Page 51 of Sinful in Scrubs

And that was it.

My phone started ringing incessantly before I had a chance to even let my lower lip quiver with upset. I looked at the caller ID. It was my grandmother.

“Zumu,” I answered. “What’s the matter? Are you—Is everything all right?”

“Emma, I need your help.”

I couldn’t determine whether she sounded tired or scared.

“Are you hurt?”

My nervous reaction to Marcus’s rejection coalesced into a riot of worry and trepidation.

“Can you come to the apartment?” she asked.

“I’m at work,” I tried to explain, but my brain started screaming. Grandmother needed me.

“Well, when can you get here?” she asked.

“I’ll see what I can do. Are you okay?”

“I’ll be fine until you get here,” she said, but there was a small quaver in her voice.

“Okay, okay,” I said as I hung up the phone.

I needed to go help my grandmother. I turned to the nurse at the station.

“Who else is on duty tonight?” I asked.

“Oh, we have a full roster,” she said.

“Do you think I can duck out? I have an emergency with my grandmother,” I said.

She shrugged.

I immediately dialed James Collins’s number.

“This is Collins,” he answered.

“Oh, good. James, it’s Emma Chen.”

“Oh, Emma, I needed to speak with you.”

“Can it wait?”

“Why?”

“Well, I just got an emergency call from my grandmother, and I?—”

“If she’s having an emergency, can’t she call nine-one-one?”

“I don’t know,” I said, panic rising in my voice.

“We have a full roster down here in the emergency department. Is there any way?—”

“Yeah, yeah, I think we can handle it if you go. But look, you’ve called out twice in a week.”

“I haven’t called out?—”

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