Burn (3 page)

"Yeah, I-" She's still frowning at me, but hey, it sounds like at least a
half
concession towards mutual fault here. I mean shit, it's not like I
purposefully 
showed up beaten to fucking pulp at
her
apartment that night. 

I clear my throat, trying to salvage this in some impossible way; "Your hair looks, uh, different than than before." She looks like she's almost about to concede -
almost
- but then I of course open my mouth again; "And I mean, you look a lot older now than back at your Dad's wake- "
Fuck
. I wince as she shakes her head at me and I bring my hand up to push it though my hair; "I'm fucking this up pretty badly aren't I." 

"With flying fucking colors, yeah." 

I mean it's true; I hadn't seen her since her father's funeral like five fucking years ago. But shit, looking at her now, would I have even said no to a girl like this even if I knew? I mean she's a knockout to begin with, but it doesn't help that while that bridesmaids dress
teases
at what's beneath, I actually
know
what she looks like naked. And the thought of her naked is making me harder than it should right now, given the situation.  She brings a hand up and pinches the bridge of her nose as she takes a deep breath; like this whole thing is some sort of
headache
she just has to deal with; "Look, lets just get through this thing." 

"And a cheers to the happy couple!" I grin, trying to lighten the mood. She smirks, but then that flush comes back into her cheeks and she shakes her head again. 

"Look-" She stabs a finger towards me, still keeping her distance with her back up against the hedge behind her; "Not a word, to
anyone
about-" 

"Quinn, I'm not going to-" 

"To
anyone
, Logan." She almost looks scared, like I'm some dirty little secret that might come tumbling out, and I can't tell if that amuses or pissed me off more. 

"Look I fucking get it, ok?" 

"Good." 

"
Fine.
"

Ah yes, this is progressing just like an adult conversation should. 

"Look, I have too much going on up here in my head to even
think
about this right now, OK?" She squeezes her eyes shut and shakes her head; "I'm about to stand up with my sister while she gets married and I have an insanely busy first day at a new position tomorrow." Her arms are still crossed over her perfect chest, and she's still glaring at me like I'm some sort of bad guy; "At my Dad's-" She stops and frowns; "At
your
fucking company, actually." 

I'm about to open my mouth when she shakes her head, cutting me off; "You know what, it's like you said; let's just get through this, ok? Cause after this,
I
don't have to see
you
, and
you
don't have to see
me
until at least Thanksgiving or some other family gathering." 

Ah, fuck; she doesn't know.

I almost want to laugh, except I think I might be too surprised to.

Quinn shakes her head; "And until then, we can drift back off to being strangers, OK?" 

Well, this is about to get even better.
 

She
knows
that her new job is with Archer Holdings in the company's new humanitarian healthcare outreach program. What she
doesn't
know is that it's
my
program, and what's quickly dawning on me is that as of tomorrow, I'll be working side-by-side with this girl for the next three months. 

She stops as she notices my silence and narrows her eyes at me; "Oh,
what
is it, Logan?" 

Oh yeah, this little meltdown is about to go fucking nuclear.

One Week Ago:

It’s almost 3 a.m. by the time I get home from what will be my last team meeting at the hospital for the next few months while I work on the outreach program at my Father’s company. I’m grinding my teeth and muttering under my breath as I stand in the lobby of my loft building, hammering the elevator button, and it’s not even the fact that it’s late and the birthday bash I was invited to is long over that’s got me pissed off either. It’s that leaving my team after
that
whole thing
feels like giving up, and admitting defeat.
 

It also seems
totally fucking un-fair.

‘It’s just not appropriate, Quinn. I can’t be seen dating one of my staff. Especially one that’s a shoe-in for team leader.”

In theory, Andy has a fair point, except it looses just a
little bit
of credibility when I walked into his office a week ago to see one of the other young Doctors on the team blowing him.

And honestly,
that’s
not what has me so furious. I mean it’s not like I ever thought Andy was “the one” or anything, and it was hardly a passionate affair, unless you count hidden dates and maybe four fairly unsatisfying intimate encounters over as many months as
passionate
.

And I don’t.

What I’m
pissed
about though is just the hypocrisy of it, and I
hate
hypocrisy. It’s telling me “being professional” is the reason things have to end when you’ve got Vicky
fucking
Spears’s lips wrapped around your cock
in your office
.

But again,
that’s
not even what has me so angry tonight. No, I’m practically steaming at the ears because Andy decided to announce at the end of our last team meeting - almost as an afterthought - that we were going to have a new team leader.

‘Mad’
is your boyfriend ditching and probably cheating on you. ‘
Fury’
is having every head in the room turn expectantly towards you just as Andy announces that skanky, cock-sucking, slut-bag Vicky Spears will be stepping into the role of technically being your
boss
after you get back from working at Archer Holdings.

Perfect.

So, I’m already thinking about which Netflix series I’m going to binge with a bottle of red wine upstairs as the elevator doors ding open, and it’s right then that the scream freezes in my throat.

The man is slumped against the wall of the elevator, bloodied and out cold. He’s shirtless, his muscled, tattooed body covered in bruises and cuts and blood, and for a horrified minute, I wonder if I’m looking at a corpse. But then the doctor in me kicks into gear instantly, and I’m dropping down next to him to feel for a pulse.

My heart jumps into my throat as he suddenly gasps awake, his hand jerking to grab my wrist and his eyes wide and wild as he stares into mine. I stutter out a gasp as I find myself staring into the most piercing brown-green eyes I've ever seen; eyes the color of the forest, flecked with gold.

His eyes dart around the elevator in wild, jerking movements, and I can see the veins in his neck pulsing as he jerks forward.

"Hey,
hey
!" I say, putting my hands on his bare chest and gently pushing him back against the wall. The muscles beneath his skin feel like rippling iron under my hands, and I feel myself blushing at how absurdly unprofessional it is to think of this
bleeding
stranger with those kind of descriptors.

Especially bleeding strangers as staggeringly good looking as this one.

His dark hair is buzzed short, and even with a thick beard covering his chin, I can see how handsome he is from the prominent cut of his cheekbones and the dark, smokey look in his eyes.

"I need you to relax, OK?” I’m pressing him back down as gently as I can; “You've been in some kind of accident, and I'm going to help you."

He lunges forward again, a crazy look in those handsome eyes; "You-"

"I'm a
doctor
, OK?”

Ok, clinical virologist, but close enough,
I mutter to myself. I didn’t sit through four semesters of triage and two years of late-shift E.R. work
not
to be able to do something in a situation like this.

 
“Listen, I’m going to
help
you while we wait for the ambulance-"

"
No.
" His voice is like sandpaper on wood; rich and rough, with a touch of something warm there. He momentarily looks much more awake and alert as his face darkens; "No ambulance; no hospitals."

I'm suddenly
very
afraid of what that implies, as well as suddenly
very
aware that I'm alone with a beaten and bloodied stranger who for all I know could have just come from murdering his whole family or something.

He must see the fear shoot through my face, because his look softens for a moment; "Look, just- no ambulance. Please."

I bite my lip, my hand still hovering near my purse and my cellphone, but there’s something utterly bewildering and unexplainable about the sincerity in his eyes that has me wanting to trust him. He winces, his hand pressing against his ribs, and it's then that I realize how much he's bleeding from some wound there.

"Oh my
God
, you
need
to let me call an-"

"You're a doctor you said?" He coughs violently, tilting his head back against the wall and gritting his teeth for a second.

"Yes?"

"Good, you're hired."

I frown; "Wha-"

"Reach in my left pants pocket."

"Um, excuse me?"

"Just do it." He coughs, wincing.

Warily, I lean closer to him, wondering when he's going to tie me up, or ax me to death, and reach into his pocket.

I blink at the fat wad of $100 dollar bills I pull out; dyed rust colored around the edges from his blood.

"Ok, what's-"

"That's your fee," He whispers out with a grimace; "For patching me up." He's looking paler and paler by the second as he leans his head back against the wall, and I notice his breathing is coming slower and slower by the rising and falling of his muscled, tattooed chest.

"I'm not taking this money."

Oh HELL no am I taking a bloody wad of hundred dollar bills from a complete stranger. I want no part of that, actually.

His brow furrows, and I can see him trying to open his lips, but I'm already whirling around and hitting the button in the elevator, the doors closing behind us.

"I'm not taking this money," I say again, this time yanking my t-shirt off over my head and pushing his hand away as I press the cotton to his open wound; “But I
am
going to help you. Just don't
die
on me, OK?”

He momentarily opens his eyes once more, and when he grins, I can't tell if its because he’s glad I’m going to help him, or the fact that I've taken my shirt off. Maybe both.

“Top floor," he whispers hoarsely.

“Wait, what?" As dumb of an idea I know it was, I was just going to drag him into my own apartment on the second to top floor. As far as I knew, the apartment above me was empty.

"I live-" he coughs blood and then he's going slack in my arms; "I just moved-“

Oh, wonderful; the hot, muscled bleeding guy dying in my arms is my new upstairs neighbor.

*****

"Thank you, really." He says with that deep, baritone of a voice. He's sitting up now in his bed, which is weirdly the only piece of furniture in the whole apartment. His color is coming back, and there's a clean bandaged wrapped around the stitches I've just put on the wound on his ribcage and another bandage taping down the other heavy cut on his brow.