Scrape. Scrape.“Come on, damn thing!” whispers a tiny, terse voice, followed by a feminine grunt.
My boots crunch on broken glass, making it impossible to sneak up on the rude individual spying on me. They’d better enjoy these last seconds in Haunted Health, because they are as good as fired. Toast. Nobody intrudes on my private meltdown and continues as if nothing happened. And before they leave, they will sign an NDA so airtight that they will suffocate on the spot if they breathe a word of this to anyone.
“Please don’t come any closer,” says the tiny voice as I round the corner.
She’s blond, with the brightest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re a strange almond shape and dominate her face like a cartoon princess, but that’s where her elegance stops. Her hair has dust bunnies trapped in snarls. Dirt sticks to her pale, sickly skin. She wears an ogre-sized hospital gown tied in a complex jumpsuit-type-thing. Her feet are comically small compared to my large boots, as if she sports the hooves of a hucow.
“Not a step closer, or I’ll stab you,” she whispers with a whimper. Fierce little thing holds an epidural needle in its protective pouch, waving it at me as if nobody informed her of her tiny stature.
“You stab me, and I’ll stab you,” I say, holding my instrument hands in front of my chest.
“Dr. Stein.”
“Lucky guess,” I say with a chuckle. I know exactly who this is now. “You must be the Werebrown brat who turned my hospital into a three-ring circus. Liam is quite upset with you, but don’t worry. I’m the best surgeon that ever was and sewed your teeth marks shut myself. He shouldn’t have a scar once he removes the bandages.”
“Teeth marks…sewed shut…oh mylanta!” She raises a tiny hand to her dried, cracked lips as if truly horrified by her actions. “I didn’t mean to hurt him—”
“When you bit him, or just in general? He’s taken the rest of the day off, so he didn’t hear you screaming at him through the vents. But the rest of us did, so I’m sure someone will relay your curses to him when he returns.”
Her eyes round into saucers.
“But Liam is one of the toughest cyclopes I’ve ever met. Did you know he’s knighted by the Fae King? Saved a wholemerpeople hatchery when a volcano erupted too close to the colony’s nursery. Some say he saved them from extinction while sustaining third-degree burns over most of his body. I used to say he was thick-skinned…but you kinda disproved that…unless…you wouldn’t happen to be a day-walking vampire, would you? You see, it would be better for his reputation if you were,” I say, laying it on thick.
I hate brats and bullies, and I can’t decide which she is. Her family brought her from the Were’s forest. Her pack is paying for her treatment. She will die without surgery, yet she bites, runs, and hides like a little puppy. Her ulcerative colitis is aggressive. I was able to glean that from the scopes she got as a kid. I can only imagine the number of painful lesions that cause her agony every time she eats.
“You don’t like me,” she says with a lip tremble.
Of all the things to say…why does my opinion of her matter? I frown at the needle jiggling in her grip. Her elbow shouldn’t be so wide in comparison to her forearm. She’s too thin. My gaze travels up her arm to where her collarbone juts out from the top of her tied ensemble. A bruise mars her shoulder—probably from the fight to get her into a wheelchair. A teardrop drips from her jaw. I follow the tracks to those sorrowful eyes.
“You shouldn’t care if I like you,” I whisper, feeling the weight of my cold mask over my feelings.
“It’s what’s really wrong with me,” she says, lowering the needle to her side. “Everyone says my colitis holds me back, but it’s really my need to be liked. If I didn’t care if my family or my pack hated me, I could go where I belong. I wouldn’t be turningyour hospital into a three-ring circus. I’d be on a wellness retreat in the human realm to work on myself…all of me. If youwant to fix me, your carving set should be aimed at my head, not my belly.”
“I know medicine. Your colitis is killing you. I want to save you.”
“Like you saved that Fae family? I couldn’t help but overhear.”
“I see,” I reply, raking my closed scissors through my hair in agitation. A small tuft of black hair rests at the tip when I bring my hand down. I’ll be bald by the end of the day if I’m continuously challenged like this.
“I shouldn’t throw your private thoughts back at you. I’d hate for someone to comment on the chaos in my head. Look, you care about them—”
“Now, it’s you who doesn’t know me.”
“True, but you wouldn’t beat yourself up if you didn’t care. Yes, you hide it in a closet, but you didn’t check if anyone was in here. I sat in the corner by the vent the entire time. Your heart was so full, I don’t think you cared who heard your troubles. Maybe you even wanted someone to hear your anguish, so you could set it free.” With each word, she slides a few inches closer to the open vent.
“And you—oh wise one—got all this insight on my character while I trashed a storage room?”
“I do a lot of meditating,” she says with a lop-sided, tear-stained smile that melts my heart.
“We’re at an impasse, Miss—um…”
“Alette,” she supplies, reaching for my hand. I drop my chin to glare at her. Her little giggle as she retracts her hand shoots an arrow to my groin. I fight my reaction to her as I watchthe blush creep up her cheeks to her hairline. Her hair is so thin that I can see where her scalp turns pink to the crown.
“We’re at an impasse, Alette. You care about me and my welfare, but you aren’t in a position to make my job easier. It’s my job to decide who gets the privilege of my OR and who doesn’t. Those Fae were rejected today, and it devastated them…and yes, it devastated me too. Unfortunately for you, I can cure you, which means I want you in my OR. I could make you a J-pouch in hours and give you a pain-free life—”
“With one hand tied behind your back?”
“You will find nobody can tie these hands,” I say with a flirty smirk.
