Page 34 of The Celtic Resolution
The door swishes once more and silence falls. Breathing in fills my lungs with the soft florals of Saoirse’s perfume and even with my eyes closed, I can track her warmth as she moves around me. Then her gentle fingers cup my jaw and she guides my head backward.
“Easy,” she says softly. “Let me look.”
“You’re not going to stab me, are you?”
“Depends.” She sounds close, so close in fact that her breath ghosts faintly against my cheek. “Can’t tell how deep it is. I’m telling you right now that if I see bone, you’re going to the hospital.”
“Okay.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Not right now.”
“Adrenaline.” She sucks briefly on her teeth and her fingertips press gingerly against my forehead. “Alright, don’t move.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She snorts in amusement as something plastic clicks to my lower left. More plastic rustles, glass bottles cling together and then warm, soft gauze swipes across my eyes and under my brows. It’s not enough to help me see again but I appreciate the effort.
“Hold this here,” Saoirse says softly and she guides one of my hands to hold the gauze in place.
“Since when did you become a doctor?”
“Please.” She scoffs with a chuckle. “For one, I’m Irish. Growing up we scrapped all the time. And second, I’ve had my fair share of bar brawls and wounds like this usually come from a glass bottle so I’ve had practice.” She suddenly presses in between my spread legs and if I breathe deeply, her body is almost perfectly aligned with mine.
Unable to see, the only way I can be sure of where she is exactly is to reach out to her. So I do. My hand rests against her waist and she doesn’t say a word, only hums softly in her throat while tenderly wiping at my wounded forehead.
“You’re lucky,” she murmurs and the tickle of her breath as she speaks sends a shiver down my spine. “I don’t see bone. Still, this is going to bruise like a bitch. What did you do to piss off that guy?”
“No clue,” I reply, biting back a wince as she applies gentle pressure on either side of the wound.
“Are you sure?” Paper tears and something falls down from above, brushing against my nose on the way past. “I think some butterflies will hold this but I can’t say for sure. There is glue here.” Plastic rustles to my left and something scrapes lightly against the table. “Are you a needle or a glue kind of guy?”
“Definitely glue.” I hate needles but she doesn’t need to know that, although my choice probably tells her all she needs to know.
“Chicken,” she teases. “But seriously, did you recognize them?”
“No.” Very slowly I crack open one eye, then blink rapidly to try and clear my vision. Saoirse’s early wipe did wonders to help and while some blood lingers in the corner of my eyes, stinging as I open them, I’m finally able to see. “They wore a mask and had their hood up.”
“Fucker,” she mutters.
I’m face to face with her breastbone. Her throat bobs slightly as she talks and the swell of her breasts pushes upward each time she stretches slightly while she works. I try to avert my gaze, to look anywhere other than the teasing crevice of her cleavage but it’sright thereand she fills my whole field of view.
Not that I’m complaining.
“Thank you, by the way. You shot him and saved my life.”
“It’s nothing.”
“No, Saoirse.” I grip her waist harder and while she doesn’t look down from smearing glue over my wound and pinching the skin together, she does lean an inch closer. “I mean it, thank you.”
“You would have done the same.”
My reply catches in my throat. I don’t know if it’s her assumption, or the trust behind it but it makes me feel… odd. Like something is pressing down on my chest. She trusts me to look out for her. Is that because she cares about me or just because we’re working together? I can’t ask, that would be weird but it sits on the edge of my mind.
The glue warms quickly under Saoirse’s delicate touch and soon she’s pressing one butterfly stitch after the other all across the wound. I lose myself in the hollow of her neck, simply watching each subtle shift as she talks me through what she’s doing, each rise of her cleavage as she breathes, and map out the subtle freckles I spot that have escaped my notice before.
Finally, she steps back with an antiseptic wipe in hand and sighs. “It’s not pretty but it’s effective,” she says. Our eyes meet and she frowns. “You okay?”
