Page 9 of Zorro

“I am a vain bastard,” he murmured.

She closed her eyes. Everything to the contrary. “Stop being charming.”

“Right, you’re like the Death Star, all bristling weapons and force fields.” His tone was teasing, but underneath was pure temptation. “Even my charm-loaded precision shots don’t get through.” He gave her a half-smile that was all sin and mischief. “The Force is strong in this young Jedi.”

She bit back a laugh. Barely. “Careful. That sarcasm’s going to get you sedated.”

He didn’t miss a beat. His voice dropped, rough and warm. “I’m always going under for you, Doc.”

Her pulse kicked, traitorous and sharp. His black hair was buzzed on the sides, longer on top, mussed with dirt and still damp from the rain, one thick strand falling across his forehead, brushing against a jawline a wrecking ball couldn’t break. The strong column of his throat drew her gaze, made her mouth ache to follow it, press past hot, velvet skin, past muscle, past bone, all the way into the man beneath. Dark stubble framed his mouth, only sharpening the distraction. Lips that knew how to grin like a devil and stir all manner of wicked thoughts.

She almost groaned out loud, masked it behind a scowl, grabbed his arm, and dragged him toward the exam room.

He let her. Of course he did. She was under no illusion. If he hadn’t wanted to move, he wouldn’t have budged. She could only have wished he would comply. The warmth of his skin under her fingers wasn’t the problem. It was the way part of her wanted to believe him.

Wanted to believe that his flirting meant something. That she wasn’t just the latest target for that smooth-talking bravado and impossible grin.

But men like Zorro flirted like they breathed, easy, instinctive. He probably didn’t even know he was doing it half the time. Again, she’d fallen for charm before. Look where that got her.

Still, some foolish part of her, the part she’d buried six feet deep, wondered if the way he looked at her was different. Like she wasn’t just a game. Like she mattered.

She directed him to the gurney, where he settled, turning away for her sanity, dismissing the overwrought thoughts spinning through her skull. She needed food. Sleep. In that order. After him, she’d get both.

“Let’s lose the vest,” she ordered. He reached for the edge and peeled back the Velcro, a soft, ragged exhale slipping out. She whipped around. “I didn’t mean you should do it. Oh, my God. SEALs. If you asked for help, you might actually get it.”

“Alpha males don’t ask for help,” he said, his tone mock-chastising. “But sometimes we beat it out in an SOS on our chests.”

“I’m way too tired for this,” she muttered, slapping his hands away, only to earn a wider grin that did exactly what he meant it to do.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice dropping a register, “a soft, warm bed sounds good about now.” Delivered in that husky way, that tone hit her exactly where he wanted it to. She barely kept from gasping.

She narrowed her eyes at him, summoning her best detached-doctor glare. It didn’t even dent that potent grin. She reached for the vest, fingers curling under the edge, pressing against the hot, hard muscles of his shoulders, absently thinking he needed that power to wear it. When her brain registered the weight, she blurted out, “This is still damn heavy. How much shit do you need to carry?”

“All of it,” he whispered. “Needs to be impenetrable to protect the heart…most of the time, it succeeds.” Startled at the meaning tucked just beneath those words, she looked up, really met his gaze for the first time, and got lost. Dark and dense molasses brown, slow to give anything away. Eyes like secrets steeped in syrup and smoke, but warm when they finally let you in. The kind of gaze that could smolder…or soothe.

Her heart fluttered, and she knew exactly why she’d been avoiding him. Picking fights. Skimming past his gaze. Working overtime not to see him. Back in Niamey, she was already running. From him. From what she didn’t think she needed in her life. Still didn’t.

But God, he was the kind of man a woman couldn’t fully protect herself from. Case in point: she’d kissed him like an utter fool the moment his vulnerability stripped away her armor.

She wanted to say it was just the healer in her. That it had been instinct. Compassion. Reflex.

But all lies she told herself.

The truth was, the woman in her, neglected, silenced, starved, had reached for him like air, while grieving, while afraid.

Breaking eye contact was as hard as rolling a boulder uphill. She removed the vest, set it down near the gurney, and grabbed the handle of her cart, rolling it over to him, the wheels squeaking slightly on the uneven tile.

Snapping on a fresh pair of gloves, her gaze dropped to the bloodstain on his shirt, darker now, dried and stiff around the edges.

Without a word, she picked up the scissors and began to cut. The fabric resisted. She worked in silence, trying to focus on the shiny arc of the steel, not on the heat radiating from the man in front of her. Her pulse tripped over itself.

Stop being a fool, she scolded herself. He’s a special operator. He’s wounded. You’re here to stitch him up. He needs to be shirtless to do that. So stop?—

Against her oath, against her common sense, and against her fear, her eyes dropped, lingered, caressed. His chest was bronzed and broad, muscles defined in the way of men who earned their strength through war, not iron. Every line looked ripped from purpose, shoulders roped with sinew, cut abs tight with tension. He was lean, built like endurance incarnate, with a body honed by survival. Scars were scattered across his torso like ghost trails, some pale and old, others fresh, still angry with healing.

Then he made a soft sound. A rough exhale. “Doc…the way you’re looking at me…”

Her hand stilled. She blinked up. His eyes met hers, molasses-dark, heavy-lidded, hurting in a way that had nothing to do with torn flesh. “I’m running on sweat and bravado right now,” he said, voice low and serious. “You looking at me like that…it hurts.”

---