Page 11 of Silent Threat
He stayed down, staring at her bare calves for a second before raising his gaze to her face. “How did you do that?”
“A couple of things,” she said with admirably restrained smugness, and counted them out on her fingers. “One: I grabbed your injured arm, then used twice as much force as I thought I’d need, deliberately overestimating you to be on the safe side. It almost wasn’t enough.”
Huh.
“Two: You think I’m a tree-hugging hippie, so you underestimated me. Probably figured your therapist isn’t going to beat you up during a session. I think you were lulled into a false sense of safety.”
He definitely had been. Not too smart.
“Three: You are drugged. Your reflexes aren’t what they should be.”
Which was exactly why he was doing all this, because the main shrink, Dr.Ambrose, had told him that if he participated in other therapies, he might be able to cut back on the drugs.
“Four: Back at the gas station, you took me by surprise. Here I was prepared and ready, expecting you to make that move.
“Last but not least”—more smug crept into her voice—“you’re a gentleman. I think you didn’t fully resist because you didn’t want to hurt a woman.”
Was that a self-satisfied smirk at the corner of her soft lips? He didn’t mind the smug, but he had to do something about the smirk. “Yeah. Don’t count on the gentleman thing.”
He scissored his legs, pulled hers out from under her, and brought her to the ground. Then, on some stupid impulse, he rolled on top of her to immobilize her, like he would have with an enemy combatant.
She stared up at him, wide-eyed, her long hair spread over the carpet of autumn leaves. She was soft against all his hard places.
Swaying branches crowded his peripheral vision. He didn’t mind them so much, suddenly. All his attention was focused on the woman under him.
Her eyes were lighter than he’d first thought, not the color of root beer but amber. They were too wide for her face, as if she wanted to gobble up all the light in the world.
“Maybe I could get into this one-with-nature business.” But really, he only said the words to get under her skin.
She’d be the worst possible woman for him to get involved with, even beyond the fact that he was her patient and she was his therapist, beyond his secrets. If they met under different circumstances, somewhere far away, they still wouldn’t make it a week. Her earth-power mumbo jumbo would either drive him to suicide or to strangle her.
“Not my type,” she said, breathless from having the air knocked out of her.
“Yeah. Same here. Bad idea all over. Sanity,” he said as he straddled her ankles like they were sit-up buddies, “ought to be at the top of the list of qualities everyone should be looking for in a partner. And, let’s face it, neither of us has it.”
She came up on her elbows. “You think I’m insane?”
“Not certifiable, but definitely on the spectrum. You hug trees.”
She wasn’t what he’d first thought of her. He felt as if she’d tricked him, and that angered him.
He had his guard up against the therapists and other quacks. But back at the gas station, he hadn’t known she was a therapist at Hope Hill. He’d let his guard down.
She’d been brave enough to talk to him. She’d been open-minded enough to see past his scowl, his tattoos, and the generally intimidating way he tended to appear to strangers. Even though blood obviously made her queasy, she’d been kind enough to help him. It’d been that reckless, uncalculated kindness that had gotten to him.
Back at the gas station, he had liked her. Back at the gas station, he hadn’t known she was just another person who’d want to poke around in his head so she could tell him what was wrong with him. Back at the gas station, he hadn’t known that she was the enemy.
Frustration made him clench his teeth.
“I’m a freaking cripple, all right? I’m dealing with that. I don’t need people looking into my head. I don’t need anyone to tell me that I’m a crazy cripple.”
“I don’t think you’re crazy.”
“Then what am I?”
“A diagnosis after five minutes? That’s a lot of pressure.”
“You had another five at the gas station. That makes it ten.”
