A muscle ticked at the side of Liam’s jaw. “If she’s getting into my car, she’s getting out at the damn airport.”
“Very mature, mate,” said Eli.
“If Kyan wants to be alone, she should leave him the fuck alone,” said Liam.
Eli cocked his head, everything about his posture seeming calculated to most get under Liam’s skin. “Aren’t you always going on about giving people what they need, not what they want?”
Liam pulled his shoulders back, his chest out as if the man was spreading wings. In his regular uniform of black jeans and tight V-neck tee, he tended to draw the eyes of every single female around.
Not for the first time, Cullen found himself utterly unsurprised at the number of women who dreamt of a chance to throw themselves at Liam’s feet. Literally. “Subs, asshole. Not friends.”
Without waiting for Eli’s reply, Liam turned on his heels and headed for the door. Which was probably a good thing since a brawl in the middle of the hospital atrium, while stress relieving, was undoubtedly not going to be good for anyone’s public relations department.
In typical Eli fashion, the man merely turned his attention to Cullen. “You lost your Band-Aids.”
Cullen shook his head. “Christ, you’re a prick.”
“That’s already been established.” Eli stuck his hands into his back pockets, his long strides easily keeping up with Cullen’s double-time pace. “But just to point out the perfect little storm you’ve got going. Swooping in to rescue a damsel in distress, one who was kind enough to patch you up, just—”
Stepping in front of Eli, Cullen smacked the Frappuccino hard enough into the man’s chest that the icy crystals spilled over his shirt. Cullen might’ve enjoyed it more if he could’ve splashed it on one of his pristine suits instead, but Eli had removed his jacket before the tussle on Lincoln. “What’s with you today? First Liam, now me? Why are you baiting everyone?”
Eli glanced down at the Frappuccino, then extracted the cup from Cullen’s fist and sipped the whipped cream. “Liam, that was just for fun. You… I’ve not seen you like a girl before, Cullen—Betsy Delmata of ninth grade notwithstanding. I just want to make sure you aren’t so blinded by your own idiocy that you don’t see what’s right in front of you.”
“What are we, in high school?” said Cullen. “Reynolds works at the Rescue. That makes her my responsibility. And she’s too close to Frank Peterson, which puts her in harm’s way. The rest… It doesn’t matter.”
And that was the truth. It didn’t matter what Cullen did or did not feel for Skylar Reynolds, because he couldn’t have her.
“I beg to differ, Commander.” The humor seeped from Eli’s voice. “I’m not claiming to be any kind of expert, but I remember how good Addie was for Bar.”
Bar was the only one of the five of them who’d had a girlfriend, then a wife. And though they’d given him nothing but shit over it at first, Bar’s contentment far outweighed any of their teasing. Of all of them, Bar had been the most at peace with everything that had gone down overseas, and he’d come right out and said the reason for it was Adrianna.
“I remember watching Bar’s widow sob at his funeral,” Cullen said. Besides, from everything he’d seen about Sky, Cullen knew he was a bad match for her. Sky pretty much disdained everything he held in high regard, and God knew Cullen had his own baggage. It would be a bad mix.
Not that Cullen planned to ever mix permanently with any woman. He couldn’t inflict himself on someone. It’d be a nightmare. Not to mention unfair. He wasn’t fit for a relationship and never would be.
“I scare her.” The words escaped Cullen before he could stop them. “When I ran into her at the Rescue yesterday, I hadn’t expected anyone to be there. She surprised me, and I…yelled at her. She gaped at me like I was a knife-wielding serial killer.”
Eli cocked a brow. “But she patched you up anyway,” he said, letting the words settle for a heartbeat before stepping away to release the tension and starting them back to Sky’s room at too peppy a pace.
A tech carrying a suture kit appeared at Sky’s door just as Cullen and Eli did. As Eli—who’d efficiently had someone bring his car over to the hospital for him—called Jaz out to take her home, Cullen placed the Frappuccino on a shelf and walked up to stand beside Sky while the tech laid out his tools.
“We can go home after this,” Cullen said, laying a hand on Sky’s shoulder to feel tension vibrating through her whole body—and flowing directly into his. Stitches. It was just a few stitches, not a blown-off limb. And yet…it bothered him in a way he wished it didn’t.
“Right.” She tried and failed to sound peppy.
“Let’s get you numbed up,” the tech told Sky. In dark blue scrubs, the man seemed competent enough—but he wasn’t one of the staff Cullen knew personally. Glancing at the name tag, Cullen saw Denver ER stamped into the plastic. A recent transfer, then. That explained the new face. “Small stick.”
Sky gasped as Denver slid the needle in, her eyes glistening. It hurt. Of course it hurt. But it didn’t have to hurt so much.
“Slow up pushing the lido,” Cullen said. “And I mean by a fucking factor of ten.”
Denver glanced up at him wearily, but did slow the injection, giving the tissue more time to absorb the liquid.
“Did you buffer it?” Cullen demanded.
Denver sighed. “Buffer it?”
“Sodium bicarbonate. It—”
“Buffers the pH to mitigate the sting. We do that for pediatrics,” Denver finished for him. “Sir, can you step back, please? You’re blocking the light.”
“You should do it for everyone,” Cullen snapped, reaching overhead to adjust the light for the tech’s convenience.
Sky hissed as Denver finished up the injection, Cullen leaning down so low toward her that his chest nearly rested on her strawberry hair. With his hands braced on either side of Sky, he watched Denver lay the first suture, go to start the second, then push himself away from Sky altogether.
“Sir? Sir, would you like to take over?” Denver asked, meeting Cullen’s gaze without flinching. “Because right now, your choices are to suture Ms. Reynolds yourself or get out of the room so I can work.”
“Sorry,” Sky told the tech before Cullen could respond to that. “Cullen has issues with letting people do their own jobs. It’s a personal quirk of his.”
Stiffening, Cullen took a full pace backward and leaned against the wall behind him. A more than just compromise, as far as he was concerned. Denver, apparently knowing better than to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, grunted and went back to his work. Admittedly, the man was competent, but the gash would likely leave a scar anyway.
The problem was that this whole situation had been unnecessary. Feeling his hands curl into fists, Cullen strode out of the treatment room before his suddenly flashing memories of seeing Sky being thrown into a wall made him do something foolish. Breathing deeply through his nose, Cullen tried and failed to slow his heart’s pounding against his ribs. How could someone as intelligent as Sky think sprinting headfirst into danger to get Frank tabloid fodder was a good idea? Goddamn it, if—