LITMIR.BIZ

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with you,” Wyatt accused.

      “She must have turned to photograph something.” Eddy crammed his hands into the pockets of his cargo pants. “It’ll be on the film.”

      Wyatt nodded. Of course, Mia’s camera would’ve been rolling the whole time, capturing every all-consuming second. He’d known she’d give her life for the right footage for one of her documentaries despite her protests back in Africa. Her heart could never have been with Wyatt when it belonged completely to her work.

      Eddy’s gaze twitched several times to the double doors that separated them from Mia. Wyatt added, “She’s going to be admitted for more than a night. She needs hyperbaric treatments and wound care.”

      “We’re on deadline.” The fatigue settling into the dark bruises beneath Eddy’s eyes softened his protest.

      “Adjust your schedule.” Wyatt stepped closer to Eddy. He didn’t have to stretch to look the tall, lanky man in the eyes. “She almost died this afternoon. The only deadline she has now is to heal.”

      “So she isn’t going to...you know...” Eddy lost his voice and only managed to swallow several times before his gaze fixed on the closed double doors and his skin paled.

      A fall from a rappeling accident in Africa had broken Eddy’s femur, snapped six ribs and readjusted several internal organs. The villagers had insisted only Wyatt could save such a damaged man. Mia had swooped into the medical camp and insisted death wasn’t a viable option before making Wyatt vow to save her friend’s life. She’d never flinched when Wyatt had requested her assistance. Only one thing had ever made Mia retreat.

      Eddy would likely faint and make Wyatt catch him if Wyatt told the man he required his help now. Thankfully, they stood in Bay Water Medical Center, not an understaffed, undersupplied medical hut in Central Africa. Wyatt squeezed Eddy’s shoulder. “Mia isn’t going to die tonight.”

      Relief shifted through Eddy and spread into his grin.

      “However, I make no guarantees about her life once she’s discharged and on her own again.” On her own, Mia embraced adventure and dared life to challenge her more. Stopping to smell the roses would only perplex her. She’d wonder why anyone would stop for the ordinary when they could traipse through the Everglades to glimpse some rare orchid.

      Eddy lifted his hands. “As her doctor, it’s appropriate that you give Mia her recovery orders.”

      “I’m only her doctor while she’s in the ER, but I’ll make sure she has the best care upstairs.” Wyatt scanned Eddy’s face, searching for twinges of discomfort or latent distress. He’d been in the water with Mia. Decompression sickness wasn’t always instantaneous. “No numbness or pain?”

      “Only the same twinge in my thigh that keeps me from taking too many risks these days,” Eddy said.

      Too bad Mia didn’t have a similar internal monitor to keep her safe.

      Eddy tipped his chin toward Wyatt. “You sure you can’t treat Mia upstairs, too? I owe my life to you.”

      “We got lucky that day.” And he intended to continue being lucky. Despite what he’d told Eddy, Mia was far from in the clear. Yet living was the only viable option for Mia, as well. He walked toward the double doors and looked back at Eddy. “She’ll have a skilled team taking over her care, but I’ll check on her.”

      Eddy’s mop of curls bounced. “Wait till I tell Frank and Shane that you have our girl.”

      “Once she’s stable, I move her out of my care.” And out of my life. Wyatt shrugged at the empty hall. Eddy had already escaped into the waiting area to find his friends.

      Mia Fiore had arrived as a patient, and she’d leave as one. Their relationship was nothing more than doctor and patient. They’d set that status two years ago in Africa after one night of confessions and secrets revealed. A night that had ended with a kiss that had offered acceptance and hope and promised something more. But sunrise had clarified what the darkness had concealed. The truth: their kiss had been nothing more for Mia than an unspoken goodbye. Until tonight, he hadn’t seen or talked to Mia Fiore in several years. If he’d thought about her more than once over the last twenty-four months, he’d never confess.

      Wyatt squeezed the back of his neck and rolled his shoulders, rushing the past into place beneath his stethoscope and medical degree.

      Mia needed the doctor now. The one who saved lives with methodical care and single-minded focus. Besides, once he transferred Mia out of the ER, she’d no longer be his concern.

      * * *

      MIA GLARED AT the TV bolted to the wall across from her hospital bed and the exuberant talk show host with her wide smile and unfiltered laugh filling the flat screen. That same laugh had woken Mia yesterday afternoon like an abrasive alarm clock. The first night, she’d slept through cinching blood pressure cuffs, needle pricks for IV lines and seven hours in the hyperbaric chamber. She hadn’t been as fortunate last night.

      Sleep had come in sporadic snippets. Mia preferred the nighttime cacophony of insect songs in the rain forest to the beeps of monitors and stat pages for doctors. The light of a full moon never startled her quite like the hall light streaming across her face when the nurses arrived to draw blood or redress her wounds.

      She’d always pushed herself to the limit when she was awake to give her body no reason to avoid sleep. Now pain disrupted her dreams. But awake she forgot to breathe through the intense muscle spasms that locked her shoulder inside its socket. Awake she forgot and tried to massage her knotted thigh muscles and only drove those invisible pins and needles deeper into her bones. Her nerves misfired like arcs from live wires brushing against each other, and her body never deflected the shock.

      Miscommunication surrounded her like that time Eddy and Mia flew into Grenada in the Caribbean Sea and the rest of the crew landed in Granada, Spain. They’d laughed about that mishap, sipped piña coladas on the beach and waited for the crew’s arrival. The urge to laugh failed to overtake Mia now.

      An absentminded rap on her door interrupted the TV show’s relationship expert’s monologue about confidence in the workplace and beyond. Dr. Hensen pumped exactly two drops of antibacterial gel into his hands from the container on the wall by her bathroom. Six steps brought him to her bedside. He moved with precision, as if he preserved his physical energy for the cell-sized version of the doctor who typed away wildly inside his brain. She suspected Dr. Hensen was a certifiable genius who had graduated medical school at the age of sixteen. Since she’d met him yesterday, she’d wanted to know if he could legally consume alcohol.

      Mia muted the volume on the TV as the relationship expert exclaimed, “Fake it until you make it, ladies.”

      If only Mia had brushed and braided her hair. If she looked put together, Dr. Hensen might believe she was. She nodded, as that also improved confidence, according to her new TV advice expert. She was confident that her doctor would see his way to sign her discharge papers.

      She’d risked two questions yesterday while Dr. Hensen examined her, and he’d looked as if she’d interrupted his latest theory on DNA regeneration. Today she waited for him to finish. He removed his glasses and pulled back as if adjusting the viewing lens on his microscope before inspecting the deepest part of her cut near her ankle. She had no explanation for slicing her right shin open in a ten-inch jagged arc.

      He covered her leg wound and applied the same scrutiny to her arm. The memory of her dive knife flaying her wet suit and skin open from wrist to elbow came in quick spurts like ten-second sound bites scattered throughout a nighttime newscast.

      Finally, Dr. Hensen peeled off his latex gloves and blinked three times as if slowing his brain.

      Mia launched into the silence. “It’s been almost forty-eight hours since the accident. Today seems like a good day for stitches.” She smiled to cover her flinch and hoped the good doctor dismissed the wince in her voice. The throb from his deft prodding pulsed through her entire arm, goading her to press the pain medication

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