Chapter Eighteen
Ava refreshed her messages for the third time in as many minutes, staring at the screen like she could will a response into existence.
Ava: Good luck today. I love you. You’ve got this.
Ava: Hey, just checking in. Hope the meeting went okay.
Ava: Jay, I’m getting worried. Can you please just let me know you’re alright?
All delivered. None read.
It had been almost seven hours since David dropped her off at her apartment. Seven hours since Jay kissed her goodbye and drove off to end his career. Seven hours of silence.
She’d tried calling twice. Both times, it went straight to voicemail.
She scrolled to find David’s number. He’d told her to call if she needed anything. What would she even say?
Hurried footsteps pulled her attention from her phone. Vickie rounded the corner at a brisk pace, her arms laden with envelopes, but her face was alight with barely contained excitement.
“Ava, you clocked in yet?”
One minute to her shift. Close enough. She typed in her employee number and willed the beep of the machine to do what it always did: pull her out of her own head and into someone else’s emergency.
“I am now.” She turned to Vickie. “What’s going on?”
Vickie’s grin grew impossibly wide as she rifled through the envelopes, pulling out a thick one with Dr. Davenport scrawled in elegant, swirling script.
“Well, for one, we’re slammed tonight—no surprise there.
” She paused, eyes dancing. “But the real news…” With a barely suppressed squeal, she thrust the envelope toward Ava. “My resident won Resident of the Year!”
Ava blinked, her brain scrambling to catch up. “You mean—”
Vickie clapped her hands together. “You, Dr. Davenport, won!”
Ava took the envelope, her fingers numb. This should feel like something. This was something. Resident of the Year didn’t usually go to second-years. This was the kind of recognition that opened doors, that validated every exhausting shift and impossible decision.
“I get to take the stage at the Fall Gala and give you the biggest award of the night!” Vickie was practically dancing.
“Dr. Page is already whining that his graduating resident should’ve won, but hospital admin chose you because you had the most patient commendations for compassionate care and clinical excellence.
” She winked. “Obviously. Because I only train the best.”
“I…” Ava forced a smile, trying to muster the appropriate amount of enthusiasm. “I don’t know what to say.”
This was everything she’d worked for. Everything she’d built during those years without Jay.
“Well, you better think of something before next month.” Vickie’s grin softened. “You’ll have to give a speech, ya know.”
The thought of a speech in front of hospital administration and donors made her stomach twist, but not as much as Jay’s continued silence did.
Her phone buzzing made her heart leap.
Eleanor: Need you at nurses’ station ASAP
Not Jay.
She shoved the phone in her pocket, chest tight with disappointment.
“You okay?” Vickie’s excitement dimmed slightly, her brow furrowing. “You don’t seem very excited.”
“No, I am. I’m—” Ava clutched the envelope tighter. “Thank you. This is incredible. It means a lot. But Eleanor is saying she needs me.” The words felt hollow even as she said them. She should feel something other than this gnawing dread.
Vickie studied her for a moment, then squeezed her shoulder. “We’ll celebrate properly later. Go see what Eleanor needs.”
Ava nodded, grateful for the escape, and headed toward the nurses’ station as she tucked the envelope into a pocket. Eleanor met her halfway, jogging toward her with wide, uneasy eyes.
“There’s a new patient asking for you.”
“What do you mean?”
Eleanor took a breath, her brows scrunching. “She’s a Jane Doe. In bad shape. Lacerations all over, and I’m pretty sure her nose is broken.” She swallowed hard. “She won’t tell us anything and refuses to let anyone touch her. She says she’ll only talk to you.”
The unease in Ava’s chest grew heavier. “Why me?”
Eleanor’s eyes darted away. “You…you know her. I do too, but she won’t show ID or give her name. Only wants you.”
Ava frowned.
“She’s in Room 202.” Eleanor handed her a clipboard, the paperwork sparse. “I’m worried about internal bleeding. If she keeps refusing treatment…” Her voice trailed off, the unspoken consequences hanging in the air.
Ava’s mind raced. A woman who knew her, beaten badly enough to potentially have internal bleeding, refusing to identify herself. And Jay, radio silent for hours after a meeting where his sister’s abuse would definitely be a topic…
Her feet carried her down the hallway on autopilot, medical training warring with rising panic.
She stopped outside Room 202, her hand on the door handle. She took a breath and tried to slip into doctor mode: calm and detached.
It didn’t work.
She pushed the door open and froze.
The woman on the bed stared blankly at the ceiling, her face swollen and bruised, barely recognizable.
Blood stained the collar of her cream t-shirt, and even more blood crusted under her nose and on her lips.
A deep bruise circled her right eye, the white of it bloodshot above a jagged laceration slicing across the bridge of her nose, blooming with black-and-blue patterns.
Mira sat up with a grimace. “I just want my nose straightened out. I think it’s broken.”
Ava shut the door, her professionalism waning. She dropped the clipboard onto the counter and forced herself to stay clinical. Mira came to her seeking a doctor, not a friend.
“What happened?”
Still grimacing, Mira pulled a leg under her. “I wanted you to see me because everyone else will judge.”
“Why would anyone judge you?”
“I went back to Riley.” The words came out in a rush. “He found me at Maya’s and apologized for what happened at Gil’s…said he wanted me to come home.”
“Home?”
Mira worried on her lower lip, as if she’d let a secret slip. “We have a place together in Franklin.”
Ava’s stomach dropped. “So you live with your brothers and Riley?”
“Yeah. He got the house a few years ago.” Mira looked down. “I split my stuff between both places so Ari and Jay don’t know anything.”
Of course they didn’t know. When Jay found out…
Ava pushed the thought away and scrubbed her hands at the sink. She dried them, reached for the glove box on the wall, and snapped on a pair as she approached Mira.
“May I?”
Mira nodded, her movements stiff. Ava gently extended her right arm to examine a few bruises forming there—distinct fingerprints pressed into the skin.
She moved up to Mira’s face, her touch careful as she tipped her chin back to inspect her nostrils.
Her nose was likely fractured, and the bloodshot eye confirmed a ruptured vessel.
“Can you lift your shirt so I can check for other injuries?”
“It’s really just my face.”
“Can I still check?”
Reluctantly, Mira lifted her shirt, pausing when the fabric caught at her ribs. Ava helped her ease it off, her breath catching at the sight: fingerprints circling Mira’s neck, a deep purple bruise on her sternum, and a smaller, angry mark near her left hip.
“We need a scan.” Ava’s voice was calm, but her heart pounded. “These bruises…I’m worried about internal bleeding.”
Mira’s eyes watered. “I knew it was bad. That’s why I came. God, I’m so fucking stupid.”
“Hey.” Ava’s voice softened. “You didn’t do this to yourself.”
Mira shuddered. “It wasn’t always like this,” she whispered. “He never used to hit me. But now…I don’t know.”
“You didn’t cause this, Samira.”
Mira’s lip quivered, but she shook her head. “But I did. He came back from the meeting in a rage. Jay beat him up, and he blamed me for it.”
“Jay fought with Riley?”
“Yeah. Riley said Jay was drunk, they barely talked, and then Jay broke his fucking nose.”
All those signs from the RV. She’d known. She’d known and let herself believe otherwise.
And now he was shutting her out.
“Riley was being a huge dick,” Mira continued. “I told him I was glad Jay fucked up his nose. I should’ve kept my mouth shut.”
Ava’s head was spinning, and that sick, heavy feeling of dread was weighing her chest down. She wanted to drop everything and drive to Jay’s condo, but Mira was in front of her. Mira needed a doctor.
Mira needed her.
Ava cleared her throat, trying to focus on the conversation. “So because Jay punched him in the nose, he broke yours?”
“I guess.”
Ava swallowed the anger rising in her throat. “And you haven’t told Jay.”
“God, no.” Her voice grew frantic. “And please don’t tell him. He’ll make it worse. He only knows about the last time Riley hit me.”
“Was another time when he broke your ribs?” Ava asked, recalling Jay’s vague mention of the incident.
“I don’t think he meant to break them,” she whispered. “Fuck. Jay figured that out?”
Ava released Mira’s hand and crossed to the cabinets, peeling off her gloves. She grabbed a fresh hospital gown and pushed it toward Mira. “Can we make sure this isn’t a repeat of your ribs?”
“Only if you promise Jay won’t find out. I can’t…I don’t know if I want him to know.”
Ava couldn’t think of a time she actually hid something from Jay, but Mira confirmed what Ava already thought: Jay wouldn’t handle this well. If he found out about this, he’d be ready for a second round with Riley, and that wasn’t what Mira needed.
But where was he? Why wasn’t he answering his phone? Had something else happened after the fight?
“It’s not my place to tell him, Samira.”
She nodded, twisting the hospital gown in her hands. “Thank you.”
Ava squeezed her shoulder. “Get dressed. I’ll be right outside.”
She slipped into the hallway and let the door close behind her.
The fluorescent lights were too bright, the hospital smell too clinical.
She leaned against the wall and tried to process everything at once: Mira beaten.
Riley abusing her for years. Jay drunk at the meeting.
Jay fighting Riley. Jay hiding it all from her.