“What the hell is going on, Beck?”
I turned back to my brother. “I think you got the gist. I saw him grab her by the hair, and I…”
I wasn’t sure how to finish that sentence, but Hayes did it for me. “You lost it.”
“Can you tell me you wouldn’t have done the same? If someone was hurting Everly like that?”
Hayes’ eyes flared. “What is going on between you two?”
I ran a hand through my hair and fought the urge to start pacing. “I don’t know.” That was as much truth as I had for him. I knew what I felt for Addie went way beyond friendship, yet it wasn’t like any other pseudo-relationship I’d ever been in before. It was more.
“You need to tread carefully, Beck.”
“You think I don’t know that? Nothing has happened.”
“But you want it to.”
“I don’t know what I want.”
Hayes blew out a breath. “You need to be damn sure before you open that can of worms. Addie’s been through too much—”
“You think I don’t know that? I know she’s been through hell. I also know she’s a fighter. Stronger than anyone I’ve ever met. She’s not weak.”
He held up a hand. “I didn’t say she was.”
Hayes changed tack. “I need to know what happened.”
I walked him through the sequence of events the best I could, but it was all a little hazy. “When I saw him, I just…” I didn’t want to use Hayes’ words. Didn’t want to admit I’d lost it.
“It triggered something,” Hayes surmised.
“I guess.”
He stepped back, trying to get a better look at me, searching for something. “Something happened in Venezuela. You’re different than the last time you were home. I thought you were just working through the guilt of being gone, about Shy, but it’s more.”
My brother…always so damn insightful. “My job has never been an easy one.”
“I know that. I’m not saying it was. But this is different.”
He wasn’t wrong there. Yet, I couldn’t get myself to tell him. As soon as I tried to get the words out, my throat closed. “I can’t go there right now.”
Hayes’ jaw tightened. “All right. But when you’re ready, I’m here.”
Even the offer had me feeling twitchy, as if my skin were too tight for my body, and I needed to move. “I gotta get back to the office. Can you tell Addie I’ll pick her up at the end of her shift? I don’t want her walking home alone.”
“You’re leaving?”
“I have patients waiting for me.” But it was more than that. I knew if Hayes could recognize that something was up, Addie would see even more. I wasn’t ready to go there. Couldn’t. Those nightmares were for me and me alone.
26
ADDIE
“He left?”
Hayes rubbed at the back of his neck. “I guess he had patients waiting for him back at the clinic.”
That was understandable. At least, I knew that much logically. My heart was something different altogether. That had me biting the inside of my cheek to distract myself from the hurt. He’d left. “Okay.”