Page 15 of Brotan

"Your mother says you're settling in." He clears his throat. "You know it's not too late to reconsider this... detour."

"It's not a detour."

"I had lunch with Alan Lucas last week. Hospital board. He mentioned they're restructuring the surgical department. There would be a place for you."

Of course. Dad and his connections. Always the safety net I've both resented and relied on.

"Dad—"

"Or elsewhere, if that's what you prefer. I have colleagues at Presbyterian and Mount Sinai. One call, Maya. That's all it would take."

"I'm not ready." My voice sounds weaker than I want it to.

"Ready?" He sighs, the sound heavy with disappointment. "Better doctors than you have lost patients, Maya. You don't throw away a career over one incident."

"This town needs me."

"But do you need it?" His voice cuts like a scalpel. "Hiding in some backwater won't bring that woman back."

Jamie Matthews. Twenty-six. Mother of two. Dead while I was distracted. "She has a name, Dad."

He's silent for a moment before I hear him clear his throat. "Punishing yourself won't bring Ms. Matthews back."

I know he's right, but I don't want him to be. I can't face the fact that I can be happy and eventually put this behind me, while she'll never hug her kids again.

"I have to go." My grip tightens on the phone. "I'll call next week."

"Maya—"

I end the call before he can finish, just as I'm turning into the diner's parking lot. I press my forehead against the steering wheel, inhaling slowly through my nose, cataloging the sensations clinically: elevated heart rate, pressure in my sternum, slight constriction in the airway—all predictable physiological responses to stress. The same aftermath that always follows conversations with my parents.

God, they'd lose their minds completely if they knew I was mentally cataloging the exact shade of an orc's amber eyes, or how his scars mapped across his green skin like constellations I wanted to trace with my fingertips. The surgeon's daughter, the Columbia med school graduate, infatuated with someone they'd consider barely civilized. The thought almost makes me laugh, despite the ache in my chest.

Movement near the diner's entrance catches my eye. A familiar bulk exits through the doorway, impossible to mistake.

Crow.

I was so deep in my conversation that I missed his bike being parked out front. Yet another moment of inattention, the kind that sends my thoughts spiraling back to the operating room, to Jamie's monitors, to everything I should have seen but didn't.

He moves with a stiffness that triggers my medical instincts—subtle favoring of his left side, careful way he holds his massive frame. As he crosses the parking lot, morning sunlight reveals damage even from this distance. His face is bruised, and he's carrying what looks like a bar towel filled with ice pressed against his temple.

The urge to retreat wars with professional obligation. I could drive away, head straight to the clinic. Avoid another charged encounter with the orc who pretended not to know me, then apologized, then vanished for days.

But those injuries...

"Damn it," I mutter, grabbing my bag and getting out of the car.

He notices me immediately, amber eyes narrowing as I approach. For a moment, he looks like he might turn and walk away. Something flickers across his face—surprise, wariness, and something else I can't quite name.

"What happened to you?" I ask, gesturing to his face.

"Nothing." His voice is gruff, dismissive. His gaze slides away from mine, focusing on some point over my shoulder.

"Doesn't look like nothing. You need medical attention."

"I'm fine."

"That's what you said last time, too."

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