Nash (Marked Men #4)(23)

If we hadn’t been standing outside getting snowed on, hadn’t been standing in the middle of a sidewalk, I would have pushed her against a wall … hell, I would’ve found a soft spot on the ground and let her work out whatever was hounding her in the sexiest, nastiest way possible. If she needed a physical release to get her emotions out, I would be only too happy to volunteer my time and my body. I had a sinking suspicion if I was ever lucky enough to get her naked, I would never let her put on clothes around me again.

She slid her hands around to the front of my face and grabbed both of my cheeks. She started to shiver, and when she pulled back I was stuck in the rolling thunderstorm that was her gaze. I moved one hand up and wiped away a single, crystal tear that was stuck on her eyelash with my knuckle. She let out a shuddering sigh and closed her eyes.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to attack you with my mouth.” She sounded embarrassed and sad at the same time.

I burst out laughing and took a step back as she let her hands fall. Some of her awareness must have come back because she started to shake. I sighed and pulled the zipper on my hoodie down so that I could hand it over to her. She looked at me silently for a second and then took it.

“Saint, you can attack me with any part of you at any given moment of any day. I will not complain … ever.”

She laughed a little shakily.

“Thanks.”

“Do you wanna talk about what has you out in the snow pacing back and forth?”

It was a long shot. She never seemed to really want to talk to me, but she still looked so haunted, I had to ask.

She shook her head and shoved her hands through her hair. Some of the red strands floated up like a halo around her head.

“It’s been busy all week. The weather makes things insane and it’s flu season. I can typically handle everything that comes through the door. Sometimes it can get overwhelming and breaks my heart, but I do my job and can typically wait until I get home to process it all or fall apart.”

I couldn’t even imagine what she had to deal with on a day-to-day basis. Rule’s twin brother, Remy, had been brought to this very ER when he had crashed his car on the interstate in a horrific accident. He hadn’t made it and it occurred to me that was something she had to see all the time.

“Today a teenage girl was rushed in. Her parents found her overdosed in the bathroom. She was just a baby really, had her entire life in front of her, but she swallowed an entire bottle of pills because kids at her school were picking on her, bullying her. They were being mean to her, calling her awful names on the Internet, and she just couldn’t take it anymore.”

I saw her bottom lip quiver before she trapped it between her teeth. Her eyes lifted back up to mine and the gray had turned slate. I wondered if she was seeing her teenage self in that patient, and felt a twinge of remorse that I hadn’t paid more attention to her back then.

“I see death and tragedy all the time and nothing makes it worse than when it’s totally senseless. All she needed was some niceness, some basic human kindness, and she wouldn’t be on her way to the morgue and her parents wouldn’t be devastated. It’s heartbreaking and so senseless.”

She pulled her hands into the sleeves of my hoodie and looked up at me. “And I have to go talk to my mom tomorrow, which is the equivalent of getting a hundred root canals at one time. This day was vicious and I think I went a little off the rails for a second.”

It was my turn to shiver.

“I’m sorry, Saint. That sounds awful.”

She narrowed her eyes at me and tilted her head toward the front of building.

“How do you know? Have you ever had anyone make fun of you, been called awful names, had anyone make you feel like you didn’t deserve to live just because you weren’t the same as everyone else?”

I winced at her harsh tone and tried to put together how she could go from sweet to hostile toward me so quickly. Her train of thought moved like a scared jackrabbit.

I reached out and grabbed her elbow and spun her around so that she was facing me.

“Look, I don’t know what I did or said that makes you think I’m some kind of monster. I do know exactly what that’s like, though, Saint. I lived with Phil for most of my childhood because my own mom didn’t like me, didn’t think I was good enough to keep around. I wasn’t like her or her husband, so she didn’t want me. She married a guy that loathed me before I was even old enough to question why. I heard it on repeat every day of my childhood, the names, the taunts, the derisions for simply being alive. So that’s how I know. Granted, mine didn’t come from my peers, but does that make a difference? Hateful actions suck no matter who is delivering them.”

Something crossed her pretty face and I noticed that in true redhead fashion she had a few tiny little freckles that dotted the bridge of her nose. She wrinkled the speckled feature and walked with me to the elevator. I could practically see her trying to pick apart my words as we moved together.

“Visiting hours are over but I’ll sneak you in considering I waylaid you outside.”

“Thanks, so what’s up with your mom? Why is going to visit her on par with the dentist?”

She made a noise in her throat and leaned against the other side of the elevator. I wanted to hit the panic button and trap us in here together for an hour or two so I could see if I could get her to put her mouth on mine again.