The automatic doors to the A&E department slid back, chill night air rushing towards me. For a moment, I was grateful. The breeze was more than fresh. It was sharp, stinging, but it didn’t smell of hot antiseptic. I tipped my head backwards, closing my eyes, taking a breath. And another breath. There was a just off-fresh smell to the night. Damp tarmac. Ambulance fumes. Cigarettes and a fruity vape scent, all diluted by thin night air.
Only ambulances sat at the hospital entrance. Some with their engines running, others quietly breathing in the few minutes before the next wave of chaos. I moved through the night, out into the dark, towards the shadow of the car park on the other side of the road. Overhead lights buzzed, distorting the calmness I’d felt when I’d first stepped out. Now the night felt too dark, like I could taste and smell it. I dug in my bag for my keys, already replaying the shift in my head. The kid we’d lost, the man who’d coded twice and come back wrong.
“Doctor?”
I froze. He was leaning near the bins, half in shadow, half in the light. Unshaven. Jittery. I knew his face, not his name. He stood straight now. Not the overdramatised stoop of before.
“I can’t help you,” I said automatically. “You need to leave.”
He gave a shallow smile. “Youcouldhelp me.”
My pulse spiked and I glanced back to the doors. I was closer to my car than I was to the front of the hospital. Shuffling, I closed my fingers tighter around the cold metal of my keys, pushing my house key between them. Around me the air stilled, like the night was holding its breath.
Yet it wasn’t the night sucking in air. It was me. Tension filling my chest. Weighing me down like I was fastened to the spot.
The man pushed up from where he leaned. One step. Two. I didn’t move. Couldn’t move.
“Back up,” I squeaked.
He kept coming. Kept walking. Closing in on me. And I kept standing. Unable to think. Unable to move. My chest tightened. My heart hammered. My brain screamed at me to do something. Anything.
He reached forward. A hand lunging at me, fingers closely around my wrist. And the world slowed. His other hand slipped into his pocket, feeling for something. My heart stuttered. Pressure hitting me directly in my chest, swelling up my throat. I croaked words, but no sound came out. I tried to shout, but nothing happened. Time ticked slower and slower, like it might stop altogether.
There was a blur to my side. Something moving quicker than we were. My arm was wrenched forward, and I stumbled with it, but then the pressure released and so did the pause button.
Now everything was fast. He fell backwards, smashing into the metal bins he’d been leaning against. A shadow running at him. Grabbing him. Picking him up and throwing him down again. My heart thundered under my rib cage, each beat hurting. My throat so contorted by fear I couldn’t breathe.
The shadowed man came into focus. Black jeans. Leather cut. Three crowned skulls. He’d crouched down now. Over the top of the other man on the ground, growling like an animal.Then he pushed upright, the man on the ground scrambling to his feet and staggering away.
Stepping backwards, breath tore out of me. Flight responses telling me to run but the message not getting to my legs or chest. Menacingly he turned, stepping into the dull glow from the streetlight. Orange glare catching in his hair, all red and shadows, tied back in a ponytail, a strand falling over his right temple. Leather-covered fists stilled balled tightly, like he hadn’t finished yet. And every long step brought him closer until I could see his face in the dark.
His eyes were almost black in the night, pupils still dilated from adrenaline and anger. A thick, dark ginger beard hid his jaw, but even underneath I could tell he clenched his teeth.
My head throbbed and my legs wobbled, and the ground rose to meet me. Yet the ground never came. A strong arm around my waist did. Fingers wrapped around my bicep. His face blurred in front of me. In and out of focus. One I’d seen before. I sucked in a shaky breath as he set me onto my feet, his grip loosening but not letting go.
Up close, he was even more terrifying. Taller than anyone had a right to be. Broad. Scarred. Built like violence. Yet the hands on me were anything but. His eyes met mine. Sharp. Scanning over my face.
“Are you ok?” he asked.
I shook my head.
His gaze dropped to my wrist, already blooming red where the sleeve of my coat had ridden up. His beard moved. His jaw tightened.
“Shit,” he muttered.
His thumb brushed the skin there, careful, controlled, and I shuddered at the touch.
“I’m fine,” I breathed, the words shaky. “Thank you. You didn’t have to…”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “I did.”
I frowned. “I’ve treated you, haven’t I?” He was familiar, in a weird sort of way.
His eyes lifted to mine again, and for a second, something flickered there. Pain. Recognition. Regret.
“Couple of days ago.”
I nodded, remembering. “Knife wound.”
