“You sure you’re okay?”
I nodded. “I just need to escape into some writing, but do you think…?”
“What?”
“Can you stay in my room with me for a bit? Or leave the door between our rooms open.”
“I’ll stay,” he said, grabbing his laptop and sitting down on the bed. He leaned against the headboard and crossed one ankle over the other. I did the same and started writing.
“What is a good descriptor word for red? Cherry? Lipstick?” I asked a while later, my brain not wanting to cooperate.
“My truck is candy apple red,” he said without looking up.
“Oh, blood.”
“Blood red? Isn’t that kind of morbid for a romance novel?” he asked.
“No blood on your arm.”
He turned his arm around to reveal a small gash across his forearm. “Huh, must have happened in the panic at the hall. Scraped it on a table or something.”
I stared at him.
“Luna, it’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing. You had to run to me because I froze, and you got hurt. Let me clean it up for you.”
“Luna—”
“Please, Hayes.”
He blew out a breath and nodded.
I retreated to the bathroom to find what first-aid supplies we had, and when I came back, he was sitting at the table by the window.
I knelt in front of him to examine the cut. It was deeper than it had first looked. “How did you not feel this?”
He shrugged. “I was focused on keeping you safe.”
My heart constricted in my chest, and I gently turned his arm so I could see better. His skin was warm under my fingertips. “I’m sorry, Hayes.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Luna. This kind of thing happens. I’ve been shot, stabbed,punched—”
“But this one was my fault.” I took a cotton ball and dipped it in antiseptic, then dabbed it over the cut.
He hissed through his teeth, and I blew gently on the cut to ease the sting.
“You can’t be perfect all the time,” he said.
“Why not? You seem to be,” I countered.
His breath came sharp through his nose. “Not always.”
I glanced up from where I was cleaning his arm. “I have a hard time believing that.”
He hesitated, jaw flexing. “When I was first starting in private security, I was at this event, guarding a rich tech founder and his wife. I’d done all the prep, background checks, building layout, and crowd vetting. Should’ve been an easy job.”
“What happened?”
