Page 2 of Hawk

“Mr. Bennett, it’s not a contest of who’s the toughest. If you want to avoid an infection after being cut with a box cutter, then I need to clean the laceration properly. And I can’t do that if you’re wriggling around.”

With that, she jabbed me around the wound and fuck me, if that didn’t sting more than the damn injury itself.

After that she worked silently, I tried making conversation, but she was laser focused on her work. I didn’t feel a thing as she flushed out the wound and then sutured it closed.

“All done,” she said as she peeled off her gloves and threw them in the trash. She then rattled off some instructions for showering and cleaning the wound and I nodded in all the right places.

I wanted to tell her that this wasn’t my first rodeo, but she wouldn’t be impressed by that either. “Nurse…” I began.

“Laura.” She supplied her first name without a smile, but without any annoyance either.

“Laura, I would love to take you out to dinner tonight.” My heart pounded in my chest, and it had nothing to do with the stitches or the lidocaine.

The apologetic look on her face told me what her answer would be. “My evening is booked, Mr. Bennett. Besides, I don’t date patients. Be more careful next time you’re using a box cutter.”

I bit my lip to stop the laugh, she really wasn’t buying my story. But at least she hadn’t gotten the cops involved.

“How about tomorrow night? I stop being your patient the moment I’m out the door,” I was nothing if not a persistent fucker, and when she showed the barest hint of a smile, I was sure I had her. “I promise,” I said with one hand over my heart and the other raised to swear an oath, “that I will avoid any sharp household implements before our date tomorrow night.”

“Busy tomorrow night too.”

Damn, that was strike two, and I wasn’t ready for strike three yet. “Fair enough.” I jumped from the exam table as if my side wasn’t fucking killing me. “Enjoy your evening, Laura. All of ‘em.”

“Thank you, Mr. Bennett. Be more careful in the future.”

I grabbed the instructions and prescriptions from the doctor who hadn’t bothered to show his face and marched out of the office. I felt worse after her rejection than the damn knife wound.

A slow smile spread across my face as I crossed the hospital parking lot. Laura the nurse was something else. She had nerves of steel, she was fucking unflappable, and she wasn’t easily impressed. Typically, I preferred my women easy, but maybe Diesel and Rocky were right and there was something to be said for a woman who wasn’t easy—in or out of the bedroom.

I shook off that thought because I must be some kind of sick fuck to want more from a woman who couldn’t even smile at me when there were tons of total fucking smoke shows who would happily warm my bed for a few hours. But my mind was stuck on a woman who was clearly not interested.

For now.

Like I said, I was a persistent fucker when I wanted to be, and by the time I arrived back at the Steel Demons clubhouse, I decided that I wanted to be.

Very fucking much.

Chapter Two

Laura

I couldn’t help the smile that fixed itself to my face as the big, broad-shouldered, long-haired man stormed out of my exam room. Okay, he hadn’t stormed out exactly, but he left in a hurry, and he wasn’t pleased about my rejection. But it was oh so damn satisfying to be able to put that man in his place. He was handsome, ridiculously so if tall men with long, dark hair, a lazy gait, well-worn jeans, shoulders broad enough to span the doorway and a dazzling smile was your type. But it wasn’t my type. I could appreciate a pretty thing without wanting it. Pretty things, especially wrapped up in a six-foot plus package were trouble, usually more trouble than they were worth. Especially if they turned up in the ER with what was obviously a knife wound. By rights I should have reported it, but he’d insisted it was an accident, and he didn’t appear to be scared for his life, so I let it go.

To his credit, Mr. Bennett hadn’t tried to change my mind the way a lot of men did, both inside and outside the hospital. Even my ex had taken a lot longer than a grown man should to get the hint that breaking up with him and moving out meant we were well and truly done. Even with broken bones, chronic illnesses, or life-altering news, men found a way to shoot their shot.

I rolled my eyes and turned my attention to straightening the exam room and preparing for the next patient. The emergency room was a nonstop parade of terrible shit every single day, because of course it was. Nobody came into the ER because their cancer was in remission or because they’d learned how to walk again after a catastrophic auto accident. I loved my job, I really did, but it wasn’t always easy.

“Knock, knock. Hey, girl, you free for a few minutes?” Kristy wore a hesitant smile as she bounced on her toes in the doorway. “I’ll be your best friend forever.”

I laughed. “You already are. What’s up?”

“Tyrone is back for his next shot and he’s… let’s say he’s anxious.”

My shoulders sagged because I had to help her. Tyrone was almost three hundred pounds of solid muscle, he had to be as a former pro football player, but he also had a huge phobia of needles and anything remotely medical. It kept life interesting. “I’m on my way.” Once the room was back to rights, I exited and followed the sound of Tyrone’s deep baritone begging to the heavens to save him.

“Miss Laura.” He grinned, his body strung tight as he eyed the needle in Kristy’s hand. “How you doing?”

“Better than you, Ty.” I flicked my gaze to the needle and back to his face. “You’ve been hit by men much bigger than this itty-bitty needle.”

---