Chapter 37
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Idragged my feet the entire walk from the parking garage to the hospital entrance, like the extra few seconds might somehow inject courage into me I didn’t have yet. When I finally reached the sliding doors, I just stood there for a moment, staring at my reflection in the glass.
My gaze lingered on my scrubs and my badge, cataloging the tiny crack in the plastic clip I’d been meaning to replace for months.
The doors slid open with a soft mechanical sigh and muscle memory was the only thing that carried me inside.
The familiar antiseptic smell hit first, followed by the steady rhythm of the hospital waking up for the day, phones ringing, carts rattling, and voices layered over each other in a language made up of urgency and routine.
I slowed as I walked past reception, my gaze catching on details I usually missed because I was always moving too fast. The faded corner of the welcome sign.
The coffee stain near the nurses’ station that wouldn’t scrub out of the tile, and the bulletin board cluttered with thank-you cards from patients and crayon drawings from kids who’d made it home.
I’d dreamed about working here for so long that when I finally got the job, it’d felt like stepping into the life I was always meant to have. Now I was walking through it like it was already a memory.
My fingers tightened around the strap of my bag as the reality of what I was about to do pressed heavily against my ribs, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to do it. Today would be my last day at Saint Raphael’s hospital.
This was my last shift. Quitting meant incurring the contract penalty and paying back the money they’d invested in my nurse practitioner program, but I’d made my peace with that.
Even if the number was large enough to make my stomach twist every time I thought about it.
I’d probably be living on instant noodles for the next decade, but it still wasn’t enough to change my mind.
Besides, maybe I can sell plasma. Or a kidney. I’m pretty sure I only need one of those.
The idea almost made me smile, but it faded quickly, replaced by the truth I had been avoiding for weeks.
This decision wasn’t just about the hospital changing.
Sure, I hated watching decisions being made by someone who didn’t understand the pulse of this place yet.
I hated the thought of staff being reduced to numbers on a spreadsheet.
I hated the way uncertainty had settled into every break room conversation, every shift handover, and every tired glance shared in hallways.
But if I was honest, that wasn’t why I couldn’t stay. I stopped near the elevator bank, staring at the glowing numbers as they ticked down, and finally admitted it to myself without flinching.
I can’t keep working here because Sullivan Crowne isn’t just another breakup.
He wasn’t the kind of man who would fade into the background with time and distance.
He’d rooted himself somewhere deep and immovable inside me, and every accidental glimpse of him in a hallway, every mention of his name in a meeting, and every rumor about his latest decision felt like someone pressing on a bruise that would never be able to heal.
Not as long as I was here anyway. I swallowed hard, blinking against the sting behind my eyes. Because the truth was worse than I’d realized before—I was in love with him.
It wasn’t the messy, impulsive kind I used to fall into when I was younger either. This felt different, like it had settled into my bones and made leaving feel like tearing out something vital.
As much as I hated what he was doing to the hospital, I understood it now in a way I hadn’t wanted to before. The fifth floor, the urgency, and his relentless push to build something that might save lives like his mother’s.
He wasn’t trying to destroy this place. He was trying to fix something he’d never been able to fix before, but that didn’t make the fallout easier to watch. It didn’t make the collateral damage hurt less.
It just stripped away the easy anger I’d been hiding behind, leaving something far more complicated in its place. The elevator dinged softly, doors sliding open, and I stepped inside.
This decision to walk away wasn’t about punishing him, or protesting what he was doing, or even protecting my pride. It was about protecting the parts of me that wouldn’t survive loving him from arm’s length.
If I stayed, I would keep hoping, keep watching, and keep breaking a little more every time our paths crossed and he looked at me like I was someone he used to know. I squared my shoulders, forcing my feet to move out of the elevator.
Once step closer to the administration offices. HR.
I’d fought too hard to become the kind of woman who could stand on her own feet to lose herself in a place, or a person, who made her forget how. Loving him didn’t mean I had to stay where it hurt to breathe.
I was three corridors away from HR when I heard someone call my name. “Bree?”
I turned to find Liana standing near the nurses’ station, her strawberry blonde hair pulled into a sleek twist, her sharp eyes softening the second they landed on my face. She frowned and stepped closer to me.
“Hey,” she said. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I replied, forcing a smile that felt completely off. “It’s just been a busy morning.”
Her gaze narrowed slightly. “Bree.”
Something in her tone cracked straight through my defenses and I glanced down at the folder clutched in my hands, the resignation letter inside suddenly weighing about fifty pounds.
“I’m fine,” I repeated, but it was even weaker this time.
“Yeah,” she said gently. “You look fantastic. Come with me.”
“I really should—”
“Bree,” she repeated gently, already reaching for my elbow. “Please.”
Finally, I nodded and let her guide me down a quieter hallway and into a small, unused consultation room. The door clicked shut behind us, sealing out the hum of the hospital, and I sat before my knees gave out.
Liana pulled a chair close, turning it so she faced me fully. “Would you like to try that answer again?” she asked.
“I told you, I’m—” My voice cracked, and suddenly, I couldn’t hold it together anymore. Tears pressed at the backs of my eyes, pressure building in my chest. Then it all spilled over before I could stop it. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, Bree,” she murmured, sliding a box of tissues toward me. “Hey. It’s okay.”
“I’m so sorry,” I choked out, taking a tissue and desperately pressing it to my eyes. “I didn’t mean to—”
“Stop apologizing,” she said firmly. “You helped salvage the biggest disaster of my life. The least I can do is let you fall apart in peace.”
Despite everything, a shaky laugh slipped out of me. “Your wedding wasn’t that bad.”
“The ceremony was a flaming train wreck,” she corrected dryly. “The liberation party afterward? That was legendary. I still get texts about it.”
“I’m glad something good came out of it.”
“Something good always does,” she said quietly. “Now talk to me.”
I stared at my hands, twisting the edge of the folder. “I’m quitting.”
She didn’t flinch, but I saw the slight tightening around her eyes. “Okay. Do you want to tell me why?”
“You already know why,” I said. “The cuts. The changes. Everything.”
“That’s not the whole story,” she said gently.
“It is for me.” I swallowed hard. “I understand why he’s doing it. I do. I didn’t before, but I do now.”
She stayed silent, just letting me speak. “If my dad had had access to the kind of tech Sullivan’s pushing for, they might’ve caught his condition early. He might never have had his heart attack. My entire life would’ve been different, and I wouldn’t ever even have known what I was missing.”
Liana’s expression softened even further, but she still didn’t interrupt.
“I can’t pretend that doesn’t matter,” I said, my voice rough and thick. “It does. It matters a lot. The hospital does need to evolve. I get that. We can’t just keep doing things the way we always have. The equipment he brings to the table is incredible. What we could do with it…”
“But?” she prompted softly when I trailed off.
“But I can’t work here anymore. I can’t be part of it.
I’m standing in the middle of something that’s tearing people apart.
It’s tearing me apart.” I laughed bitterly.
“I keep wishing there was a way to keep the people and bring in the tech. Like, there has to be some middle ground, but I don’t see it. ”
Liana studied me carefully. “You might not have the full story anymore, Bree. Things have changed.”
I shook my head immediately. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It might.”
“No,” I said, a little more confidently than before.
“I can’t stay here hoping things might get better while it hurts this much just walking through the front doors.
I love him, Liana. I do. I just can’t be with him.
I can’t condone what he does or how he thinks.
So yeah. I love him, but he loves business more. ”
Her lips pressed together like she wanted to argue, but she exhaled instead. “Okay. I hear you.”
“I just need someone to keep me strong long enough to do this,” I admitted. “Because if I think about it too much, I’m going to fold.”
“I’ve got you,” she said instantly. “You don’t have to do it alone.”
Relief loosened some of the tension thrumming in my chest. “Thank you.”
She stood and held out her hand. “Do you want me to walk you to HR?”
“Yeah,” I said, taking it as I stood. “I’d like that.”
We went back out into the hallway together. Liana stayed close, her presence steady as we moved through the hospital. She chatted lightly about nothing in particular, but about halfway down the corridor, she slowed slightly, pulling out her phone.
“Sorry,” she said casually, her thumbs moving quickly across the screen. “I need to answer this.”
“No problem.”
She slipped the phone back into her pocket almost immediately, flashing me an encouraging smile. “All set. Are you still okay?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
“You’re stronger than you think,” she said quietly.
“I don’t feel strong.”
“You don’t have to feel it for it to be true.”
We reached the administrative wing sooner than I wanted to, the HR sign looming ahead like a final checkpoint I couldn’t turn back from. My grip tightened on the folder. “This is it.”
Liana squeezed my shoulder. “I’m right here.”
We took the last few steps together, stopping just outside the frosted glass door. My pulse roared in my ears, drowning out everything else. I drew a shaky breath and reached for the handle.
“Bree, wait!” The voice echoed down the hallway, urgent and breathless.
I froze, every muscle locking as I turned toward the sound. Sullivan was sprinting toward us, his hair disheveled and panic written across every strong line of his face. He slowed when he reached us, his chest heaving and the expression in those devastating blue eyes as raw as I’d ever seen it.
“Stop, Bree,” he said, or maybe pleaded was more accurate. “Don’t quit. Please just give me one minute to explain. Just one, Bree. Please?”