Page 22 of Vital Signs (Wayward Sons #7)

The walls were fucking breathing.

I watched them expand and contract, knowing it wasn’t real.

"Hunter?" Misha’s voice. That damn accent. It was all that was keeping me grounded in reality.

Every nerve screamed. My hands used to save lives. Now they shook like a junkie's.

Fuck. That was exactly what I was.

Misha knelt beside me, and I wanted to tell him to run. Instead, when he pressed a cool cloth to my forehead, relief flooded through me so intensely I nearly sobbed.

"How long was I out?" My voice sounded as if I'd been swallowing razor blades.

"About twenty minutes. You were talking to someone." The cloth moved to my neck. "Your temperature's climbing."

My left leg bounced as if it had its own electrical system. The panic built behind my ribs like steam in a pressure cooker. Everything ached down to the cellular level, like my DNA was trying to rewrite itself.

"Make it stop," I gasped, reaching for him. "Please, I can't—"

"I'm trying." His voice was so gentle it made my chest crack open. "Tell me what helps."

Nothing helped, but he didn’t want to hear that.

Nausea slammed into me, and I doubled over. My stomach clenched so violently I thought my ribs might crack. Nothing came up but bitter acid, but my body kept trying to turn itself inside out anyway.

"Breathe," Misha whispered, one hand rubbing circles on my back. "Stay here with me."

Stay here. Like my body wasn't holding me hostage while my brain kept offering the same bargain: one hit and all of this stopped.

"This is nothing," I panted. "The real hell hasn't even started yet."

Fear crept into his voice. "What's coming?"

Smart man. Fear was the right response.

"Hallucinations. Muscle spasms that feel like seizures. Fever that might actually kill me." I grabbed his wrist because I needed something solid to anchor me. His pulse beat steadily and strongly under my fingers. Alive. Present. Real. "By tonight, I'll be ready to kill for a fix."

"We'll get through it."

"You don't understand." My grip tightened. "I've tried this before. Made it three days once before I broke into a veterinary clinic and stole ketamine meant for horses." The memory burned like acid. "I'll hurt you if you get between me and relief. I'll say things that will make you hate me."

"Try me."

Two words and something cracked open in my chest because he said it like he meant it.

All those patients I couldn't save. At least I could still confirm he was alive. My hand moved to his wrist, and I clung to the steady feel of his pulse beneath my fingers.

"What are you doing?" His voice was soft, curious instead of annoyed.

"Checking that you're okay." The admission slipped out before I could stop it. "It's the only way I know how to care right now. It feels... grounding. Familiar."

Instead of pulling away like any sane person would, Misha shifted closer. "Show me."

"Show you what?"

"Show me how to check your pulse. Teach me how to do it right."

And just like that, my vision went blurry because this beautiful man wanted to learn from me.

Wanted to understand the one thing I still knew how to do right.

I positioned his fingers over my radial artery, the tremor in my hands making me want to apologize for how pathetic I was, how unworthy of his attention.

"Two fingers, not the thumb. The thumb has its own pulse."

He adjusted his grip, and I nearly lost it completely at the touch of his elegant fingers to my pulse.

"Count for fifteen seconds, then multiply by four." My voice cracked as muscle memory took over, the same tone I'd used with new nurses back when I believed healing mattered. When I thought I was someone worth listening to. "Normal resting heart rate is sixty to one hundred beats per minute."

He counted silently, and I watched his perfect lips move. Un, deux, trois. French numbers, which shouldn't have surprised me but somehow did. Even counting, he sounded like poetry, like something beautiful and refined that didn't belong in the same universe as my decay.

Tears burned behind my eyes.

"One hundred and twelve," he said, voice soft, like he was sharing a secret.

"Stress response. Normal for withdrawal." The words came out broken, fractured by the emotions clawing up my throat. I guided his hands to my neck, positioning them over my carotid pulse, and the intimacy destroyed me. "This is stronger. Easier to find during emergencies."

The tears spilled over before I could stop them. When was the last time someone had touched me like this? Like I was precious instead of pathetic?

One of my tears landed on his hand where it rested against my throat, and his eyes snapped up to meet mine. For a moment we just stared at each other while he counted my pulse and I fell apart.

He pulled his sleeve over his hand and gently wiped the moisture from my cheek, and I wanted to lean into that touch until I disappeared completely.

"What else should I check?" he asked, like my crying was the most natural thing in the world. Like I wasn't some broken-down junkie having an emotional collapse over basic human kindness.

Before I could answer, another wave hit me.

My temperature regulation was gone. I was burning hot, then freezing cold.

Misha pulled the blankets around me, tucking them tight before curling up against my side. His warmth pressed into me through the fabric, solid and grounding while my body couldn't decide if I was freezing or burning alive.

Eighteen hours in. The early afternoon had been bearable, relatively speaking. By six o'clock, hell arrived in its purest form.

The symptoms I'd managed to endure all day became unbearable. Not worse—I'd already maxed out the pain scale. But my ability to withstand it was eroding.

Clothes became torture. I ripped them off, but the cold air felt like relief for exactly three seconds before the fever returned.

Outside, full darkness had fallen. The van shrank somehow, becoming more claustrophobic, like the walls were slowly closing in.

The fever climbed toward dangerous territory, and I knew—I fucking knew—that this might actually kill me.

"I need a hospital," I gasped, shaking so hard the van rocked. "I’m dying."

"Your pulse is strong," Misha said, fingers finding my throat again. "One hundred and twenty, but steady. Your body's fighting, not failing."

But his kindness, his gentle reassurance, his stubborn refusal to abandon me triggered something vicious in my withdrawal-addled brain. The pain needed somewhere to go, and he was the only target within reach.

I shoved his hand away from my throat. "Leave me alone," I snarled, but that wasn't enough. The poison kept pouring out. "I don't want you! I don't need you! Get your fucking hands off me and fuck off!"

He jerked back like I'd slapped him, face going pale, and the exact moment the words hit home played out across his features. The flinch, the curling inward, the careful composure cracking.

But I couldn't stop. The cruelty poured out unchecked, poisonous and brutal.

"Quit being so goddamn needy and leave me the fuck alone! Stop touching me, stop hovering, stop acting like you give a shit. I never asked for this. I never asked for you."

The silence that followed was deafening. Misha's face went carefully blank.

Shit. What had I done? This beautiful, damaged man had given up his family to stay with me, and I'd just tried to destroy him for the crime of caring too much.

"You're in pain," he whispered. "You don't mean that."

But we both knew the damage was done. It showed in his eyes, the way he was already retreating behind walls I'd just given him reason to build.

"Misha, I—"

"It's okay." Too controlled, too careful. "You're suffering. People say things when they're suffering."

But he wouldn't look at me. Wouldn't touch me. Just sat there holding himself together while I fell apart from guilt on top of everything else.

"Fuck, I'm sorry," I gasped. "Misha, I'm so fucking sorry. I didn't mean it. I don't mean any of it."

"I need some air," he said suddenly, voice tight. "Just for a minute. Don't go anywhere."

He slipped outside, and I watched through the gap in the curtains as he walked away, pulling out his phone and joint.

His hands trembled as he lit the joint. The lighter illuminated his face for a moment, and his composure crumbled completely.

Silent tears streamed down his cheeks as he took one shaky drag before the joint fell from his fingers.

He wrapped his arms around himself, holding tight while quiet sobs shook his shoulders, and I realized what I'd done. This man had survived something terrible enough to leave him needing touch like air, and I'd just convinced him he was unwanted. Unlovable. Too much for anyone to handle.

My first thought was crystal clear and shameful: He's distracted. I could slip out, find Jimmy McCoy, score enough to make this stop.

Fucking hell, what was wrong with me?

I forced myself to move, crawling toward the van's door despite every muscle screaming in protest. Each step outside was agony, but I made it to him anyway because he needed me.

"Hey," I whispered, settling beside him in the snow.

He startled, wiping at his face. "I'm sorry. I should be taking care of you, not—"

"No." I pulled him against my burning chest, ignoring how my body protested the movement. "You've been carrying me all day. Let me carry you for a minute."

He collapsed into me then, all that careful control dissolving into sobs that shook his entire frame. I held him while he cried, my hands stroking his hair the way he'd been stroking mine. For just a few minutes, I was the caregiver instead of the patient.

"I don't know if I'm strong enough for this," he whispered against my neck.

"You are. You've already proven it." I pressed a kiss to his head. "But you don't have to be strong every second. Even caregivers need care."