Chapter Ten
Britt lay still, wondering where the hell she was and why she was so damn hot.
When the mattress under her shifted, she froze—and everything returned in a flash.
Going to bed after a wonderful night. Feeling horny, getting herself off while thinking about the look in Chad’s eyes as he’d said good night at her door .
.. then being woken up by a thunderclap that felt as if it was inside her room rather than outside.
And just like that, memories flooded into her brain and she was eight years old again, scared out of her mind. Alone while it seemed the world exploded as a storm raged outside.
Last night, her only thought was to get to safety. To not be alone. And she’d gone to the person she’d fallen asleep thinking about, who made her feel safe.
Chad.
She was lying on her side next to him in his bed. She had one leg and one arm flung over his body and was using his shoulder as a pillow. He was on his back, had one arm around her shoulders, holding her against him, and the other resting over his head.
As she lay there, she felt his breathing change. He wasn’t sleeping.
She didn’t know what time it was, except that it was probably nearing the time they needed to get up and start the breakfast they’d planned for Evelyn’s birthday.
It had taken Britt a bit to acclimate to the summers in Maine and how damn early it got light outside.
Being on the extreme eastern edge of the country meant the sun rose super early in the summer and set very late.
Even knowing she needed to get up, Britt didn’t move.
For one, other than being warm, she’d never been more comfortable in her life.
But more importantly, she was mortified .
It had been a long time since she’d experienced a storm like the one that had hit last night, and she thought she’d been managing her fear of them just fine in the last couple of years. But apparently she was wrong.
“I know you’re awake,” Chad said softly, his warm breath wafting over the hair on the top of her head.
“Yeah,” she whispered.
“Are you all right?”
She nodded against him, trying to get up the nerve to leave the warmth of Chad’s bed and embrace. She hadn’t noticed when she’d first woken up, but as clarity returned, she realized he was practically naked. Chest hair tickled her arm, and she could definitely feel skin under her own naked thigh.
For a moment, she panicked, wondering if she’d somehow stripped before climbing into bed with him. Then she sighed in relief when she figured out she was wearing her sleep shirt. But it had ridden up until it was bunched just below her breasts.
“Talk to me,” Chad requested.
Talk to him? She was ashamed that her first thought was Talking when we’re both practically naked would be a total buzzkill.
She wasn’t in his arms, in his bed, because of some romantic tryst. She’d given him no choice but to care for her.
She’d come to his door and barged in, desperate for comfort.
“Britt?” Chad pressed, and she felt him lift his head as if trying to see her face.
Mentally, she sighed. She wasn’t going to be able to get out of this without talking to him. And honestly, he deserved some kind of explanation. She was a grown-ass woman who’d acted like a four-year-old.
“I’m afraid of storms,” she blurted.
She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it wasn’t for him to chuckle. The sound rumbled through her from the ear plastered against his shoulder, and she realized how stupid that succinct explanation sounded.
“I think I got that, Peach.”
The nickname surprised her, and she lifted her head enough to stare at him.
“What?”
“Peach?” she retorted.
He shrugged. “You’re from Georgia. It just popped out. Sorry.”
“No, it’s okay. I just ... I haven’t ever had a nickname before.”
Neither said anything for a long while, until he spoke.
“You’re afraid of storms ...” His voice trailed off, obviously an invitation for her to keep talking.
Britt put her head back down on Chad’s shoulder so she didn’t have to look at him while she explained her fear.
“When I was eight, I was home in the trailer we were living in. It wasn’t great, but our neighbors were mostly nice.
Hardworking people who for the most part minded their own business. It was all my mom could afford.
“Mom was working the night shift, as usual, and it was just me at home. There was a storm. No, that’s not the right term—it was actually a hurricane. Much less dangerous and powerful than when it had first hit the coast of Florida, but by the time it got to Atlanta, it was still a Category One.
“The wind was howling, and I think I remember hearing afterward that there were tornadoes too. The trailer started shaking, and it even moved off its foundation. Trees were coming down everywhere, and debris was hitting the sides. The window in my room blew in, which made everything even louder.
“I had no idea what to do. Where to go. The trailer was shaking so hard, I thought it was going to tip over. That I’d be blown away like in The Wizard of Oz .
I have no clue how long it actually lasted, but as a kid, it felt like hours.
I hid under my bed at first, but that seemed like a bad idea if the trailer collapsed.
So I ran into the bathroom and got into the tub, like we were taught in school.
But the latch on the door was broken, so it kept opening and closing, slamming against the wall.
I could literally feel the wind blowing through the house, through all the cracks in the windows and seams.
“When the storm finally passed, I stayed right where I was, too scared to move. To see what had happened. My mom didn’t get home until it was light outside, and when she found me still huddled in the bathtub, covered in vomit, shaking like a leaf ... she laughed.”
Britt cringed at the memory that was still fresh in her mind after all these years.
“She what?” Chad asked.
“Laughed,” Britt repeated. “Told me I was pathetic, that it was just a storm. A bad one, but a storm nonetheless. Told me to get up and change my clothes because I stank. Then said that she was exhausted, so she was going to bed.”
When she paused, Britt realized that the man she was practically lying on was extremely tense. It seemed that every one of his muscles was clenched.
“It wasn’t a big deal, I was used to taking care of myself,” she said, downplaying how big a deal it really was and how relieved she’d been not to be alone anymore.
“It took a year and a half for the landlord to get our trailer straightened on its foundation.
Granted, it had only shifted about eight inches, but every time I came home and saw how it was askew, it reminded me of that night.
“Anyway ... I got up and changed, like Mom wanted. Then, because I knew better than to do anything that might wake her, I went outside and started helping our neighbors clean up. Overall, we were lucky. No one was killed or even hurt that badly. There were just some cars that were damaged because of falling limbs and trees.”
“And you’ve been scared of storms ever since,” Chad said in a tone Britt couldn’t read. It was strangely calm. And unemotional.
She shrugged against him. “Yeah.”
“Last night’s was bad,” he told her. “I forgot how intense they can get here on the coast. Thankfully Lobster Cove is protected, and we don’t get a lot of pounding surf on the beach. We do get high and low tides, but that’s about it. What do you usually do when there’s a storm?”
His change of topic was a bit dizzying, but she answered his question. After what he’d done for her, both last night and in general, she felt as if she owed it to him to explain pretty much anything he wanted to know.
“I usually don’t climb in bed with strangers,” she said a little flippantly.
But he didn’t laugh. Instead, he practically growled, “You and I ... we aren’t strangers .”
He was right. They might’ve only met recently, but she knew Chad.
And she had a feeling he saw a lot more than she wanted him to when it came to her.
“I usually turn up the TV and put in headphones and play music to try to drown out the sound of the thunder. That doesn’t help with lightning, but that doesn’t bother me nearly as much as the thunder boomers.
One thing I don’t do is go hide in the tub.
I have an aversion to baths now ... which makes sense, I guess, but it’s annoying as hell. ”
“We don’t really get tornadoes here in Maine,” Chad said. “If we do, they’re usually in the southwestern and central parts of the state, not here on the coast.”
Britt swallowed hard. He was trying so hard to make her feel better, and it was kind of weird, but it was working. “That’s good.”
“But even so, anytime you get nervous or feel uneasy, anytime it starts raining, you can come to me. I’ll do what I can to distract you, and if it’s not working, then we’ll hide under the covers together like we did last night.”
Even though Britt didn’t love talking about her phobia, she couldn’t help but squirm a little at the thought of the two of them hiding out together in his bed, in a position much as they were right now. She opened her mouth to thank him, but he kept speaking, cutting her off.
“Your mom was cruel to blow off your fears. To not care that you’d been so terrified, you’d actually thrown up. I get that she was probably working her butt off to keep a roof over your head, but that was uncalled for and completely heartless, and she should’ve had her damn mom card revoked.”
Britt couldn’t help it—she giggled at that last part.
“I’m serious,” Chad said angrily.