Chapter 28 Dave
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
DAVE
The bed’s cold when I reach over. For a second, I think maybe she just rolled to the other side, but the sheets are empty, smooth.
My chest tightens. There’s a brief moment where I have to question whether the entire night was a dream.
Shaking my head, I push up on an elbow, blinking at the faint glow of the dying fire down the hall.
“Char?”
When there’s no answer, I climb out of bed, pulling on my pants and Henley, padding barefoot through the house.
The place feels too still. The fire’s nothing but embers now, her wineglass still sitting on the coffee table.
My stomach twists. I check the guest room.
The bathroom. Even the porch. Nothing. She’s gone. But where?
And why?
I make it to my office and sink into my chair, pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes. Did she go for a walk? At this hour? It’s still dark as pitch out there. Doesn’t she realize what’s out in these woods? Coyotes. Maybe even worse. I push to stand. Then I see it.
The papers.
“Fuck!”
They’re scattered across the rug, exactly where she must’ve found them. My heart sinks into my gut.
“Dammit, Char. Did you actually try to leave on foot?” I find myself hoping she’s craftier than I imagined and managed to steal my keys or hot-wire my car.
This thought goes up in smoke as I grab my keys from the entry table and tear out of the house toward my Toyota Tundra.
My headlights slice through the darkness as I fly down the drive.
Where could she have gone? It’s not like she can call an Uber out here.
There’s one gas station and two churches in this town. No cabs, no buses.
I fumble for my phone, thumb hovering over Matt’s number. Maybe she called Ellie. Maybe she’s already safe there.
But then I see something up ahead. A small figure cowering along the shoulder of the road, bundled in only that cable-knit sweater, arms crossed over her chest as if attempting to fight off the bitter chill, hair whipping in the wind.
Suddenly, it’s like déjà vu. That morning after our one night together.
The jogger I passed wearing a hoodie. It had been her then too.
My heart slams against my ribs as I slow the truck, rolling to a stop beside her.
“Char! Get in the car.”
She doesn’t even look at me. “No!”
“It’s the middle of the damn night!”
“Don’t care. I’d rather walk!”
“Baby, please!” I beg.
She stops dead in her tracks. “Don’t call me that! You have no right.”
Throwing my hands in the air in surrender, I blurt, “I’m sorry!” I quickly take hold of the steering wheel before anything else can happen tonight.
“I’ll walk all the way home if I have to. Even if it takes days.”
I slam my truck into park and get out, boots crunching against gravel. “You’ll have frostbite before sunrise. And that’s if the coyotes don’t find you first.” As if on cue, a long, low howl echoes through the trees.
She startles, her eyes bouncing around the surrounding trees in alarm.
I should be ashamed of myself, but I drive the nail a little harder. “But a copperhead or a black bear may get you first.”
Char turns that gloriously beautiful but angry face in my direction and glares before turning her attention back on the road before her. Her stance is a lot more tense and jumpy than it was before my warning. Nice, Dave. Real nice.
“Please,” I plead, softer now. “I promise I won’t bother you. You can take the guest room. I’ll take you to Matt and Ellie’s place first thing in the morning.”
“No. And excuse me if I don’t trust you or your promises,” she sneers. “Seeing how you took it upon yourself to invade my privacy.”
“Okay, I deserve that.” I rush to walk backwards in front of her so I can face her head on. “But if you have a key to their house, do you really want to wake them up in the middle of the night?”
Not cool, Dave. Playing on her guilt. You’ve really stooped to an all new low. Not to mention, if she insists on walking, it will take her forever to get a signal, much less reach the main road below. There’s no possibility of her waking those two before morning.
She hesitates, her shoulders slumping as she likely considers her heavily pregnant friend. Then rolls her eyes in defeat, muttering something under her breath before turning to climb into the passenger seat of my truck.
The drive back is silent, except for the rhythmic swish of the wipers against the glass. The flakes of snow falling would’ve been romantic, if I hadn’t ruined any chance with her.
I want to tell her everything. To explain that the papers weren’t what she thinks. I was honestly trying to help. I knew something was wrong and only wanted to understand what she was running from. Yet her walls have obviously snapped back into place.
“I was only worried about you,” I finally say.
“I’ve had enough of wealthy men thinking they can control my life!” she spits.
This statement has my mind reeling. Who is she referring to? And in what way did they try to control her? There’s so much I still don’t know about this enigma of a woman. And whether I crossed a line or not, I simply wanted to make sure she was safe.
“You may not believe me, but I really care about you. I only wanted to help.”
Her gaze stays fixed out the window. “Well, save your hero complex for the job. I don’t need your help.”
That one hits harder than I expect. Like a virtual slap to the face. As much as I want to beg her to give me a chance to explain, I don’t argue. It seems futile right now.
The cab’s too damn quiet. The only sound is the low hum of the heater fighting against the cold and the occasional creak of the truck as we wind back up the mountain road.
Char stares straight ahead, her arms folded tightly over her chest. Her shoulders are trembling.
Whether from the cold or from me, I can’t tell.
Probably both. I want to pull her into me, keep her safe and warm.
Beg her to understand. Yet I keep my hands locked on the wheel. White knuckles. My pulse won’t settle.
The headlights carve tunnels through the dark, catching the ghostly shimmer of frost on the trees. It’s beautiful, but all I can see is her. Finding her shivering as she braved the long road, her face pale. And that look of betrayal etched there, like I’d put a knife in her back.
“I wasn’t…” The words scrape out of my throat. I stop, force myself to breathe, and try again. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you, Char.”
She lets out a cynical laugh under her breath, bitter and broken, shaking her head.
Hell with this. If I’m losing her anyway, I might as well go all in.
“I was trying to help.” My voice cracks on the word.
“You don’t get it. I knew something was off.
The way you flinched when Matt touched you.
The way you look over your shoulder when you think no one’s watching.
I just…” I glance at her long enough to see the rigid set of her jaw. “I wanted to make sure you were safe.”
Her head snaps toward me. “By digging through my life?”
“I didn’t dig,” I say quietly. “I asked someone I trusted to check a few things. Only enough to know if you were in trouble.”
Her silence is worse than her anger. I’d take her yelling, throwing every name in the book at me, over this cold, aching quiet.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see her turn toward the window, jaw trembling.
She doesn’t speak for a long time. Finally, she says, barely above a whisper, “You don’t know me. ”
“I know enough,” I murmur. “Enough to care.”
She exhales sharply, like the air’s been punched from her lungs. “That’s the problem, Dave. You shouldn’t.”
I want to tell her she’s wrong. That I didn’t want to care. Not about her or any woman. But from the moment I saw her smile at Matt and Ellie’s wedding, I was already gone. But I bite it back. She doesn’t need that kind of confession now. Not when she’s two seconds from bolting again.
The truck hits a patch of gravel, tires crunching. I ease off the gas. The trees thin just enough for the valley lights to flicker below. Her hand twitches against her thigh, like she’s thinking about reaching for the door handle.
“Char,” I say, keeping my voice low. “I don’t know what you’re running from. I don’t need to. But if it’s danger you’re in, you don’t have to handle it alone.”
She doesn’t respond, but her arms loosen a little.
The tension in her shoulders eases, just barely.
As we crest the last curve, I catch her reflection in the glass.
I want to reach over, to tell her that what’s between us isn’t some passing spark, that it’s been a long damn time since I’ve felt this alive.
But I don’t. I simply drive. Because if I say the wrong thing now, I may lose her for good.
The headlights sweep across the front of the cabin, lighting up the stone facade before I kill the engine. Silence drops heavy between us. There’s only the ticking of the cooling engine and her uneven breathing. She hasn’t moved. I don’t, either.
“Char,” I say softly. “Come inside. The guest room’s yours. Or go back to my room, and I’ll take the couch. Whatever makes you feel safe.”
Her eyes stay fixed on the windshield. “Safe,” she repeats under her breath. “I don’t even know what that feels like anymore.”
The admission makes my blood boil. I want to find out who hurt her. Who’s still making her feel this way and take care of them once and for all. Instead, I try to remain calm. Swallowing hard, I plead, “Then start here.” That at least gets her to look at me. Although I can’t read her expression.
Is it disgust or defeat?
“I’ll drive you to Matt and Ellie’s first thing,” I reiterate, voice low, steady. “I understand if you’re mad, but I honestly wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
Her chin lifts. “You still did.”
“I know.”
We sit in the dark, speechless for a few moments. She finally exhales, reaching for the door handle. “I’m too tired to fight.” When she climbs out of my truck, I do too, careful not to move too close. We walk side by side toward the door, the cold biting through the silence.
At the threshold, she pauses. I open the door, gesture her in, but she lingers on the edge. Then she steps past me, into the warmth, and I feel something uncoil in my chest. It’s not forgiveness. But at least she’s still here.
For now.
Later, after staring at the ceiling for what feels like hours, I get up for some water when I find her wrapped in a blanket on the couch, staring into the fire like she’s a thousand miles away. She looks small, fragile in a way I’ve not seen with her before. She’s usually larger than life.
I hover in the doorway. “Sorry,” I say quietly. “Didn’t mean to intrude. I just wanted a glass of water.”
“You’re not intruding,” she murmurs without looking up. Are there tears in her eyes? “It’s your house.” I take a step toward her, but I don’t make it far. “Do you mind if I take a quick shower before you drive me to Ellie’s?”
I nod, swallowing the ache in my throat. “Yes. Of course.”
As she disappears down the hall, my head falls forward. My chest feeling as if I’ve been sucker punched. I finally had her here with me. We had the most phenomenal night together.
And somehow, I still managed to lose her.