The days Jed had PT, Max didn’t see much of him, but on his free days, Jed had taken to finishing up the many undone jobs around the cabin. Max didn’t mind. He worked hard to keep the cabin from falling down, but his approach was somewhat scattered. Besides, Jed was good with his hands, and occasionally Max got lucky and caught a glimpse of him at work. No right-minded soul would complain aboutthat.
Max groaned and pulled a pillow over his head. The sight of Jed’s strong arms and deft hands was beautiful, but it wasn’t the picture that lingered in his mind. No. The image he couldn’t shake was something far less pleasant, something that made him shiver for all the wrong reasons.
Jed possessed stealthy ninja reflexes; but a few days ago he’d emerged from the bathroom shirtless, lost in a world of his own. Max was a foot away before Jed noticed him, and by then it was too late—too late for Jed to hide the macabre burn on his shoulder, and too late for Max to hide his shock.
They’d passed in the hallway without comment, but Max had hardly seen him since. Coincidence? Maybe, but Max had seen the flash of pain in Jed’s eyes. His body bore many scars, no doubt inside and out, but he carried something in that marbled patch of skin—grief, loss, pain. Max knew those emotions well, but seeing them reflected in Jed’s eyes hurt more than his own grief ever had.
Had.Did. Would it ever go away? With another heavy sigh, Max dragged himself out of bed to face a solitary day in the boat shed.
That afternoon, he gave up on his work and called it quits early. He felt restless and out of sorts—not a good mix with tools. A scar on his own arm bore witness to that.
He locked the shed and walked back to the cabin, noting the persistent absence of Jed’s truck. He’d been gone all day, and despite Max’s early finish, it was getting late. PT or not, Jed was usually home by sundown.
Max cleaned up, then ventured back out to raid the shed where he stored vegetables. He loaded up his arms with yams to cook his mother’s yam stew. Makemba’s old recipe was one he could cook in his sleep, and something he often turned to if he was feeling off. But it didn’t work tonight. The first bite tasted bitter and metallic. Frustrated, Max jammed the lid on the pot and dumped it in the fridge. Perhaps Jed’s strange ways had rubbed off on him more than he thought.
Agitated, he drifted through the cabin. His roving gaze fell on a folded pink bedspread on the end of the couch. He picked it up, surprised Jed hadn’t tidied it away. Books aside, Jed didn’t seem to like things lying around.
Max grinned as he recalled the long-awaited slumber party. It had passed without much incident, save a round of musical beds. Despite previous insistence that Jed’s room was too spooky, after trying out every other possibility both girls had claimed his bed for the night.
“You can top and tail with Uncle Max.”
Max couldn’t help a snort of laughter. Belle’s very British suggestion was innocent, but the smirk he’d shared with Jed over her head had been anything but. Jed had fallen asleep on the couch minutes later, dozing through twoLion KingDVDs until it was time to put the girls to bed, but Max had watched him for most of the evening, noting the way the noisy room put him to sleep. It crossed his mind that perhaps Jed wasn’t used to sleeping alone. Military life had always struck Max as communal and loud—a far cry from the secluded peace of the cabin. Maybe life had become a littletooquiet for Jed.
Or maybe Max was seeing things that weren’t there.
Max took the bedspread to the closet and put it away. On his way back, he spotted a broken window catch, and it became the first of many bonehead tasks that kept him occupied for the rest of the evening.
Later, he took a shower and flopped on the couch, but after staring at the TV for a while he found himself still buzzed with willful energy. Agitation became paranoia—a creeping, prickly feeling he couldn’t shake. After a time, he became convinced he’d left his power tools plugged in. Irritated, he stamped into his boots and picked his way across the dark yard.
Flo followed him, lazy and disinterested, until the boat shed door closed behind her. She whined and scraped at the wood, reminding Max to leave the door open.
Max kicked open the door and set about checking his tools. He found them neatly packed away in their rightful place. He growled and let the tool chest slam shut, annoyed with his dysfunctional brain. He was used to his mind playing tricks on him, but he wasn’t in the mood to indulge it.
Vexed, he locked the shed. Over the wind whistling down from the mountains, he thought he heard the cabin phone. He growled under his breath—a phantom phone was his faulty brain’s other favorite trick—and set off around the lake for a late night walk.
JEDPULLEDinto the hospital parking lot with a heavy sigh. Most of his PT appointments were scheduled in the mornings, but every second Tuesday, Carla pulled him in for an evening session. He didn’t usually mind—PT hurt like bitch whatever the hour—but today a round-trip to Seattle had left him beat.
He trudged wearily into the hospital. Carla took one look at him, flipped a switch on the treadmill, and pointed to the massage bed.
Relieved, Jed slipped one leg out of his sweatpants and maneuvered himself onto the bed. He bit back a wince as Carla slid practiced hands over his weakened thigh. Her hands were small, but deceptively strong. Though a therapeutic massage was less effort than physical training, it was sometimes every bit as painful.
Carla manipulated the damaged muscles in his leg. Jed bore it in silence until he noticed she was uncharacteristically quiet. Carla talked his ear off most days, even when he closed his eyes in protest. When the fog of pain had cleared enough, he glanced up and shot her a quizzical look. “Why so quiet?”
That earned him a smile. He’d learned his first Spanish from Dan, but over the years his dialect had become more Mexican than Ecuadoran. The syntactic variations amused Carla, and fascinated Jed enough to filter through his apathy-clouded brain.
Carla lifted his leg and pressed her fingers into a sensitive spot below his hip. “Long day,” she said. “I took my senile grandfather grocery shopping. It’s always an experience.”
“Grocery shopping’s never fun.”
“Speak for yourself.” Carla waited for Jed’s discomfort to pass. “I’m pretty sure I saw you and Max living it up in Walmart.”
Jed let the remark pass. Walmart was the devil’s playground as far as he was concerned.
“Speaking of Max,” Carla said when Jed failed to take her bait. “I’ve called him a few times today, but he hasn’t gotten back to me. Has he got a big project booked in at the boat shed?”
Jed shrugged. It was sometimes hard to tell what Max was up to. He worked his fingers to the bone, but his tidy workshop belied his chaotic approach, and Jed was never altogether sure which boat had his sketchy attention. “I don’t know what he’s working on.”
Carla let it go and moved on to a particularly painful phase of her massage. Jed covered his face with his arm and gritted his teeth. The time for talk was over and, perversely, the grinding pain in his leg sometimes sent him to sleep.