"Please." Her voice was barely a whisper. "Not tonight."
I watched her walk back inside, knowing there was a secret she'd been keeping. A grief she'd been carrying alone. Something about that baby, that mother, had opened a wound I hadn't known existed.
I wanted to follow her. Wanted to demand answers, to break down whatever walls she'd built and force her to let me help.
But Calla had asked for space. And after everything we'd been through, the least I could do was give her that.
Even if it was slowly killing me.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CALLA
PRESENT DAY
The on-call roomwas small and sterile, with a cot that had seen better decades and a pillow that felt stuffed with regret. I lay there for hours, staring at the water-stained ceiling, replaying the moment in the cafeteria over and over.
The mother. The baby. The way my whole body had betrayed me, crumbling in front of Cassian like I hadn't spent five years building walls specifically to prevent that from happening.
Everything we lost. Everything we could have had.
I'd said that. Out loud. To him.
What was wrong with me?
The words had escaped before I could stop them, rising from some deep place I thought I'd sealed shut years ago. And Cassian had looked at me with such tenderness, such concern, that I'd wanted to tell him everything. All of it. The truth I'd been carrying alone since the day our marriage started dying.
But I'd kept my mouth shut. The way I always did. The way I'd been trained to do since childhood, when my mother's illness had taught me that falling apart was a luxury we couldn't afford.
Around four in the morning, I gave up on sleep entirely. I showered in the communal bathroom, changed into fresh scrubs someone had left outside my door, and went to check on ourpost-op patients. Rounds wouldn't officially start until seven, but I needed to move. Needed to do something with my hands that didn't involve thinking.
The patients were stable. The man Cassian and I had operated on together was already showing signs of improvement, his vitals stronger than they'd been six hours ago. I stood at his bedside, reviewing his chart, and tried to feel the satisfaction that usually came from saving a life.
It wouldn't come. My mind kept drifting back to the bench outside the emergency entrance. Cassian's shoulder against mine. The way he'd looked at me when I asked him not to push.
Please. Not tonight.
He'd let me go. He'd given me the space I'd asked for, even though I could see how much it cost him. That was so Cassian. Respecting boundaries even when he was desperate to cross them.
I finished my rounds and found myself wandering, restless energy driving me through unfamiliar hallways. Riverside was older than Obsidian, the architecture dated, the paint peeling in corners the cleaning staff couldn't quite reach. But it had a rooftop garden, I'd noticed during our initial tour. A small green space on the seventh floor, designed for staff who needed a moment of peace between crises.
I took the elevator up.
The rooftop was empty at this hour, the sky just beginning to lighten along the eastern horizon. The garden was nothing special, just some potted plants and a few benches arranged around a central fountain that had been turned off for winter. But the view was decent, the city spreading out below in shades of gray and gold, and the air was cold enough to wake me up properly.
I found a clear space near the railing and started to stretch. Basic movements, the kind I'd learned in medical school whenstress had threatened to consume me. Reach for the sky. Fold forward. Breathe.
"Couldn't sleep either?"
I turned. Cassian stood in the doorway, two cups of coffee in his hands, looking as tired as I felt. His hair was damp from a shower, his scrubs wrinkled in a way that suggested he'd slept in them. Or tried to.
"Not really," I admitted.
He crossed the rooftop and handed me one of the cups. Our fingers brushed during the exchange, and I pretended not to notice the warmth that spread up my arm.
"I checked on our patients," he said. "Everyone's stable."
"I know. I checked too."
