Cari Lynn - The Doctor's Recovery

“If you looked at the floor plan, there’s more than one window.” Wyatt crammed the stack of applications into his backpack, ramming his frustration inside, too. “It isn’t a prison.”

“Mia suggested that my therapists do a home visit to assess the dangers before I move back.” Helen adjusted her covers, tugging the blankets up to her chin. “I spoke to both of my therapists this afternoon and offered to give them my set of keys if you’re schedule is too full to accommodate such a small request.”

Wyatt tapped his fist against his mouth, knocking his retort back behind his teeth. He really must thank Mia for her abundant help.

His mom lowered the head of her bed, signaling her desire to sleep and the end of their conversation.

Mia needed to stop making suggestions. Now. His mother needed to stop acting as if she came last in his life. He’d come home, hadn’t he? He swung the backpack on his shoulder and kissed his mom’s cheek. “I’ll talk to your therapists tomorrow.”

Right after he set Mia straight before things went too far and she’d written his mother’s discharge and home care orders herself.

Wyatt strode down the hall and noticed the light streaming from Mia’s room, not the soft night setting that allowed patients to see their way to the bathroom. But the full daylight setting that lit up the room like the noon sun across the desert. She knew the importance of sleep. A hospital room wasn’t a home office, and pulling an all-night work session would set back her recovery.

She had to be awake. No one could sleep in that flood of light. After he yelled at her for working all night, he’d order her to stay away from his mother. And if he sounded like a father warning a detention-stricken boy away from his honors-achieving daughter, maybe she’d listen and get in line.

“It’s lights out, Mia.” Wyatt tugged on the curtain shielding Mia’s bed. “As in stop working and go to...” Whatever else Wyatt might’ve said drained from his voice.

Several pillows propped Mia upright as if to better support her work session. Except her hands clenched the laptop like metal clamps. The deep, dark pockets under her eyes cast shadows down her cheeks. Strands of her chestnut hair poked out from her braid, stiff and crinkled, not soft and silky. Her right leg rested on top of the covers, but her foot, encased in a Bay Water Hospital sock, remained flexed, her knee locked and toes rigid as if she prepared herself to absorb the impact of ramming into the wall feetfirst.

“Working all night isn’t part of your treatment plan.” Wyatt reached for her laptop.

“I’m not.” Her grip on the computer tightened as if someone secured those clamps. “I have to.”

Wyatt checked her IVs, wondering if some sort of night terror was being caused by the pain meds. “It can wait.”

“I just need to watch.” Her hold never loosened. Only her wide gaze lifted to collide with his, her words toppling over each other. “If I just watch, everything will be fine again.”

The terror that burned the edges of her amber eyes seared through him, spiking his own blood pressure. He hadn’t ever witnessed her fear. As far as he knew, Mia dared fear to try to scare her. But in this moment, he couldn’t deny that fright engulfed her like uncontained wildfire.

“You can watch tomorrow.” He soothed his voice into the placating style of those hostage negotiators he’d seen on TV and tugged on the laptop, gaining some traction. She certainly hadn’t slacked off with her fitness in the past two years. Of course, all those adventure and wilderness shoots didn’t happen from the comfort of a jeep.

“Wyatt, press Play.” Mia’s gaze locked on the computer screen. Her cheeks paled as if she’d whitened her warm beige skin with bleach. “Just press Play, please.”

The shiver of dread leaking through her voice crept up his spine. Time to end this and regain control. He sat on the side of the bed and shifted into her view, replacing the computer screen with his face in her line of sight. “Mia, inhale now. Breathe in until I tell you to stop.” He cupped her cold cheeks in both of his hands. “Good. Exhale.”

He mimicked her breathing, matching his inhales and exhales to hers. The hitch in her breath stopped after the fifth exhale. She blinked after five more inhales. Another set of five and the warmth returned to her skin beneath his palms.

“You can let go.” Mia blinked, the movement slow and exaggerated, as if her eyelashes cleared the lingering fear from her gaze.

He rubbed his thumbs over her cheeks. “I’ll let go when I want.”

“Really, I’m fine now.” Still she leaned into his touch.

The shadows finally settled back into the bruises beneath her eyes. She was better, but far from fine. “You need to get some sleep.”

“I was trying to do that,” she argued.

“With your laptop.”

She pushed his arms away and grasped the computer as if he’d caused the crisis. “I’m being stupid. I already survived. It’s not like I’ll die from watching the footage.”

He flattened his palm against the laptop, keeping her from lifting the screen. “What footage?”

“There’s video from my accident. I need to watch it.” Confidence coated her voice, yet the tremor in her fingers as she tried to open the computer gave her away.

He set his hand over hers as if he had every right. As if she was more than just another patient. “Eddy and Shane can pull out any useful footage.”

“Shane already did that.” She curled her fingers into a fist beneath his palm.

“Then let it alone.”

“I can’t.” She stared at their hands. Her fingers twitched beneath his touch.

“There’s no point in reliving it.” If she only released her fist the tiniest bit, he could weave his fingers through hers and draw her focus back to him. He wanted to replace her fear with something better. Something meaningful. Something worth remembering. Like their first and only kiss.

“I relive it every night already,” she whispered.

“Isn’t that enough?” Couldn’t he be enough? No, he didn’t want to be her anything. He straightened and folded his arms over his chest to keep from reaching for her again. Or doing something absurd like giving in to his urge to hold more than her hand.

Mia was his past. Their brief time together nothing more than an inaccurate reading on an otherwise normal EKG. His future involved setting up medical clinics to those in desperate situations, not succumbing to what was nothing more than a chemical reaction in his body. He’d touched Mia and his brain released dopamine and norepinephrine to charge his nerves, trying to enhance his emotions, trying to lead him astray. Yet science was his specialty, and any reaction to Mia, or any woman for that matter, he controlled.

The only heart-related discussions he planned to have involved words like cardiac arrhythmias , coronary thrombosis and myocardial infarction . There were no medical degrees in fairy tales and pipe dreams. Besides, if love truly saved, his brother would be alive today. Love always exacted a price, and that was a price he’d never pay again.

He shoved the clinician inside him forward and eyed her as he would any other irrational patient. “There’s medicine to help you sleep. Nurses right down the hall who can administer the medicine into your IV.”

“Sleep won’t help me.” She latched onto his arm and squeezed as if more pressure would make him understand her better. “Why can’t you get that?”

Wyatt curled his fingers into fists, coiling his arms tighter against his chest like a cornered rattlesnake. Taking her into his arms and kissing her panic away had not been prescribed. Disgusted with his misplaced impulses, he didn’t pause to dilute the acidic bite in his tone. “Why can’t you be reasonable? Take some medicine and forget the accident.”