“I give it forty-eight hours. The Deepest Snow pack leader doesn’t just go missing—”
“Okay then, you’ve only been his nurse for forty-five minutes. I think you’re safe so far.”
“You’d think, but I really like my license. Hang on.”
I was quiet while Gina reviewed her work, watching Winter breathe, his chest lift matching the corresponding line on the ventilator.
“Okay. I think we’re all up to date,” Gina said at last. “I don’t need to make any changes.”
“Good. Can I come out now?”
“Yeah, I think that’s best.” She looked up from her charting, and squinted into the room and our future. “I’d bet money that within a day there’ll be guards on his door.”
“Too bad for you I’m too smart to bet against you. Plus I’m poor.” I came out of the room, and she sealed the door, turning on the camera feeds. We could still look up at what was happening in the room—and hear things, as it turned out, when a pump beeped to warn it was running dry—while remaining safely outside the room.
“I’m looking forward to the end of tonight,” Gina said around three A.M.
“I’m going to be a cripple tomorrow.” I held up my right arm. “This is my mashed-potato-whipping hand.”
Gina snorted. “I keep forgetting that it’s Christmas.”
“Me too. I’m in denial.”
There was a lull in our conversation while she wrote down Winter’s latest set of vitals. I stared at the monitor showing Winter’s sleeping form. “Brandon said he has something big to ask me tomorrow,” Gina said from behind me.
“Brandon?”
“The guy I’ve been dating, whom I don’t talk about, so people won’t judge.”
I glanced over my shoulder, and Gina was still charting, but also chewing on the inside of her lip. I tried to figure out why she’d be sharing information with me now, and it hit me like a hammer. “Oh, God. He’s a former patient, isn’t he?”
“No. His brother was.”
I wasn’t sure how I ought to take that news. Did she want me to be the blindly supportive friend? Or the wise friend who told her she knew better? “He’s not a vampire, is he?”
Gina snorted. “No. He’s a were-bear.”
There was another long pause between us. I decided to feel things out. “How long have you been dating him?”
“A while.”
“What do you think he’s going to ask?”
“I don’t know,” she said without looking up.
I couldn’t seriously endorse marriage, for myself or for just about anyone. But that probably said more about me and my hesitant attitude toward commitment—and the fact that I rarely bothered to learn the names of men who shared my bed. “Well, just because my track record’s been bleak doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try,” I said.
“Thanks. I think.” She stood up and shook herself, a little like a wet dog. “It’s on the hour. Ready to go?”
“As ready as I’m gonna be.” We both suited up.
* * *
“The thing is, when you were sleeping with a zombie it wasn’t particularly contagious,” Gina said as she shone a light into Winter’s eyes again, one at a time, in case the size of either pupil had changed. Bleeds in the head would apply pressure to the nerves in control of the pupils—a blown or uneven pupil meant a fresh bleed.
“I made sure he didn’t bite me,” I said sarcastically. To be honest, I didn’t know all the ins and outs of becoming a zombie. And Ti, my erstwhile boyfriend, had been the cursed kind of zombie, not a mindless ghoul. “I showed him my bra but not my brains. I think that was the trick.” I went around the room to stand opposite from her, so that she never blocked my shot. I’d actually shown him a lot more than my bra, but I didn’t want to embroil Gina in a TMI.
“Do you miss him?”
“I don’t appreciate being ditched.” No matter how much it might have been for my own good. Ti had rescued me at the end of my trial, and I knew he’d felt he’d been seen by too many people there, even before that, when he’d been out acquiring extra … parts. We’d walked through the hospital lobby looking like we’d been through a bloodbath, and a lot of the blood had been mine. I could understand why he felt like he needed to lay low for a while, but I didn’t like being left behind. Even though we hadn’t been together very long, him choosing to keep his cover over me hurt. Especially when he hadn’t made any promises about ever coming back.