“I’ll escort you to your personal quarters.”
“Nah,” Roz cut in sharply. “I’ll take him. He’s not going anywhere without me.”
Rose’s voice was gentle. “I can show you both—”
“No,” Roz snapped. “Just tell me where it is.”
Gage sighed inwardly. He knew his friend meant well, but he was starting to make him feel like a toddler being dragged around by an overprotective parent.
“I’m Dr. Aliyah Rockwell,” another woman said.
Roz yanked Gage behind him. “Whoa, back up. He don’t need no doctor or any more fuckin’ experiments.”
“Roz, I can understand your hesitation,” Jo intervened. “But Dr. Rockwell is one of the country’s leading ophthalmologists. She’s the former Chief of Vision Trauma at Walter Reed and served over twenty years, rehabilitating combat veterans with catastrophic sight loss. We’re very lucky to have her.”
Dr. Rockwell stepped in closer. Very close.
Her honey-sweet scent was subtle. Her authority and confidence weren’t.
She got in Roz’s space, close enough Gage could feel the annoyance in her breathing.
“Let me be extremely clear,” she said with a sharp tone. “I am the only thing standing between your friend and a lifetime of confusion and pain. No one is experimenting on him. My job is to teach Gage how to live, not as a helpless blind victim, but as a vision-impaired Raven. A man with independence and full use of the abilities and strength he doesn’t realize he possesses.”
Roz didn’t say anything else.
Thank God.
Dr. Rockwell lowered her voice, like doctors did when talking to a hesitant patient.
“Gage, without a full examination, I can already see how fatigued you are,” she said. “Your conjunctiva is inflamed. The pupillary response is reduced to less than forty percent, and the eye muscles behind the right eye are twitching from overstimulation.”
He thought her assessment might be spot on since it felt like his eyes were about to burst into flames.
“Can someone kill the floodlights, please? Now,” she ordered.
The doctor’s breath ghosted over his chin. She was short, but she carried herself like a giant.
He already liked her.
A second later, the lights snapped off.
The burning pressure eased almost instantly.
“I’ve had weighted eye masks placed in a warmer in your quarters. They’re infused with chamomile and lavender. It’ll help soothe your retinal pain and reduce your headache.”
Gage was too exhausted and sore to turn down any potential relief.
During the remainder of the flight, Valor and Zorion had told him their own story, which sounded like hell incarnate. Yetthey stood alive, free, content, and loyal to Jo. If they trusted her…maybe he could try too.
“Okay,” he sighed.
“Right this way.” Rose said.
“Fine. Let’s go.” Roz took his arm and dragged him forward, but a hand was slapped against his friend’s chest.
“Are you blind?” Dr. Rockwell barked.
“What?” Roz sputtered.
