I can’t disagree. It’s the same conclusion that led me to up sticks and move two hundred miles. But hearing him saying it, and seeing the certainty in his molten gaze that this is how it’s meant to be for him—I don’t know. It doesn’t sit right. Like a deeper part of me knows this man is meant to be loved.
“Tam Dubois?”
Our cinched gazes break. We’ve been so wrapped up in our conversation we’ve missed Tam’s name turning green on the screen and the nurse has come to fetch him.
He rises, tension returning to his face.
I catch his hand—by accident, I think. But here we are. “You want me to come?”
Tam hesitates, a myriad of emotions crowding his gaze. Fear. Bewilderment. Frustration. They’re gone in a heartbeat, but I see them, and I stand without waiting for an answer.
“Come on, mate. Let’s get you fixed up.”
Five
TAM
To no one’s surprise, not even mine, my wrist is fractured in two places. I get a cast and a bollocking from a doctor for leaving it so long. But I don’t need surgery, and Bhodi is with me, so I don’t have much to complain about.
Bhodi. He was in the room when the doctor pulled my medical records and mentioned the shit-ton of broken bones I’ve suffered before, standing behind me, his hands on my shoulders as if we’re old friends, not strangers who met for the first time a few nights ago.
He hasn’t asked what happened. Or how it’s connected to the intense conversation we fell into in the waiting room. The one that made me forget the weird buzz in those old scars and the razed sensation in my gut. It’s crazy how he does that—with everything, not just the clusterfuck I dragged into the hospital with me. Five minutes with him and I forget my fucking name.
“We can go now.”
I’m not asleep, but I come back into the room like I’m waking from hibernation. “What?”
Bhodi grins and moves closer, rubbing my arm—the one not encased in fibreglass. “You’re all done. We can go home, unless you want to extend your nap here.”
My desire to hang out at the hospital is less than zero.
I sit up, testing the weight of my casted arm and the flexibility in my fingers.
My arm weighs nothing. My fingers remain utterly fucked, but I can live with that.
Bhodi sets my boots where I can step into them and passes me a paper bag.
A bag that rattles. “What’s this?”
“Your prescription. I got it while you were snoozing.”
I don’t believe him. I hate this place. Everything about it sets my teeth on edge. ButBhodi, man. He’s a fucking sorcerer. If anyone can chill me to sleep on a hospital bed, it’s him, and it’s an odd feeling to know it.
We leave the fracture clinic. Bhodi steers his fucked-up car onto the main road. I have every intention of directing him to the garage on Bell Street, but I’m so fucking tired I can’t formulate the words, and we’re home in no time.
“You should take it easy for a couple of days.” He guides me through the gate, hovering on the other side, as if he remembers that his tenancy agreement forbids him from approaching my house. “Do you have someone you can call?”
“For what?”
It’s another cold day. Bhodi rests his hands on the frosty gate and gives me a patient look. “To help you out.”
I flex my fingers, ignoring the bolt of pain that rockets up my arm. “I don’t need help, and I don’t have time to kick it. November is my busiest month.”
Bhodi sizes me up, probably trying to figure out what I do for a living that makes Christmas so stacked. But he won’t get there—no one ever does, and he surrenders after a beat, backing away. “I’m home all day. Shout if you need anything.”
He disappears. I hear the side gate open and close, then I catch another flash of him as he passes the gap left by the missing panel, and I feel like I’m seeing that messy blond hair for the first time all over again.
Avoir le coup de foudre.
