It works. Lucky’s mouth curves, the kind of smile that feels like prayer and profanity at once. “Good thing,” he says. “Because I’m a long way from being done with you, Dagger Kitten.”
The door suddenly opens, and a man in scrubs and an easy, practiced smile steps in, clipboard tucked under his arm. He’s got the kind of calm voice people probably hire him for—the medical equivalent of a lullaby that saysyou didn’t die, congratulations.
“Ms. Vale,” he says. “Good to see you awake. How are we feeling?”
“Like I was bulldozed over toxic gas and barbed wire,” I rasp.
He chuckles politely. “Descriptive. Ten points for creativity.”
Lucky sits up straighter beside me, and I wonder what lie he told them when he brought me in.
The doctor glances at his chart, then back at me. “You presented with acute metabolic acidosis and severe gastrointestinal distress. Essentially, your body thought you’d been poisoned. Which, technically, you had.”
I blink. “Technically?”
He gives Lucky a knowing look. “Your partner explained everything. The ‘cleanse smoothie’ you drank at that private retreat outside the city. It was clearly contaminated. We’ve seen similar cases before. Too many ‘natural healing’ compounds mixed together can produce dangerous reactions—blood sugar crash, organ stress, sometimes even convulsions. You’re lucky he got you here when he did. You were in bad shape.”
I glance at Lucky. His face gives away nothing, but the twitch in his jaw tells me he rehearsed his story. Probably between punches.
The doctor keeps going. “We ran a full tox panel. Nothing synthetic, but some high concentrations of alkaloids, and traces of… well, substances that don’t belong in a smoothie. We’ve stabilized your blood pH, treated dehydration, and flushed your system with IV fluids. You’ll feel weak for a few days—soreness, dizziness, probably a raw throat. But your labs are trending back to normal.”
“So, I’m going to live?”
He smiles. “You’re going to live.”
Lucky exhales, like he’s been holding his breath since the Stone Age.
“Try to avoid any detox drinks or powders for a while,” the doctor adds. “And maybe… stick to regular smoothies. Bananas, strawberries, yogurt. Not… whatever this was.”
“Yeah,” I say, dryly. “No more smoothies. Got it.”
He makes a few notes on his clipboard. “We’re going to keep watching you for a little longer, but you should be good to go home in a few hours.”
“Thanks, Doc,” Lucky says as he offers a smile. The doctor gives one in return and exits the room to check in on his next patient.
Silence fills the room again. The IV pump hums softly, the heart monitor ticks steadily.
Lucky’s still sitting there, watching me like I’m made of glass and lightning at the same time. His thumb traces slow circles over the back of my hand.
“You really told them I got poisoned by a wellness smoothie?”
He shrugs. “Technically true.”
I laugh, and it burns my throat, but I can’t stop. “Did they really not ask questions about these?” I raise my wrists. They’re bruised to shit from Phoenix tying me to the chair.
“It’s Vegas,” Lucky shrugs. “Weirder shit walks through those doors every night. There was a guy out there with a rope tied around his wrists and neck. His whole body was painted yellow. And he was wearing a diaper. The way he was walking? Pretty sure he’s in here with something stuck up his ass.”
I scoff and shake my head. “Why do we live here?”
Lucky smiles in return and steps forward, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “’Cause Vegas is home to the psychos like us.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I say with a smile.
He looks down at me, and I meet those green eyes. He’s trying. He’s trying to keep it light, to joke with me. But it’s obvious, what happened to me has hit him hard.
He looks wrecked—bruises on his jaw, cuts on his hands, one sleeve of his shirt torn. But the way he looks at me… It’s devotion distilled to its purest form. Raw and reckless and terrifyingly real.
“I thought you were gone, Willow,” he says, voice cracking for the first time. “When I found you, you weren’t breathing right. I—” He breaks off, jaw tightening, forcing the words through. “I’ve seen a lot of shit in my life, Willow. But I’ve never seen anything that scared me like that did.”
