Bridging Two Hearts by Michelle Ule

Author:Michelle Ule
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2014-05-12T00:00:00+00:00

sixteen

Even though Josh would be training at the navy’s medical center in Balboa Park most of the week, he still had to participate in morning physical training. PT started at 0500, five in the morning, for him and several others. They ran the beach past the BUD/S trainees, went through the obstacle course, zipped across the street, and swam for half an hour before changing into clean uniforms.

Josh drove Pete’s Camaro and left for Balboa at seven fifteen. He roared onto the bridge and hit fifty miles per hour in seconds. It felt good to power the car, especially after last night’s disaster. As he reached the top and the curve toward downtown San Diego, he could see burn marks on the cement roadway. Josh slowed and frowned.

Pieces of the blown tire littered the area along the side rail. Burned rubber marks veered to the right on the road—he remembered that clearly—and then straightened to the left. His forearms ached from how hard he’d clenched the wheel trying to maintain control. If his stomach hadn’t been turning flips at the moment, Josh would have felt smug. His instructors had taught him well. He hadn’t hit the center divider nor even rubbed the side of the car against the guardrail.

Of course, Josh had trained in different circumstances, not on a narrow bridge, but the first few times he had a tire shot out from under him had been unnerving. Living through it six times and being evaluated on his reaction meant he’d gone through a lot of tires, but he had known instinctively what to do when Amy’s tire blew.

“I told her last night,” he said aloud. “One of the best ways to deal with fear is to gain knowledge and practice.”

Of course you had to be in a peculiar line of work to practice such skills.

He rubbed the sore left side of his neck. Nausea flared and he shivered. No wonder Amy feared the bridge. They had come close to disaster last night. If there had been any other car on the road near them, they might not have walked away.

As he drove past where he’d changed the tire, Josh thought of Amy sobbing against his chest and how he’d tried to comfort her. His parents had taught him to care for people in distress, whether they deserved it or not.

It served her right to be scared. She should have let him change the tire. He hoped she’d learned her lesson.

Maybe now she’d forgive him? He’d make her eat crow.

If he didn’t have to eat some himself—it disturbed him to drive past the spot.

Josh turned off his smartphone as he entered one of the hospital training rooms half an hour later. New protocols for wound care in the field, assessment skills, and the annual refresher CPR training were on the docket. While Josh knew the basic plan behind the upcoming team training cycle, surprise medical training always made him suspicious.

He didn’t turn his phone on until he got back home at dinnertime with Pete’s burrito and several bags of groceries.

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