Then, not looking at either of her friends, she whispers, “We’ve been dating on the down-low.”
“So “down-low” that you didn’t even know he was waiting for you here at the ER? That you called us first and wasted our goddamn time trekking through L.A. traffic to bring you home?”
Every word Poet uttered before I started holding her triggered the tiniest of flinches out of her. Now, she doesn’t even cringe as she turns to him and says, “I wanted my family around me. Is that so wrong?”
Because I know our relationship is fake, I’m well aware that I gave her the strength to utter those words. Words I don’t think she’d have said otherwise.
The bastard deserves the guilt trip too. This was clearly a cry for help, but he’s so busy tearing her a new one, he doesn’t care.
Poet’s jaw clenches. “Selfish junk—”
“David!” Charlie hisses.
“I’m not!” Isabelle shrieks. “Charlie is my family. I wasn’t thinking though. You’re right. I’m sorry I wanted my best friend close when I just got out of the ER.” Bitterness weighs down each word.
“Cindy,” Charlie says on a sigh as Poet reaches over to rub one of her shoulders.
I get that he’s trying to protect his woman, but treating Isabelle like shit isn’t going to happen on my watch.
I don’t even care that she and I aren’t dating. If someone spoke to my sisters like he did, I’d beat their ass.
“Just…thanks for coming, Charlie. I’m sorry I hauled you over here for no reason. If you need me for a last-minute shift or whatever, just text.” Stiffly, she turns to the woman’s husband and as cool as you like, her gaze withering, drawls, “David.”
Like a queen, she lifts her chin and urges me to move past him.
That has to be the most regal put down I’ve ever fucking seen.
My God, she’s glorious.
Even in this state.
As we step down the hall, she whispers guiltily, “I just gaslit them.”
Not liking how wooden she sounds, I rumble, “You overdosed and the only thing he could do is fire you.” When she just bites her lip, I prompt her, “Isabelle?”
Immediately, she stops walking. More tension invades her frame now than it did during that conversation with Poet.
“What is it?” I ask. “What’s wrong?”
She swallows. “How do you know my full name?”
Fuck. No one calls her Isabelle around here. I don’t see her that way in my head so it’s jarring.
The lie comes too easily. “I saw it on your chart.”
I’m getting too good at this subterfuge BS because she takes that as read. “Oh. Of course. Anyway, David didn’t fire me. He’s being protective of Charlie, that’s all. He’s just… He’s, well,David. Disciples protect their women,” she says wistfully, but her tension fades as her hand reaches for mine. Squeezing it, she whispers, “I can’t believe you waited for me. I must have been here for hours by now.”
“Nine,” I admit ruefully.
She blinks at me, and if this were a manga comic, there’d be hearts popping out of her eyes. “You didn’t have to do that. And you didn’t have to pay my bill either.”
I get the feeling she doesn’t know if it’s me for sure so I focus on the doors up ahead. “I wasn’t about to leave you here on your own.”
“The bill—it isn’t right that…” She sighs. “I have insurance.”
“It’s fine.”
She only took those goddamn pills because I engineered the whole mess with that couple arguing at the diner. The least I could do was cover the bill.Not that I can tell her that.