Page 14 of Daddy's Little Patient

“So now what?”

It was nice to have a likely answer for why she’d been so tired for so long, but what was she supposed to do? Was there anythingtodo? Of course she could start by googling what the hell sleep apnea was beyond what Doctor Pierce had told her but then she’d get pages and pages of information, and even then, who was to say her doctor would believe her? And—

A squeeze to her hand kept her thoughts from running off the edge like a bunch of lemmings.

“The next step is doing some testing to make sure that’s what’s going on. People used to have to go to a sleep lab but you can do the diagnostics at home now.”

Home. Right. Crapsicles. Cricket had managed to forget about her apartment for a few minutes with all this sleep apnea stuff and now it came crashing back.

Another squeeze to her hand refocused her attention on Doctor Pierce. He was so patient with her when a lot of people got frustrated.

“I want to be clear that by ‘at home,’ I mean here. You don’t need to do any of this alone.”

“But—”

“There are no buts here, Cricket. When I said you’re not leaving until we can figure out how to make everything not terrible, I meant it. If you do in fact have sleep apnea, that’s pretty terrible.”

“But—”

“I swear, Cricket, if you say ‘but’ one more time…”

Doctor Pierce shook his head. What had he been going to say? What would he do if she said it again? The mischievous, curious part of her wanted to find out, but she already felt as though she was treading on thin ice so she didn’t. Everyone in Alaska knew better than to go out on thin ice. She probably wouldn’t die from his rejection but she didn’t want to test that theory.

He took a deep breath and looked at her. “I understand you might have concerns. Let’s get those taken care of. Because they will be taken care of.”

How could he possibly say that everything would be taken care of? But maybe if you were a really good-looking doctor you could say things like that with confidence because things always went your way. No money troubles, no getting fired, no worrying about being homeless or how you were going to eat. Yeah, easy for him to say. But if he wanted to use some of his good fortune to help her, maybe she should let him.

“What about my apartment?”

“What about it?”

Self-consciousness made her stomach all squiggly.

“My rent is due next week and I don’t have the money to pay it.”

Would he frown and ask her why she didn’t have an emergency fund saved up to cover it? She didn’t need to be shamed right now, which was part of the reason she hadn’t called her parents. They were solid, practical people who hadn’t wanted her chasing her dream up to Alaska in the first place.

“Then you’ll stay here with me.”

“You don’t have a guest room!”

“I could, though. If that’s what you want.”

She didn’t, but that was a whole other issue.

“What about all my stuff?”

“I suspect you don’t have a big place, and I don’t have a lot of things. It will all fit in my house.”

“How is it going to get here? My car isn’t—”

Son of a Sitka Periwinkle, wherewasher car? Doctor Pierce had said he would take care of it, but—

“Yes, your car is here, in the garage,” he told her with a gentle smile. “My friend Linc brought it over last night while you were asleep. You want to go see?”

“No.” She believed him and besides, the garage was probably cold whereas the couch was warm and comfy and she really liked how Doctor Pierce was holding her hand.

“Okay. If you’re worried about moving your things, don’t be. I can help you pack up, and Linc and I both have trucks that haul plenty.”

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