Page 29 of No One But You
“She’s still injured,” I reminded him.“She isn’t in any condition to go gallivanting around in the forest, and don’t even get me started on how traumatic it could be for her.Yes, certain stimuli might trigger a reaction, but as with PTSD, it’s unlikely to be the kind of reaction you want.You’re more likely to give her a panic attack than find anything useful.”
A dozen pairs of eyes burned into me, and everything fell silent for a long moment.Apparently, I’d shocked them.God only knew why.Nate was the one who wanted to re-traumatize poor Bailey for the sake of solving the case.
After several painstaking seconds ticked by, Nate cleared his throat.“We’d wait for her to heal enough to get up there without hurting herself,” he said gruffly.“And we’d bring someone along for support.If the memories are going to come back anyway, she’ll have to deal with them at some point.”
I disliked the truth of his words.
“That’s no reason to rush her.”On this, I wasn’t budging.
Nate gave me a lingering look before turning to Bailey.“What do you want to do?”
Bailey glanced around, her eyes wide.“I, um, don’t really want to go back there.”
“Then you don’t have to,” I said firmly, daring anyone to disagree.
Nate still seemed baffled by the entire exchange.
“You could use a GoPro,” Toby suggested around a mouthful of bacon.“Someone else could walk up while Bailey watches the video feed.”When everyone stared at him, he shrugged and shoveled more bacon into his mouth.“What?I have good ideas sometimes.”
“It’s not the worst suggestion I’ve ever heard.”Coming from Nate, that was a ringing endorsement.“What do you think, Bailey?”
Bailey caught her lip between her teeth.“I wouldn’t have to go up there?”
“No,” Nate said.
“If it was too much, could I cut the feed?”
“Of course,” I assured her.If she became uncomfortable, I’d throw the damn screen out the window if that was what it took to soothe her.“But you don’t have to do anything.If this is too much, Nate will understand.”
Nate gave me a look that said he didn’t understand much right now and that I ought to expect questions later.Hopefully he hadn’t read too much into my protectiveness of Bailey.He was famously oblivious, and I was counting on that now, even if I suspected that some of the women at the table saw more than they let on.
“I’ll try.”Bailey speared a piece of tomato and studied it with more attention than it warranted.“I want to find them.”
“Great.”Nate clapped his hands briskly.“Connor, want to hike up there with me today?”
“As long as we’re back by five,” Connor replied, reaching for the tomato sauce in the center of the table and squirting it over his hash browns and eggs.“I have a shift monitoring the radio starting then.”
“No problem.We can be up and back by then, easy.”
I relaxed enough to eat my meal.I didn’t love this idea, but it was better than exposing Bailey directly to any triggering stimuli, and I’d be there if anything went wrong.
“We could set up the screen here,” Summer said.“That way, there will be plenty of people for support.”
But Bailey demurred.“That might be overwhelming.I’d rather only have a couple of people there.”
“I’ll be one of them.She might need medical assistance.”
Summer arched her eyebrow, and there was a smug little curl to her mouth.“Sure, Max.Sure.That’s definitely all there is to it.”
I narrowed my eyes at her.“It is.”
She wouldn’t catch me admitting to anything else.
SEVENTEEN
Reason #8 why Max Braddock is husband material:
He’s strong, but in a quiet way that no one notices until they really look.
