I pick up my phone and send a message to his number:Running from something you should be grabbing hold of...WOW...I never would have thought you a coward, Reaper.
It’s a message written in anger and disappointment, I know that, but I can’t help myself.Perhaps it will shake him out of his self-loathing and wake him up to the truth.
After I’ve showered, I call a cab.I have nothing to pack, so I grab my purse and climb into the sedan, my mood blackening by the second.
What right did Reaper have to come into my life like a whirlwind of hotness, throw me into a wild adventure, and then piss off like that?He was sadistic, that’s what he was, making me want him, giving me the best sex of my life, and then vanishing into the night.If I ever saw him again, I’d throttle him, and then kiss the face off of him.
Once back in my small apartment next to the hospital, I make coffee and toast and put on music.I opt for Pink, I’m in need of her rebellious energy and emotional honesty.She can put two fingers up at the world in the most lyrical of ways.
I flip open the laptop and email the ER department telling them I’m no longer sick and will be on duty the next day.With each tap of the keyboard my heart shreds.I’d protected it for so long after I’d rebuilt it, and now, in moments, it has been broken all over again.New wounds, new scars.
How had he gotten to me so quickly?Maybe our souls were destined.Perhaps he was the exact opposite to Billy and that’s exactly what I’d needed.This thought has my head spinning, thoughts and memories of both men disorientating me.
I stand and go to the window.The outside world carries on as though I don’t have an ache in my chest that’s threatening to overwhelm me, a gut-wrenching sadness that is sucking the energy from me.
Closing my eyes, I remember his smell but that only exacerbates my sharp sense of loss.It isn’t just him I miss, it’s thoughts of a future.Oh, I hadn’t planned a house with a picket fence, kids, and a dog, that isn’t his style.But I had entertained the dream of a man at my side to love and protect me and see me as an equal, a woman who added value to the world and not a worthless piece of shit, as Billy had been fond of calling me.
Yet Reaper had gone.
I look at my phone.He hasn’t read my text message.In fact, it hasn’t even delivered.Perhaps the bastard has blocked me!Yep.That would be about right.
I could go to the clubhouse, where I’d found him before.Not a chance.I have too much pride.If a man doesn’t want me, I don’t want him.End of story.Even though that hurts like a bitch, it is a rule to live by.
As the day progresses my appetite goes completely and I find it hard to focus even on a favorite Netflix series.My emotions are in chaos, swinging from longing and anger to disbelief.My mind constantly drifts back to stolen moments with him.Kissing him, fucking him, the relief of seeing him arrive back at the safe house.The way he’d defended me like a man possessed, determined to have my attacker destroyed.
I shiver and wrap myself in a throw despite the warm day.I begin to long for nightfall, for sleep and an escape from my torment.
The moment the sun slips from the horizon, I take myself to bed, curl up into a ball, and let blackness seize me.I’m exhausted and sleep finds me quickly—a thick dark escape into nothingness that I’m thankful for.
When my alarm goes off, I’m groggy and take a cool shower to wake up.After two cups of coffee and forcing a slice of toast down, I head off to work.
The ER will be a relief from my heartbreaking disappointment.Once there my mind will fill with the here-and-now and the lifesaving decisions demanded of me.
Which is exactly what happens.I’ve barely put my purse in my locker when Todd shouts across the department.“Crash in Bay Four!All-hands-on-deck!”
I rush to Bay Four.A middle-aged man is supine and blue.Todd is slapping pads onto his chest ready for defibrillation.
He glances at me.“Fifty-seven-year-old man, presented with acute inferior infarction thirty minutes ago.”
“Fibrinolytic?”I ask though I don’t need to, I can see the drug dripping into his arm.
“Yep.And ten of morphine for pain.He’s diabetic, type two.”
“Okay, charge to two-eighty.”
“Two more members of the nursing staff join us.One checks the oxygen and another draws up adrenaline.
“Clear.”I place the paddles on his chest and click the button to release a huge electrical discharge.His cardiac monitor stays the same.I charge the machine again, the rising beep telling me it’s getting ready to go.“Clear.”Once more I shock the patient.This time it results in the satisfying beep of sinus rhythm on the monitor.
“He’s back,” Todd says.
“Let’s give him some atropine, he’s a bit bradycardic.”I nod at the nurse with the adrenaline.“Stat.”
She nods and sets to her new task.
I study the patient for a moment, relieved to see his lips returning to a normal color.“You okay in here now, Todd?”
“Yep.”He looks at me.“Feeling better?”
