Page 41 of One Night with the Doctor

Callie startled at Sebastian’s unexpected outburst. He shook his head from side to side like he was fighting against something as he muttered, ‘No!’ again, but this time it was louder, more panicked, and he vaulted up in bed.

Her heart leaping to her throat, Callie murmured, ‘Sebastian?’ as she laid a hand on his shoulder.

His skin leapt beneath her touch as he twisted to look at her with wild eyes that, didn’t seem to recognise who she was at all.

She withdrew her hand, her heart fluttering wildly in her chest. ‘Sebastian?’

He seemed to sag then and the blank look of confusion lifted from his eyes. ‘Callie,’ he said on an exhalation. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.’

‘Hey,’ she murmured, opening her arms. She wasn’t sure if he’d accept her comfort but when he did, she gathered him close and whispered. ‘It’s fine. You’re fine.’

She didn’t know how long they sat there. Long enough for the tremble in his arms to settle and the mad pulsing of his heart against hers to return to its normal rhythm.

‘Is it your father?’

He shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Do you want to talk about it?’

Sebastian roused himself, the shocking realism of the nightmare receding. Even more shocking was the realisation that he did want to talk about it.

And, if nothing else, he sure as hell owed her an explanation.

‘Actually… yeah.’

If she seemed surprised, she didn’t show it, just shimmied back so she was resting against the head board, opening her arms to him again. He went to her, settling between her legs, his back to her front, her arm slung over his shoulder and across his chest, cradling him against her.

‘Something happened a few years back, when I was in Afghanistan. I was travelling with a supply division to get to another base. There was a roadside bomb.’

She gasped softly and her arm banded around him tighter. Sebastian slid his palms onto her shins, needing to touch her as much as she seemed to need to touch him.

‘The vehicle in front was blown to smithereens. I’d just been talking to the driver a few minutes before we left. He was supposed to be going home a month later.’

‘Did he…?’

Sebastian stared into the darkness, his mind awash with the desperation of men trying to save their comrades. ‘He didn’t make it. None of them did.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ she murmured, her arm tightening even more, her legs coming up to wrap around his thighs. ‘That’s terrible.’

Sebastian nodded, the terror a little less here in her embrace. ‘It was.’

‘Do you have nightmares often?’

‘No, not really. Not any more. Only when I’m really tired, I guess.’

It shouldn’t have surprised him, then, that this had happened tonight. He’d come to Callie’s from Frank already totally exhausted. And then there’d been the sex. Sex that had felt so much more than all the other times and not because he’d been bare but because it had reached much deeper than physical gratification.

And he was pretty sure she felt the same.

‘Have you seen anyone about it?’

He grimaced. ‘Ironic, isn’t it? The foremost expert on PTSD suffering from it himself?’

She rubbed her chin against his hair. ‘No. It’s just life.’

‘I have talked to someone about it but only recently. It was her who suggested I think about switching up my work situation. That maybe I should take a break from twenty-four seven PTSD and give myself some space to work through my own.’

‘She sounds very smart.’