Text (Take It Off) (9 page)

Honor

As I was staring at the slashed and unusable tires, the sky chose that moment to open and throw down some rain.

Yay.

Nathan’s jacket had warmed me up. The fat icy drops now lunging from the sky were likely going to hinder that a bit.

“Get in,” Nathan said over the
roar of the rain, pulling open the driver’s side door and ushering me into the tiny back seat of the Wrangler.

After I was in
, he got in the driver’s seat and shut the door behind him. I collapsed against the seat, thinking that being in this cramped Jeep was the most comfortable place I’d ever been. Never mind the seats were vinyl and not all that warm. Never mind the tires were ruined and we couldn’t actually drive anywhere.

In that moment
, I was just thrilled to be out of that hole, away from that vile man, and out of the rain.

Everything else was just details.

Right?

Okay, no.

“I don’t suppose you have several spares in the back and not just one?” I asked.

He grunted. “No.”

“Well, shit.”

“Yep.”

“Where do you think he is?” I whispered, the words refusing to come out any louder.

He turned in his seat and looked at me through the dark. I wished it was light enough for me to make out his features. I really wanted to
see
him. So far, all I could make out was that he was tall and broad with short, dark hair.

“He’s still out there,” he said, grim. I shot at him, but the bullet might have just nicked him because I was moving when I fired. “He’s obviously still pissed too.”

“Because of the tires, you mean?” I guess it was a dumb question. People who weren’t angry didn’t go around slashing other people’s tires.

“Yeah. And because you got away.” He was silent a moment. “Guys like him don’t like to lose. They like to be in control.”

I shuddered a little at his words. My kidnapper was definitely big on control. “I called 9-1-1. I told her my name, but the phone was disconnected.”

“I went to the police too. There was some bad accident out on Route 210. A lot of casualties. The police station was practically empty when I got there.”

“That’s why you came,” I whispered.

“You needed someone fast.”

Yeah, I did. And he came. Emotion swelled up in my chest, choking me up. I swallowed it down. “Thank you,” was all I could manage. Why is it those words never seem like enough?

“You’re welcome.” The
reply was a soft whisper that floated to me from the front of the cab. His words were simple too. They were more than enough.

He opened up the center console of the Jeep and pulled out some sort of energy bar. “Here,” he said, handing it back to me.

I took his offering, ripped open the wrapper, and bit into the sweet food. I made a sound of appreciation when vanilla burst over my tongue.

“How long were you down there?” he asked, his voice strained.

“He took me this morning. I was out for a run on the trail.”

“So like fifteen hours,” he surmised.

“I guess,” I replied around a large bite of food. It had felt like forever.

As soon as the bar was finished
, I crumpled the wrapper and stuck it the jacket pocket. A bottle of water appeared in my line of vision.

I took a small sip at first, the
cool water slipping down my parched throat with ease.

“What did he do to you?” Nathan whispered. His voice was hoarse.

I paused my drinking and lowered the bottle against my chest. “It could have been worse.”

“You’re bleeding.”

I glanced down at my hand holding the bottle. I’d forgotten about the raw state of my knuckles. “I’ll be okay.”

He didn’t say anything but went back to rummaging through the center console. When he closed the lid
, he held up a small white kit. “I’m coming back there.”

Before I could protest that there was no way we would both fit
, he squeezed himself between the seats and mushed his wide frame beside me.

He smelled good. Like a fresh
-cut Christmas tree.

He held up the tiny flashlight
, which was surprisingly strong, and handed it to me. “Here, point this at your hands. Keep the light trained down.”

“What if he sees?” I worried, glancing out the very dark window. I could see nothing. The sound of the rain pounding against the ragtop was very loud
, and the wind rocked the vehicle occasionally.

“If he comes here, I’ll shoot him.”
There was no room for doubt in his words. In fact, his voice held a backbone of steel that made me a little nervous.

“It’s not that bad.” I tried. “I can wait.”
Okay, so since he reminded me of my injuries, they hurt like hell. But I wasn’t going to admit that.

“Honor,” he said gently, all trace
s of the steel gone. He didn’t just say my name—he breathed it. It was like he inhaled it into his body, filled up his lungs, and then exhaled.

Something warm spread throughout
me, like I was being warmed up from the inside out.

“
There’s no reason to leave it like that when I can clean it up.”

He didn’t touch me. Maybe he knew I was still kind of in shock from everything that happened.

I was.

But damn, I wanted him to touch me.

He placed the small kit on his lap and popped it open, reminding me of an oversized kid with his lunchbox. “This is probably going to hurt like a bitch.”

I laughed. Thank God he wasn’t the kind of guy to say
, “This might hurt a little,” when we all knew that it was going to hurt way more than that.

He was looking at me when I placed my hand between us. “What?” I said, my heart lodging in my throat and making it very hard to breathe.

“You have a good laugh.”

I didn’t say anything because my throat
was still obstructed and now my stomach was doing all kinds of funny flips. I really hoped the bar I just inhaled didn’t make a reappearance. I turned on the light and shined it down low between us over the bloody mess that was my hand.

He used his teeth to rip open some kind of little wipe. “Ready?” he murmured, slipping a free hand beneath mine.

I nodded.

He was right. The process of cleaning my scraped and raw knuckles hurt. It hurt a lot. But the good thing was I barely registered the pain because I was too entranced by the feeling of his skin against mine.

Too entranced by sitting there in a tiny enclosed space with a very large man while he protectively curled his body close to mine and cupped my hand with his. The sound of falling rain splattering against the ragtop and sliding down the vinyl windows was so melodic that if I wasn’t in survival mode, I might have been lured to sleep.

The scent of pine wrapped around me, bringing me comfort as I stared at the top of his dark head bowed laboriously over my hand. If he noticed the way the flashlight shook in my hand
, he didn’t comment.

Nothing had ever affected me this way. Not ever.

I tried to commit this feeling to memory, the exact sound of his breathing, the way our knees bumped together. It sort of felt like we were in a small cocoon, closed off from the world. Safe.

Feeling safe had become a real luxury.

I tried to tuck away every detail for later when I was able to sit down at the keyboard and write. Yes, I guess I was thinking about work. But when you do what you love, it isn’t work. And when every experience, every single aspect of life can be pulled on for inspiration… well, even my own kidnapping is fair game.

And so was Nathan.

He was far more interesting than any story I could ever write about myself.

“Almost done,”
he spoke, bringing me out of my head and back in the moment with him.

I watched him gently spread some antibacterial cream over the worst of the scrapes and then individually wrap each of my four fingers in separate
Band-Aids.

“That looks ridiculous.” I scoffed. “They probably won’t stay on.”

“They’ll stay,” he stated, smoothing the last one into place.

“How do you know?” Little tingles shot up my arm and into my elbow
. It made me feel all squirmy inside.

He looked up, our eyes connecting in the dim light created by the flashlight. “Because I put it there.”

I would have called him on his arrogance… if I could’ve found the oxygen to speak.

The temperature in the Jeep rose about twenty degrees as we stared at each other silently. It was like there was some sort of pull between us, a special gravity that only he and I could feel.
The air between us practically crackled with tension—but not the stressful kind, the good kind. The kind of tension that made me bite the inside of my lip and squeeze my thighs together.

After several charged moments
, he broke eye contact. I was partially relieved, partially disappointed. Nathan ripped open yet another of those wipe thingies. The flash of his straight white teeth as he used them had me biting the inside of my lip even harder.

He shook
out the mini towelette and looked up. Without warning, without a single word, he cupped the back of my head, his palm completely spanning the base of my skull. His warmth seeped into my scalp and sent little goose bumps racing over me. They multiplied so fast it almost felt like a million tiny ants rushed over my body.

I couldn’t hold back the shiver.

“You cold?” he asked.

“Not as cold as before.”

His fingers flexed into my hair and he reached up, using the wipe to gently dab at my lower lip. “What happened here?” he asked gently.

I swallowed. “I’m not sure.” It could have been from me biting it. It could have been from being hit
. Who knew?

He grunted and pulled it away
, and I caught a glimpse of the dark stain against the white. He folded it over and then returned, swiping carefully over more of my skin. “I’m not going to be able to do anything about that eye right now.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” he said, that steel creeping back into his tone. His shoulders stiffened slightly and I tensed. In that moment, he seemed like a cornered, aggressive animal. Like he was seconds away from completely losing it.

He took a deep breath and expelled it, the action seeming to calm him down. “It makes me angry he did this to you.”

“Are you friends with him?” I couldn’t keep the question in any longer.

He tossed the wipe into his lap with the other used one. “No
,” he replied.

“Then how come you texted him?”

“I play poker once a week with a group of guys. Lex is one of them. He was late to the game and I texted to see if he was coming.”

“His name is Lex?”

Nathan nodded.

Putting a name to the hideous man who tortured me didn’t make him seem any more human. In fact
, it made him seem like more of a monster.

“I had no idea he was a total whack job.”

“Well, he is that,” I agreed.

Nathan flashed a grin in the darkness. I longed to see him in the light. I wanted to know the angles and planes of his face. I wanted to take in his features and truly see the man who had literally saved my life.

Nathan seemed oblivious to my thoughts as I watched him tidy up the first aid kit. Before he put it on the floor, he glanced at me. “Where else are you hurt?”

“I won’t be requiring any more
Band-Aids,” I quipped.

He turned to look at me fully. His hand closed over mine and he gently took the flashlight from my grasp and clicked it off. “What about your ribs?”

“I don’t think you have anything in that kit for them.”

“Let me see them.”

“Wh-what?” My mouth ran dry. He wanted to look under my shirt?

“I want to see them.”

“That’s not really necessary—”

He studied me and then thrust his hand out in the space between us. “Hey
, I’m Nathan Reed. It’s nice to meet you.”

I wanted to laugh. We were a little beyond a formal introduction. But it was fun (hey, you try being kidnapped and beaten and see what you consider fun)
, so I slid my hand into his. “I’m Honor.”

He held my hand a little longer than he needed to, his thumb brushing over the inside of my wrist. I caught myself right before I started purring like a cat.

That would have been hella embarrassing.

“
I’m a staff sergeant in the United States Marine Corps. My favorite color is green, and I like football.”

“What are you doing?” I asked, thoroughly charmed by him.