Marked by Three

ChapterFour

KIRA

My shift kicked off at seven and I was already running on fumes. Three hours of sleep, max. Every time I tried to close my eyes the night before, there was Damon again, those cold hands sliding over me, his voice low in my ear saying I belonged to him, like it was some kind of fact. I’d ended up in the shower at four a.m., scrubbing at my skin until it stung, but my own fingers had wandered anyway, chasing the ache he’d left behind. Pathetic. Coffee wasn’t helping it. Neither was pretending I wasn’t replaying every second.

I kept moving anyway. Patients don’t care if your head’s somewhere else.

“Kira, you okay?” Maria called as I passed the nurses’ station for what had to be the third time in ten minutes, fiddling with the same chart I didn’t actually need.

“Yeah. Just tired.” I didn’t look at her. She’d been trying to pry details out of me for weeks now, ever since she caught me staring at my phone like it might bite.

“Rough night?” That eyebrow went up, the one that meant she was already writing the story in her head.

“Something like that.” I grabbed my tablet and scrolled through the board without really seeing it. Three in triage, two in obs, one discharge hanging on a signature. Same Friday mess as always. I could fake my way through it. I had to.

My phone buzzed against my hip. Zane. Of course.

Zane: Good morning! Still thinking about our dance. Coffee today? I know this great place.

I caught myself smiling before I could stop it. Roan was… easy. The kind of easy that didn’t come with icy stares or midnight texts that made my stomach twist. Just a guy who liked bad dancing and worse jokes.

Me: Shift ends at 3. Meet you then?

Zane: Perfect. I’ll pick you up at the hospital.

I shoved the phone back in my pocket and got on with it. Vitals in Room 3. Meds for the lady in obs who kept asking if the pills would make her sleepy. Restarting the IV on the old guy who yanked it out every time the nurse turned around. Two hours bled away in that familiar blur of beeps and complaints and the endless smell of antiseptic.

Then the sirens started.

The radio crackled overhead. “Incoming trauma. ETA ninety seconds. Eighteen-year-old male, motorcycle versus sedan, unconscious at scene…”

I was already jogging toward the bay before the rest of the words landed. Jazz was there, snapping gloves on and yelling at the techs to clear space. “Gear up,” she told me without looking. “This one’s gonna suck.”

I yanked on the yellow gown, gloves, shield, everything from muscle memory doing most of the work while my brain stayed half-stuck on Damon’s hands and Zane’s text and the fact that I hadn’t eaten since yesterday. The doors flew open and two paramedics came in fast.

I knew Santos right away. The guy had been bringing people into this ER longer than I’d been alive, probably. He was solid and steady, the kind you wanted on a bad call.

The other one I’d never seen.

Tall, really tall, shoulders filling out the navy shirt like it was thinking about giving up. Dark skin, strong jaw clenched in that focused way paramedics get when they’re trying not to think about how bad it is. He was squeezing the ambu bag in perfect rhythm, eyes locked on the kid like nothing else existed.

“Eighteen-year-old male, motorcycle versus sedan,” he said, voice low and even. “Unconscious at scene. GCS three. Intubated in the field. Two large bores, two liters NS en route. BP seventy over forty and dropping. HR one-fifty. Obvious left femur deformity.”

Clean report. No joke. Exactly what we needed.

We slid the kid over on the count. It was smooth. A routine. Until his eyes, those dark brown eyes, flicked up and caught mine across the body for maybe half a second too long. Something weird happened in my chest. Not fear. Not even surprise, exactly. Just… recognition? Like the air between us thickened for no reason at all. My hands actually paused on the sheet. Then Jazz barked my name and the moment popped like a soap bubble.

“Vitals, Kira!”

I grabbed the cuff. Sixty over thirty. s**t. Heart rate one-fifty-two. O2 sat tanking. Jazz called for blood and surgery and we were moving before I could even process the weird static feeling still buzzing under my ribs.

I rode the elevator up with the team, handed off to OR, then trudged back down alone. The bay was trashed, blood on the floor, wrappers everywhere. I grabbed the mop out of habit. Wiped the floor and restocked. I stripped off the gown. Washed my hands until the water stopped running pink.

My brain kept trying to drift back to that paramedic’s face. I told it to shut up. Three patients still waiting. Meds due. Paperwork. Normal stuff.

Fifteen minutes later I headed for the supply room because my trauma bag was running on fumes and I didn’t feel like begging from another nurse. The hallway was dead quiet, everyone either with patients or hiding in the cafeteria. The room itself was the same cramped closet it always was, shelves crammed with vials and kits, fluorescent light buzzing overhead like it had a personal grudge.

I found the IV start kits. The alcohol pads. The four-by-fours. Then I reached for the last glass vial of normal saline on the middle shelf.

The second my fingers closed around it, heat slammed through my palm like I’d grabbed a live wire.

Not warm. Burning. I jerked and my hand spasmed.

Glass exploded.

Not cracked, shattered into a million tiny knives right there in my fist.

“f**k….” I dropped what was left and stumbled back. Blood welled up fast, bright and hot, dripping onto the linoleum. Little shards glittered in the cuts. The pain hit a second later, sharp and deep, but underneath it that same weird heat kept pulsing, like something inside my hand was still on fire.

I stared at it. Glass doesn’t just do that. Not from one normal grip. Not from body temperature.

I fumbled for gauze with my good hand, pressed it down hard. The white turned red instantly. Deeper cuts would need stitches, probably. But I couldn’t make myself move. Couldn’t stop looking at the mess I’d somehow made.

That same tingling had been happening lately, during compressions last week, during that impossible save the month before. Every time something weird went right in a code, this feeling crawled up my arms like static. I’d told myself it was nothing. Stress. Low blood sugar. Anything but the obvious.

Something was wrong with me.

I was still standing there, bleeding on the floor and trying not to panic, when a voice came from the doorway.

“What was that?”

I spun around so fast my shoes squeaked in the blood. Someone was watching me.