Page 8 of Tempting Fire

“Jesus Chloe, look at this mess! Where’s your first aid kit?”

“What?”

He looked up into her face, what focus she’d had as she tried to fight him for the blanket was pretty much wiped out.

“Your. First. Aid. Kit?”

“Why do you need that?”

“Look at your foot Chloe, you cut it. There’s blood all over your floor and on your sheets.” That got her attention, she looked at her foot in his big hand, as if she was noticing it for the first time. “Didn’t you even realize you were cut?” he asked in amazement.

“I cut it earlier. I stepped on some glass.”

“Your mirror. Do you know when you broke your mirror? Do you know when you cut your foot?”

“I can’t remember. Do you think it was yesterday?” she asked him.

“Honey, I wouldn’t know.” She was clearly out of it.

“It’s not that big of a deal. It doesn’t hurt now,” she said softly.

“Well it will when I clean it up. Is your first aid kit in the master bathroom?”

She nodded her head.

He gently set her foot down on the bed, and went to the bathroom to get the kit. At least the mirror in this bathroom was intact, but it was a mess in here too. He needed to get her the hell out of this house. But first he needed to see if she needed stitches. He wet a wash cloth, and grabbed the small case with all of the first aid supplies and went back into the bedroom. Chloe was sitting up in the bed. She had more color in her cheeks and she was beginning to look ticked off.

Good.

“You don’t need to be here.”

He sat down on the bed, and propped her foot on his lap. She hissed in pain.

“Thought it didn’t hurt,” he taunted.

“It’s your rotten bedside manner.”

As gently as he could, he washed away the caked blood. “I don’t see any glass.”

“I’m not an idiot,” she said as she tried to pull her foot out of his grasp. “I took it out.” He held on and looked closer and pressed. She gasped.

“Cupcake, you still have something in there.” He took the tweezers out of the kit and carefully extracted a small shard of glass from her foot. When he looked up he saw her biting her lip and he swore. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“You didn’t. I did this to myself.” She slumped back against the pillows.

He sighed. She was right.

“I need to clean this up and put some antiseptic on it.” He got out the hydrogen peroxide and dabbed it onto the cut. When he was finally done and could see the extent of the damage he breathed easier. She wouldn’t need stitches. He pulled out a waterproof bandage and covered the cut.

“Are you done, Mr. Fireman?” He looked up and saw that there were beads of sweat on her forehead. “Jesus, could you have made a bigger deal out of this?” She tugged at her foot trying to get him to release it, but he wasn’t letting go.

“You hadn’t even bandaged your foot Chloe, what the fuck were you thinking?”

“I see those wheels turning Zarek. You want to take control. You think you’ve finally gotten an upper hand.” She was pointing her finger at him, then it dropped down. She was trembling with exhaustion.

“Look at you, you’re too tired to even properly fight. When was the last time you ate?” He studied her chapped lips. “Or drank water?”

“I drink water,” she defended herself. “Haven’t the rising tide of red plastic cups proved it?”