Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
The fact she was so relaxed was a new sensation for Steff, particularly considering there was a man in her apartment. Something she never thought she’d have again.
“Do you want the last potsticker?” he asked.
“Go right ahead, I don’t think I can eat any more.”
He grinned widely, and deftly picked it up with his chopsticks. She still had trouble mastering using them, so she’d stuck with a fork.
She looked at her empty bowl. How long had it been since she’d eaten her plate clean?
Usually she always had something leftover, her mind blocking her ability to eat everything.
A hang-up from her captivity. Food had been scarce, and when she’d ever been given something, she gobbled it down.
Then afterwards, she always wished she’d saved some for the days when she didn’t get anything to eat.
Her stomach cramped in memory of the times it was so empty she thought it was eating itself. Something that was impossible, but when all she had were her thoughts, they often turned weird.
“Hey, are you okay?” Dalton’s soft words were a soothing balm, and chased away her thoughts of that horrid time.
“I am. I–uh …” Should she tell him what she was thinking?
Would it turn him off? Steff hadn’t forgotten the words he’d spoken to her on the phone.
How he’d said he wanted to be with her. Told her that she was a functioning person when she hadn’t felt that way in so long.
“I was just remembering how little I had to eat when I was held captive, and how I’ve gotten into the habit of leaving something on my plate, just in case. I didn’t tonight.”
Dalton nodded. “Food deprivation is an often-used torture technique. It’s not a pleasant experience to feel like your insides are twisting and turning as if they’re munching on themselves.”
“Have you…?” Steff couldn’t make herself finish the sentence.
“Yeah, I have. I and one of my other SEAL teammates got captured. We were held for forty days. I’d rather do Hell Week again than go through what we did.”
“How long ago?” She clutched her bowl tight, as if that would keep her grounded. She could feel the threads of panic creeping up on her, but she took some deep breaths. She didn’t want to have another attack in front of Dalton.
“Over ten years ago. It was my first mission. I wasn’t with Fox and the others at that time, I was with another team. They needed someone last minute, and I got the call up.” Jag paused. “I’m not sure I should continue.”
“Because of how it might affect me?” Considering how easily she could fall into an episode, his concern didn’t surprise her at all.
“Yeah. I sometimes still get nightmares about it, but I worked through it with the doctors on the base.”
“To get through what you did to become a SEAL, you’d have to have a certain resolve that not everyone has, right?” She certainly didn’t. She was afraid to go outside most of the time. And she couldn’t remember the last time she had anyone in her personal space.
“That’s true.”
Maybe to face what she’d been through, she needed to hear someone else’s experience. Whenever she and Cynthia talked, they never spoke about what they’d gone through. Cynthia had tried a couple of times, but Steff had shut her down. After that, she hadn’t broached the subject.
Perhaps they should’ve. Perhaps she should’ve been brave enough to talk about it the way Cynthia had seemed to be.
“Please tell me. I want to know.” And she did, because what Jag went through shaped him into the man he was now. Perhaps that was why she felt drawn to him. Some inner instinct reassuring her that he was safe.
She’d certainly felt safe in his arms at Teresa’s place.
“If it gets too much, interrupt me, okay?”
“I will.” Steff was determined to hear him out. To let him tell her everything he went through.
“Okay.” Dalton took a sip of his drink before he started.
“So, the team I was put with had been together for years. They had a rhythm and a way to communicate that most teams develop after working together for any length of time. I didn’t know any of that, plus I was so green.
So new and gung-ho, ready to throw caution to the wind and see what happens. ”
“Like any new SEAL would do.” Steff could picture a younger Dalton eager to please his fellow SEALs and do what he could to protect the world.
“Maybe, I know better now. Anyway, Astro and I were patrolling, and out of nowhere without any type of warning, two guys came up behind us and clubbed us on the back of the head. We were out before we hit the ground. When we woke up, we were in cells in the depths of a cave in the mountains. We couldn’t see anything, it was that dark.
There had been a huge rainstorm after we were taken, which washed out our tracks, so our team didn’t have any idea where we were.
As you can imagine, we were seen as prizes and weren’t treated the best. I’d just about given up hope that we would be found, when we were.
The whole ordeal hit Astro hard. He chaptered out the moment he could. ”
Steff had a feeling there was more to the story and that Dalton had decided, even though she said she was fine, not to go into too many details. After hearing what she had, she was kind of glad that he hadn’t. “Do you still see him?”
“Nah, he married an English woman after he got out, and they moved to the UK to be close to her family. I think Astro needed the fresh start. I recently ran into some of the guys from his old team and they said he was doing well. Had a new career and a couple of kids.”
“Do you think he still thinks about that time?”
“No doubt, it was a defining moment in both our lives. We didn’t see each other the whole time we were captive, but I heard him when the rebels were trying to get information from him, and I’m sure he heard me.
” Dalton turned toward the picture of a waterfall she had on her wall.
His demeanor pensive, as if he was now battling the demons from that time.
Which, of course, he was. He’d have to be a robot not to be.
Talking always made everything seem so fresh.
It was one of the main reasons she never spoke about what was done to her.
It had taken her therapist hours of gentle coaching and coaxing to get Steff to tell her what had happened.
And then she’d stopped going because she believed that once she’d put it out into the world, she would be fine.
She’d been so wrong.
“Thank you for telling me,” Steff said after a few beats of silence. “I know that couldn’t have been easy for you.”
Dalton shrugged, and while it may have looked casual, Steff suspected it was anything but. “Making yourself vulnerable can be difficult, but when you’re with someone who you trust, it’s easy.”
Steff breathed in deeply at what he said. He trusted her. Trusted her with something that darkened his soul, knowing that she would guard it like a precious stone. There was no way she was going to tell anyone about it.
He looked like he belonged in her apartment, and she didn’t know how she felt about that.
“Thank you for saying that. It means a lot.” She wanted to say more, but didn’t know how to articulate the thoughts running rampant in her mind.
“How about I clean up, and then we can chat some more? I know we haven’t talked about what I said on the phone. Although I just hinted at how I feel about you.”
“Thanks.” Steff looked away, unable to meet his gaze. The reason he’d come over was because of what he’d said, but she’d been happy to leave that conversation alone for a little longer.
Not because she didn’t like Dalton—she did. However, only a few days ago, the thought about being around him and his friends had triggered her anxiety to attack levels.
Yet you’re in the same room as him and haven’t had even an inkling of an attack.
Her inner voice was right, from the second she’d opened the door to him, and he’d walked in, everything that had always trapped her in her own mind and within her apartment, seemed to have disappeared.
She wasn’t foolish enough to think it was gone for good, but Dalton’s presence certainly helped her.
"I put the leftovers in your fridge. I divvied up the steamed rice and Pad Thai so that we have half each of what was left over.”
Steff looked toward the kitchen, noticing all the surfaces were clean and the plastic bag that had held all the food, was less full now. It was knotted neatly, and sat on the corner of her kitchen counter, ready for when Dalton left.
“Thanks. For everything. For dinner. For cleaning up. For talking.”
Dalton stood in front of her, his gaze darting to the spare spot on the couch beside her and then back at her, as if asking a silent question.
“Yes.” The word slipped out, and he knew exactly what she was saying yes to.
The couch dipped as he sat, and their legs brushed against each other. Would he move once he realized what was happening? Or would he stay where he was?
He didn’t move.
“I know I said a lot of things that you might have thought were a lot, and maybe a little disingenuous.” He paused as if giving her an opportunity to say something, but the words wouldn’t come, her mind was blank, so she nodded instead, hoping he would continue.
He smiled gently. “I want to assure you that I meant everything I said. I do want to spend time with you. I know we only chatted for the first time at Angelica’s birthday, but that’s how most relationships start. With someone coming up to someone else and striking up a conversation.”
Relationship.
The word hung in her mind like a shirt flapping in the breeze. Then the rest of his words registered and she snorted. “I wouldn’t say you came up to me, more like I ran into you in a fit of fear.”
“Did you ever wonder why I was so close?”
Steff paused at that thought. At the time she assumed she’d been moving quickly between the second the urge to leave was one she couldn’t ignore, and ending up in Dalton’s arms. “Because I’d covered a lot of ground,” she eventually voiced.
“No, it was because I was coming over to say hi.”
She lifted her gaze to study Dalton. Was he telling the truth? His eyes were the same clear blue she’d noticed, even while in her panicked state. There was nothing about his demeanor to suggest he was lying.
Wait.
He had probably been trained to give the impression he was telling the truth when he was, in fact, lying.
Stop it. Stop questioning every little thing.
Steff was torn. She wanted to trust herself and blindly accept everything Dalton was telling her, but people lied as easily as they slept at night.
“You were?” She finally found her voice. “Really?”
“I was. I won’t ever lie to you, Steff. Not when it comes to the two of us. As I said on the phone, I may omit telling you about our missions, but that’s because I can’t talk about them. But I won’t lie. Ever.”
Again, he held her gaze the whole time he spoke. She also noticed the way his fingers twitched as if he wanted to grab her hand and squeeze it as a physical confirmation of what he was saying. But he didn’t, and her respect for him grew.
Any other man touching her would have her running for the shower to scrub away the memory of dirty hands all over her, but with Dalton, she didn’t feel that way.
That had to mean something, didn’t it?
Taking a leap of faith, she curled her fingers around his. A spark of warmth tingled through the connection. “I believe you. I know you won’t.”
He turned his hand beneath hers, so they were palm to palm, threading their fingers together. “Thank you. And there’s something I need to tell you.” He swallowed, as if what he was about to say next was something she wouldn’t like. A sense of dread pooled low in her belly.
“What?”
“The night of your rescue, I was the one who carried you to safety.”
The confession was almost a whisper, as though he didn’t want to say it too loudly in case it triggered her.
Reflexively, she pulled her hand out from his, and curled her fingers until the sharp points of her nails were digging into her palm. Her eyes closed, and she concentrated on the sting of pain as her rescue replayed in her mind like a movie.
It wasn’t the first time she remembered being lifted up by strong arms. The sound of his voice reassuring her that he was a friend, not a foe, and that she was safe. He kept saying she was safe.
Slowly, that night morphed into the most recent time she’d heard those words spoken by the man next to her. “How did I not pick up on it?” she said almost to herself. “How did I not know it was you?”