20
Flint wasn’t a coward. At least, he’d never been one up until now. But facing a room full of family members and Emma’s friends, plus Mirabel—who wasn’t so much an ex as a friend with a one-time benefit—plus Dr. Swan . . . Yeah, no thanks.
Pretending to be asleep while inhaling her apple cinnamon scent had been easy. “Sorry about that. I did pass out, though. For a few minutes, or a minute.”
She smiled at him.
Flint pulled his nose away from her. “I’ll get out of your way.”
“No. Don’t go.” Her arm tensed around his body, holding him in place.
“I should get up.” Flint didn’t move. He didn’t want to move.
“Please stay.”
“I’m pretty sure this is against hospital policy.” His wolf chuffed.
“You don’t seem like the type who cares about policy.”
“I’m not.” Flint pulled one of her curls down around her neck, leaving a line of visible goosebumps as he did. He needed to get up. Gauze was wrapped around her burned arm. Any shifter would have been healed by now. Well, not exactly true—any shifter who’d gone through what she had would have been dead. So, yeah, dead was a little harder to heal from. “How’s your arm feeling?” He rubbed his thumb along the edge of her hand.
“Fine, I guess. It doesn’t hurt. I must’ve slept through the worst of the pain.” She closed her eyes and took in a shallow breath.
He understood why—the sensation overwhelmed him too. Her apple scent enticed him. But seducing a female in a hospital bed? One he’d refused in his own cabin? No, he wouldn’t do it. He’d heard the doctor. Their energies were combined, whatever that meant. He took a sniff. She wasn’t his fated mate. No, he’d have known. Everyone knows you can tell right away.
Flint inhaled again and contorted his appendages away from Emma’s. With the bed bouncing, he managed to twist onto his side and awkwardly do a controlled fall over the bed rail. His feet on the floor, he turned back to Emma. Strands of energy were reaching for her. Shitty, shitty strands of fucking magic. He strode away from her to the little bathroom on the opposite side of the massive room. His brain grappled with two things: who the hell wanted to hurt her, and why couldn’t they separate? Because they were going to separate.
He left the bathroom. Emma lay on her side, facing away from him. Flint marched out into the hallway. He’d been to this floor a couple of times—the shifter maternity ward. But it was empty right now. Wolf shifters had a habit of going into labor on the new moon or full moon, and since they’d had a full moon last weekend, things were fairly quiet.
A nurse he recognized as a friend of his mother’s jumped up from the nurse’s station. “What in the stupidity are you doing, Flint Larsen? Get back to bed.”
“Doctor said we needed to try separating to see what happened.” He straightened his shoulders and held his head up high. No wooziness or lightheadedness. “I feel pretty good.”
“Stay there. Better yet, here.” She pushed her own rolling chair to him. “Sit. I’m getting your nurse and a wheelchair.”
Prick that his wolf was, there was no way he was going to obey her command.
“Come on, Flint. Just sit. That way, if you do fall to the ground, you won’t hurt yourself. Otherwise I’ll get in trouble.”
He sat. His wolf didn’t like it, but he sat.
“Thank you. I’ll be right back. I’m going to grab a wheelchair. You’re right, Dr. Swan wanted to try this anyway when you woke up.”
He sat, his ears straining to the waiting room down the hall. Not everyone was still there. But the deep baritone of her boss was, and he wanted a word with him. Several, in fact.
Mirabel appeared with a chair and helped him into it. She scowled at him. “You get me in trouble with Heidi again, and you and I are going to have words.”
“I’m going to check out the waiting room.” He grabbed hold of the wheels and took off. “I’ll call if I need you.” She was a wolf shifter too. She’d be able to hear him.
“Fine. The sooner you get out of here, the sooner things will quiet down to hollering newborns.”
“I’m all for that.” Flint wheeled himself to the waiting room. Carter sat in the corner, a laptop and two phones next to him.
Reagan, his youngest sister, sat quietly in the corner. “Flint.” She stood up and hurried over, then hugged him hard around the neck. “Vivianne had to go home to take care of the baby, but I wanted to stay longer. Are you really okay?”
“I’m good.” His stomach flipped. He never wanted to cause Reagan pain. She took everything so hard. Whether never meeting their dad had caused her empathy to go into overdrive, he wasn’t sure. The female cared about everything, lost and broken. Growing up, Reagan kept their home full of abandoned and disabled pets. Tad, their oldest brother, had made a cart for their two-legged dog. Blind rabbits, pregnant cats, and wingless birds—Reagan brought them all home. “Really, I am. Are you okay? Ross is leaving you alone?”
She nodded.
“Thanks for coming, Reagan. But I’m good. You can go home.”
“Mom wanted to come, but Eloise told her not to.”
Flint didn’t respond.
“I’m so glad you’re okay.” She held his hand.
His magic didn’t strain toward Reagan’s, and he’d heard Eloise and Vivianne talking about Reagan’s strong powers. Part of him was relieved it didn’t, but then the other worried about what the implications of being tethered to the red-haired witch were.
“I am too.” He eyed the mogul in the corner of the room. Carter Williams had given Flint a precursory glance when he came in, a quick scowl, and then he’d returned to whatever business call he was on. “Are you done with classes for the week?” His sister commuted into Pittsburgh to an elite graduate program every day.
“I haven’t exactly been.”
“Reagan. Get out of here. I’m fine. Seriously, go.”
“You’re sure? But how are you getting home?”
He cocked his head. More than once, he’d thought about how lucky he was. There were more than enough people for him to call: sisters and their mates, his cousins, the guys in his unit. He had more people willing to help him. So many that he’d moved to the other side of the village for occasional solitude. “Listen kid, you must have a lot of studying to make up. Go home.”
