Chapter 15
Fifteen
Beckett
A month after the accident, Dan Morales looks like a man who’s finally won a small but meaningful victory over the reaper.
He’s sitting up in bed when I walk in, and there’s color back in his face. His wife, Elena, is perched on the edge of the mattress beside him, her hand wrapped around his.
They’re laughing together. It’s a good sound. In this wing, I never take it for granted.
“Well,” I say, stepping fully into the room. “This is a promising start. I half expected to find you doing push-ups.”
Dan grins. “You’re interrupting my wife, who’s reminding me I’m not allowed to do anything remotely stupid for the rest of my life.”
Elena doesn’t look apologetic. “You fell three stories from scaffolding. You’ve lost your unsupervised privileges.”
Dan rolls his eyes. “See? This is what I’m dealing with.”
I move closer, checking the monitors and scanning his chart. Multiple fractures and internal injuries that would have leveled most men. It’s a miracle he made it out of the operating room, let alone that he’s sitting here joking.
“How’s the pain?” I ask, clicking my pen.
“Manageable,” he says. “Better every day.”
“And the dizziness?”
“Gone. Mostly.”
I shine a light into his eyes, running through the checks I’ve done a thousand times—move this, breathe here, tell me what still stings. He answers easily, which tells me more than the telemetry ever will.
“You’re still on track to go home in a few days,” I tell him. “Provided you keep behaving.”
Dan raises his eyebrows. “Hear that, babe? I’m almost free.”
Elena squeezes his hand tighter, her expression softening. “Free is a strong word. You’re just changing guards.”
I glance down at their intertwined hands. Dan is the same age my father was when he died. Same build. Same quiet, dry wit. When they wheeled him into the ER a month ago, something in me latched onto that resemblance and refused to let go.
You’re trained not to get attached. They tell you to be a technician, a mechanic of flesh and bone.
But sometimes a patient comes in who looks like the man who taught you how to ride a bike, the man who never made it to fifty, and your hands shake for a fraction of a second before the muscle memory takes over.
That’s the part they don’t talk about in med school—why some doctors start to look like robots.
It’s not because they don’t care. It’s because if they don’t find a way to shut it off, the weight of it will rip them in half.
Elena’s gaze follows me as I write. She nods, then glances pointedly at my left hand.
“I don’t see a ring. Has no one scooped you up yet, Dr. Lawson?”
Dan groans. “Elena, leave the man alone.”
“What? He saved your life. I’m allowed to be curious about whether he has someone to save him from a long day.”
I smile politely. “No ring.”
Dan smirks. “Too busy playing hero?”
“More like married to the hospital,” I reply, tapping the chart. “The hours are terrible, and the food is even worse.”
Dan hums. “Ah, but it’s always good to have someone to argue with, don’t you think? Keeps the blood flowing.”
The thought slips in before I can block it. Madison, standing in my doorway with fire in her eyes and a tongue like a scalpel. The way she looks at me, as if I’m a puzzle she’s already bored of solving, even though her eyes say otherwise.
I clear my throat. “Rest,” I tell Dan. “No heroics.”
In the staff room, I grab the mail I put into my locker earlier. It’s just bills and junk. Then I see the last envelope. It’s addressed to me, in neat handwriting.
Inside is a neatly printed list:
Outdoor cardio alternatives.
Apartment-friendly, low-impact workouts.
Local running trails.
Parks with 24-hour security lighting.
I live upstairs. She didn’t even drop it under my door. She stamped it, addressed it, and sent it through the postal service, as if we were pen pals in the nineties.
I stare at it for a moment before I realize my mouth has curved upward. “Jesus Christ.”
The door swings open.
“You ever have a day where you consider walking out mid-rounds and pretending you forgot you worked here?” Hudson asks, heading for the coffee.
I grunt. “Every Thursday.”
He narrows his eyes, sizing me up. “You look like shit.”
“Thanks. Always good for the ego.”
“Didn’t sleep?”
“I tried. I got ambushed.”
He pauses, coffee pot mid-air. “Come again?”
I sigh, drag a hand down my face, and toss the envelope onto the counter. “My neighbor orchestrated a knock-and-run hit.”
“What?”
“With children, Hudson. She recruited children.”
That gets a laugh. “How old were these mercenaries?”
“Young enough to be fast, old enough to be lethal. They charged at me.”
Hudson bursts out laughing. “What the hell?”
“On the third knock, I finally caught the culprit. I had her. Then the kids came screaming around the corner with Silly String.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “I think I still have blue residue in my ear.”
“You got taken down by a babysitting militia.” Hudson wipes his eyes. “That’s dark, man.”
“It was coordinated. She used a code word.”
Hudson takes a sip of coffee, still grinning. “She’s winning this war by a mile.”
I nod. “She’s definitely ahead on points.”
“Any retaliation planned?”
“Not yet.” I hold up the envelope. “This just arrived. A list of places I can run that aren’t above her head. Stamped and addressed. I think she’s tracking my schedule. She knew I’d be home.”
“She’s probably got a whiteboard,” Hudson says.
I rub my jaw, the exhaustion finally hitting. “She’s terrifying.”
“She’s hot.”
“Not relevant.”
“Extremely relevant,” Hudson counters. “Look, if a woman ever plans to publicly humiliate me with craft-store ammunition, I’d marry her out of respect. Get some rest. Before she comes back with more.”