“And you won’t have to. We’re installing a closed-circuit TV in the house, with cameras on-site so you can see the show without risk.” Lindsey needed the layer of protection—no crowds, no excess exposure to the outside world.
“But Gloria should go! And Toby—”
“Covered,” Sloan assured her. Terri had arranged for a local RN to stay with Lindsey and a sitter to accompany Toby to the concert and bring him home, in order that Gloria could have a good time “stargazing” in the VIP tent.
A week before the concert Sloan was in her Nashville room when Terri, in the city to handle last-minute details, handed her a manila envelope. “Here are the tickets and VIP badges you asked me to set aside. Are you sure you only want three besides Gloria’s? You can have more. You’re the star.”
Sloan peeked inside the envelope. Certainly Cole would get a ticket and a name badge. FedEx would deliver the other pair, although she was unsure they’d be used. She hoped they would be. “Terri, I cut ties with this place years ago, so yes, three is enough. Now let’s go to dinner. I’m ravenous.”
Sloan rehearsed for her concert in Windemere, with the same musicians who’d worked with her on the album. With three days remaining before the event, feeling prepared, nervous, and antsy, she drove to Lindsey’s, determined to decompress. Dark rain clouds chased her all the way from her hotel to Lindsey’s front door, where Gloria met her, looking distraught. “It’s gonna rain, Sloan! Pour. Don’t want nothing to spoil your concert.”
“Nothing’s going to spoil it.” Sloan tugged her roller bag inside, where the smell of home-cooked biscuits made her mouth water. “Weather’s supposed to be clear by Saturday night. And maybe the rain will cool things off a bit too.” August was forever hot and steamy in Tennessee. “How’s Lindsey?”
“She’s restin’.”
“Toby?” She glanced around, having expected him to meet her at the door as usual.
“He’s camping with Cole.”
“In this weather?”
“For his birthday, Cole bought Toby some real camping gear…a tent, lanterns…a bunch of outdoor stuff, and he’s been promising they’d camp out tonight in his backyard, but with the rain and storms, they’ve moved the campsite into his living room.”
“Well, fun for Toby. I’ll put this in his room and wait for Lindsey to wake up.”
She reached for the handle of her bag, but Gloria grabbed hold. “I’ll put it away if you’ll take Toby’s toothbrush over to Cole’s. I think the boy forgot it on purpose.” Gloria hustled off, and returned with a ziplock bag of toothpaste and a toothbrush. At the sight of the Spider-Man colors and Spidey symbol, a memory crept out and caused Sloan’s chest to tighten. Gloria asked, “Can you take it now before the sky opens? So I don’t have to leave Lindsey alone?”
Sloan stuffed down the memory, accepted the plastic bag. “Glad to help.”
“And hurry back. I’m cookin’ up chicken and dumplings and buttermilk biscuits.”
Sloan drove to Cole’s and had almost made it to the front door when the rain clouds let go.
Cole heard his doorbell, opened the door to see Sloan wet with rain on his welcome mat. A surge of pleasure shot through him. “Hey! Come in. Don’t get soaked.” He tucked her inside the foyer. “Great to see you.”
“I thought I could make it before the rain hit. Sorry.” She shook rainwater onto the tiled floor, warmed from head to toe by the voltage of his smile.
“I’ll get you a towel.”
“Don’t bother….I can’t stay. I come bearing toothbrush and toothpaste for a certain camper.” She held out the bag.
“Toby, it’s for you,” Cole called over his shoulder, then, leaning closer to Sloan, whispered, “I thought he was traveling light when all he showed up with was pajamas and his baseball glove.”
Cole’s warm breath fluttered wisps of her hair and sent goose bumps skittering along her skin. She shied away.
Toby ran into the foyer. “Sloan, we’re camping! Come see, come see!”
“One towel on its way,” Cole said.
Sloan followed Toby into Cole’s great room, where a dome-shaped tent of bright green stood in the center of the floor, looking very out of place and giving the room a new-out-of-the-package smell. Cole’s sofa had been shoved against one wall, chairs to another. The edges of his nine-foot colorful area rug peeked from beneath the tent. “Wow. It’s…huge. I thought I’d see a pup tent.”
“Yeah,” Toby said, “ain’t it neat!” He pulled her toward an entrance flap. “You gotta come inside. We got sleeping bags, lights, a TV, everything!”
Cole returned and handed her a towel. “Almost everything. We left the sink in the kitchen.”
She blotted her hair and arms while staring at the tent. Metal poles came together to form a dome in the center of the structure, holding it upright and in perfect symmetry. “You think it’s big enough?”
Cole’s grin widened. “It sleeps four, just in case he wants to bring a few of his friends along sometime.”
“I can stand up in it,” Toby announced proudly.
“I can kneel gracefully,” Cole said, making her smile.
Toby tugged on Sloan’s hand. “Come inside, see our stuff. It’s supercool.”
Just then a jagged brilliant streak of lightning shot through dark clouds, and a boom of thunder shook the window glass of the great room. “That was close,” Cole said, frowning.
Too close. “I should go before it gets worse.”
“Not a good idea,” Cole said, and before she could insist, the wail of a tornado warning siren cut through the roar of the rain. “That’s it. We’re all going down to the basement.”
“What about Mama?”
“Gloria knows to get down to your basement. It’ll be okay.”
Sensing the boy’s reluctance, Sloan held out her hand. “Come on, Toby. Cole’s right. We’ll go down together.”
They descended the stairs with Cole in the lead, and walked into an inner room with a solid steel door. “My safe room. I built it when I updated the house.” When he shut the door, the room went silent. And very dark. Sloan gave an involuntary gasp.
Cole heard her, felt her recoil standing next to him. “Hold on. I’ve got this.” He flicked on an LED lantern and turned the room blue-white.
Sloan took deep breaths, attempting to mask the cold fear that had snaked through her in the darkness.
“Awesome!” Toby whispered.
His word broke the spell of the darkness’s hold on her. Feeling childish about her reaction to the dark, Sloan inspected the room and the comforts Cole had stashed for emergencies—floors cushioned with rubber mats, a cluster of LED lanterns, stacks of blankets, pillows, and two plastic containers of food and water.
“This is even cooler than my tent,” Toby said, dropping down and rooting through a tub holding food.
“I’m impressed,” Sloan said.
But Cole had seen her reaction to the darkness, fear. Maybe the tornado warning had spooked her. “Sit, make yourself comfortable.” He set the lantern along a cement wall, turned on another to fill the space with more light. Sloan propped a pillow against the wall next to the light source and sank to the floor. Cole retrieved a battery-operated weather alert radio, fiddled with the knobs to search for information, and sat cross-legged beside her. “I heard that a tornado hit the town a few years back. Were you living here at the time?”
“I was in middle school, and the tornado cut a path right through downtown.” An instant image of the trailer where she and her mother had spent so many miserable years flashed in her mind. She had stayed home from school that day and had been alone, and she would never forget the coppery color of the sky, the stillness of the air—like nature was holding its breath—and the feeling of foreboding, just before a funnel cloud touched down and ripped parts of Windemere apart. “We were lucky. It missed us, just intense wind and rain, but downtown and a few farms were hammered.” She cast Toby a glance, watched him dig into
a box of crackers. “I wouldn’t want to go through another one, that’s for sure.”
The radio crackled, and a robotic voice issued barometric pressures and other numbers. Cole leaned forward. “Sounds like it’s passed north of us, so the town caught a break this time.” Minutes later, the radio announced an all clear for their area.
“Awww. Is it over?” Toby sounded disappointed.
Cole, grateful they’d dodged the worst, got to his feet. “Come on, we have a campout upstairs. You still want to camp, don’t you?”
Toby scrambled up, and Cole led them upstairs by the lantern’s light to the great room, where vanished electricity had left the room shrouded in darkness. Toby grabbed a flashlight, and Cole set the lantern on the floor. Sheets of rain still stung the windows, sounding like waves crashing on a shoreline. Sloan shifted, unsure what to do. “I guess it’s okay for me to leave. I mean, the danger’s over and it’s just raining.”
Cole’s eyes bored into hers. “No way. Trees will be down, roads flooded. Little Man, it seems like we’re having company tonight. How about rolling out another sleeping bag for our guest?”
“I can’t stay here all night.”
“You can’t leave either. Extenuating circumstances.” Cole’s face, lit by the upward glow from the lantern on the floor, made him look otherworldly.
“Yeah!” Toby inserted. “That’ll be cool. Like we’re rescuing you.” He dropped to all fours and crawled inside the tent, then stuck his head out momentarily to say, “And in the morning, Cole’s gonna make ‘camp pancakes’ with chocolate chips and whipped cream!”
“But there’s no electricity.”
“Gas stove and gas fireplace,” Cole said, thumbing over his shoulder. “We know how to camp, don’t we, Toby?” They slapped high fives, and Toby scooted backward. As soon as the boy was in the tent, Cole led Sloan into the kitchen area by lantern light. “I know this is awkward for you, but I’m not kidding about it being too dangerous for you to leave tonight. You’re safe here.”
The storm wasn’t the only reason she wanted to leave. Being close to Cole was unnerving, the whisper of his voice, the feel of his warm breath on her face. How could she possibly sleep next to him all night inside a tent? “I can go back to Lindsey’s.”
“Don’t think so. Let me show you something.” He walked her to the back door. “Land’s low in our area, so it always holds water in heavy rain. The yard’s underwater, and so is the driveway and front road.” Her safety was primary, but he wanted her to stay, and any reason to keep her with him would do. “I’m playing my paramedic card. Sorry…you’re stuck here tonight.”
“I should call Lindsey.” She reached for her cell phone, before remembering it was in her purse, which was—where?
“You can try, but I’m pretty sure the cell towers are jammed this far out. They usually are in any emergency.”
“But…Lindsey—Aren’t you worried about her? She and Gloria are in the dark too.”
“Watch,” he said, turning her toward the door’s windowpanes. He raised the flashlight and flipped it off and on so that the light shone across an expanse of standing water between his and Lindsey’s houses. Seconds later another flashlight beamed a staccato pattern. “That’s Gloria telling me all’s well. I taught her some Morse code, basic stuff. SOS and A-OK, because electricity and cell phones can fail.”
He lowered his flashlight. They were so close, he could smell her rain-damp hair mingling with the scent of her floral perfume. Intoxicating. “Plus, I’ll need you to stay here with Toby if I get called out on the job. Four-wheel drive, high cab, off-road tires,” he added with a grin before she could point out the discrepancy between her staying and him leaving.
Toby was her reason to stay. She gave an involuntary shiver. “My clothes are wet. I—I have nothing to sleep in.”
“I have a shirt I’ll be glad to loan you, and we’ll toss your jeans over a chair to dry.”
“You think of everything, don’t you?”
“I don’t think of everything. Otherwise I’d have something besides one of my old work shirts for a pretty woman to wear when she gets stranded in my house on a stormy night.”
The absurdity of the whole situation and his good humor made her laugh and lower her defenses. “Well, okay then….Why don’t you show me my wardrobe choices? I have standards, you know.”
Cole lay listening to Sloan’s and Toby’s rhythmic breathing from the bedrolls beside him in the tent. The rain had passed, but not the electrical outage, and without AC, the house had become stuffy. He’d brought in a large auxiliary battery from his garage and wired it to a string of twinkle lights, along with a small fan. The tent was too big for the fan to be much help with cooling, but it kept the air moving. All three of them had chosen to sleep atop their sleeping bags…too warm to crawl inside. Toby was in between Cole and Sloan, to act as a barrier because Cole knew he might be unable to cope with lying beside her, desiring her as he did.
He rose up on his elbow, watched her as she slept, her flawless face, the tangle of her hair on the pillow, the blond strands catching and holding light like the sparkle of stardust. She wore one of his softest denim shirts, the shirttail long enough to reach her knees. When she’d put it on, Toby had giggled and said, “You look funny.”
Cole thought she looked gorgeous and enticingly sexy. He’d also given her a pair of his running shorts, but she’d had to use a safety pin in the waistband to keep them up. And now she slept, a few feet away in proximity, a world away in reality. Out of your league, he reminded himself, and hunkered down, turning his back to her and knowing it was going to be one helluva long night.
He must have dozed, because whimpering and soft crying alerted him. Cole flipped over, sat up. “Toby?” But the boy was sleeping. The sounds came from Sloan, soft sobs, but she wasn’t awake. Her head tossed from side to side, and the lights reflected her look of pure terror. A nightmare? Cole scrambled around Toby, watched Sloan writhe and twist, and was unsure how best to wake her. She looked to be in agony. He straddled her, gripped her shoulders, leaned close, whispered, “Sloan…wake up. You’re dreaming, honey. Wake up.”
Her body arched, her eyes flew open, and he heard her take a deep ragged breath. “It’s okay, Sloan. You’re safe. I’m right here.” It took a few seconds for her eyes to focus. She shuddered, turned her head, wept quietly. He drew her to him while she cried. When her trembling slowed, he whispered, “Let’s get out of here so we don’t wake Toby.”
They crawled out of the tent, and once in the open room she gulped in air. He led her to the sofa pushed aside for the tent, lay down on the cushions, and with her spine pressed against the length of his body, he locked his arms around her in the embrace he’d been trained to do for patients in emotional distress. He stroked her arms to calm and soothe. “You’re safe now. I’ve got you. Nothing can hurt you.”
Sloan, awake, turned into him, weeping and balling his T-shirt into her fists. Cole felt the wetness on his skin, and wished he had a wad of tissues, but he wouldn’t have moved for all the world. “Bad dream?” Silence. “Tell me, baby, get it out. Let me help.” Slowly he felt the tension in her body loosen, her tears lessen. “You had a nightmare….It’s over now and you’re safe.”
“Hands…almost…got me.” Her voice was muffled and sounded childlike. He realized that while she might be awake, the dream still held her captive.
He pressed his lips to the crown of her head, damp with sweat and smelling of fear. “Talking often helps a dream to lose its power. Will you tell me about it?”
“Always…same dream…years…” Her voice, childish and singsong.
He righted her, lifted her chin so that their faces were inches apart and on the same plane. Her eyes were wide, not yet seeing him but instead seeing some distant past. He lightly brushed away a clump of hair stuck to her cheek. “Go on. I’m listening.”
“Mama brought men home. Some were nice. But one…not very nice.” Her voice kept its little-girl c
adence. “He—he came into my room at night when Mama was asleep.” This in a whisper.
He felt like a rock had settled in his gut. “How old were you when the man came to your room?”
“Five.”
He held himself perfectly still, deciding against asking What happened? “What did you do when he came into your room?”
She perked. “I hid under my bed. He tried to reach for me, but I lay on my side and made myself very straight and flat against the wall.”
“That was smart of you.” Cole’s mind raged, wanting to tear the unknown guy apart with his bare hands.
She cast her gaze downward, shook her head. “I could hear his hands scratching on the floor. I held my breath, sucked it all inside me to make me really small. If he couldn’t reach me, I didn’t have to come out like he kept telling me to.”
He imagined the man’s hands scraping in the dark, like rats’ feet, her tiny body flattened, with nowhere to go. The image made him want to puke.
“Then one night—” She looked up and straight into Cole’s eyes.
In the gloomy shadows of the room, so close to her, he watched her eyes begin to clear, and return her to the here and now. He knew that Sloan was fully with him, and silently willed her to finish her sentence, but allowed her to take all the time she needed.
Sloan held Cole’s gaze, the child replaced with the grown-up version of herself. She couldn’t hold back. “One night he grabbed me. He dragged me from under the bed. I guess I’d grown some and wasn’t small enough anymore.”
Her voice was stronger, in control. His pulse pounded, and he steeled himself for what she might say. “Did he hurt you?”
On her face, was a sly smile. “I bit him so hard, I tasted his blood. And I screamed and kicked, and he yowled and called me names, and we woke up LaDonna and she came to my room.”
Her finish to the story left his insides watery. “Clever girl. You were brave and smart.” He ran his thumb under her eye, absorbing tears and perspiration. “Rest now.”