Chapter 15 Lara
Lara
This time when I woke up, there was a depression on the other side of the bed. A fossil where the furious man had slept. Who knew, though, for how long?
I’d tried to wait it out while he went outside last night, but my eyelids couldn’t hold their own. Despite their failure, I couldn’t regret the hours of unblemished deep sleep that had claimed me.
It was the adrenaline crash that had tossed me into exhaustion. Not the desire to relive that kiss in my dreams.
Even now, my lips tingled, their nerves altered from the memory.
The mattress crunched as I sat up, and I remembered I’d shoved Dr. Julia’s notes on Rachel underneath it when Calder left the tent again.
Should I have taken them? Should I continue to read them?
I reached for the papers but stopped when I heard footsteps approaching the tent. And that distinct whistled tune.
Crap. Where was Calder?
“Breakfast!” The yell had been preceded by what passed for knocking on the tent.
“Shit,” I muttered, rising and brushing the wrinkles from my scrubs. My eyes zipped from side to side as though I could’ve missed my extra-large fake boyfriend in the small space. Not possible.
Looked like I was going to have to face Ben on my own.
Heart pounding, I went and unzipped the front flap just enough to be able to reach for our food.
“Morning,” I said tightly, refusing to cower from the guard who’d gone on a small power trip last night, only to be thoroughly embarrassed by Calder.
His eyes turned squinty as I took the tray of food. “Where’s Calder?”
“Bathroom.” I tugged on the zipper to close the opening, only for his meaty hand to block its path.
“You know, breaking curfew is a serious violation . . .” Ben said slowly, the creep of his eyes like slime as it wandered over me.
“Well, holding your pee can lead to serious kidney damage or kidney failure, so as a doctor, I can’t say I recommend doing it just to preserve some arbitrary curfew.”
His eyes narrowed to slits, and then he shoved his hand against the zipper, pulling it out of my fingers and forcibly open.
“I could have Calder kicked out of the retreat.”
“I was there, too.”
A twisted smirk appeared. “Only if I say you were.”
His tone . . . his meaning . . . I wanted to vomit.
“Well, I was. So it doesn’t really matter what you say. It’s not like I would stay without my boyfriend anyway,” I said with a tight smile. “Now, if you could let go of my tent, I’d like to eat and get ready for the workshop this morning.”
He didn’t let go. He didn’t even seem to have heard me, let alone care about what I’d said.
“I could give you plenty of reasons to stay.” He leaned into the tent and reached for me.
And my brain short-circuited.
Panic traded the tent for the emergency room. The rustle of the forest for the beeps of machines. And the look on Ben’s face for the desperate one on Ian’s. The nerves that had been fried by trauma still weren’t healed, sending me into paralysis rather than response.
He tried to grab my arm, and instinct jolted me into action. I stumbled back, everything on the tray shaking.
“I want you to leave,” I said in my best life-or-death doctor voice, still hearing it tremble.
Get it together, Dr. Crane. How will you ever be back in the ER if you can’t keep your cool?
“Now,” I added, clinging to the spike of strength in the syllable.
Ben wasn’t going to listen. I saw it in his face, in the stretch of his arm. “Are you sure—” He broke off with a cry.
A large hand locked on his wrist and twisted it at an unnatural, excruciating angle.
“She sounded very sure to me.” Calder’s voice felt like warm rain over my fear-frozen skin.
“Let me go,” Ben ordered, but Calder didn’t budge.
He lowered his head uncomfortably close to Ben’s face. “Remember how I dismantled your weapon last night?” He didn’t wait for his answer; of course Ben remembered. “That is what I will do to the next extremity that trespasses into her personal space.”
“I could get you kicked out for this,” Ben snarled, like we actually cared.
Calder leaned closer, and Ben, insecure as he was, tried to pull away.
“And I could have you dead, dismembered, and disappeared faster than you can say wild core.” Calder released him with that promise—that warning—and Ben tripped over his feet to get away.
“I want someone else delivering our meals, clothes . . . anything to the tent,” Calder added before the other man completely fled. “Either you can make the request or I can.”
Ben was practically fuming, but he finally thought better of saying anything else and turned and stomped away from our tent as fast as he could without breaking into a run.
Calder zipped the flap shut and looked at me. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I set the tray on the table, and the dishes would’ve clattered from my trembling if they weren’t that soft, recyclable material.
“Lara.” His palm landed on my shoulder, and all I could think about was the calloused heat of that very hand on my throat last night, holding me to the mercy of his mouth.
“I’m fine,” I insisted, jerking away at the first squeeze of ache in my chest. “Where were you?” I sank into one of the chairs.
Calder took one of the bowls from the tray and brought it to me, a not-so-subtle instruction to eat. Pausing, he tipped his head and made sure no one was outside listening.
“Checking in with Callum.”
I stirred the cinnamon oatmeal and took a few bites, though panic had demolished my appetite. “Anything on EC?”
The feathering of his jaw muscle was answer enough. “Not yet,” he said, and catching my forced exhale of stressed frustration, added, “But he’ll find something.”
Before he could say more, the chime sounded through the speaker above, distracting us both.
“Good morning, Wild Ones,” Dr. Julia’s voice soothed through the tent. “We will begin our morning session at the gathering place in five minutes. Please start heading there so we may begin on time.”
Calder took our bowls and set the garbage back on the tray. I watched his hands the whole time, remembering how they’d held me to him—held my mouth prisoner to his. Strong and immovable and as desperate as I was.
“We should go,” Calder murmured, and I snapped my head up.
He was right, but we also should talk about what had happened last night.
Setting down what was left in my cup, I called to him just as he grabbed the zipper to open the tent. “Calder.” He stopped but didn’t turn. “We need to talk—”
“I’m sorry for kissing you,” he said, his voice like sharp shards of stone grinding up the warmth of the memory. “It was our best chance at getting Ben to not question why we were out there. If I’d had more time—”
“Stop,” I interrupted, almost desperate to not hear his regret. “I wanted to apologize.” I swallowed over the lump in my throat. “For putting us in that position in the first place. It’s my fault.”
He didn’t reply right away, the pulse of his jaw marking the passing seconds.
“I should’ve told you I was going. I’m sorry. I’m not used to working with a . . . partner.” Our eyes locked. Mine, hopeful. His, hard.
“But I still shouldn’t have kissed you,” he repeated, like we needed the reminder.
“It’s okay.” Was I giving permission or confessing to wanting more?
Calder’s jaw clenched, his eyes taking on that wild glint I’d caught only in the moonlight.
“Don’t tell me it’s okay that I kissed you,” he said harshly. “Not if you don’t want me to do it again.”
And then the zipper sliced completely open and Calder disappeared through it, leaving me with my mouth gaping and my heart spilling wild, wanton beats into my veins.
So, I wasn’t the only one who wanted him to do it again.
Calder paused a few paces up the trail, and at first, I thought he’d stopped only to wait for me to catch up, but then I heard it: the angry rumbling of a masculine voice approaching from the tent nearby.
“Goddammit, Sarah. What the fuck are we doing here? You told me camping. Not this bullshit—”
“I told you it was a camping retreat, so we could work on us—”
“Bullshit. You tricked me into coming here. You’re so fucking worthless, you know that? I tell you to plan a trip, and this is what you come up with? I swear to God—” The man stopped as soon as he reached the path about thirty feet in front of Calder, noticing us immediately.
His eyes swiped over Calder first, then me. His prematurely thinning hair was almost as noticeable as his receding hairline, and judging from the rest of him, the trip he would’ve preferred involved shooting animals, drinking beer, and enjoying a healthy dose of toxic masculinity.
Behind him, a pale blonde came through the trees, her hair braided into two plaits and her cheeks flushed, though most likely not from the exertion. Not if their color had anything to do with the red rim of her eyes.
“Good morning,” Calder said just as the other man was about to turn away, forcing him to greet us.
“Morning.”
“I’m Calder. This is Lara.” My fake boyfriend took charge of the situation, striding right up to the couple and not-so-subtly stopping partially between them.
“Trent.” The shorter man reluctantly took Calder’s hand and shook it.
It took several seconds for the blonde to finally speak, like she wasn’t sure whether Trent was going to introduce her or she should introduce herself. No. It was as though she’d made the wrong choice too many times.
“I’m Sarah.”
“Hi, Sarah. It’s nice to meet you,” I said, reaching my hand out for hers and giving Trent a taste of his own medicine. And unimportance.
“We should go. Wouldn’t want to be late,” Trent scoffed, his tone dripping with equal parts displeasure and mockery. Again, without thinking or waiting for his partner, he stalked ahead, leaving the three of us in his wake.
When he was a good several paces ahead, Sarah looked at me and said, “I’m sorry.”
“Please,” I begged her with a soft smile. “Don’t apologize.”
She gave me a grateful but unconvinced look. “This is just a lot for him . . . too much, maybe.”
Her reply rattled my nerves for so many reasons, but the biggest was how it reminded me of Mom. And of Rachel.
It wasn’t my place or my business to say anything, but the weight on my chest was wondering whether I could do more to help her—whether I could’ve done more to help my sister.
Maybe if I’d kept speaking up, things would’ve been different.
Maybe if I’d given her more reasons to hate me, she wouldn’t have found herself dating so many men who made her hate herself.
Before I could help myself, I dipped my head lower and murmured, “Well, then maybe he should go find less.”
Sarah’s eyes went wide, and a smile she couldn’t control spread over her face.
“Sarah!” Trent called but didn’t even bother to stop, like he’d hollered for a wandering dog to catch up to him rather than a woman he cared about. I couldn’t believe a man who acted like that was capable of love.
“Thank you,” Sarah said softly, and sped to catch up to her partner.
“You okay?”
I turned to Calder and found him looking at me strangely. Only then did I notice that I’d banded my arms over my chest and how hard I was scowling.
“Yeah.” I dropped my arms and shrugged like that was all it took to release the tension. “That’s just the kind of guy my sister would date, and I just . . . I can’t stand men like that.”
“That’s not a man, Lara. That’s a piece of trash.” With that simple yet true statement, Calder Stone continued toward the gathering place.
And I’d never wanted to kiss him more.