sucker for those blue eyes.
Eyes that had at one time caused her to go weak in the knees and melt. There was a change in his, but Ella seriously doubted there was much of one. Slime was still slime.
You kissed that slime before too.
She’d done more than kiss that slime. She’d given a piece of herself to him, a piece of her heart, and then he’d crushed it with his cruelty.
Ella was going to say something else when Zac entered the staffroom. He didn’t see her as she hurriedly stood up, but her heart skipped a beat at the sight of him. She felt her knees weaken, her pulse start to race and her palms grow sweaty. He’d been here a couple of weeks, but she’d tried to avoid him as much as possible. Not to be on duty when he was.
Apart from the odd blip, it had been working up until now.
Suddenly she felt like that dumpy, awkward girl in the lime-green dress. And she didn’t like that much. It was exactly how she’d felt when he’d spoken to her briefly at Charles’s wedding.
She’d thought he was off duty. He was supposed to be on the next rotation and part of the staff that couldn’t get in. What was he doing here?
“Merry Christmas, Dr. Davenport,” Stacey squealed as she ran up to him, holding the ugly fake mistletoe over her head and kissing him on the cheek. Carol snatched it from Stacey’s hand.
“Merry Christmas.” And Carol kissed him on the other cheek.
“Uh, Merry Christmas...” he said stiffly.
Ella snorted. He didn’t know their names. That wasn’t surprising. They were only two of the trauma nurses in the department he worked in, why should he know their names? Typical spoiled Zac Davenport. Not a care in the world for anyone but himself.
“Stacey,” Stacey said.
“And I’m Carol,” Carol said, stepping in front of Stacey. “We’re on duty tonight.”
Zac looked uncomfortable.
Good.
“Shouldn’t you two be out on the floor?” Zac asked, trying to untangle himself from the onslaught of nurses. Ella felt a small amount of pity for them.
“Yes, you two should be out on the floor. There are patients waiting,” Ella said stiffly, trying not to make eye contact with Zac.
“Of course, Dr. Lockwood,” Carol said. “We’ll just take our decorations and go.”
Stacey nodded and picked up the dilapidated box where they’d got the fake mistletoe from and left the staffroom.
“Thanks,” Zac said. “I wasn’t sure how I was going to get out of that.”
“No problem,” Ella replied, but she didn’t look at him. It was better that way.
“Isn’t your shift over?” he asked, as he approached the coffee pot where she’d retreated to after he’d walked into the room. In effect, cornering her.
“Yes, but if you haven’t heard, most of the next shift is unable to make it in and Manhattan has shut down.”
“You worked a full shift, you can just walk home.”
“It’s not safe,” Ella snapped, annoyed that he wanted to get rid of her so badly.
Wouldn’t you be pestering him the same way too?
“I’m just worried that you’re too tired to work another shift.”
She glared at him. “Really? You’re concerned about my well-being?”
“You’re tired,” he said.
“You don’t look so hot yourself. You have dark circles under your eyes.”
Zac’s eyes narrowed and he pursed his lips. “I didn’t sleep well.”
“Then maybe you should go home and rest.”
Zac’s eyebrows shot up. “What is wrong with you?”
“What is wrong with me?” Her voice rose an octave and she was annoyed with herself for engaging in conversation with Zac. She’d promised herself when she’d heard that Zac Davenport had been discharged from the navy and was coming to work at Manhattan Mercy that she would keep her distance from him. That she wouldn’t let him bait her.
She’d worked hard here to build a reputation for herself, and just because Zac had come waltzing back to Manhattan and had immediately got an attending position in Trauma because he was a Davenport, it didn’t mean that she was going to run away with her tail between her legs.
No way. Not this time.
“You’ve been acting weird lately. I mean, I tried to speak to you at Charles’s wedding and you said nothing to me, and then fighting over that patient? We haven’t exactly worked well together.”
“Actually, I said hello and goodbye, if I remember correctly, at the wedding. As for the working situation, well, the trauma floor is tense and that was my patient.”
Those brilliant blue eyes darkened with annoyance. That mouth, which she was all too familiar with, frowned and he crossed his arms.
“Ella, what is wrong?”
You were my best friend, my first kiss, and then publicly dismissed me in front of our peers. You broke my heart.
“Nothing is wrong.” She set down the plastic cup that was half-filled with now-tepid coffee. “You know what? You’re right. I’m tired and maybe I should head out in the whiteout conditions and go home.”
She turned on her heel and stormed out of the staffroom, clenching her fists to keep herself from shaking.
There was no way she was actually going to head out into that storm. The ER was short-staffed and whiteout conditions didn’t make it exactly safe to navigate the streets tonight. It was safer in the hospital.
As long as she could get away from Zac.
She was going to stay, but she just couldn’t stay in the same room as Zac Davenport. Not for one more second.
“Ella!”
She heard him shout her name from behind her.
Why is he following me?
“Ella!”
She ignored him and quickened her pace, but she was no match for Zac, who gripped her by the arm and pulled her down a side hallway.
“What?” she demanded as he spun her around to face him.
“Look, I didn’t mean it. You can’t go out in that storm.”
She rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t going out in the storm. You really don’t think much of me, do you?”
He
