Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
FLORENCE
‘Another difficult patient for you,’ Cam says, popping his head around the door of the break room where I’ve been hiding for at least the last fifteen minutes under the guise of making a cup of tea. I don’t even drink tea, but no one’s questioned it so far.
They probably know I’m sulking. I have been for three days.
Ever since the night at the abbey.
I can’t tell whether I’m annoyed with Quinn for assuming the worst of me and fleeing, or whether I’m annoyed with myself for how hurt I was by it.
I’ve lived on this planet for the best part of two hundred years, so I’ve encountered more than my fair share of humans, and something I’ve grown to understand about them over time is that they, like us, are animals at heart.
Yes, they’ve evolved over the years. They’ve grown into creatures of intelligence, of humanity and of empathy. But underscoring all of it is something far more primal. It doesn’t take a whole lot to strip them to their baser instincts: anger, lust, survival, fear.
I know rationally that that’s what happened with Quinn. I blindsided him and he panicked, landed a warning blow and then fled. And as I’m a creature of instinct too, after he lashed out at me, my inclination was to retreat to my lair and lick my wounds.
I know all this, but it still hurts because deep down, I wanted him to think better of me. And I know I’m basing that on nothing. When it comes down to it, he’s just a distant relative of the man I used to love. And as Josiah’s long gone, it’s probably about time I got over both of them.
So I look over at Cam and plaster a smile on my face.
‘Bay three,’ he says with a wink and then he vanishes, leaving me to walk to the blood room by myself.
When I reach bay three, the curtain is completely drawn, and that immediately puts me on high alert. I brace myself for what I’m going to find behind it. A drawn curtain generally means it won’t be good.
So when I pull the edge back and peek around it, the very last thing I expect to see is Joe Quinn, sitting ramrod straight in the blue chair and worrying his thumb between the first two fingers of his other hand.
‘Hi,’ he says as he sees me, and there’s such weight in that single syllable that it almost makes me cry.
I step into the bay and pull the curtain closed behind me. ‘Hi,’ I reply tentatively.
Those blue-green eyes fix on me like a plea as one hand goes to his already-tousled hair. He’s nervous. I can see it in the quickening of his pulse at his temples, in the dimples his teeth press into his lip.
I lower myself carefully to sit on the stool, like I might spook him if I move too quickly. I don’t wheel it closer to him. Instead, I perch six feet away and wait.
‘Florence,’ he says, but nothing follows it for a while.
There is only a slight hitch in his breath and the almost inaudible sound of him swallowing.
‘I’m here to apologise,’ he says eventually, his voice low and even, as though he’s been practising.
‘It was a shock, what you…’ He looks around, realising just before I’m about to tell him that these flimsy curtains are not even slightly soundproof.
When he carries on, it’s almost at a whisper. ‘What you told me.’
I nod my understanding. ‘It was a lot.’
‘It was.’ He almost laughs then, but there’s no humour there. ‘But there was no need for me to have a tantrum about it.’
His smile is so slight that it almost isn’t a movement at all. Even so, it feels like a peace offering. And with it, some of the weight in my chest eases.
‘It wasn’t a tantrum, Quinn. You were scared.’
‘Yes,’ he admits after a beat, looking me straight in the eye. ‘I was.’
There’s such vulnerability, such raw honesty in those three simple words that I can’t possibly give them the reply they deserve.
Not here in the clinic, anyway. The urge to pull him into my arms hits me with a ferocity that I almost act on, and I have to shove my fists deep into my pockets to stop myself reaching for him.
‘I get it,’ I say. ‘It is scary.’
‘It is, but that’s not an excuse.’ He leans towards me. I don’t know if he knows he’s doing it. ‘I was a dick to you, and you didn’t deserve it. So I’m sorry.’
That makes me smile. ‘Apology accepted.’
His brow quirks. ‘Just like that?’
I manage to hold in my laugh but can’t stop my smile from widening. ‘I can make you walk through fire, if you’d prefer?’
This time when he grins, it’s the bright, unchecked version that brings out his dimples – the version that makes him look a little less like Josiah. Two very conflicting emotions rumble to life deep in my belly.
‘I’d prefer to just accept your help,’ he says earnestly. ‘If it’s still on offer?’
Warmth pools in my chest. ‘Of course.’
‘And that,’ Cam says, whipping back the curtain and striding into the bay, ‘is where I come in.’
I look at Cam, at Quinn, and then back at Cam, my face pulling into a frown. ‘Were you eavesdropping out there?’
‘Florence, no!’ Cam says, aghast. ‘I was supervising.’ He straightens his lanyard, the hint of a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. ‘It is my job, after all.’
A look passes between them, like something’s happened to which I’m not party. I eye them both suspiciously. ‘Is one of you going to clue me in?’
‘Absolutely,’ Cam says, a boyish grin on his face. ‘If you wouldn’t mind taking a couple of samples from our patient first, and then I’ll meet you both in consultation room two and we can discuss where we go from here.’
We hear Cam’s name being called somewhere across the clinic.
Before he leaves, he hands me a Post-it note, nods a quick goodbye at us and darts back through the curtain.
Written on the note are three sample request codes, and then Cam’s delicate cursive: NOT to go via the lab.
Hand directly to me. ‘Not’ is underlined twice.
I pull some gloves from the cart and snap them on, wheeling my stool over to the chair Quinn’s sitting in. ‘Here we are again,’ I say gently. ‘You ready for this?’
He takes a shaky breath but meets my gaze head-on. ‘No,’ he says, smiling through obvious anxiety. ‘But I guess I’d better get used to it.’
* * *
‘Cam was at Bitten last night,’ Quinn says the second the consultation room door closes behind us. ‘I didn’t know how to get in touch with you, short of turning up here like a weirdo, and then he walked right in and sat down at the bar next to Creepy Perm Guy. ‘I couldn’t believe it.’
He’s back to his usual mile-a-minute chattering, and it makes me smile. ‘Creepy Perm Guy? Do I want to know?’
His grin is wide and a little lopsided. ‘He’s one of our regulars. Was very taken with Cam.’
I huff a single ha! of a laugh. ‘You’ve got to watch Cam – he’s a terrible flirt. Man, woman, mortal, immortal … he’s not fussed.’
Quinn’s face falls at that, a small groove appearing between his eyebrows. ‘He doesn’t flirt with you?’
I shake my head, more pleased than I should be at this show of what looks a bit like jealousy. ‘No, not with me. We grew up together. It’d be like flirting with your sibling.’ I bite back a smile. ‘He’ll probably have a go with you at some point, though.’
That dimple smile returns, beautiful and bright. ‘I think he already has,’ he says in such a way that makes it seem like he’s proud of it. I beam back at him and then there we both are, grinning at each other like fools in that overly sanitised consultation room for just a beat too long.
There’s a charge in the air, then, some invisible force between us that I can’t even begin to name.
I wonder if he feels it, if his mostly human senses are sharp enough to detect the change.
He seems to feel something because his smile falls, his gaze dipping to my mouth for a moment before he looks away, down to his feet and then somewhere else entirely.
‘I really am sorry, you know,’ he says. His voice is rougher than before, a thread of vulnerability running through it again. I want to reach out, to trail my finger along the groove in his cheek that so easily pulls into that dimple.
‘I know,’ I say, shoving my hands into the pockets of my tunic again. ‘For what it’s worth, I understand.’
He’s confused. ‘You do?’
‘Of course.’ I shrug. ‘I didn’t help, dragging you out to the abbey in the dead of night. We could have had that same conversation in your flat.’
He hums, his smile almost reappearing. ‘I liked the abbey.’
Our eyes catch again and I tighten my hands into fists in my pockets to avoid doing something I can’t take back. But then Cam saves the day, barrelling through the door and closing it behind him with a flourish.
‘We meet again,’ he declares, like a cartoon villain, before grinning and flopping down in an empty chair across from us. ‘Florence, did you—’
I pass him the vials of blood before he can finish, and he pockets them.
‘Excellent.’ He turns to Quinn. ‘So, as I was telling you last night, we have options here. These new samples are heading to a specialist lab in Edinburgh. I have an old colleague there who is very experienced in’—he pauses, weighing his words—‘less mortal matters. I have every confidence that you are a puzzle he will be able to crack.’ His glasses slip down his nose and he shoves them back up with a forefinger.
‘And until then, we have something in medicine that we call “watch and wait”. Basically, we keep an eye on you and just see what happens. We’ll do regular bloods, monitor your symptoms, and wait to see if anything changes. ’
Quinn’s nodding slowly. I imagine it’s not the decisive answer he was hoping for, but quite often with the human body – and the not-quite-human body – there isn’t a straight answer.
‘What do I do in the meantime?’ he asks, that crease reappearing between his brows, and it makes Cam’s grin change to something softer, something wistful.
‘I suggest,’ Cam says, uncharacteristically serious, ‘the same thing I would suggest to any patient: live your life. Enjoy every moment of your mortal existence as if it’s your last. Whatever happens, one day it will be.’
And as Cam’s words settle in my consciousness, I suddenly know exactly what I can do to help.