Page 11 of The Candle Palace (Jamison Valley 6)
“No, it’s my fault. You were right. It’s not my business.”
“I’m being an ass.” He dropped his head back to the pillows and closed his eyes. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“You’re in pain. Don’t beat yourself up.” I walked over to his bed and shut off the light above him.
“Thanks.” He sighed, the lines in his forehead relaxing. Milo always seemed calmer in the dark.
“Dr. Vernon wants to clean the burns on your arms today,” I told him. “He’s got a few other patients lined up in front of you, then he’ll be in and we’ll get started. So first, I want to check the dressings on your stomach and chest. We’ll get those changed and then you can rest until it’s time.”
He gave me a barely there nod as he continued to sip his milkshake.
It didn’t take me long to change his dressings, even with only the dim light coming from the shaded window and bathroom at my back. Dr. Vernon had removed most of the dead gray skin from Milo’s torso yesterday and would do the same for his arms today. Milo lay perfectly still, not so much as twitching, as I swapped bandages out on his third-degree burns.
So much damage had been done to the nerves in those areas, I doubted he could feel my touch. It was when I treated his first- and second-degree burns that I’d hear the familiar sound of grinding molars.
“Sorry,” I whispered.
He grunted.
I touched a tender spot, peeling off the old bandage that was soaked in yellow, orange and red splotches. Milo winced so hard it shook the bed.
“Talk to me,” he said through a clenched jaw.
“About?”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Okay.” I nodded, searching the room for a conversation starter. My eyes landed on Luna’s tea light that I’d left in here yesterday. I’d been so distracted by his handsome face and those intoxicating eyes, I’d forgotten to give him an explanation. “That tea light is a gift from your neighbor. I’m sure you’ll meet her soon. She makes it a point to introduce herself to everyone. Just don’t . . . don’t stare.”
“Is it bad?”
I met his gaze, my eyes softening. “Everyone here has it bad.”
I couldn’t tell him about Luna’s situation, not that I’d have to. Luna would tell anyone who looked at her scars for more than five seconds about the accident. I think it helped her deal with this new reality and her new appearance. She gave her scars a story and that made them less frightening.
“When she first came here, I sat with her at night a lot. Her parents couldn’t always stay because she has two younger siblings at home. So I stayed after my shifts to keep her company.”
Milo relaxed as I spoke, the rigid muscles of his stomach relaxing. He wasn’t bulky, but he had a firm, trim body. He was tall, his ankles dangling off the bed when he was fully stretched out. And he was lean—borderline lanky—but it worked for him. Standing, he’d tower over me. Those long arms would probably engulf me with a hug.
Milo didn’t wear a wedding ring, but for all I kn
ew, he had a girlfriend. The idea caused a flare of jealousy. Did he have a girlfriend? Was it Jess who Kirk had mentioned?
It didn’t matter, because he was a patient.
The only hug I’d ever get from Milo was a good-bye squeeze when he left this hospital and I never heard from him again.
“So why the tea light?” Milo asked.
“She’s been collecting them since she got here. She told me she didn’t want to be scared of fire her entire life, so she was going to surround herself with it until she wasn’t afraid. Obviously, real candles aren’t an option in the hospital. But I found a battery-powered tea light in the gift shop and it sort of became our thing. I bring her one every few days in a different color.”
My latex glove brushed one of Milo’s burns and his entire body jerked. “Sorry.”
His eyes stayed shut as his hand fumbled across the blanket toward the edge of the bed, his fingers searching for the button attached to his IV. He found it and, with a push, gave himself another dose of morphine.
I waited for a minute, giving the medicine time to work through his IV tubes.
Self-regulated pain medication always made me nervous. I didn’t want my patients to be in severe pain and the mechanisms had limits, but still, I’d watched one too many former patients walk out the door with prescriptions that became addictions.
