Page 81 of The Night Shift

“Hopefully, this is going to sting a lot,” she warns, bending in front of me. “Try not to flinch.” She unscrews the lidocaine bottle and draws up the syringe to fill it up, injecting the anaesthetic at the corner of the stab wound.

I hiss.Fuck.

“I saiddon’tflinch.”

“It’s not something I can control — fuck,fuck, Holly, be gentle, shit.”

She glances up at me through her lashes. I forget how to breathe. “Say please,” she says.

“Please, Holly. It hurts.”

The corner of her mouth twitches upwards before flattening again. She puts the syringe down and dabs the cold, wet cotton pad over the raw edges of my wound, though now the sting is a welcome distraction from the way my breath hitches as she leans in. A few seconds later, I can feel the numbing sensation begin to take effect, a welcome relief from the throbbing pain. She threads the needle with steady fingers, the tip of the needle catching the moonlight filtering in through her window.

Once the anaesthetic takes hold, she doesn’t hesitate.

“Stay still.”

So commanding.

She positions the needle’s curved tip just beside the wound. The metal pierces my flesh with a wetpop. I feel the thread pulling through my skin, slick and warm with blood, as she drags it taut. The edges of the wound gape open wider for a moment, flesh stretching grotesquely, before collapsing together under the tension of the suture.

My vision blurs for a moment, but her focus never wavers. She pierces the opposite edge of the wound. My stomach heaves as I hear the thread cutting through the meat of my body, each tug sending a tremor through my frame —fuck. Fuck, fuck, FUCK!The needle twists, coming through the other side. I wince, a low groan slipping from my lips.

“Stop being so dramatic.” Holly’s cool breath fans my burning skin. My eyes flutter open. She ties the first knot, her fingers slick with crimson as she pulls the thread tight. Bloodseeps around the sutures, oozing thickly down my side. “If you hadn’t pissed me off so much, maybe we wouldn’t be in this position right now.”

Sweat drips down my temples. “But I like this position.” The pain starts to fade like background noise, overshadowed by the overwhelming sensation of being so utterly and irrevocably drawn to the feeling of Holly’s breath against my skin. “You look good on your knees for me.”

My remark is met with a sharp jab of the needle to the side of my torso.

After that, it’s pretty much a blur. Her hands move quickly, looping the thread again and again, each knot dragging the jagged edges of the wound closer together. Again and again with a practiced motion, snug against my severed flesh. I feel like I’m coming undone in her hands. “Do you do this often?” I ask.

Her brows furrow in concentration as she leans in to cut excess thread with her teeth. She doesn’t look up. “Stitch up men I’ve stabbed for stalking me? Yeah, every Friday like clockwork.”

“And here I thought I was special.”

“A special type of idiot,” she mumbles under her breath.

By the time she reaches the last knot, sweat is dripping down my bare chest, mixing with the blood. Holly leans in, inspecting her work, her breath warm against my gore-slicked skin. A lock of hair slips loose from behind her ear, brushing against her cheek as she comes closer. She adjusts her position, her collarbone peeking out from beneath the edge of her white crop top, and that’s when I see it — a faint scratch, no longer than an inch, just above her clavicle. It’s small, barely visible against her skin.

My body reacts before my mind can catch up. I reach out, my fingers brushing against the soft curve of her collarbone. “Did you know those people tonight?”

Holly’s head jerks up, eyes wide with surprise as my thumb gently runs over the scratch. She stays frozen for a beat, her gaze darting between my face and my hand. “What?” Her tone is clipped but she makes no attempt to pull away.

“The people I dug two graves for,” I murmur, my thumb still tracing the scratch like it might break open if I press too hard. “Did you know them?”

She frowns. She hesitates. She swallows once. Then, like a door slamming shut, her features harden. Her jaw sets, her eyes turning cold and distant, a wall thrown up so fast it leaves me reeling.

Her hand shoots up, slapping mine away from her collarbone. Not as hard or as forceful as I’d expected. “Of course, I did.” She’s stitching me up again, her focus sharp and unrelenting, but her movements are rigid now, as if I’ve unsettled her. “Fred was my childhood best friend who I hadn’t seen for over a decade. Must be why I rammed his head in with a brick.”

I bring my thumb to my mouth, running it over my lips savouring the taste of her. “Mm, a smashing reunion.”

She shoots me a look.

“What? That was the first appropriate joke I’ve cracked all night.”

Rolling her eyes, she goes back to pushing the needle into the edge of my torn skin. “No, Theo. I did not know him.”

“What about the girl?”