Irish Sex Fairy

Chapter Ten

Keara woke to Maeve nudging her arm.

“I can’t let you sleep too long, muirnín,” she said softly. “Can you wake up and talk for a few minutes?”

“Mmmm.” She forced her eyes open and pushed up onto her elbows. Every muscle screamed with pain and she whimpered. “Dammit.”

“You okay? What can I do?”

“Can I have more pain pills yet? What time is it?”

The room was dim but Keara could see Maeve look at her watch. “Yes, you can have more now. Here.” She shook out two tablets and handed them to her with a glass of water. Then she sat carefully on the end of the bed.

Keara downed the pills and took a few long gulps of water. Her head throbbed to the point of making her feel a little nauseous. “Well, this is no fun,” she said, lying back down.

“I’d say not.” Maeve studied her. “I feel terrible that this happened to you, muirnín.”

“It’s not your fault. It’s my own stupid fault.”

“You said someone else caused the accident.”

Keara sighed. She’d been thinking about it ever since, when she hadn’t been dozing. “I thought he did. I don’t know. Maybe I just imagined it. I was nervous with him tailgating like that, on the winding road.”

“That highway is crazy. I never should have asked you to go into Santa Melita.”

“It’s not your fault, Maeve. Maybe the guy was just trying to pass. I was slowing down and pulling over. I must have overreacted. An accident.” But she recalled how close he’d been to her car, how her heart had leaped with fear. He’d had the whole two-lane highway to pass her on.

“But he didn’t even stop. You’d think he would have stopped to help if it had been an accident.”

“Maybe he didn’t realize I’d gone over the side, once he’d passed me.”

Maybe. No. He’d absolutely known she’d gone over the side of the mountain. Had to have. Fear gripped her again, seizing her lungs and making her heart trip.

Oh shit. Here we go again. That morning when she’d set out on her errands, her focus had been on getting her mind off Shane and sex. Off sex with Shane. Now she was back to being reduced to a trembling mass of nerves and fear. And was bashed and bruised on top of it.

Tears stung her eyes and she squeezed them shut, not wanting to break down and cry in front of Maeve, but a hot tear tracked down her cheekbone and into her hair.

“Don’t cry, muirnín.” Maeve moved closer and gathered her into a hug. “Don’t cry. You’re okay. You’re okay.”

“I was starting to feel better,” Keara sobbed. “I had fun at the Dunstans’ last night. And…and…Shane was f-flirting with me.” Maeve’s hand rubbed her back soothingly. “I was th-thinking about sex. Like you wanted. And…then this happens, and now I’m all scared again. Oh. I think I’m going to throw up.”

She slid from Maeve’s arms and rushed to the bathroom across the hall, fell to her knees in front of the toilet. Saliva accumulated in her mouth and she swallowed repeatedly while her stomach heaved, but nothing actually came up.

Tears wet her cheeks, and when her stomach settled she reached for the towel hanging above her and dried her face.

“Okay?” Maeve stood in the doorway, looking drawn and worried.

Ah hell. “I’m sorry,” she muttered. She climbed to her feet, her whole body aching and tight. “I’m okay.”

“It’s the concussion,” Maeve said. “In a couple of days you’ll be fine.”

“Yeah.” But she hadn’t been fine in weeks.

“I’ll make us some soup for dinner, how’s that? Do you want to go back to bed?”

“I think I should move around,” Keara said. If she lay around too long her muscles would just tighten up even more. Tiny hammers swung in her head but she followed Maeve to the kitchen. While Maeve bustled about heating up soup, Keara found a box of soda crackers and munched on a couple, hoping that would help her stomach. She hadn’t eaten all day and had been taking strong pain meds, which could also be making her feel sick.

This had to stop. She could not go on this way. She’d gone from prickly fear and pervading anxiety to numb and lethargic, then to annoyed—hey, it was better than dead—and yes, turned-on, and was now full circle back at clawing panic. She focused on taking in slow, regular breaths.

Why did this have to happen now? Was her mind playing tricks on her and making her think someone did this to her deliberately? It was just like the break-in at her condo all over again. She’d sworn someone had been out there, but the police were equally certain no one had been. That her paranoid imagination had just taken off. And now it had again.

Her stomach tightened and as Maeve slid a bowl of soup onto the table in front of her, she peered down at it in dismay. She picked up her spoon, knew she should eat, but felt repulsed and her stomach protested.

“You should eat something,” Maeve murmured, taking a seat at the table.

“I know I should.” She dipped her spoon into the creamy bowl. “What is it? Cream of mushroom?”

“My special mushroom chowder.”

Keara tasted it. “It’s delicious.” She ate another spoonful. And another. “I don’t think Shane believed me.”

Maeve met her eyes. “He said there was no reason not to believe you. But they won’t likely be able to find the person unless there’s some kind of evidence.”

“I know.” She huffed out a breath. “Asshole.”

“I’m going to assume you’re talking about the other driver and not Shane.”

A little snort of laughter escaped her. “No, I wasn’t talking about Shane. He was very nice to me today. A little bossy, but nice.”

“He was worried about you.”

“Well.” Keara lowered her gaze to her soup again. “He doesn’t even know me. Really. He doesn’t need to worry about me.”

“You said he was flirting with you.”

Keara sucked in her bottom lip. “Oh. Yeah. I don’t know what got into him.”

“You’re a pretty girl. Why wouldn’t he flirt with you?”

Keara laughed. “I’m not going to talk about this.” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’m okay, Maeve. I’ll be moving a bit slow for a day or two, but I’m okay. This was just a stupid accident.

Even as she said it, her face grew hot and tight and her throat closed up. She blinked at stinging tears, feeling as if her world was spinning out of control. If she didn’t even have control of her mind, if her brain could play tricks on her like it had been, what did that mean? How could she control anything?

She looked at Maeve and blinked back the tears. “I didn’t tell you exactly why I came here.”

Maeve regarded her solemnly. “Well, I knew it wasn’t for a holiday.”

“No.” Keara gripped her hands together in her lap. “The robbery shook me up.”

“It would shake anyone up, going through something like that.”

“But it seems to have affected me…a lot.” She rubbed the back of one hand across her nose. “I’ve been off work ever since the robbery. I was seeing a psychologist. They told me I had to, to deal with the trauma. I was supposed to go back to work last week, on Monday. Two days before I called you, I had gone in to work for a visit. I…had some kind of strange episode. Apparently it was a panic attack. Just slightly humiliating.” She struggled to get the words out, hating the way her voice was all shaky and pathetic. “And then, the night before I called you, I thought someone tried to break into my condo.”

“Oh no.” Maeve’s eyes widened and she set down her spoon.

“Except, it was nothing. I called the police and they came and it was all very embarrassing, but there was nothing there. My nerves were still shot from the robbery thing.” She swallowed. “Then I was terrified to stay there alone. That’s why I came here.”

She twisted her trembling fingers tightly. “Now this happens. And I did it again. Let my nerves get to me. I probably thought that SUV was closer than it was, and I panicked and overreacted and…I could have killed myself. I’m just glad nobody else was with me.”

“Oh, muirnín.” Maeve’s face softened and she stood up and held out her arms. “Come here and give me a hug.”

Keara stood, muscles aching, and stepped into Maeve’s embrace. She held onto her aunt, let her hold her, soothe her.

“It will be okay,” Maeve murmured.

Keara gathered up everything she had and stepped out of Maeve’s arms. She had no right to dump this on her poor old great-aunt, no right to worry Maeve, when she was just being silly.

“Yes, I’ll be okay,” she agreed with a tight smile. “Actually this week I was feeling pretty good. I had fun last night at Dunstans’. And then flirting with Shane kind of took my mind off things.”

Maeve drew back and smiled at her. “See? I was right. Sex is what you need. A good round of hot, shake-the-bed sex.”

The sound that emerged from Keara’s throat was half laugh, half sob. “Maybe you are right,” she said, dragging her fingers across wet eyes. “But now it’s going to have to wait until all these bruises are gone.”

“Perhaps.” Maeve returned to her chair and picked up her spoon again. “Eat your soup. And tell me about the robbery. Maybe it will help to talk about it.”

“I talked about it to the psychologist.” Keara obediently lifted her spoon. “I don’t need to talk about it anymore.”

“Well, I’m not a psychologist, but people tell me I’m a good listener. And keeping stuff inside you isn’t healthy.”

So Keara talked as she ate her soup, telling Maeve about the robbery and the hostage-taking. She didn’t tell her everything. Because some things were just too awful to even think, never mind tell someone else. Because she didn’t want Maeve to be disgusted with her, to know the whole thing had been her fault. She kept that part of the incident closed away in a partitioned-off part of her brain, where she didn’t have to examine it or deal with it.

And to a certain extent, telling Maeve and hearing her sympathetic comments did make her feel better.

They’d just finished their dinner when Shane arrived, buzzing at the back door, now locked.

Shane walked into Maeve’s apartment, still in his uniform. He hadn’t even gone home to eat yet. He sought out Keara and found her seated on the couch, cross-legged, a cushion clutched on her lap.

“Should you be out of bed?” he asked with a frown.

“I’m fine,” she replied, with a roll of her eyes. “Sore, but fine. I want to keep moving around so I don’t stiffen up too much. What are you doing here?”

“Just checking to see how you’re doing.”

“You don’t need to do that.”

He ignored her. “Will you be up to coming in to the station to make your report tomorrow?”

“I think so. I just have no way to get there.”

“You can use my car,” Maeve offered.

“I’ll pick you up,” Shane said at the same time.

“Do you offer that service to every crash victim?” she asked, frowning.

“No. Not everyone. It’s no trouble. I’ll come around lunchtime and we’ll get it done.”

She gave him a look—chin tilted down, up through her eyelashes—and his chest tightened. She looked so damn vulnerable and lost. What was it about her?

“Fine,” she finally said with a sigh.

“I called your insurance company,” he said, taking a seat on the other end of the couch from her. “An adjuster will have a look at the car to see if it can be repaired. But first thing tomorrow Joe and I will go have a look at it also. See if there’s any evidence of another car hitting you.”

“There won’t be.” She looked down at the cushion on her lap then back up to him. “I think I imagined that.”

He stared at her. “You think you imagined it. Why do you say that?”

Her lips pressed together. “I just do. I think I probably overreacted to the guy tailing me close. So I’m sure the accident was all my fault.”

He said nothing. It was possible. And yet, she’d seemed so certain earlier. “Is that what you’re going to say in your statement?”

“I…I don’t know. I just want to tell the truth.”

He nodded. “Well, you figure it out, honey, and we’ll go from there. I’m willing to investigate if you think someone deliberately tried to force you off the road.”

“There’s probably no point in it.” She sighed. “I don’t want to put you to a lot of work for nothing.”

He nodded, not sure how to respond to her. Keara wasn’t the type of person to try to blame someone else for something that was her fault. He was pretty sure of that. Some drivers would make up a story like that to take the blame off themselves, maybe thinking they’d be charged with something. But he didn’t believe she would.

So what had really happened up on San Marcos Pass? He found himself hoping unreasonably that he’d find something on her car the next day, even though he knew it unlikely, and even though he knew if he did, he had a helluva bigger problem on his hands. But…Keara’s new admission that she might have overreacted and the sadness on her face as she said it tugged at something inside him. He wanted to pull her onto his lap and wrap his arms around her.

“Everyone makes mistakes,” he finally said, not sure if she was going to take that as reassuring or an indictment. She just nodded, her morose lethargy heart-tugging.

“You look tired,” he said, standing. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

As Maeve walked him to the door, he asked her in a low voice, “Is she okay?”

Maeve nodded, her mouth tightened into a thin scarlet line, eyes narrowed. “Shane. I’m worried about her.”

He stopped, glanced over Maeve’s shoulder at Keara, staring into space.

“You think she’s hurt? Did they miss something at the hospital?”

“No.” Maeve shook her head. “She’s just going through a difficult time right now. She just needs a friend, I think.”

He met her eyes. What was she saying? “We…I…”

“You two were friends. A long time ago.”

“Yeah.”

“Just be a friend to her again, then,” Maeve said gently.

He nodded and left, about a hundred questions bouncing around in his brain. What the hell was going on? And why should he even care?

But he did.

As he’d said he would, Shane picked her up and drove her, again in the police cruiser, to the station to fill out the report. She repeated everything that had happened, including the fact that she’d thought the vehicle forced her to the side,

She could tell from the look on the officer’s face who took her report that people probably told him stories about mysterious vanishing vehicles forcing them off the road, into telephone poles, and over curbs all the time. They thought she was just making it up so she wouldn’t have to take the blame for the accident. She could tell.

It annoyed her because she wouldn’t make something up. Sure, she’d probably overreacted to the vehicle being there, but she wasn’t inventing the whole thing. There had been someone following her too close, for whatever reason, and even if it wasn’t totally his fault she’d driven over the side of the mountain, he had been a jerk. She could still be angry about that.

Shane kept his expression carefully neutral as she made the report, unlike the other officer who didn’t much hide his disbelief, and she wondered what Shane was really thinking. About her. She didn’t want him to think she was avoiding blame.

Shane told her it wasn’t likely her car would be able to be repaired. Great. She’d have to see what the insurance company offered her, but now she was stuck in Kilkenny with no car until then, and until she could buy a new one. Just effing great.

When they stepped outside the small police office into bright sunshine and cool mountain air, she glanced at him.

“What?” he asked, looking at her.

She hesitated then said, “I want to have sex.”