CHAPTER 5 — THE FATHER OF THE MAN WHO LEFT ME #3
His honesty caught me off guard because it wasn't trying to excuse anything.
When Bram explained things, he always delivered a version where I ended up owing him understanding.
Cael handed over the failure and let it hang heavy between us.
That didn't fix anything. It just made it harder to hate him with the simplicity I needed.
“How touching,” Bram cut in, his voice too smooth. “You've always been excellent at taking blame in a way that still feels like control.”
Cael turned his face toward him, and the hallway lost a few more degrees. “You're done here.”
“Actually, my meeting is with Odette in ten minutes.” Bram adjusted his shirt cuff, ignoring the glances from two nurses who'd already picked up on the tension. “About audit integration. System stuff. You know, that territory where your name shows up more than you do.”
The phrase seemed to hit a nerve. I saw his hand tighten on the folder—a small reaction, quickly controlled. Audit. Signature. C. Hawthorne. L.A. The day had too many pieces, and some were starting to fit together in a way that chilled me.
“Then go to your meeting,” Cael said. “And if I find your access in any record involving Lucia Avenel without technical justification, the next conversation won't be in a hallway.”
Bram looked at me again. The smile disappeared for an instant, and without it I saw the man I should have recognized sooner. “You always wanted someone powerful to say that for you, didn't you, Lu? Maybe now they'll finally believe you when you say the world is against you.”
I had a response ready when a gurney burst through the side door fast enough to turn the hallway into a rushing current.
A nurse shouted for clearance, someone yanked an emergency cart, and I moved on instinct to get out of the way.
The problem was that stepping back put me too close to the red line separating the main hallway from the trauma route—exactly as another team came from the opposite direction with heavy equipment.
Cael's hand closed around my wrist and yanked me back before the metal support passed where my shoulder would have been.
The touch was quick, necessary, almost rough with urgency—but the effect didn't stop at necessity.
My entire body recognized the pressure of his fingers before my mind registered the danger.
Heat shot up my arm, crossed my chest, sank to places that had no right waking up in that hallway, that morning, between my ex and his father.
Cael felt it too. I knew by the way he released my wrist the moment the gurney passed—but not fast enough to fake indifference.
His gaze dropped to the faint mark his fingers had left on my skin, then returned to my face with a tension that had nothing to do with the emergency.
There was apology there, restraint, and something darker, more dangerous—something Bram saw too.
“Thank you,” I forced the words out like protocol, not surrender. My wrist still burned where he'd held it, and I hated how alive the sensation felt. “For the strictly necessary physical intervention.”
“Don't cross trauma lines while looking at someone who wants you to lose your footing,” Cael responded in the same tone, though his eyes couldn't immediately pull away from my wrist. “That's also strictly necessary guidance.”
Bram let out a short, humorless laugh. “You two are unbelievable.”
“We're two doctors trying to keep a hallway functional.” I grabbed the tray before Cael could speak, with a firmness that cost more than I let show. “You're the consultant standing in the way, Bram. If you want to play victim, pick somewhere you're not blocking an emergency.”
This time, he didn't smile. The words had found somewhere unvarnished. His face shut down for a second, and in that second I saw the man beneath the charm—resentful, small, dangerous because he knew exactly where words could wound without leaving a bruise. Then the mask slid back into place.
“I'll leave you to the functional hallway, then.” Bram passed by us but stopped beside me just long enough for only me to hear what came next—though Cael was too close for me to be absolutely certain.
“Have you told my father the rest yet, or are you going to wait for him to figure it out on his own?”
He left before my body could decide between ice and fire. The tray in my hands stayed steady on pure hatred alone. Cael watched Bram walk away, then looked at me, and I realized I didn't know if he'd heard or just read on my face that something had been driven under my skin.
“What did he mean?” The question came low—not as an order, not as an accusation, but as a man trying to stop another blow before it landed.
I could have told him. The hallway was less crowded, the emergency had passed, Bram was walking away, and the baby's father—maybe, probably, horribly—stood in front of me with his hand still holding the memory of my wrist. But telling him in that moment would mean delivering the truth in a scene Bram had staged, and I refused to let the first decision about that test be a reaction to his poison.
“Ask your son.” I held Cael's gaze even with my chest tight. “He seems to enjoy getting his version out before anyone else.”
I turned before he could stop me—or worse, before he could offer me care in the right way.
I walked to the medication room with the tray pressed against my body, my wrist still warm under my sleeve and the test hidden in my bag like a second heartbeat, knowing Bram's question had opened a door I wouldn't be able to keep closed much longer.