Page 7 of Scorched Hearts

“Aren’t you a paramedic?”

“No, I’m a trauma surgeon. But they dispatched too few ambulances. I stabilized the boy. Now he’s going to the hospital, look.” She pointed toward the ambulance getting ready to leave. “But we can’t leave you guys without an ambulance, so we’ll wait until they come.”

Maya truly hadn’t changed much. Her light hair rested tightly bound, the color she’d once explained to Elle was strawberry blonde, but when Elle pointed out another blonde, Maya insisted that Maya’s hair wasn’t strawberry blonde but sunflower blonde. They laughed it off in the end.

The weight of memories nested somewhere at the bottom of Elle’s chest.

“Why’d you come back?” Her voice came out much more meek than she would have liked, little vibrations of emotion on the string of her words.

Maya turned to look at Elle’s face—an intense stare difficult to endure. Elle turned away, regretting the question.

“I don’t think it’s any of your business, Elena.” She shrugged, collecting the equipment in one place.

Elle raised herself up on her elbows, feeling significantly better under the cloudy sky. Evening was approaching, and her skin breathed in the cold water from refreshing compresses. The firefighters were still in the middle of wrestling with the fire, and a few cars had pulled up at the parking lot, hopeless residents of the building who’d got back from work to see their home had been ruined. Some held little children in their arms, some came with teenagers, some had no one to turn to and watched their undoing alone.

“Where are you staying?” Elle was desperate for at least a small piece of banter, if not to rekindle Maya’s affection, then perhaps at least to distract her from being unable to help any further. Heat exhaustion would keep her out of work for at least two days, and she’d have nothing to do. Work was her life.

Oh, and whiskey and women… The three beautiful W’s. But she had given them up, hadn’t she? Women, at least.

Probably a hangover had caused the heat exhaustion. She had to stop drinking on nights before she had work.

Maya let her hands fall in resignation.

“Elena, I don’t want you to talk to me. We no longer have any kind of personal relationship. I’m here as a professional doctor to watch you in case you pass out. As soon as my colleagues arrive, I’m gone.”

Elle’s breathing got heavier. She’d thought that once they’d settle into their separate lives, they could be at ease with each other. That she could treat the woman she’d known inside and out as a friend, even if their paths had at some point diverged.

The woman she’d never forgotten.

“Am I supposed to pretend nothing between us has ever happened?” Elle brushed her hand against Maya’s, but it was quickly shoved away.

“No, you’re supposed to act according to what happened.” Her voice trembled a little, but she quickly took control of it. “Take responsibility for your actions for once in your life, Elena. Your truly shitty actions. Remember them?”

Elle sighed. She needed a drink.

For fuck’s sake.

The atmosphere between them grew irreversibly sour. Maya was as beautiful as ever, especially when she was pissed. The ambulance still hadn’t arrived, and the other one was preparing to leave. Maya ran up to it to consult the plan, leaving Elle alone for a moment. O’Malley and Montgomery, having rested, were helping the crew extinguishing the fire, and the situation appeared to have deescalated quickly.

Elle’s stomach swelled with another wave of nausea, rapidly paling her skin. She crawled over to the water bottle, gulping the cool liquid. The clear taste of it swam down her tongue, but the painful nausea exhausted her. Slowly, her eyelids grew heavy, and she plunged into a feverish sleep.

“You okay? Elena?”

Someone was touching her shoulders. When she opened her eyes, it was Maya again. She smiled, feeling stronger.

“So worried, how sweet.” She tried sitting up to prevent falling asleep again.

“No, lie down.”

Elle obediently followed Maya’s cold command, so contrasting to her head-spinning heat of fire and abruptly met old love. After a moment, she tried again. “Could we cast aside what happened and be on normal terms? Maya, it’s been so long…”

Hearing her own name leave Elle’s mouth made Maya subtly flinch. Her arms grew tense, and in the dusking sun, Elle could see the shimmering drops of sweat create silver paths along her skin. Maya’s presence did something to Elle that she hadn’t experienced with any other woman, not before nor since. Her bones itched with want, the heat of their reunion beat in her heart with more intensity than the fire blazing next to them. And in the heart of that beating fire of her chest, something poisonous dripped. Melted. Elle began feeling the poisonous little pangs of guilt.

Maya turned to look at her, a prolonged, cool stare meant to hide her trembling heart. But Elle saw the corners of Maya’s mouth twitch, and she knew everything she needed to know.

“You hurt me, Elena. You hurt and humiliated me. And after all this time, I’d hoped you’d grow up enough to see that your actions have consequences. You play with fire – you get burnt. Maybe you got that idea messed up after all these years running into burning buildings.”

Elle swallowed spit louder than she’d intended to, and in a small voice said, “Very clever.”

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