Faith reaches across the table and squeezes my hand. “We’re going to be okay. You and me. I just need this. I hope you don’t think less of me for it.”
“No. I think I get it, actually.” Because if she gets me as her maid of honor, then her fear that I want Jason will be over. Or so she thinks.
But insecurities like that don’t just go away with some grand gesture. If you need a grand gesture to get over them, they’ve already taken root and started to grow.
I sigh. Faith will never stop thinking I’m after Jason. Not really. It’ll always be in the back of her mind, gnawing at her. And there’s nothing I can do to fix that, but if I do this for her, at least I can say that I tried.
20
DAMIAN
I am tootired to be polite.
The night was relentless. Not catastrophic, just grinding. The kind of shift where you don’t sit once. Where Meron leaves early and then returns in the morning to review metrics, as if he personally carried the department on his back. My shoulders and calves ache. My eyes burn. My patience is thin and caffeine-dependent.
I step out into the parking lot just as dawn begins to bleed into the sky. The hospital looks harmless in daylight. Brick façade. Symmetrical windows. No hint of the exhaustion pulsing inside.
I pull my keys from my pocket and hear an engine behind me. Meron’s car slides into a parking spot two rows down.
That figures. He shows up when the night is over, so he looks like he’s been here all night for the administrators. The nurses could tell them differently, but no one wants to counter Meron, or he can make their lives difficult. If I cared more, I’d stay to tell the administration what actually goes on here, but lately, I have fewer and fewer fucks to give this place.
It’s not that I don’t care about the hospital—I do. But given how little care the administration puts into things, caring is becoming increasingly difficult.
So when Meron pulls in, I don’t alter my pace. I’m off the clock. I owe him nothing, not even an information handoff. He can read the charts and learn what he needs to. I’m done.
“Damian!” His voice carries across the asphalt.
I keep walking.
“Damian!” His voice reminds me of a petulant toddler.
I open my truck door.
He closes the distance quickly, heels striking pavement with unnecessary force. Giant, stomping baby. “Ignoring me is real mature.”
I pause before climbing in, simply because his temper tantrum might be amusing. “What do you want, Meron?” My tone is flat. Not hostile. Just tired.
“You left without checking in.”
“I was under the impression you knew how to read a chart without me explaining it to you.”
“You could have waited. It’s polite?—”
“I did two people’s jobs last night. Yours and mine. I’m done.”
His jaw tightens. “Another example of your unprofessional behavior.”
“Unprofessional how?”
“You know exactly how.” He lowers his voice, as though the empty parking lot might judge him. “Dating a patient is unseemly. Especially one that young. Especially a new mother.” His tone sharpens. “Honestly, Damian, what were you thinking?”
“To be honest, part of me was thinking Amber wouldn’t say anything, because that would mean admitting she went to Dos Hermanos. It’s hardly her kind of restaurant, and she hates Blackbriar.”
His whole body goes smug. The posture, the sly smirk on his face. “Dos Hermanos is where we used to go to avoid Snow Valley—and you—finding out about us when we first started dating.”
For a split second, rage flares. At the way he positions himself as an arbiter of propriety while screwing my ex-wife behind my back before we were separated. The bastard is a hypocrite of the highest order. But the rage doesn’t last. It pops, like a balloon pricked at its weakest point. And in the silence that follows, something rearranges in my mind.
He thinks he has leverage over me. Because I work here. Because I handed him that leverage a long time ago.
