Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
Chaos wasn’t tired.
Okay, yes he was. Exhausted, but he wasn’t going to fall asleep. Not when they were in the middle of a freaking hurricane, when his shoulder was on fire, and when the woman in his arms was so vulnerable.
Something terrible had happened to her. Of that, he had no doubt. And he wasn’t talking about finding herself stuck in a tree in the middle of a flash flood. No, it was more than that. He could tell from how skittish she was and what he’d inferred from some of the things she’d said.
He would stay awake as long as it took to make sure she was safe and as warm as he could make her. Which wasn’t as warm as he’d like. He was cold himself, but his flight suit and boots did a good enough job of keeping him from freezing, despite being wet.
Kara was in a T-shirt and shorts. No shoes.
As much as he hoped his team would find him tonight, he had a feeling they were currently grounded, and probably pissed way the hell off about it.
The wind had gotten worse, and not staying out in the storm was the right call, even with him missing and more people needing rescuing.
They were good at what they did, but even they knew when they needed to stand down.
He hated that his friends were probably worried about him.
Wondering if he was even alive. Because it had been a very stupid thing he’d done.
Jumping into a flood wasn’t something any sane person would do.
But Chaos hadn’t thought twice. Seeing the woman, Kara, disappear under the water while still clinging to that tree had sent him into a panic.
But they were safe now. Cold, hurting, and hungry, but safe enough.
Chaos had time to think about the things he’d learned.
And to worry about how hurt she really was.
It was too dark to see her well before they’d climbed into this hidey-hole.
But the feel of her ripped-up palm had been worrying.
He’d kissed it before thinking of how weird that might come across to someone he’d just met.
She’d been gracious enough to accept his apology, but Chaos vowed to not do anything else to scare her.
Because he had scared her. He’d felt it in the way her body stiffened, how her fingers had curled into a fist. If they hadn’t been plastered against each other with rocks at their backs, he had no doubt she would’ve immediately moved away from him.
He hated that he’d frightened her. And a familiar niggling in the back of his mind said it was more than just her being wary of a stranger.
He had a feeling it was the intimacy of his actions that had really alarmed her, rather than the comfort he’d meant to convey with the barest brush of his lips against her skin.
Which likely meant she’d been hurt. By a man.
How he knew that with such certainty, Chaos had no idea.
His sixth sense kicking in again, no doubt.
Whatever it was, it made him want to rage.
He’d just risked his life to save her, to pull her back from the brink of death in those floodwaters.
She’d been through enough tonight to last anyone a lifetime, and the idea that someone had purposely mistreated her, hurt her, had him wanting to use everything he’d learned in the military to hunt down whoever had dared to touch her.
Willing himself to relax, to stay calm, Chaos took a deep breath.
He had no proof that Kara had been hurt by anyone.
But that sixth sense he’d relied on all his life was working overtime.
He wanted to ask her a million questions.
Find out how she’d found herself in that tree in the first place.
Where she’d been before she was swept away. If she had a family. A husband…
That thought made him feel sick, but he pushed it down.
Surely she would’ve said something if she was married?
Begged to know if he and his team had managed to rescue her husband?
Any possible children? At least asked about them.
Told him she was anxious to get back to Asheville so she could find info on her family.
Thinking about if—God forbid—Laryn, Mandy, Zita, or Penny had been in her shoes, he knew the first thing they’d demand was to get back to civilization so they could be reunited with their men. Even if it was impossible, they’d still ask it of him.
But Kara hadn’t seemed concerned about anyone else. True, she was probably in shock, but still.
His mood lightened just slightly when he thought about the thriller books she’d written. He was determined to discover her pen name, so he could download one of her stories.
His arms tightened around her a bit, and the movement made whatever was embedded in his shoulder shift. He winced. Motherfucker, it hurt. Whatever was in there was big. He needed to get it out, but Kara needed sleep more.
The wind was slowly dying down, and Chaos knew the hurricane was supposed to have dissipated by morning. It was probably already at tropical-storm strength now, and by the time the sun rose over the horizon it would have moved out to sea.
That’s when the real work would start for most people. The devastation the rain and winds had wrought on the area was immense. It would take time for a search party to find them. To find all the people, alive and dead, who needed finding.
Chaos felt a little guilty that the attention of his team would be spent on finding him rather than rescuing others, but not so guilty as to hope they’d put him on the back burner.
He needed to get Kara to safety, to a doctor, to figure out what she needed to get her feet back under her.
It was a compulsion, and one he wasn’t about to fight.
He’d watched most of his friends fall head over heels in love, knew how happy they were.
He wasn’t going to fight his attraction to the woman in his arms. But he also wasn’t going to rush her.
She was skittish enough. He had no idea how things would work between them, with her being here in North Carolina and him being in Norfolk, but they weren’t that far apart.
Maybe six or seven hours? Perhaps they could meet in the middle, in Greensboro or something.
He was getting ahead of himself, that was for sure.
Kara was grateful for his help, of that he was certain, but he didn’t want her gratitude. She might not want anything to do with him once they were found. She may want to put this entire life-threatening episode behind her. Bad memories and all that.
Chaos hoped not, but he’d respect her decision.
He couldn’t force her to want to see him again.
If she didn’t feel any spark with him, if she didn’t feel the crazy attraction that he felt, he’d have no choice but to back off.
It would upset him, as he truly felt a connection with this woman, but he’d abide by her wishes.
It was probably two hours later when the rain stopped, the wind died down to a whisper, and the sky finally began to lighten. It wasn’t sunny, not at all, but at least he could see more clearly.
And what Chaos saw first were the bruises on Kara’s face.
She had two black eyes and finger-sized bruises around her throat. His earlier thought that she’d had reason to be scared of him was confirmed in that moment, and it made Chaos’s anger rise dangerously close to the surface once more.
He was right.
Someone had hurt her.
Badly.
He did his best to tamp down his fury. The last thing this woman needed after everything she’d been through was to wake up to his outrage on her behalf.
He took a deep breath and tried to figure out what his next steps were.
After they were rescued—and they would be rescued, of that he had no doubt—he needed to make sure Kara was safe.
That whoever had hurt her wouldn’t come after her again.
Though, that was easier said than done. He was well aware that many women couldn’t find the strength to leave their abusers.
He didn’t blame those women, some of them had endured a lifetime of being oppressed.
Of being told they were worthless. Or they had kids who they couldn’t leave behind.
Or money was an issue. Or they truly loved the person who was abusing them mentally, physically, or both.
But he literally couldn’t stomach the thought of this woman choosing to stay with whoever had put those marks on her.
His arms tightened around the woman who was currently snoring lightly against his chest. He couldn’t imagine hurting her. It made his stomach roil.
Lying there on the ground, Chaos thought about his own mother.
How much she’d like Kara. She was amazingly strong.
She had to be, in order to cling to that tree in the middle of the river for however long she had before getting swept away.
But it was more than physical strength. She hadn’t panicked when he’d caught up to her.
She’d done what she could to help him move through the water.
And when he was on the verge of letting go of that tree, she’d acted. Saved him.
He suspected she was exactly the kind of partner he wanted. Someone who’d remain strong on her own when he wasn’t by her side, yet welcome him home with open arms and a happy heart.
Of course, there was no way to truly know what Kara’s personality was like. He’d just met her, after all. But how someone acted in an emergency said a lot about them as a person. And Chaos liked what he’d seen so far.
As if she could somehow sense all his thoughts about her, Kara stirred.
He knew the moment she remembered what had happened and where she was, because she stiffened.
Hating that she was still afraid of him, but honestly not surprised after seeing the bruises and knowing someone had put them there in acts of violence, Chaos loosened his hold.
“Morning,” he said quietly.
“We made it,” she returned, just as softly. “I honestly wasn’t sure we would.”
“Yeah, it got hairy there for a while,” Chaos agreed.
After a moment, she said, “You should know something about me.”