The way she stood. The way she breathed. The way the blue-black shine of her hair made my fingers curl in the sheets. The way her mouth flattened when she was trying not to feel something. The way the scent of her—clean soap, coffee, something faintly floral under hospital air—cut through antiseptic and drugs like memory with teeth.
Bennett smiled at her again.
My jaw locked.
“Rourke,” he said, “I’ve been meaning to ask if you’re off this weekend.”
The room went still.
My room.
My hospital bed.
My nurse.
Not mine.
The sheet bunched under my fist.
Pain sliced through my side, but I welcomed it because it gave me something legal to be angry about.
Destiny looked at him like she wanted the floor to open.
“Doctor.”
“There’s this new place near Old Town,” Bennett said. “Good mezcal, supposedly decent food. I thought maybe?—”
Was he serious?
Was the man asking her out in front of me?
In front of a patient?
In front of a man recovering from a gunshot wound who had no weapon, no boots, and no decent way to break his jaw?
My abdomen tightened.
Bad idea.
Pain flared white.
I gritted my teeth.
Destiny saw it instantly.
“Do not tense your abdomen,” she snapped.
I looked at her. “Then tell him to stop flirting.”
Silence.
Beautiful silence.
Bennett blinked.
Destiny stared at me.
I regretted nothing.
