Page 62 of Dirty Game

She’s reading, always reading in some aspect.

She looks up when I enter, but doesn’t flinch.

Not at the mess, not at the blood, not at the fact that I probably look more like a corpse than a man right now.

“You’re hurt,” she says, before I even get the door closed.

I grin, baring teeth. “You should see the other guys.”

She stands, closes her book, and crosses to me in three careful steps.

I half-expect her to shy away at the smell, but she doesn’t.

Instead, she reaches for the buttons on my shirt, starts undoing them from the bottom up.

Her hands are steady.

I let her work.

Every movement is neat, precise, almost ritualistic.

I study her face as she goes—how her brows pull together in concentration, how she bites the inside of her lip when she hits a stubborn button.

She’s so close now I can smell the strawberry in her hair, see the tiny freckle on the bridge of her nose.

She slides the shirt off my shoulders, careful not to peel the stuck part too fast.

When she sees the wound, a crescent of torn skin, raw and crusted black at the edges, she presses her lips together.

“Sit,” she orders.

It surprises me, the command. I do as I’m told, lowering myself onto the bench at the foot of the bed.

She disappears into the bathroom, returns with a first aid kit I didn’t know I owned.

I watch her set out the supplies. Alcohol. Gauze. Tweezers. Scissors.

She opens the bottle and pours it over a cloth, then dabs at the wound.

It stings, but I don’t react. She works in silence.

“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” I ask.

She doesn’t stop. “Who says I’m not?”

I laugh, the sound a little too sharp. “You’re not shaking. You’re not running. You’re not even blinking.”

She looks up, meets my eyes. “You’re the first man I’ve ever met who doesn’t pretend to be anything but what he is.”

“What am I?”

“Dangerous,” she says, and goes back to cleaning.

For a moment, I want to argue, but I know she’s right. I’m dangerous. To everyone. Even to her.

She finishes cleaning the wound, then presses gauze to it, taping it down with practiced efficiency.

She sets the bloody cloth aside and wipes her hands on a towel.