Page 66 of Sweet Revenge

CHAPTER39

ELISA

The elderly man who’d walked into the clinic about forty minutes ago was still sitting in the same chair I’d escorted him to when I’d gone in the back to help restock some shelves. I saw him there, pushing his glasses up and down on his nose, staring at the admission forms.

With a soft smile, I headed over to him, stepping around some children who were playing on the lobby floor with some of the toys I’d suggested Drake put out for long waits. The clinic had gotten unbelievably busy recently. They were understaffed and overworked, but they were making a huge difference in this community. So when my brother had hinted that he could use another set of hands, I’d taken him up on the nudge and found my way here.

Nursing wasn’t my calling, and answering phones, filling out forms, and that sort of thing weren’t really my cup of tea either, but I didn’t mind spending a few hours a day here when I could, just to show him my support. It was the least I could do after what he did to save Daemon.

“Sir, do you need some help?” I asked, sitting down next to him. He smelled a little like my grandfather had in his later years—overwhelming cologne with a hint of that unique scent one only acquires with age.

“I’m sorry to be any trouble, miss.” He looked over his glasses at me, his eyes downcast. “I just can’t seem to make out all the words. It’s these darn glasses.”

“It’s no trouble,” I assured him. I took the clipboard and the pen I’d handed him earlier and quietly went through all the questions on the paperwork and filled them in for him. “All right, Mr. Robertson. As soon as one of the doctors is available, well get you back to have a look at that wrist.”

“Thank you so much, dear. You really are an angel, you know it?” He patted my arm, and I smiled at him before getting up and heading back over to the desk.

“That was sweet of you,” Mindy, the full-time receptionist, said as she typed some information into her computer. “We need more people like you.”

“I was just trying to help.” I placed the clipboard in the rack, moving it up a couple of spots to account for Mr. Robertson’s arrival time, not his inability to see the papers.

“You are your brother’s sister,” Stacia, the head nurse, said behind me. “That boy has a heart of gold.”

I turned and smiled at her, opening my mouth to agree, when I saw her countenance change.

Stacia’s lips parted, her jaw went slack, and her eyes widened before she cleared her throat. “Damn. Whatever that man’s ailments are, I’m happy to be his medicine.”

My eyebrows furrowed as I tried to figure out what was happening. Mindy was making small noises in the back of her throat that sounded a little like, “Mmm, mmm, mmm.”

When I finally managed to spin back around, I saw Daemon stepping over the kids, and a giggle escaped my lips. That explained it. Of course, the other women in the office were going to fawn all over him. My man was hot.

He was wearing a suit, like always, his dark hair a bit messy, his brown eyes narrowed in that expression that told everyone he wasn’t someone to fuck around with—in case one of our patients wanted to pull a semiautomatic weapon on him, I supposed. That was just his version of resting bitch face by now.

In his hand, he carried a dozen long-stemmed red roses, with thorns. Holding them up, he said, “Hello, gorgeous.”

“Are those for me? Thank you.” I took them and hurried around the counter to give him a hug and as innocent a kiss as I could get away with.

“This is your man, Elisa?” Stacia asked. “Girl, you’ve been holding out on us.”

My cheeks flamed up from her comment. “Yes, this is Daemon.” I rested a hand on his chest, his arm still wrapped around me. “Daemon, this is Stacia and Mindy.”

He let go of me to shake their hands, Stacia’s lingering a bit longer than necessary. “Nice to meet both of you,” he said politely. I could tell he was faking, but they couldn’t. He didn’t really care to meet anyone—ever. These two ladies were no exception.

“I guess I better haul my ass back to work.” Stacia shook her head reluctantly. She took a few steps before turning and calling over her shoulder, “You got a brother?”

“Not one you wanna meet,” Daemon told her. Then, giving her a pointed look, he added, “Trust me.”

“I don’t know about that,” Stacia said, laughing, then looked at me. “You and I are gonna talk later, girl.”

“Okay,” I told her, just to get her on her way. Daemon and I moved away from the patients and Mindy’s workspace. “You don’t think we should try to hook Vin up?”

He laughed. “Do you like this woman? Because if you do, I would not fix her up with any of the three of my brothers.”

I didn’t really have an answer for that, so I let it go. Stacia was nice, but I wasn’t planning on being here forever, so I hadn’t been working that hard to make friends.

“Red roses.” I lifted them to my nose and inhaled deeply. “Doesn’t that seem like forever ago?” Images of him standing behind me as he trailed thorny stems down my back came to mind.

“Seems like just yesterday to me.” He leaned down and kissed me again, this time a little more passionately. The man certainly knew how to get me going. If he kept it up, I was going to have to find an empty patient room.