his deeds and that they didn’t reflect on the man.

He also had to forgive himself.

It was something we both needed to do. Maybe fate had brought us together for a reason.

Healing.

Understanding.

Survival.