Page 29 of The Heat of Us

“There you go.” I smiled and turned to leave. After my disaster of a session with Kerry it would’ve been wildly hypocritical to coerce him to talk before he was ready.

“Hazel.”

I paused, halfway to the elevator.

“My grandma’s in the hospital.”

Oh. This called for way more than candy-level reassurance. I walked back to his desk, laid my hands flat on the counter and propped my chin on them. “Is she going to be ok?” I asked plainly. Aleks did not strike me as someone who needed coddling, even during a crisis.

He exhaled as he ran a stressed hand through his hair. His short loose curls managed to land in the most effortlessly tousled way that others would probably spend hours to achieve.

Pretty! cooed my omega.

Grandma in hospital. I urgently reminded her with a mental slap.

“She had some chest pain early this morning. I took her straight to emergency and they said they had to keep her there overnight because of her age.” Aleks rubbed his jaw nervously. “They wouldn’t let me stay,” he finished bleakly.

“Seriously?”

“Rules are rules, I guess.” His lip curled slightly, unimpressed by the hospital’s protocols.

How could I try to reassure him? “Did you get to meet her doctor?” I asked.

“Yes, he didn’t seem…terrible. One of the nurses actually spoke Russian and said she’d make sure my grandma was looked after,” Aleks conceded.

“She sounds like she’s in good hands,” I said carefully. “I’m glad they’re taking the time to make sure she’s ok. Even though it’s hard knowing she’s there by herself. Hopefully it’s just a one-off and not anything more serious.”

Aleks was silent for a while. Ruminating, on the cusp of saying more. I waited and gave him space, letting him make the decision of whether to fill it or not.

“She’s…not been herself for a while.” His voice was quiet but gritty when he finally spoke. “It’s been getting harder and harder to look after her. I put her on a waitlist for a care facility even though I have no fucking idea how we’re going to afford it.”

I thought for a moment. “What do you think your grandma would want you to do?”

“She would tell me to keep studying and working towards my future. And that circumstances might change when the time comes,” he said slowly.

“Smart lady.” I smiled.

Aleks returned it and my stomach did a little somersault.

“She is. She’s the best.” He picked up his pen and turned it over and over between his fingers restlessly. “I just…don’t want to go home after work knowing she’s not there.”

This fucking counter, this barrier between us. It chafed on me for some reason. I needed it gone so I could curl up in his lap, pull that sad head into my neck and let him breathe in my—

Hazel, what the fucking fuck.

“Dinner,” I blurted.

Aleks blinked up at me.

“We should get dinner. When you’re done,” I said, more coherently this time. “I know a great little curry house that’s a 10 minute walk from here. Let’s set our heads on fire so it takes your mind off it for a little while.”

“Yeah, that sounds good, actually. Thank you.” I could sense his burden lift slightly, a tiny gilded sparkle of sunshine after a storm. “You’ll wait for me? I clock out at 8.”

“Of course.”

I wondered why his trust in me made me feel so much.

9

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