I sat down in front of the exam table where he was resting. “Seemed like she might be a good nurse.”
He laughed. “A little obsessive, but I’ve never minded that in my…nurses.”
“So, how hard did shenurseyou last night?” I teased him. “I warned her that you were injured.”
He laughed harder, then coughed, his neck wound still healing. “Nothing like that. We talked, until she insisted I get some more sleep. That’s all. For now.”
I studied my friend. “You like her, don’t you?”
His lips twitched upward. “She has a certain appeal.”
I grinned. “You’re smitten!”
He shrugged. “I’m testing the waters.”
“Surge in love,” I mused, playfully grabbing at my heart. “I never thought I’d see it.”
He laughed again, pointing a finger at me. “Andyouare an asshole.”
I winked at him, happy for my friend. “May the two of you have many, many babies.”
Surge pursed his lips. “Get Discord, smart ass. I’m dying here.”
“Dying?” I stood, still in a teasing mood. “On second thought, you’re all the baby Sam will ever need, aren’t you?”
He waved a hand at me. “Dial Discord up—wait, where’s your gauntlet driver?”
I looked down at my bare arm and laughed. “I got fucked so good I forgot it. If you stop being a big baby with Sam, you might find out what that’s like.” I waggled my brows at him.
He flung a piece of bread at my head and got me good. “Now you owe me Discordandmore bread.”
I was buoyed by his mischievous demeanor. “I’ll be right back, Big Baby.”
Jogging upstairs, I tried to remember the last time I’d left my room without my driver. Jenny had a way of making a man forget things.
I knocked on Discord’s door, gently opened it, and kept my voice low. “Discord—”
“Shh,” she hissed at me.
When I opened the door fully, I saw her knelt in a prayer pose on the floor, her naked back to me. My gaze dropped instinctively—shit—I turned away fast, pulling the door closed again.
“It’s fine,” she huffed, a little annoyed by my interruption. “Come in.”
She pulled a gauzy night dress on before she stood and faced me, pressing against the tiny wound on her wrist. A small shrine sat where she had been. A set of golden scales, each side perfectly balanced by an amulet on a chain on one side, and a shot glass of blood on the other. Discord’s blood.
“Is everything alright?” she asked me.
“Yes, but Surge needs more blood.” I glanced back to the shrine. “Maybe Enatu can go without for a morning?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “Enatu gets her fill, no matter what. Deny a goddess her tribute at your own hazard, isn’t that what they say?”
“So I hear.”
Discord checked her wrist, then shot it with a med cannon without flinching to heal her worshipful wound. “Get any sleep?”
“Very little, but what’s new?”
She nodded, then came toward the door. “To the lab, then.”