Chapter 24
Chapter twenty-four
Who do I belong to?
Carina
Idon’t sit down.
I know if I do, I won’t get back up.
The locker room’s half-lit, reeking faintly of antiseptic. My feet throb inside my shoes, and my bra strap has carved a permanent canyon across my shoulder blades. And my back—Jesus, my back is screaming.
Twelve hours down, one low-stakes wrist fracture reassigned “just in case,” and a few new murmurs I didn’t bother pretending not to hear. Jenny, apparently, has thoughts on my pregnancy and discreet affairs.
Heidi had the grace to give me a heads-up before I ran face-first into the latest swirl of speculation that she thinks I’ve probably had an affair with a married man, and that’s why I’m not talking about who the father is.
I almost laughed, but didn’t because today, for the first time, felt like a limitation. Like being pregnant was more than just something I was managing—it was something other people were defining me by.
A reason to reroute me, go whisper, and to withhold.
But I didn’t fight it or correct the reassignment. Didn’t say a thing when the resident two years behind me got the case that Moreno would’ve tossed my way in a second.
I just stood there, feeling too tired to protest. Too hollow to argue with something that would only prove their point that I was too emotional and fragile.
I haven’t missed a single damn call or consult, yet suddenly, they’re adjusting around me and softening the corners. Deciding, without asking, what I can and can’t take.
But I didn’t forget how to drill a damn plate simply because my body decided to build a damn human.
So now I’m here, peeling off gloves with shaking fingers, swaying on sore feet, stomach twisting like it’s punishing me for not eating since sunrise.
My muscles ache in a way that feels deeper than usual, a tug I’ve been ignoring for the past hour. There’s a stretch across my pelvis when I lean forward, the kind of tightness that makes me pause before I stand. Probably nothing, or maybe something. I don’t know anymore.
I shove my badge into my coat pocket and knot my hair back up with a tie from my wrist, even though I’ll take it down in five minutes.
The hallway is nearly empty as I step out, just the glow of artificial light and the trace of a case I didn’t get to scrub in on, already fading behind the doors.
And still, all I can think is that if someone had handed me a scalpel, I wouldn’t have hesitated.
But today, they did.
***
The sky’s already dusky by the time I unlock my front door. I step inside, and the silence hits like static. I toe off my shoes in the entryway and sink to the floor to peel off my socks.
And stay there.
I can’t get up. I’m too tired.
And maybe I should cry, maybe that would help. But instead, I stare at the scuff mark on the baseboard, then lean my head back against the wall and let my eyes fall closed.
A key turns in the lock, followed by a tentative knock—a courtesy, not a question.
I gave him the spare key two weeks ago. Just slid it into his palm without a word one night when I was too tired to argue.
So I don’t flinch when I hear the familiar squeak, the dull thud as it bumps the edge of the console table. I just sit there on the floor of my own hallway, one shoe off, the other half-undone, watching the light from the streetlamps pour through the gaps in the blinds.
His footsteps are slow at first, then sharper.
“Carina.”
I try to speak, try to tell him I’m fine, that I just need a second. But my throat’s tight and my chest aches and something hot pricks at the corners of my eyes.
Reid crosses the room in three long strides.
“I’m fine,” I murmur. “I just—sat down.”
His eyes scan me once, then again. Clearly, he doesn’t buy it, but he doesn’t argue.
“Okay,” he says, crouching beside me, a deep frown carved into his beautiful face. “Let me help.”
His hands are warm beneath my arms, careful but firm as he lifts me easily into his chest. I let my body sink against his, exhausted and trembling in ways I can’t fully explain.
He carries me through the hall, past the living room, and into the bathroom. The world tilts a little as he lowers me onto the closed lid of the toilet, crouching in front of me.
I stare at the grout between the tiles as he brushes my hair behind my ear, then gently lifts my foot into his lap to peel off the second shoe.
His thumb brushes the edge of a raw blister. It’s worse than the others—torn and red and angry.
“Christ, Havoc.”
“It’s just a blister.”
“It’s three.”
His jaw tightens, and I can see him swallow the thing he wants to say, the thing that’s clawing at the back of his throat. Instead, he shifts closer and lifts my foot into his lap, reaching for a tissue from the vanity to dab away the worst of it.
“You didn’t stop,” he says quietly. “You didn’t even sit.”
“Didn’t have time.”
“Are you limping?”
“Not badly.”
His hands still, and his thumb rests against the arch of my foot, holding me there.
“This isn’t sustainable,” he murmurs.
“It has to be.”
A breath passes between us. Thick and taut and full of everything neither of us is saying.
Then he reaches over to the bath and turns the taps on. Tests the temperature with his hand under the stream, adds a few drops of lavender oil from the tray by the mirror, then pulls a clean towel from the cabinet.
“I got knocked from a case today,” I whisper, watching him. “I didn’t even fight it. Just stood there and let them reassign a fracture case and whisper about whether I’m fragile or unstable or sleeping with a married man.”
Reid stills.
My voice wobbles. “They think I’ve lost it. That I’m not good enough anymore.”
He looks up, eyes locking with mine. “You are.”
I shake my head again. “I haven’t missed a single consult, you know? I’ve hit every target, and I’ve been managing it. But today, it wasn’t about what I can do. They just… decided for me. They didn’t even ask.”
My jaw trembles, and I bite down hard to keep it steady. “Like I forgot how to do my fucking job because I have a uterus and a due date.”
Reid reaches up, brushes his fingers along my shin, and waits.
“I feel like I’m being erased,” I whisper. “Bit by bit.”
He exhales, but his hand tightens around my ankle like he’s anchoring both of us.
“I hate that you felt alone in that,” he murmurs. “You can talk to me about this shit, okay? Always.”
“I didn’t want to make it your problem.”
“Carina, you’re my… You are never a problem.”
That sentence hits somewhere low in my chest, sharp and soft all at once.
“Come on,” he murmurs. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
I nod once, because it’s all I’ve got left.
He rises first, then reaches down and pulls me to my feet with both hands. I sway, but he steadies me, and his hands find the small of my back, warm and firm and grounding.
“You gonna let me undress you, or do I need to file a request form?”
My lips twitch. “Depends who’s processing it.”
“Pretty sure I know someone on the inside.”
He steps closer, fingers brushing the hem of my top.
“Can I?”
I nod, and he helps me out of my top first, lifting it carefully over my head, eyes not leaving mine. Then the tank beneath. His fingers are warm where they graze my skin, but his touch stays reverent, especially as it sweeps across the swell of my stomach.
He kneels to help me step out of my leggings, and when he tugs them free, he winces.
“Jesus. You’ve got another blister on your other foot, too.”
“Occupational hazard.”
“Gonna start wrapping you in bubble wrap.”
“Kinky.”
He huffs a breath that almost sounds like a laugh, then leans forward and presses a kiss to the inside of my knee.
When he helps me into the tub, the water is perfect. Warm and easing around me like a sigh. He tucks the towel behind my neck, then sits on the closed toilet seat, watching closely.
“You hungry?”
I nod. “Haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
His jaw ticks. Just once, but I catch it.
“Carina.”
“I know,” I say quickly, already bracing. “I meant to—there just wasn’t—”
“No.” His voice is quiet, but not soft. “This isn’t negotiable.”
I blink.
“You don’t get to run yourself into the ground,” he says, leaning forward. “You don’t get to go all day on caffeine alone and then collapse in a hallway.”
“I didn’t collapse—”
“You were on the floor.”
“I… sat. Briefly.”
He exhales, but there’s heat simmering under his calm. “Let me help. Not because you’re fragile, but because you shouldn’t have to fight so hard just to be taken seriously.”
My breath hitches.
“And if you let me help carry the small things, you can focus on the big ones. You can keep doing your job your way, and no one gets to say a damn word about whether you’re coping or not.”
The words land like kryptonite wrapped in logic, because that’s what it is. He’s not offering pity, he’s offering strategy. The kind of loyalty I’ve never known how to ask for, let alone accept.
“What about hockey?”
“It’s the off-season,” he says with a quirk of his mouth. “Exploit me while you can, baby.”
I snort, but my voice comes out smaller than I intend.
“You brought food?”
He nods once. “Coconut curry. And snacks for later.”
My eyes flutter shut. “Of course you did.”
“I brought your body wash, too. The one you said didn’t make you wanna barf or give you a headache. And some honey,” he adds after a beat, quieter now. “The good stuff. From my hives.”
It hits me then, a quiet breaking. A pressure in my chest that gets tighter with every breath.
“I’m so tired,” I whisper, sinking further into the water. The words scrape out of me before I can swallow them. “Not just today, not just work. All of it.”
Reid doesn’t move, but I feel his eyes on me.
“I thought I could keep pushing through, like it wouldn’t change anything. Like if I didn’t talk about it, no one would treat me differently. But they are. They already are.”
I swipe at my eyes, frustrated. “And I know I shouldn’t care. I know it’s not true. But it still—” My voice breaks. “It still hurts.”