Page 15 of Keeping Kara

“Come back to Virginia with me,” he said softly. “I can help you deal with the police and press charges against that asshole. I can help find a place for you to stay, get you back on your feet. I know for certain my friends will become your friends. We’ll get you set with clothes and other necessities. And most importantly, if the asshole who kidnapped you survived the hurricane and flood, he won’t know where you are.”

Kara could only stare at him in surprise.

She instinctively wanted to accept. To say yes, but she wasn’t the same woman she’d been just two weeks ago. Wasn’t as naïve. People didn’t offer to do such generous things like this man was without strings attached. And she wasn’t going to climb out of the frying pan into the fire again.

“Right. You need time to think about it. Fair enough. Just don’t say no right now. When my team finds us, you can meet them, ask them whatever you want about me. They’ll be completely honest. They aren’t going to say good shit about me just to butter you up. They’re a little rough around the edges sometimes, but they’re all good men.”

Arrow looked down again…and frowned. He lifted her hand and stared at the bruising around her wrist. “I’m sorry.”

Kara was confused. “About what?”

“I bruised you when I held on to your wrist.”

Looking at her hand, she saw that he was right. The pain from his grip had simply blurred into the countless other aches and pains. “It’s fine. If you hadn’t held on to me, I would’ve been washed away.”

“Doesn’t make me feel any better, knowing I put more marks on your body.”

“More?”

“Yeah. You’ve got two black eyes. And bruising here…” He brought his hand up slowly, so as not to startle her, and very lightly brushed his fingers along the side of her neck, exactly where her ex had put his hands around her throat.

Kara blinked, then brought her own hand up to her neck, as if to cover the marks she hadn’t even realized were there. “Oh. I didn’t know…which is stupid, because of course I have bruises from where he…But I guess I forgot about it, what with the flood and all. Or didn’t realize they were so obvious or something.”

She could hear the shame in her voice. And based on Arrow’s expression, he felt…maybe angry on her behalf again? Maybe a little guilty, thinking he’d caused that shame? Whatever he was thinking, his next words were an abrupt change of topic…which sounded like “distraction” to Kara.

“Come on. We need to get out in the open so my friends can find us.”

“How will they know where to look?” Kara asked, her mind still spinning with his offer to go to Virginia.

“They won’t. Not exactly. But they also won’t stop until they do. Doesn’t matter if they have to search the entire state. They won’t leave until they’ve found me. They’re going to be anxious to tell me what a boneheaded thing I did, jumping out of a perfectly good helicopter.”

Kara snorted at that. “It wasn’t exactly the smartest thing to do.”

Arrow didn’t crack a smile. “I’m thinking it was the best decision I’ve made in my entire life.” They walked about twenty feet before he stopped again. “Wait, stay here a sec.”

Kara watched as he walked back to pick up his discarded T-shirt. He brought it over to where she was standing and knelt at her feet. He ripped it into long strips, using the hole where the glass had gone through as a starting point and discarding the bloodiest portion of material. He gestured to one of her feet. “May I?”

Kara frowned but nodded, having no idea what he was even asking.

It only dawned on her after he gently picked up her foot…and began wrapping one of the scraps of material around it.

She used her hand on his shoulder to steady herself and watched as he tied the material around her ankle. Then he did the same to her other foot.

It wasn’t a shoe, and it wouldn’t protect her against anything too sharp, but the difference between the cloth on the sole of her foot and the cold, hard ground was like night and day.

For some reason, despite everything else she’d been through, his thoughtful gesture almost had her breaking down.

But she blinked back the tears. She had a feeling once she started, she wouldn’t be able to stop. And she didn’t want to look weak in front of this man. Not that he’d consider her tears a weakness. How she knew that, Kara had no idea, but she still didn’t want to have a nervous breakdown in the middle of the woods. She’d wait until she was somewhere a little safer. Cleaner. Drier. And hopefully private.

For now, she’d put one foot in front of the other. That’s all she could do. All she’d ever done in her life. She’d figure out what to do next once she was out of the woods.

But Arrow’s offer wouldn’t stop rattling around in her head. She’d never been to Virginia, and she wasn’t sure she fully trusted the man walking next to her…but what other choices did she have? She couldn’t stay here in Asheville. Not with the threat of Nolan over her head. And Arrow hadn’t done anything to make her think he’d hurt her. But then again, neither had Nolan until he’d Tased her in her parking lot.

Sighing in frustration over the uncertainty of her future, and not knowing what to do, Kara decided to push it all to the back of her head for the moment. Arrow wasn’t asking her to decide right now, so she wouldn’t. And they had to hope for a rescue first, anyway. She’d see what the day held and go from there.

What she did know was, the man leading them through the trees had saved her life. Had literally risked his own well-being and very life for her own. No one had ever done anything like that before. If she couldn’t trust him, well…she literally couldn’t trust anyone ever again.

That thought was depressing as hell, but she couldn’t seem to shake it. Time would tell if Arrow was authentic or somehow playing her. She hoped like hell he wasn’t another in a long line of people in her life who saw her as a means to an end.