I wanted to pinch (or punch) everyone in this room.
“You know…” Luke’s low voice tickled my bare shoulder when he bent to speak to me. “Crossing your arms like that makes your boobs look even better…”
I quickly removed my arms and hastily grabbed my wine, downing the entire glass in one large gulp.
I was two seconds away from saying something inappropriate to him when General Siekman cleared his throat over the microphone. I stopped moving instantly, and JoJo quickly put her hand on my lap and gave me a warm smile.
“It’s going to be okay…” she whispered, and I could feel Luke watching us. The entire table was. A few more of our friends, including Daniel, sat down, and they all gave me the same remorseful look, which only made me gulp louder.
I was tough. I always had been. I was once told that to be a nurse, you had to have a thick skin. You had to be strong, and you had to be capable of turning your feelings off. But tonight, I wasn’t feeling very strong. In fact, I felt anything but. My fingers started tingling, and my breathing started to pick up its pace with each word that fell out of the general’s mouth.
I couldn’t do this.
I couldn’t sit here and be okay while he talked about my dead brother.
About my dead best friend.
My heart thumped loudly beneath my ribcage, and in spite of the wine, I felt completely jittered and unrelaxed. My breaths were coming in short spurts, and when the lights went dim to showcase the short video the Marine Corps had put together, I stood up quickly, almost knocking the table off balance.
I knew people were staring, but I didn’t care. I pushed my chair back and squeezed past the few tables that stood between me and the door.
I mumbled a “sorry” here and there, but I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
The second I opened the door, I was blinded by the entry hall’s bright lights shining. I tried not to focus on the distant sound of the video as I leaned my huffing back against the gold, papered wall. I thought back to nursing school, where they’d taught us about panic attacks and how to talk someone through one.
I was drawing a blank. I couldn’t remember.
I could remember the fucking Pythagorean theorem, but I couldn’t fucking remember how to calm myself down in a panic attack.
My chest was slowly squeezing the life out of me, and my entire body tingled as a wave of heat coursed throughout.
“Jesus Christ. Get yourself together,” I huffed, shutting my eyes tightly.
Talk about embarrassing. This was embarrassing. More embarrassing than when I walked in on my ex sleeping with a blow-up doll. This moment landed right above the blow-up doll incident and right under that time in eighth grade when I’d ran right into a revolving door in front of my entire school—that was mortifying.
“Cammie?” A soothing voice came from the left as I took another deep breath, still squeezing my eyes shut.
“What are you doing out here, Luke?” I asked, but my voice was all breathy—and not in the good, sexy way either.
He ignored my question. “You alright?”
I didn’t answer him right away. I tried my hardest to find every distraction possible to keep my mind off what had just happened in there. And sadly, nothing had even happened. I’d bailed before anything was even said.
Distractions. Think of distractions.
The feeling of the wallpaper along my exposed back. Yes, that’s good. What else? That delicious scent coming from the man beside me. Ah, what is that? I took a big whiff of the air and heard a rumbling chuckle.
My eyes snapped open in an instant.
I just smelled him. I. Just. Smelled. Luke.
“I’m gonna let that slide, since you’re having a difficult time right now…” he teased, and I quietly let out a laugh.
“You smell good,” I whispered.
“I know.”
I finally looked over at his smug smile and couldn’t help but allow my grin to follow.