Page 26 of Tate
Oh. Um.
But he winked. “Sorry. I guess I’m still a little starstruck. I saw your video on YouTube. You’ve come a long way since singing for tips at the Bluebird.”
For some reason, his words found her sore, jagged edges and soothed them. “Thanks.”
“So, I guess I’ll see you this weekend at the fundraiser?”
She nodded, maybe a little too enthusiastically, because when she sat back down, Cher was grinning.
“What?”
“Yee-haw, honey.”
“No. Cher. C’mon.”
“You want to get over Tate?”
Not especially. But Glo didn’t say anything. She just watched Sloan pull out a chair, put his order number on a table, and grab his iPad.
The rain had stopped, and a stream of light broke through the clouds.
Cher picked up her mug, lifted it to Glo. “Giddyup.”
“Not funny.”
“We’ll see. Because yes, I’ll be your date to the party. Let the campaign begin.”
Tate hadn’t woken in a cold sweat for nearly five years. That sense that the enemy had crept up, got a bead on him, and was taking apart his position.
With a shout, he sat straight up in bed, his heart a fist banging against his ribs. The cry echoed against the whitewashed ceiling of his childhood bedroom, dissolving in the wan, early morning light filtering in through the blinds and striping the floor.
The sudden movement had brought another shout to his lips, this time from the deep-seated pain in his ribs. But he bit it back.
No need to bring his mother running down the hall like he might be six years old and broken up after a fall from his horse.
He’d come a long way since those days.
Tate eased back, listening to the screams of his nightmare dying. The shouts of his fellow Rangers, the gunfire pinging against the cement walls of a mosque, the taste of dust and blood in his mouth.
He could still feel Jammas’s body in his arms, his hot blood coating his skin, his breaths shallow as he?—
Tate flung the covers off, letting the chill of the late-April morning raise gooseflesh and yank him out of his memory, back to the present.
The one where his body still ached, the pain deep in his bones. Where his cut had healed to a fine, still reddened line. His broken nose had also healed, although darkness hung under his eyes, the bruises fading. He’d ditched the sling from his dislocated shoulder but still favored it, his arm held close to his body.
But he could move it just fine, thank you.
And it was time to get back to work.
Because those screams could just as easily have been Glo’s as she tried to keep Slava from killing him, and if he let them sit onemore day in his brain without seeing that she was safe, he might lose his mind.
He pulled on a pair of faded jeans and a white T-shirt, stopped by the bathroom to brush his teeth and splash water on his face, bypassing the shave, and headed downstairs.
The early morning light turned the two-story ranch lodge into a fairytale, complete with gleaming hand-hewn logs, a towering stone fireplace, and leather sofas made for lounging. The recently remodeled kitchen was quiet, and he opened the fridge, letting the cool wash over him as he reached for a pitcher of orange juice.
“Coffee?”
He nearly dropped the juice at his mother’s voice.
