Page 43 of Keeping Kara

Her breathing sped up, but she did her best to hide it from Arrow. The last thing she wanted was to be a burden. To be weak. Especially in front of a man she wanted to impress. Or at least, not irritate or turn off.

“Kara?”

“Okay,” she managed to say.

“It’s not okay,” he muttered. “I wanted to come over. Bring you dinner. See you. Find out how you’re settling in. You get to search for accounting jobs today?”

Kara swallowed. Then did it again. When she spoke next, she thought she managed to sound mostly normal. “Yeah. I found a few that seemed interesting. Two were office jobs though, and after everything I’ve been through, I’d rather find something where I can work remotely. I did send an email to one place, I’ll have to wait and see if they get back to me.”

“Awesome. And yeah, I agree about working from home. I’d do that if I could get away with it.”

Kara couldn’t hold back a snort.

Arrow chuckled. “Right, kind of hard for a pilot to work from home, huh?”

“Just a little.”

She heard someone say something in the background but couldn’t understand the words.

“Shoot, I need to go. I’m not sure that I would wait for Jen to get home to eat. Sometimes those searches can go on for quite a while. And it’s supposed to start raining in an hour or so. I don’t want you to go hungry simply to be polite. She wouldn’t expect you to wait for her.”

Kara’s anxiety ramped up again. Rain? She hadn’t thought twice about the weather, didn’t even think to check it. But hearing that it was supposed to rain had even more bad memories rushing into her consciousness.

“If I don’t get home too late, I’ll text to see if Jen got home all right. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Have a good night.”

“You too.”

“Bye.”

Kara hung up without saying goodbye, because her mouth was dry as a bone and her throat seemed to have closed up.

She clicked off the phone and put it on the counter, immediately walking over to one of the windows in the apartment. Pulling back the curtain, she looked outside and saw how cloudy it was. The sun was setting, and soon it would be dark and rainy.

A shiver ran through her body, and Kara pulled the curtains closed with a jerk. She went to her butt right there under the window and wrapped her arms around her updrawn knees. Her breathing was too fast, and it was taking all her effort not to completely lose it.

Why she was reacting this way was beyond her. Back in North Carolina, the rain had actually helped her escape Nolan. She shouldn’t be afraid of it, she should welcome it. But somehow her brain was equating rain with the monster who’d hurt her so badly.

She’d never had anxiety before now. Never had panic attacks. Had actually been a pretty healthy person. But now she felt as if she couldn’t breathe, as if her heart was beating out of her chest, and everything hurt, even the hair on her head.

Putting her head on her knees, Kara did her best to relax. To breathe deeply. But nothing was working.

How long she sat under the window, she had no idea, but when she picked her head up and opened her eyes, she saw the room was dark.

Shit, she’d been sitting there for way longer than she’d thought.

Getting to her feet, she hurried over to where she’d left her phone on the counter and snatched it up. Looking down, she saw she’d received a text from Jen saying the search was taking longer than usual, and she wasn’t sure when she’d be home.

A whimper left Kara’s lips before she could stop it. Being alone right now, with the rain coming down outside, hitting the windowpanes, felt exponentially scarier than she ever thought it could.

This was the first time she’d been alone since Arrow had found her in that tree, and she didn’t like it. Not at all.

Sprinting to the door, Kara frantically checked the locks, relieved at finding them still engaged. She was tempted to put the chain on the door, but then Jen and Fred wouldn’t be able to get into the apartment. She’d have to be satisfied with the deadbolt and the little lock on the doorknob. She hurried to her bedroom and slammed the door shut, locking the flimsy knob on that door as well. She was panting as she stared at it, knowing it wouldn’t keep Nolan out if he found her.

Spinning, she looked around the room for something she could barricade the door with. The room was sparsely furnished, so she had no choice but to drag the twin-size bed until it was blocking the entrance to the room.