Chapter 40Charlotte Lane
Chapter 40
Twenty-One Questions
Charlotte Lane
O ver the last few hours, the faint pops of burning wood from the fire had settled into soothing background noise. The rain had slowed, though it still dripped steadily into the cave through the hole where they had dropped down. The wind howled above them and the occasional strike of lightning lit up their small space, making strange shadows dance along the cave walls as if they were spirits joining them from the other side.
Charlotte had removed her denim jacket, and she and Wade seemed tangled around each other and tried to keep warm. Somehow, through the night, they’d become impossibly close.
He seemed to think of himself as her personal space heater. When her teeth chattered, he’d turned to face her, then pulled her in closer and tucked her head under his chin. When she’d shivered after a draft had blown into the cave, he’d wrapped both of his arms around her waist and settled her entire body along the length of him.
She couldn’t say it was an unpleasant feeling. And it was definitely something new. But she was having a hard time reminding herself not to turn and run her fingers over him.
Instead she kept her hands clasped under her chin and even curled her toes to keep from feeling too intimate. But he surrounded her, and the truth was she wished they could get even closer than they already were.
She just couldn’t risk ruining their friendship by asking for something she wasn’t sure he wanted to give.
“It’s your turn, Charlotte. Or did you fall asleep?” Wade whispered.
Her heart stuttered. They’d started a game of twenty-one questions, though they were well past twenty-one by now. She’d learned so much about him: his favorite music, how many siblings he had, how long he’d been in the Army. And she’d told him about herself as they swapped embarrassing stories from their childhood and talked about all the places they’d each been.
The more they talked, the more she wanted to know about him. Tonight was different than their usual nights eating nachos at the bar. This time they didn’t have the topics of students and school to keep them from discussing the real world. Something had shifted in their relationship. And she’d run out of simple questions she wanted to ask.
Uncertain of how to say what she really wanted to know, Charlotte spoke slowly, rethinking each word that came out of her mouth. “How did . . . I mean, did you . . . Were you injured while you were in the service? Is that how you got . . . you know, the scar on your chest?”
A low chuckle slipped through Wade’s lips, but she felt how his body stiffened.
“I told you. It’s nothing.”
“You didn’t get that from a broken heart,” she breathed. She worried that she was crossing a line by pushing the subject, but something in her said this was important. “I understand if you don’t want to talk about it. It’s just that you’ve become a good friend, and when I mentioned it before I sensed there’s more to the story. You can tell me anything.”
For a moment he didn’t speak.
Then, a deep sigh rumbled through his chest. His arms tightened around her, and he held her closer, as if using her as a weight to keep him grounded in the present. “About six years into my service in the Army, I decided I needed to help more than I’d been able to so far. I’d had friends who’d been injured in training ops or overseas, and I wanted to help take care of our guys. So, I enlisted to become a medic and got sent to San Antonio for training.”
Wade took a deep breath, then let his words come faster. “Within a few days on base, I met this woman, Elena. Gorgeous, smart, hardworking, fast learner. Her mother was a doctor, and she’d enlisted to be a medic for the same reasons I had. We were like the same person. It was perfect.”
He paused and Charlotte untangled her fingers to wrap her arms around him. “You okay?” she whispered.
Wade rubbed his chin into her hair. “Yeah. Well, anyway, we got serious pretty quick. Too quick. And soon I was proposing, thinking I’d never find another woman so right for me.” He chuckled to himself. “I was young and dumb. I don’t know what I thought would happen. I guess I was just living in the moment and hoping everything would work out in the end. But then the sixteen-week training course was over and we were sent to different bases.
“I went to California, and Elena was sent to Hawaii. I didn’t think it would be a problem. After all, it’s an easy plane ride to the islands. So, a few weeks later, I flew out to surprise her and found her in bed with another soldier.”
Charlotte gasped and felt him shake his head.
“I don’t know what got into me,” he continued. “I charged the guy. But he saw me coming and bam .” Wade pulled his arm back and ran his fingers over the scar on his chest. “He hit me with the closest thing he could find, a bedside lamp. The bulb broke and a piece of glass stuck me. I made it all the way through my enlistment without a scratch and it was a lamp that scarred me up.”
For the first time ever, Charlotte’s brain stopped working. She didn’t know what to think or what to say. She heard herself squeal, “He stabbed you with a lamp?”
“Yep.” Wade grasped her hand. “It wasn’t really that bad. Not too deep. Not fatal. Looks worse than it was. Honestly, my pride was hurt worse than my body.” He sighed again. “And that was the last time I saw Elena or her new boyfriend. I moved on. We got in trouble, and the military sent me to court of course, but the charges ended up getting dropped. I went back to California and moved on with my life.”
Charlotte wondered if it was really as simple as he made it sound. She’d never experienced a grand love or a devastating heartbreak like the ones in her books, but she had seen the pain of rejection and betrayal up close. She’d watched her mom spiral fast after her dad left them to start another family with another woman.
Maybe that was why Charlotte found it so hard to let people in. Why forming and sticking to routines had become her habit. There was safety and stability in what was known. That was why it’d taken her so long to break away from her life at A&M.
Charlotte leaned in and kissed the scar over his chest. The symbol of his broken heart and the quiet pain he tried to avoid. “I’m sorry.”
Wade had stiffened under her hands. “For what? For my tragic love tale or kissing me?”
She felt her face flush. She didn’t know how to answer. “I . . . For everything.”
He pulled back and lifted her chin, trapping her gaze with his. “Don’t apologize, Charlotte. Elena was a long time ago. It doesn’t bother me at all anymore. I’m not a heartbroken mess like the characters in your books. And you can kiss me anytime. Maybe next time try it on my lips.” He winked.
She tucked her head back to his chest and thought about smacking him as laughter moved through him.
“No, seriously,” he said, wrapping his arms around her like he’d done before. “All jokes aside. Thank you for the kiss. I know why you did it, and it was very sweet. I also know it made you really embarrassed and you shouldn’t be. You genuinely care about other people, and I love that about you.”
He ran his fingers down her spine and she tried to ignore the shiver that swept over her. “You’re like no one I’ve ever met before. You’re special. Intelligent. Daring. Passionate. Interesting as hell. I mean, you coached a high school football team with no knowledge of the game. You didn’t do great, but you still did it.”
Charlotte felt herself melt into him. “Maybe it was your game plans that weren’t so great.”
“What? Those plays were perfect.” Wade pretended to be offended but she could hear the laughter in his voice. After a beat he whispered, “I love that sense of humor. And your quiet beauty. And the way you carry yourself with elegance and pride. I told you before, you’re my kind of woman, Dr. Lane.”
Surprise washed over her. His blue eyes were burning with a seriousness that made her giddy. Suddenly she felt as nervous as a teenager on her first date. “I . . .”
She turned away, untangling herself from the warmth of his stare and his body heat. She sat up, then got to her feet, balancing her weight on her good leg and pretending to stretch.
She’d moved to Crossroads to start a new chapter of her life. To find peace and make a change. Instead she’d found adventure and made her first real friend in a long time. One she didn’t want to risk losing.
Charlotte had tried a few flings in college, mostly study buddies, but that felt like a lifetime ago. And every time she’d thought of getting serious with someone, she always found a flaw she couldn’t overlook.
The guy from her British Literature class had slept through most of the course and tried to steal Charlotte’s ideas for the rest of it. The one in her creative writing course had thought himself a reincarnation of Edgar Allan Poe, complete with binge drinking and disappearing for days on end. Then she’d tried dating a psychology major, but all he’d done was explain what was wrong with her. Charlotte guessed she’d been his personal research project.
If Wade wanted more, she didn’t know what she should do next. What if they messed everything up and lost what they had now? What if the fear of a true heartbreak led her to making her life in Crossroads an inescapable routine like she’d done in College Station?
As she limped away from Wade, trying to sort through her thoughts, Charlotte realized the sound of dripping water was gone.
“Hey, I think it’s stopped raining.” She turned back to him, motioning him to join her under the opening where they’d jumped down.
“Yep, the storm’s finally passed. Thank God. In a couple hours we can work on getting out of this cave. Now come on back here. I promise I won’t bite . . . unless you ask.” He smirked. When she didn’t move, he said, “Seriously, you’re going to freeze. And you should really get off that leg.”
Charlotte crossed her arms over her chest and shuffled to him. “Why are we waiting to get out? Why can’t we get out now?”
Wade settled on his back, using his arms as pillows and gazing up at her through barely opened eyelids. “Because we don’t really know where we are. We rode for hours on this massive ranch, and we could be dozens of miles away from the Double K headquarters. Besides, it may have stopped raining, but it’s still wet and freezing outside of this cave. But most importantly, we can’t get out of here by ourselves. I could barely pull you out last night, remember? There’s no way I can climb out by myself. We need help. And then there’s the fact that it’s still dark out. We need to wait for daylight.”
He was right. They couldn’t get out alone and even if they did, the horses were gone. How would they get back to the ranch on foot? The Double K was thousands of acres.
He patted the packed earth beside him. “Come get warm. I have a plan.”
She sat down next to him and jabbed him in the ribs. “Care to share this brilliant plan?”
Wade opened one eye and blinked. “Come daylight, I’ll fire three rounds into the sky.” He patted the pistol still on his hip and shrugged like that explained everything.
“And?” She poked him again as his eyelids started to droop.
He raised an eyebrow. “And, the cowboys will know we need help. Didn’t you hear that foreman explaining the emergency signal when we first started riding off on our own?”
“No.” She flushed. She was usually so good at listening to instructions. She must have been distracted by Wade and his antics.
“Yep, as soon as everyone’s awake to hear it, I’ll shoot into the air and they’ll all come charging in to save the day. Now will you lay back down so we can stay warm. It’s survival rule one-oh-one.”
As Charlotte lay next to him, she felt a shiver run through his body. Wade must be colder than he’d let on. If she was honest, a chill had settled over her skin too. She pulled her thin denim jacket back over them and prayed morning would come soon. They needed to get out of here. Their fire was out and right now lying close to each other was their only hope of staying warm. All they could do now was hope the night wouldn’t get much colder.