2. Dayton
Dayton
“Yeah, I’ll take it.” I disconnected the call with the chief of staff and turned back around.
I was literally just walking out of the hospital when I got paged because Martinez called in sick with the flu, and they needed me to cover for him.
After just finishing a twelve-hour day shift, which I rarely took, taking the night shift seemed like a cakewalk.
If I were lucky, I could sleep through it and get paid triple time for doing so.
Besides, working wound care was actually one of my favorite areas to cover. During the day, we got a lot of kids with scraped knees or cuts that needed stitches and a lollipop. But at night, that’s when things got interesting.
That's why I liked working the night shift.
It would go from quiet to hopping in a matter of minutes.
It kept my blood pumping and fulfilled the need in me to take care of people.
The best part was that I rarely saw people die.
I tried to move those patients with life-threatening situations into the ICU as soon as possible, and since we were a small, private hospital, the worst of the worst rarely showed up in my emergency room.
I’d never jinxed myself by acknowledging it was a slow night, but it kinda was, so I ducked into one of the empty triage rooms and closed the curtain around the bed to catch a quick nap.
We had an on-call room, but I liked being closer to the action.
I also liked jumping out of bed and walking out of the room without it looking so obvious that I had been napping.
Not that I wasn’t supposed to nap, but I always felt a little bit guilty.
To make sure I didn’t miss anything important, I set an alarm to ring every hour.
After sleeping through a bus accident that brought in seventeen injured people last year because I was locked away in a private on-call room, I learned the importance of not getting too comfortable.
I was still at work, after all. And if someone needed me to be alert, I couldn’t risk being in a sleep fog from interrupting my REM sleep.
I’d only been woken up by my alarm once when it buzzed with a page from Abby, my assigned nurse for the shift. “Dammit!” I forced my eyes open and called her back, shaking my head to fully wake up as it rang. “Hey, Abs. What’s up?”
“Dayton, hi. Sorry to bother you so soon, but we have a woman who just came in with some severe burns from candle wax. She’s looking a little pale, so I’m gonna put her in exam two to wait for you.”
Candle burns. Ouch. “Yeah, I’ll be there in a minute.”
It took me a second to remember I was in exam three, so at least I wouldn’t be running into my patient on my way out, but I ducked into the bathroom to take a piss and wash up before I went in search of my next patient.
When I finally stepped into the small exam room, the scent of cinnamon and sugar filled my nostrils and made me smile. Delicious. But my smile dropped when I saw the woman with her arms and legs spread out on the table.
She didn’t look good. In fact, I rushed to her side to check her pulse because I wasn’t completely sure she was conscious.
“Miss Arnold?” I checked her chart again to make sure I had her name right. “Cassie Arnold?”
She opened her eyes and flinched. “Oh. You’re here.”
“I am.” I pulled out my penlight and checked her eyes.
Her pupils were equal and reactive. “I’m Dr. Janssen.
Why don’t you tell me what happened to you?
” I glanced down at her left forearm and her inner thighs.
Large patches of the skin were burned, and a few blisters were present with skin peeling off.
She stared at me for a moment and then looked down at her injuries as if just remembering them.
That’s when her lower lip started to quiver.
“I was…” She took a breath and started again.
“I was making candles…” That lip bounced in the most heartbreaking and appealing way that I had to fist my hand to keep from reaching out and smoothing it over.
“What were you doing, Cassie?” I said quietly, employing my best bedside manner.
She took a deep breath and started over. “I was making candles and dropped the pot of melted wax. It just fell and then splashed and then…” The tears started to flow in full force as she choked out a sob. “And then I burned myself, and it hurts so much.”
“Just your forearm and your thighs?” I looked her over again. “Did any other place get burned?”
“No.” She spread her legs even wider, letting her knees fall to each side of the bed in an invitation that my dick immediately took notice of.
Cool it, Doc. She wants you to soothe her burns, not ignite your own flames.
“That wax got you pretty good, huh?” I gently lifted her arm by the elbow to take a closer look. “Were you wearing gloves? Your hand seems to be in good shape.”
She nodded and took a stuttering breath. “Yes. I tried to be careful.” That lip puckered again, but the tears had slowed down. “I always try to be careful, but I’m by myself, and sometimes accidents happen anyway.”
“Yes, Cassie. Sometimes accidents happen.” What really had me sporting the biggest hardon I’d had in months was the way she talked.
She acted like she was a Little, but she was also vulnerable and in pain.
Everybody regressed a little bit under the circumstances, so it didn’t necessarily mean anything.
The other hint that maybe there was more to this beautiful girl than met the eye was her outfit.
She was wearing a short princess dress with fluffy ruffled panties that I had definitely seen in the daycare room at the club.
In fact, the more I thought about it, the more familiar she looked. Had I seen her there before?
If she was a Little, where was her Daddy?
“We’ll get these cleaned up and wrapped, but it’s gonna hurt for a while. Probably a few weeks. And driving will be tough because you don’t want to rub your legs together.”
She pursed her lips tightly and nodded without saying a word.
“But you should be out of here within the hour. If you want to call somebody to pick you up, go ahead and do that.”
She shook her head and sighed, looking toward the door. “I’ll call an Uber when we’re all done here.” She was quiet and then seemed to remember something urgent. “But I’m still allowed to make candles, right?”
I cocked my head at her and the corner of my mouth twitched. Was she actually asking me for permission? “Do you think that’s a good idea?”
She tried to cross her arms over her chest and realized her left one didn’t work that way anymore, so that made her even more frustrated as she held her right arm against her tummy.
“Well, yes, I do. I promise to be more careful, and besides, accidents happen for every artist. If I’m gonna be the best candlemaker in the whole world, I have to just keep going whether I get burned or not. ”
Well, fuck. I didn’t like any of those words.
“Cassie, if you’re gonna be stubborn and make decisions based on what you think is supposed to happen to an artist instead of taking precautions to make sure you don’t become a statistic, then I would say you might need to look into a less dangerous art.
” I raised an eyebrow in her direction. “How are you with watercolors?”
Her jaw dropped, and her sad expression turned to annoyance.
It was fucking cute. “I am excellent with watercolors, thank you very much. But that’s not the point.
I love candles. And candles love me.” She held up her arm as if to prove her point.
“They even want to be attached to me everywhere I go.”
Brat . I rolled my eyes and kept myself from grinning. “Do you think you’re helping your case, Cassie?”
She shrugged and then looked me over with her scrutinizing gaze. “How are you with watercolors, Mr. Fancy Doctor?”
I cleared my throat and released a chuckle. “I’m okay with all paints, but only when I’m helping a Little girl with her art .” I held her stare, waiting to see how she would respond.
Cassie’s breath hitched as she flushed the most delicious shade of pink. “Oh. Well, that’s very nice to hear. I’m sure any Little girl you helped would be happy for your assistance.”
I couldn’t help but notice that instead of keeping her legs splayed wide open for me, she tried to close them up before realizing that was no longer an option. She settled for adjusting the sheet to cover her crotch, which I’d already been staring at since I walked in.
What was this girl trying to hide from me?
I allowed my eyes to trail down her body and then back up. “I’m gonna get you all cleaned up, Cassie, but I don’t want to see you back here with any more wax injuries.”
She swallowed hard. “Yes, sir.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to correct her and tell her to call me Daddy, but that was completely inappropriate.
I must’ve been really low on sleep if I was letting myself daydream in that way.
I’d never lost control of my composure with a patient before, much less one who was alone and vulnerable.
Honestly, I just had that gene in me. The one that made me want to take care of people who need to be taken care of.
And Little Miss Cassie Arnold over here definitely needed someone to take care of her.