“Because I don’t know many aides that are willing to volunteer at a clinic in exchange for getting their patients help,” Grey explained as Chase opened the bottom cabinet and grabbed a bag of chips.
“She did that?” Chase asked, glancing back to see Grey nodding as he sat down at the kitchen table.
Grey took a sip of his beer as Chase tossed the chips on the table and rolled over to join him. “She offered to come in on her days off and work for free doing whatever was needed, answering phones, mopping floors, and cleaning toilets. Basically, anything we need, she’s willing to do as long as I work with you,” Grey said, taking him by surprise.
“She’s not doing that,” Chase said firmly.
“No, she’s not,” Grey murmured, looking thoughtful as he glanced around the kitchen, taking in the floral wallpaper that Amy had fallen in love with when she’d convinced him to buy the fucking house.
Not really in the mood to think about just how badly she’d fucked him over, Chase gestured to the scar running down the side of Grey’s face. “Where’d you get that from?”
“My mother,” Grey said, shrugging it off as he copied the gesture. “You?”
“A building collapsed on top of me,” Chase said even as he couldn’t help but wonder if he should check on Sloane.
God, she’d nearly fucking destroyed him today.
He couldn’t stand to see a woman cry but watching Sloane cry today for that little boy had made him want to fucking kill something. He never wanted to see her in that much pain again. He’d do anything to make sure that she
“She’s worried about you,” Grey said, drawing his attention to find the other man watching him.
“She doesn’t need to be,” Chase said, opening the bag of chips and popped one in his mouth before he shoved the bag toward the man that was wasting his time.
“I think she does,” Grey said as he helped himself to a chip.
“Yeah, and why’s that?” Chase asked, deciding that he’d played along long enough as he moved to roll away from the table when Grey’s next words stopped him.
“Because she told me that you were an annoying asshole who didn’t deserve what happened to you and it’s killing her to see you struggling. She also told me that you would probably tell me to go fuck myself, but I thought I’d risk it after reading the email that she sent me. The articles didn’t hurt either.”
“She had no business sending you that email,” Chase bit out, furious that she’d gone behind his back. He didn’t need help and more importantly, he didn’t fucking want it. He was willing to work with her to fix his legs, but that was it because he was
“You’re probably right, but from what I can see, Sloane is willing to do whatever it takes to help you, including begging a complete stranger for help. The question is, what are you willing to do for her?”
Chapter 17
“Why is she glaring at me?” Sloane asked, frowning when the adorable little girl that had offered them a cup of imaginary tea narrowed her eyes on her.
“I told her that you beat me,” Chase said, adjusting the tiara that the little girl had given him with one hand as he dutifully sipped his tea.
“When?” Sloane asked, wondering how she’d missed that.
“When you returned the paperwork to the front desk,” Chase said before shifting his attention to the little girl. “This is delicious,” he said, making her smile.
That is until her gaze landed back on Sloane.
“What? I was only gone for a few seconds,” she said, trying to give the little girl a reassuring smile only to sigh when the little girl shook her head in disgust.
“And that’s apparently all it took,” Chase said, moving his attention to the plate of invisible cookies.
“I really hate you,” Sloane said, sighing heavily as she sat back in the surprisingly comfortable chair and took in the large waiting room.
It was actually very welcoming.
Over the years, she’d spent a lot of time in waiting rooms and she could always tell how the staff was going to treat her patients based on how they kept their waiting rooms. The more unwelcoming the waiting room, the worse it was going to be. There really was nothing like sitting in a hard-unforgiving plastic chair that killed your back with nothing to read but old pamphlets to pass the time as you struggled to ignore the scent of dust, body odor, and cheap air freshener while you wondered if you were going to die of heat exhaustion because they refused to turn on the air conditioner.
Shadow House wasn’t officially open yet, but she could tell from the warm colors they’d painted the walls and the consideration they’d put into their patients’ comfort that this place was run by people who actually gave a damn. It gave her hope that this would work out for Chase.
God, she hoped so, at least.
Sloane still wasn’t sure why he’d agreed to do this and she didn’t plan on asking, afraid to push her luck and end up saying something that would make him change his mind. He needed to talk to someone and she knew that person couldn’t be her. As much as she wanted to help him, she couldn’t even begin to understand what he’d been through, which was why she did something else that he was probably going to kill her for when he found out.
Granted, there really wasn’t any doubt in her mind that he was going to kill her when he found out that she’d called his old firehouse and talked to his boss. She never would have even considered doing this for any of her other clients, but then again, since he was no longer her client, it didn’t really matter anymore.
Not that he knew that.
She just couldn’t do this anymore. Sloane couldn’t tell herself that she didn’t care when the problem was that she cared too much. She cared if her patients were struggling, if they got worse, and it destroyed her when she lost them no matter what she told herself. For so long, she’d thought that she could do this, thought that she could take on the difficult cases that no one else wanted because she could do her job without it affecting her, but she was wrong.
She couldn’t keep pretending that this job wasn’t slowly destroying her.
They didn’t really talk about burnout when she was in school, but they’d mentioned it pretty much every hour during orientation when she was hired. They’d actually dedicated an entire day to burnout in the medical field and explained how quickly it affected home aide nurses and while she didn’t think that she was burned out yet, she knew that it was only a matter of time.
She couldn’t pretend that hearing her patients cry in the middle of the night wasn’t killing her or the look on their faces when they realized that their lives would never be the same didn’t destroy a part of her soul, which is why she’d taken a leave of absence.
The funny thing was, it had nothing to do with what happened with Chase.
Right now, she still loved what she did and she wanted to keep it that way. She just needed a break, some time to figure things out, and get her head straight before she decided what she was going to do. In the meantime, she was going to keep her promise and help Chase. She’d made him a promise and she wasn’t going to break it, which meant that she was going to have to cross that line one more time.