Drew shook his head. “That’s not—”
“I am not some little piece of fluff. Do you understand me? Yes, I had an asthma attack. My asthma gets severe—especially if smoke is billowing around me! But I’ve got
it under control. I’m fine now.”
But he’d never forget how terrified he’d been. “I’m not going to risk—”
Her finger stopped its stabbing, but her eyes were bright with fury. “I’m not yours to risk, Agent.”
I feel like you are.
“I told you already. This is my life.”
But he felt like she was his.
“You think I’m some green girl who doesn’t know what she’s doing? That I’m just a healer. That’s what you said, right?”
There wasn’t any “just” about it. She saved lives. She’d saved plenty of agents. That was damn important.
“I killed a man when I was eighteen.”
There was that magic number again, only now he realized it was attached to a dark story that had changed her life.
“I can do it again, if I have to.”
She’d killed a man? His doc? Drew shook his head.
Her smile was sad. “Anyone can kill, under the right circumstances. Those circumstances...” The smile vanished as she swallowed. “They didn’t give me a choice.”
His heart was pounding in his chest, racing fast, but when Drew spoke, his voice came out flat. “What happened?” He had to know. It was getting to the point where he felt as though he had to know everything about her.
She backed up a step.
He caught her wrist, held her there. “What happened?” She didn’t get to drop a bombshell like this one and just walk away from him.
She straightened her spine. Her whole body seemed to tense as if she were bracing herself for the memory. “It’s one of those ‘wrong place, wrong time’ stories. They always end badly, you know.”
Pain echoed in her voice and seemed to strike right at his heart.
“My parents and I got caught in the middle of a bank robbery. When we walked into that bank, we didn’t realize what was happening until we heard the teller scream.”
She eased out a slow breath and continued. “My dad, he was a cop. He had his dress blues on that day. He always looked so good in them. My mom would call him her ‘handsome cop.’ And he did look handsome that day. I was proud of him. Always so proud.”
She pushed her left hand through her hair. Her eyes were on his, but Drew didn’t think Tina was actually seeing him. Her gaze seemed to be focused only on the pain of the past. “We went inside, thinking that we’d be in and out. We had dinner reservations at six that night.” She pushed out a hard breath. “We didn’t make dinner.”
“Tina...”
“As soon as they saw my dad, the robbers panicked. They screamed for him to get on the ground and to lift his hands up.”
He wanted her in his arms. But Drew didn’t move.
His thumb rubbed lightly against her wrist. The beating of her pulse seemed to steady him.
“I had an attack. They were worse back then. I used to get them more frequently.” Her breath eased out slowly. “My dad always carried medicine for me. He was reaching for it, but the robbers thought he was reaching for his gun.”
Hell.
“They shot him. My mother ran at them and they shot her, too.” Tears glimmered in her eyes. “My mother died instantly, but my father didn’t. His blood was all over me, and there wasn’t anything I could do. I was trying to pull in air, begging them to help my dad, and when I looked up—” She blinked and finally seemed to see Drew once more. “The shooter had his gun pointed right at my head.”