16. Blue
Blue
I waited until I was alone.
Then I collapsed behind my desk like my bones had given up. I lay on the floor. My mind whirling wildly.
The linoleum was cold against my cheek. I didn’t care. My heart was pounding like it had something to prove.
Faron Lightfoot.
The boy I met in the desert, the man who made hell feel like home.
The one who broke me and held me together in the same breath.
I should hate him. I should send him packing.
Instead, I lay there with his scent still on my skin and whispered, “Idiot.”
Didn’t know if I meant him or me.
Probably both.
Eventually I got up, washed my face, and buried the pain like I always do — beneath a mask and a mission.
But as I pushed open the office door and walked back into chaos, one thing echoed in my chest like a drumbeat.
This time… it’s not just the patients I need to save.
It’s myself.
And God help me — maybe him too.