Once Touched Read Online Free Page A

another facility where he could receive therapy and counseling. He’d ignored their arguments and pleas. He refused to be jabbed with one more needle, handed one more plastic cup filled with pastel-colored pills that were 100 percent guaranteed to turn his brain to slush, or subjected to one more test by a doctor who stared at his laptop screen and repeated that he’d need to be
patient.
With the right rehab program Ethan should regain full mobility in his shoulder and arm. With counseling he should get past the horror of the explosion that had ripped through the armored vehicle and sent him flying from the backseat to the rock-strewn ground to land among other bodies.
    It was possible the doctors were right, that if he talked and talked he might eventually be able to remember that gruesome tableau without wanting to crawl inside a bottle. Eventually he might accept why he alone had survived the blast, why that wasn’t simply some awful, sick joke. It was conceivable that with the right combination of pharmaceuticals, he might succeed in banishing the visions and muting the sounds that assailed him day and night, his own hell on earth.
    What they didn’t understand was that even if a full recovery was in the cards, he couldn’t stay in a hospital room or rehab clinic one more day, wouldn’t lie in a bed and receive treatment that should go to soldiers—some of them still teenagers not even old enough to buy a drink—who’d come back from tours of duty with wounds far more grievous than he’d sustained.
    He’d shot down the idea of staying at his parents’ and receiving outpatient treatment, too. He needed to be in a place where he couldn’t see their worried expressions or have to listen to their tentative, anxiety-laden questions. Perhaps because he’d lived in Acacia for a good stretch of his youth, Silver Creek Ranch was the one place where a few positive memories remained—of open land that stretched, reaching out to pine-covered mountains; of horses and cattle.
    The signal for the attendants to begin the crosscheck interrupted his thoughts. All around the cabin seatbelts were unfastened as the travelers launched themselves from their seats, intent on seizing their place in the narrow aisles. The man with the fuzzy amoeba tie in the adjacent seat was equally determined. Bowed into a lumpy C shape, he lurched toward the aisle, barreling his way through the two-inch space that separated Ethan’s knees from the seat in front of him. He reached his destination with a heavy grunt of satisfaction.
    There’d been a time when Ethan would have beat every passenger on board in that particular race. He was a gold medalist at disembarking from planes and navigating airports at top speed, his carry-on hefted over his shoulder, his stride eating up the carpeted corridors as the promotional posters welcoming him to whatever city or country he’d landed in passed in a blur. Now he remained seated as the plane emptied until only he and the crew standing by the door were left. A minute later, one of the female attendants hurried down the aisle, sympathy in her eyes.
    “Are you all right, sir? If you’d like, we’d be happy to call for a wheelchair.”
    “No, thanks.” He’d managed to get on the airplane. He’d damn well walk off it, too. Steeling himself against the dizziness he knew would come, he grabbed hold of the seat in front of him and hauled his body up, willing his legs to unfold. He stood and a fresh river of sweat snaked down his body. Swallowing his nausea and ignoring the flight attendant’s outstretched arm, he stepped into the aisle.
    —
    In the end, Quinn had no trouble recognizing Ethan Saunders. What was difficult was hiding her shock. He was so…gray. His skin ashen, the sockets of his sunken dull pewter eyes smudged, his gaze cloaked in heavy shadows, his short-cropped hair a liberal mix of salt with the pepper. Even the sweat on his face seemed gray, as though his body were oozing toxins.