Chapter 24 Ghosts Don’t Sleep
ghosts don’t sleep
DUKE
The world snaps back all at once.
I’m no longer in sand and fire and blood. I’m not in that alley, not hearing the screams.
I’m in my room.
Roxanne’s beneath me.
My arm is pinning her down. Her eyes are wide and terrified.
“Fuck—” I jerk back like I’ve been shot, stumbling off the bed, my breath coming in hard bursts. “Shit, no, Roxanne?! What the hell?”
She rolls off the bed and takes a step back from me. “I heard you screaming. I—”
“Oh my God, did I hurt you?” I hate that she flinches when I reach for her.
“I’m okay,” she says, rubbing her neck.
The look on her face alone is gut-wrenching, and yet I can’t even concentrate on making sure she’s okay because my pulse is still thundering in my body like a machine gun.
I back up until I feel the bed and slump to the floor, burying my head in my hands, hoping the room will stop spinning. Jameson whimpers and comes to my side.
Roxanne touches my forehead. “I’m getting you a cold cloth.”
Moments later, she’s back from the bathroom and kneeling on the floor next to me, dabbing the back of my still-flaming neck.
“Roxanne,” I rasp. “Please tell me I didn’t—”
“You didn’t hurt me,” she says, her voice steady and calm. “You were having a nightmare.”
The cool touch of the rag is soothing, and I finally feel like I’m calming down. “You shouldn’t have come in here. I didn’t mean to scare you, Christ.”
“You don’t scare me. I was a little startled, but I realize I shouldn’t have woken you up like that. I—” She stops dabbing and brushes hair off my forehead. “I reacted when I heard you.”
She leaves for another moment to cool the washcloth down again and when she returns, she presses it to my temple. I swear it sounds like someone’s cooking an egg on me.
“You’re burning up,” she says.
“I think I—” My room suddenly feels like a tunnel, and I grasp at my chest as it tightens.
“Do you need some fresh air?” Roxanne asks.
I want to tell her to stop. To leave. But the words won’t come. My jaw’s locked and my throat feels thick.
“Can you stand?” she asks, wrapping her arm around my back.
“You don’t have to help me.”
“C’mon,” she says again.
I wrap my arm around her neck, and with a grunt, I get to my feet.
We make it outside onto my deck that connects to my bedroom.
The air bites sharp at first, but it’s good and grounding.
Even though it’s June, the alpine chill almost never leaves the Colorado night.
The sky’s ink-black and cluttered with stars.
Somewhere out past the fence line, a coyote yips once, then goes silent.
Jameson growls, then waddles back inside to his bed.
The world feels big and small all at once.
“Breathe,” Roxanne says. “Take a deep breath. You’re okay. You’re okay now.”
I nod as she helps me into one of my lounge chairs.
“I’ll be right back.” She vanishes before I can protest and tell her she doesn’t need to stay with me. She returns with a big glass of ice water. I take it and sip slowly.
“Better?” she asks.
“Yes. Thank you.”
The swell of crickets singing is the only sound around us for a moment, and I finish off the water.
“I’ll get you more,” Roxanne says.
I reach out for her, then instantly regret taking her wrist. The flash of fear in her eyes when I woke up was almost too much for me.
Whether she admits it or not, she was scared and I had caused that.
That revokes my right to touch her, and I reflexively pull away.
“No, thank you, you don’t have to do anything for me. ”
“I know I don’t, but I don’t mind. Take some deep breaths and keep trying to cool down.”
I don’t argue. I just sit there with my hand on my chest. I feel a release as my temp drops and my breath returns to normal.
“Here.” She hands me another full glass and sits down in the chair beside me.
“Thank you and again, I’m sorry … I never wanted you to see me like that.”
Roxanne shrugs. “Well, I hadn’t planned on almost drowning in the Arkansas, having you haul me to shore, cut my clothes away, and see my horrible disfigurement, so I’d say we’re even.”
My mouth curves into a smile. “I suppose so, but I told you, you’re not disfigured.”
“Do you ever … talk about them?”
I arch an eyebrow. “The nightmares?”
“Yeah.”
“Nope. I get up and shower, try to read or go back to bed.”
“And let me guess, you don’t take something to help you sleep?”
“Nope.”
“Is it easier to focus on helping everyone else rather than deal with your own stuff?”
That question hits me like a horse kick to the gut.
Because it’s true.
“Yes,” I say with a slow nod. “Helping others is so much easier.”
“I get that.” She pulls her knees into her chest. “But I’m sorry for whatever happened to you. If you … if you ever want to talk about it …”
My eyes wander over to her. I’m suddenly overcome with wanting to tell her everything. About the night terrors. About the guys I couldn’t save. About the woman who left me because she said lying next to me felt like sleeping beside a ticking time bomb.
“Thank you, I’m good,” is all I can scrape out.
“I don’t usually sleep well either. Well, I do in my bed at home, but when I would travel, it was hard for me to get settled.”
“Do you have nightmares … about …” I motion my head toward her shoulder.
“All the time. Every time I hear thunder, every time I smell pot.”
I sit up in my chair, excited at the prospect of her opening up to me. “Oh?”
She stretches out her long legs and rubs her neck. “My ex … he …” Her voice trails off as her gaze focuses on her hands.
She never says his name. She really has a thing with saying someone’s name.
It’s “he” or “my ex” or sometimes “that man”.
I don’t know why I notice it now, but I do.
For Roxanne, saying someone’s name probably means giving them space and power.
My hunch is, she’s not going to do that until she feels someone has earned that right.
My heart feels weighted when I think about all the times she’s called me Mr. Faraday, even when we’re alone.
“Roxanne?”
“What?” Her attention jerks back to me. “Right. My ex. He didn’t smoke pot when I first met him.
Shortly after we were officially dating, he started smoking to manage his anxiety.
Once he got bored with it, he moved onto stronger things, but he always smelled like stale weed.
Like it was permanently attached to his skin.
Now, the smell of pot takes me back to …
to being with him. I hate it now. Do you get that way about smells? ”
I nod. “Oh yeah, CK One cologne.”
She tilts her head. “Really?”
“Yeah, we had this guy in our unit who was an incredible mechanic and to combat the smells that would attach to him when he was working on something, he would douse himself in that cologne. Great guy, one hell of a card player. One day, he … he didn’t come back.
After that, the smell of that strong cologne reminds me of him. ”
“Makes sense.”
“What about your favorite smells?” My question makes her smile, which is now my new favorite mission.
“Hmm, my favorite smells. They’re kind of weird, I guess.”
“Spill it,” I coax.
“Street vendor pretzels, warm and buttery. Old bookstores and cedar.”
“Great, now I want one of those warm, buttery pretzels.”
She giggles. “What about you?”
“Favorite smells.” I pretend I’m thinking and rub my chin, but I know instantly. “Fresh sawdust, a saddle after it’s been oiled, lemons and … you.”
Her eyes widen. “Me?”
I should stop right there, but I can’t. “Yep.”
“And how would you describe it?”
“It’s like…” I pause, running a hand along the back of my neck. “God, I don’t even know how to say it without sounding like a creeper.”
She raises an eyebrow, amused. “Try me.”
I glance over at her, then up at the stars. “You smell like … flowers, but not soft ones. Something more inspired. Jasmine, maybe?”
She tilts her head, lips twitching. “Fancy nose you got there, Cowboy Ken.”
“Don’t sass. I’ve been trying to figure it out for weeks.” I look down, then say quieter, “There’s this intensity to it. Not sugary. It’s warm and spicy. Exotic.”
“Exotic?” she echoes, suddenly flustered.
I nod. “Oh yeah.”
When I finally meet her gaze again, her cheeks are that exact shade of pink that makes it hard to stay composed around her.
“Wow,” she says, clearing her throat. “I’m flattered. Just when I think you can’t surprise me … And for the record, you don’t sound like a creep at all. You sound … weirdly poetic.”
My gaze turns unfocused, locked on the mouth that said “poetic.” All I can think about is carrying her back to bed and kissing my way down every inch she’d let me.
What is wrong with me?
“Um, you okay over there?” she asks.
“Not even a little.”
“Do you think you can go back to sleep?” She stands and offers to take the glass from my hand.
“Probably not, but it’s worth a shot.”
I hold onto her arm to steady myself as I rise. She helps me back into the room and sits me down in the chair. She starts to straighten the bed but stops when her hand skims the sheets.
“Your sheets are soaked. You must have been on fire. Do you have a spare set?”
I rub my temples. “Roxanne, you don’t—”
“Well, do you?”
“Probably in the linen closet.”
She moves around the room with this quiet determination, her blond hair falling loose over her shoulders. She’s barefoot, in soft gray pajama pants and a loose shirt that hangs off one shoulder.
I realize I’m getting to see her in another, truer form, and she looks absolutely beautiful. It’s not the kind of beauty that takes effort, and it’s the kind that unravels you when you’re not expecting it. The kind you want to wake up next to.
Damn.
I’ve seen her dressed up, hair tamed, mouth painted the exact shade of danger, and yeah, she is the kind of woman that turns heads. But this? This intimate version of her? This is worse because there is no defense against this.
I can’t remember the last time a woman cared for me like this. Roxanne changes my bed sheets, fluffs my pillows, and refills my water glass. She pats the bed, crosses the room, and holds out her hand.
“Let’s get you back to bed,” she says with a comforting smile. “Is there a book you want from the library?”
“You’ve already done too much for me. Let me at least take you back to the lodge.”
“You need some rest, and I’ve got a little more work to do.”
She shakes her hand, insisting I take it. It pains me that I have to let it go as she tucks me into bed. Did you hear me? This woman tucked me into bed after I scared the shit out of her.
“Thank you,” I say as she shuts the light off.
She lingers in the doorway. “Flowerbomb.”
I sit up on my forearms. “What?”
“My smell,” she says, making air quotes. “It’s called Flowerbomb, my favorite perfume by Victor and Rolf.”
“I’ll have to remember that,” I say coyly, knowing I’ll never forget.
“Goodnight.”
She closes the door behind her, and just like that, it’s one of the best and worst nights of my life.