Reborn (Shadow Falls: After Dark #1)(35)

Glad for the interruption from her haunted thoughts, she snatched out her phone. Thinking and hoping it was Chan, she glanced at the number. It wasn’t Chan.

Chapter Ten

“Why didn’t you call me?” Steve asked first thing.

“I got caught up with a few things and was busy,” Della said, knowing it wasn’t the complete truth. The real reason she hadn’t called him was fear. Fear she’d end up spouting out something about the cute little doctor’s daughter who’d polluted the air with all kinds of pheromones when she’d shot him that toothpaste-ad smile.

Della couldn’t be jealous. Well, she shouldn’t be jealous. She had no hold on Steve. Had no right to insist he stay away from blond chicks with bigger boobs than she had and who wanted his body.

But telling herself that didn’t make the feeling go away. It only made it worse. Because she hadn’t really thought about the girl’s boobs until now.

“Too busy to call me?” he asked, sounding ticked.

“Sorry,” she offered, and went into her bedroom, shut the door, and fell on the bed. “I wanted to go back to the falls on the off chance I could still catch a scent of the person who knocked me in the head.”

“Dr. Whitman said for you to rest.”

She rolled her eyes. “Look, I’ve already been read the riot act by Holiday, I don’t need you adding to it.”

He huffed. “I’m not … I’m just worried. The doctor was looking over the paperwork I did on you after you left and he noticed your temperature was elevated. Remember I told you that you felt warm this morning. Anyway, he wanted to know if I’d asked if you were on your menstrual cycle. And I told him you’d said you were—but his concern just sort of worried me.”

Della reached up and touched her brow. Did she have a fever?

“I especially don’t like it that someone hit you on the head. Does Burnett have a clue who did this?”

“No, I don’t think so.” She almost told him about Chase’s scent being on the rock, but decided against it. Steve had already expressed dislike for the guy and she didn’t want to encourage it.

“Could it have anything to do with the case you helped Burnett with and the intruder at the falls that you caught a trace of?”

She frowned. “He mentioned it could be a possibility,” she said.

“Is the young couple who died involved in this case?”

The image flashed in her head. “How did you know?”

“I read about an accident in the paper. I know they sometimes cover up the deaths when it involves supernaturals, so I just assumed…” He paused. “Shit, I don’t like this. A murderer could be after you.”

“We don’t know it was him. And if he comes back again, he’ll be the one who needs a doctor.”

A pregnant pause lingered both on the line and in her bedroom. Della looked around. The door to the bedroom was open. Hadn’t she shut it?

“Did you actually see it?” Steve asked. “See them dead?”

She inhaled, her mind shifting away from the door to death. “Yeah.”

“Damn, I’m sorry, Della. I mean, it had to be tough.”

“It was, but it just makes me more determined that this is what I want to do. Catch bastards like that. Make them pay for what they did. Keep them from doing it again.”

“Yeah, but I don’t like thinking about you looking for sick bastards like that.”

I don’t like you hanging out with blondie, either. Silence came to the line. “I’m sorry.” The line went quiet again. She tried to think of something to say. So tell me about the doctor’s daughter and her thing for you. She spit the words off her tongue and went with something else. Something that didn’t sound so jealous. “So do you see all the patients who come in? Even the animals?”

“Yeah,” he said, as if knowing she’d taken a conversational U-turn.

“Do you enjoy it?” she asked. Enjoy being around the doctor’s daughter?

“Yeah. Dr. Whitman suggested I go to veterinarian school if I want to practice medicine for supernaturals. He said the few supernatural doctors he knows who went through regular medical school have a lot more trouble. And he said I could work for him while going to school. Besides, I like animals.”

She couldn’t help but wonder if the good doctor had his sights set on Steve for a son-in-law. “You don’t have to work as a vet. Supernatural doctors work at regular hospitals. I know because when I was turned I ran into a nurse and doctor.”

“Yeah, but how often do you think supernaturals come in to the emergency room? Which means I’d mostly be working on humans. I could open my own practice, but then it gets messy with insurance and all the regulations. Jessie said Dr. Whitman and his partner were talking about bringing in another partner in a few years, so when I graduate I wouldn’t even have to set up a clinic and find clients.”

“Who’s Jessie?” she asked, but she was afraid she already knew.

“Dr. Whitman’s daughter. I think you met her. The one with the big smile.”

Big smile? “I see,” Della said.

And she did see. Blond and big-smiling Jessie had her life all planned out. And Steve was part of it.

The question was if Della was ready to become the hiccup in the girl’s plans. Or better put, was Della ready to put her heart on the chopping block?