Page 5 of Brotan

She nods, then helps me out of the ambulance. The security guards hover nearby, impatient now.

"Dr. Johnson," one of them says, more insistent this time.

"I'm coming," she snaps, then turns back to me. "Take care of yourself. And maybe stay out of bars for a while."

I look at her—really look at her. This human woman who stood up to a mob to protect an injured orc. Who put her job on the line to treat me when her colleagues would rather watch me die. Who touched me with hands that healed instead of hurt.

"I owe you, Doc," I say, my voice dropping to the dangerous rumble that typically has humans backing away. Maya doesn't back down. Instead, her pupils dilate slightly, and I catch the quick flutter of her pulse at the base of her throat.

Her eyes meet mine one last time, something unreadable flickering in their depths. “Then do me a favor and don't make someone else patch you up tomorrow night.” A challenge flashes in her eyes. "If you're really as tough as you claim to be, why not prove it by not needing to destroy something for once?"

The words land on my chest. I mask the impact with a sneer. "You don't know what I need, Doc."

"Maybe not," she concedes with a small smile. "But I'm pretty good at telling the difference between what someone shows the world and what's actually there."

"And what do you think you see?" I growl, suddenly angry that this human thinks she can read me after thirty minutes of stitching me up.

"Someone who's spent so long being what everyone expects that he's forgotten there might be anything else." Her voice softens. "Someone who's more than just the damage he can deal."

With that, she turns away, flanked by security guards, her white coat billowing behind her like a battle flag.

I watch until she disappears through the sliding doors, then slowly turn toward the street. The pain is duller now, thanks to whatever she injected me with. I can make it back to the clubhouse and my brothers in the Ironborn.

Her words echo in my head.Someone who's more than just the damage he can deal.

Bullshit. That's exactly what I am—what I've made myself into. A weapon. A monster. Someone who doesn't care about anything except survival and the next fight. It's kept me alive this long and kept me from the weakness that gets orcs killed in this human world.

But as I limp away from the hospital, my mind keeps returning to her hands against my skin, the challenge in her eyes, the way she stood between me and danger without hesitation.

And for the first time since crossing the Rift, I find myself craving something more dangerous than any fight—the chance to be seen as more than just tusks and green skin by someone who isn't afraid to look. The thought terrifies me more than any enemy I've faced.

Because caring is a weakness I can't afford, and becoming something more than destruction incarnate means admitting there's something in me worth saving.

ChapterTwo

Maya

Six months later

The medical community has a term for doctors who crack: impaired physician. As if failure is a medical condition with its own diagnosis code. A year ago, I lost a patient I shouldn't have. Yesterday, I packed my life into my Honda. Today, I'm staring at a dusty clinic in a town that doesn't even register on most maps. This is what rock bottom looks like—Shadow Ridge, Georgia.

The town sits before me now. Peeling paint and boarded windows tell a story of slow death by economic failure. An obituary written in faded storefronts and empty parking lots. Perfect. I came here to bury myself, too.

My Honda sputters as I pull into what passes for the town's main street. The GPS chimes that I've arrived at my destination, but all I see is a building with a hand-painted "CLINIC" sign hanging crookedly above a door that's seen better days.

So this is my fresh start. This dusty, forgotten place where I can either outrun my failures or fall into obscurity trying.

I kill the engine and sit in the silence, my hands still gripping the steering wheel like it might somehow reverse me out of this decision. The random phone call that brought me here plays on repeat in my head:

"Dr. Johnson? My name is Hammer. I run the Ironborn MC. We've got a town that needs a doctor, and I heard you might need a change of pace."

I didn't ask how he knew about me. Didn't ask why a motorcycle club president was recruiting medical professionals. I just said yes, because New York's pristine hospitals had become suffocating after the review board cleared me while Jamie Matthews' husband looked on with empty eyes. What did it matter if bikers funded my practice, as long as I could treat patients without politics?

Jamie Matthews—twenty-six, mother of two, routine appendectomy turned fatal on my watch—followed me through every hospital corridor. I kept replaying that night, searching for the moment I could have changed everything. I missed her dropping blood pressure. I trusted the anesthesiologist who'd already been drinking. I didn't check the medication dosage myself. The collection of small mistakes that ended with a dead patient and a career in freefall.

A knock on my window snaps me out of the familiar spiral. A woman with honey blonde hair pulled back in a severe bun and sharp eyes peers in at me, her expression a mixture of curiosity and undisguised assessment.

I roll down the window, forcing professionalism into my voice. "Hello. I'm Dr. Maya Johnson. I'm the new doctor."

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