The Evidence #2
It’s a mess of scribbles, blood smears, and frantic shorthand. To her, it’s a map. It’s the holy grail.
“I charted his vitals.”
She taps the page, her finger landing on a jagged line of blue ink.
“Time of death: 21:04. Heart rate was 140 before the crash. Blood pressure was sky-high. That’s the panic response to the paralysis. He knew he was dying. He could feel his lungs stopping.”
She points to a line of text at the bottom.
Injection site noted. 2mm puncture. Hematoma consistent with forced administration. No IV access established by EMS.
“I wrote it down. Before Mercer arrived. Before they scrubbed the digital record. This is the paper record. It’s legal evidence. It establishes the timeline.”
I look at the paper. Then I look at her.
“You stole it.”
“I secured it.”
“You risked your life for a piece of paper.”
“I risked my life for the truth.”
She meets my gaze. The defiance in her chin radiates absolute certainty.
“They killed a nineteen-year-old boy. They murdered him in my trauma bay. If I let them erase that, then I’m an accomplice who watched a murder. I took an oath. Do no harm. That includes not letting murderers walk away.”
The fire in her eyes outstrips the one dying in the hearth.
Something lands hard inside me. Not lust, though that’s there, a constant low current in my blood I’ve stopped pretending to manage. There’s something sharper. Something more dangerous.
Respect.
She isn’t just a civilian. She isn’t just a package to deliver. She’s a warrior. She fights with different weapons: knowledge, stubbornness, ethics. The spirit is the same. She stood in the fire and didn’t burn.
“You’re dangerous, Doc.”
The words leave my mouth barely audible.
“I’m right.”
“Usually the same thing.”
I reach out. I don’t take the paper. I take her hand.
Her fingers are cold, the skin smooth, but the bone structure underneath holds like steel. Mine run warm. The contrast sends a jolt up my arm that nearly knocks the wind out of me.
She looks down at our hands. Then up at me. Her breath catches.
“Boyd—”
“You did well. This changes everything. It proves intent. It proves a conspiracy. Hutchinson can use this.”
“Does it keep me alive?”
“It gives you leverage. Leverage keeps you alive.”
I squeeze her hand once, tight. A promise. Then I let go.
The loss of contact hits me physically. A cold spot takes over where her skin was. I want to take it back. I want to pull her in.
I pick up the paper instead.
“I’ll scan this. Send it to Hutch. He can get a warrant for the body before they cremate it. We need to move fast.”
She hesitates.
“I have the photo too.”
“What?”
“The injection site. I took a picture with my personal phone before they came in. It’s time-stamped.”
“You have a photo?”
“I do.”
I stare at her. She didn’t just secure the chart. She secured the smoking gun.
“You realize what that makes you?”
“A witness.”
“A target. The primary target.”
“I was already a target.”
I turn back to the laptop, forcing myself to focus on the mission. On the data. On anything but the woman standing next to me, who just escalated this war from a skirmish to a nuclear exchange.
But she doesn’t move.
“You checked the perimeter.”
The change in subject throws me.
“Huh?”
“Yesterday morning. With the axe. You were checking the perimeter.”
“Routine.”
“You were angry.”
I stop typing. The cursor blinks on the screen, a steady, mocking pulse.
I look at her.
“I was focused.”
“You were angry.”
She steps closer. She invades my tactical space. She enters the kill zone, and she doesn’t even know it. Or maybe she does. Maybe she knows exactly what she’s doing.
“Why?”
“Because you’re here.”
The truth slips out before I can stop it. Raw. Unfiltered.
“You don’t want me here.”
She’s pushing. Poking the bear.
“I want you anywhere but here.”
I tower over her. I use my size, my darkness, to intimidate her. To make her back down. I need her to back down. I need her to be afraid of me, because if she isn’t afraid, I don’t know if I can hold the line.
“Why?”
“Because as long as you’re here, you’re a target. And as long as you’re a target, I have to be a wall. And I’m tired of being a wall.”
“Then stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Stop being a wall. Be a door, or a window. Be something letting the light in.”
She reaches out and touches the scar on my neck. Feather-light, and it burns like a brand. My pulse jumps against her fingertip. She has to feel it.
“You didn’t save the last one, did you?”
The question slices like a knife between the ribs. Precise. Surgical. She found the old wound and pressed her thumb right into it.
“No.”
I rasp the word out. It tastes like failure.
“I didn’t.”
“Is that why you won’t touch me?”
“You know why I won’t touch you.” I drop my voice, keeping it steady but tight. The air between us hangs thick enough to choke on. “You’ve already figured it out.”
She doesn’t look away. Doesn’t flinch. She tracks this as closely as I do. She diagnosed the fever.
“Because if you touch me,” her voice drops to a quiet whisper, “it stops being clean.”
The word lands exactly where it’s supposed to.
“Yes.” I drag in a breath, slow and deliberate, forcing the truth into order. “Because the second I put my hands on you, this stops being a job. And once it’s personal, I can’t switch it off. And when it’s personal, my focus suffers.”
Her eyes darken. Not with fear. With understanding. She recognizes the monster, and she isn’t running.
“I’ve seen what happens when I lose focus. When I give an order, and someone doesn’t follow it.”
The memory grinds behind my teeth.
“That’s when people die.”
“If you give me an order, I’ll follow it.
You’ve already figured that out.” She uses my own words against me, stepping closer instead of backing away, closing the space like she already decided the risk is worth it.
Her palm comes to my chest again, right over my heart, testing how much restraint remains in me.
“You’re not afraid of touching me. You’re afraid of what comes after. ”
I don’t deny it. I can’t.
“If I touch you,” the honest truth bleeds into my tone, “I won’t stop. I’ll take everything, and I can’t afford to want you when I need to be watching doors, angles, and exits.”
Her thumb presses in slightly, deliberately. Grounding. Provocative.
“Then don’t lose focus. Keep me alive. Do your job.” She looks up at me: bold, terrified, incandescent. “But don’t pretend you don’t feel this.”
I cover her hand with mine, pressing it harder against my chest, forcing my body to remember discipline. Pain. Control. I want to crush her against me. I want to drag her to the floor. I want to ruin us both.
“I’ll keep you alive. No matter what it costs me.”
For one suspended second, we stand there: biology, instinct, and willpower colliding in the narrow space between us. The laptop hums. The fire pops. The blood rushes so loudly in my ears that it drowns out everything else.
Then I step back.
Because the line isn’t about whether I want her.
It’s about whether I can still be trusted to protect her once I take her.
“Coffee. I’m making coffee.”
I turn away before I test it. Before I grab her. Before I prove her right.
“Boyd.”
I pause at the counter. My knuckles go white where I grip the edge of the marble.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
I don’t answer. I can’t.
The machine starts to drip: steady, mechanical, something predictable in a moment that isn’t. I focus on the sound. I focus on the smell of the grounds. I tell myself I made the right call.
Behind me, her voice comes again. Clear. Unhesitating.
“And I meant what I said. I’ll follow your orders.”
The words slide under my skin. They settle somewhere low and dangerous.
I keep my hand still on the granite. Total control. But my pulse surges anyway, a sharp, unmistakable reaction having nothing to do with caffeine or exhaustion.
She didn’t say it like a concession. She said it like a choice. Like she knows exactly what she offers and understands the weight of it. She offers me the one thing I crave more than air.
Control.
I shut my eyes for half a second.
That’s the problem.
I don’t turn around. If I do, I’ll see her watching me. Measuring the effect. Feeling it. And I won’t give her that, not tonight.
“I know.”
Two words. Low. Certain. They carry more than agreement: acknowledgment. Acceptance. A promise wrapped tight in restraint.
The drip continues. Slow. Deliberate.
I force my lungs back into rhythm. I rebuild the walls in my head: protocol, perimeter, purpose. Anything to keep my focus where it belongs.
Because if I let myself lean into what she just said, into the way my body responded to her willingness, I won’t just be making coffee.
And the fact that she knows it.
That’s what makes it burn.