Jen_C’s Reviews > Strike a Match > Status Update

“You have to let me in, Kate. Take that leap and trust me. I promise, I’m not going to let you fall.” He took her hands and slowly drew her toward him. Kate collapsed against him, shoulders shaking. “I think I love you, too,” Kate said. “And it terrifies me.”

He’d thought he’d finally met someone who would understand when he started dating Kate. Her family was even more dysfunctional than his. With a drug-addicted dad in prison and a mother that was probably dead of an overdose, surely she’d understand why he had to do everything possible to help Amy the way his parents wouldn’t.

Kate had been abused. Not physically, perhaps, but emotionally. Suddenly everything clicked into place, so much of her previous behavior making perfect sense. Anger roared inside Taylor, as strong as any fire, along with a fierce need to protect Kate. To make all her pain disappear. He was glad Beau was

Of course she wouldn’t remember him. Some people remembered traumatic events in crystal-clear intensity, like an instant replay every time the event came to mind. And some barely remembered it at all. He’d only lost three people to fires over the past eighteen months, but he remembered each event with near perfect detail. He shouldn’t have assumed it’d be the same for the loved ones affected.

I showed her your picture and we talked. She was really drawn to you.” Surely she’d recognized him. Maybe there was something she wanted to tell him and that’s why she’d asked for the date. Maybe she simply wanted to spend a few hours in the company of someone who had also been present on that horrific night.

Some days she barely thought of Beau. Other times she hated herself for being so much happier with him gone. The last year and a half had felt like sunlight after a long winter, but loneliness had begun to creep in as well. It had taken a lot of courage to admit she wanted another relationship—this time, a healthy one.

Kate dropped onto the couch in the nurse’s break room, her legs collapsing beneath her as she struggled to keep her eyes open. Sixteen hours since she’d been outside the hospital. It felt like sixteen days. She’d stay for sixteen more if it meant not having to play a nurse-slash-doormat to Beau. But she’d worked her three days of twelve-hour shifts, and she’d have to spend the next four days at home.