Page 49 of Ashes

He sighed. “You coming home or do you have more business to attend to?”

“This was enough for tonight. I’ll see you in a bit.”

The door slid open and I stepped off, removing the earpiece and sliding it into one of my inside pockets. I passed the hotel lobby and pushed open the glass doors to the renowned five-star hotel most politicians liked to visit for their secret encounters.

The valet stood with my car already parked up front. Ithanked him and slid him an extra few bills for getting my car on time like I’d requested when I came in.

He nodded. “Always a pleasure, Mr. Brown.”

I fell into the driver’s seat and threw my car into gear, the tires screeching as I pulled away, the sun setting behind me.

CHAPTER 12

SIENNA

Two weeks had passedsince I’d been naked in front of my husband and he’d taken care of me.

He’d been different that night, letting me see a side of him I’d never imagined possible. I thought things would change, that he’d be more approachable, but I was wrong.

Like a switch had gone off, he went back to the Jamal I’d grown accustomed to. He became even more distant and had barely spoken a word to me since then.

I was walking toward the staff lounge after my shift when I heard my name being called out.

“Sienna, wait up,” a familiar voice said.

I turned to see Kenna, in scrubs, making her way toward me from the end of the hall. “Kenna?” I asked, surprised to see her here.

I knew the hospital she worked at was still renovatingafter the flood since we were still receiving their influx of patients, but I was confused as to what she was doing here.

She finally made her way over and bumped my shoulder as we continued walking. “Hey, beautiful,” she greeted me.

“Hi, gorgeous. What are you doing here?”

“I got a page that one of my patients landed in the ER here. She’s scheduled for a CABG next week, so I came to check her out myself.”

I chuckled, pushing the staff’s room door open. “You know we have doctors here, right?”

“No offense to your staff, but I’d rather check her out myself,” she said as she straddled the wooden bench in front of the row of lockers.

I shook my head at her and opened my locker. “You’re the only doctor I know who will come on their day off, to another hospital, might I add, to check on a patient.”

I grabbed my clothes out of my locker and placed them on the bench she was sitting on.

She rolled her eyes at me, her fingers tapping on the side of the seat. “You mean except you.”

I let out a small laugh and changed out of my scrubs and into a pair of ribbed leggings and my favorite oversized Formula One sweatshirt. We were in the middle of spring, but it was still so cold outside.

“Are you still coming to the wedding?” she asked, and I groaned internally.

Fuck, I completely forgot about the wedding.

I dropped the hospital scrubs into the hamper and sat next to her. “Absolutely, I am,” I confirmed, infusing as much enthusiasm as I could into my voice.

She narrowed her eyes at me. “You forgot, didn’t you?”

“Of course not. It’s your wedding. How could I forget such an important day in your life?”

“Oh, yeah? So you’ll be there Saturday.”