Road Tripped (Satan's Devils MC Utah #1) - Manda Mellett Page 0,63

you thought I was having a frig.” She snorts again.

I lay back against the pillow, feeling a bit proud that despite the seriousness of our conversation and her admission of weakness, I’ve managed to put a smile on her face.

15

Swift…

I hate admitting I’m weak.

I hate that my vulnerability affects me in ways I can’t control. That being in an unfamiliar environment with none of the technology that I normally depend can cause a panic attack to come up as if from nowhere and make me physically shake. I can’t help myself, can’t control the fear that comes over me. I can sleep on a plane, in a chair, but put me in a bed, when my PTSD hits, the ability to drop off evades me.

It’s the silence, so acute. I can hear things like a voice very close to me, or noises like a gunshot, loud enough to penetrate my deafness, but I always know if I close my eyes an enemy might sneak up, unheard and unseen.

Talking with Road, I’d picked up enough to satisfy his questions, but when he was speaking fast, I could only make out the odd word.

Snatcher knows I get PTSD, and his solution is ensuring I don’t sleep alone and that without my technical aids, I have working ears in the room with me. I should have expected he’d team me up with Road, but I didn’t think. I suspected it would be Rascal or Piston.

I’m a soldier. I’ve never asked for, or expected, to be treated differently from a man. Of course, when I served, separate bedrooms and bathrooms were available for the different sexes on base. But out in the field it was a case of make do where and when. Here, with the Devils, it’s more important than ever to pretend I’m the same as them.

When we walk into a situation such as how we rescued Mona today, we receive information in bits and pieces. So we tend to set out en masse, even if only a few of us end up taking part in a mission. It’s better to be overmanned than under, and better still to get to where we need to be fast, even before we know what we’ll be walking into.

Duty is good at finding us places to stay but were we to insist on the right number of bedrooms, it would cause him a headache. It’s not unknown for eight of us to be faced with just two rooms.

Unless I was going to act like a prima donna and insist on my own room, I would have to suck it up and sleep with however many brothers needed to share. I was never worried about anyone making a pass at me, but I knew from the start I risked exposing my PTSD.

My hope that I could keep it hidden was defeated early on, and it soon became clear that something happens to me when the lights are turned out.

Luckily, I was with men who knew how debilitating PSTD can be. My Satan’s Devils’ brothers’ reaction had, to a man, been supportive. We’re a family first, and they went out of their way not to make me feel excluded or different, my deafness just an obstacle to be overcome. The solution was obvious. When I didn’t have my technology around me, I’d have human ears sleeping near me. That was why I’d been scared when I’d felt the bed move and thought Road was going to leave.

Usually a human presence is enough to reassure me, but sometimes I’ll still get panic attacks at night, in whatever form they might take. Sometimes, I freeze, lie awake, and just wait in hope that the attack will pass and I’ll either sleep or day will break. Sometimes I whimper in my sleep. Sometimes, apparently, I call out.

Other times I uncontrollably shake. I should be embarrassed for the explanation that Road had jumped to, but it’s so ludicrous it had made me laugh. Never, ever, before had I been accused of rubbing one out.

There was no reason not to explain to Road, and there’s some comfort in him knowing now. Now he knows, he won’t leave me alone. With that assurance, I should be able to go to sleep now.

But I still can’t. And now it’s not my PTSD plaguing me, talking to Road had pushed that back into its box. It’s Road himself. It’s knowing how close he is. It’s the effect he’s having on me. Once we’re back in