The same voice that got the jacket on her and got her into the river.
She sat back down. Annoyed. Arms folded. The posture of a woman who wanted it on record she was complying under protest.
He pulled the med kit from his pack and opened it. Antiseptic, blister plasters, gauze, tape. Basic field supplies. “Boots off.”
“Pav, it’s just blisters?—”
“Bootsoff.”
She huffed a sigh before she unlaced them with stiff fingers and yanked them off. She peeled her wet socks away, her face crinkling into a grimace.
Everything stilled inside him.
Her feet were a mess. Raw blisters on both heels, two burst and weeping. Angry red skin between her toes where the wet skin had been rubbing. The beginnings of maceration along the edges of her soles—the skin white and soft and breaking downfrom hours of moisture. Her left foot was worse. The blister on the heel was deep, and the surrounding skin inflamed in a way that said infection was coming if it wasn’t treated now.
She’s been walking on this for hours. Keeping pace with him. Not a word. His anger was immediate, directed inward. He checked everything. Entry points. Sightlines. Wind direction.
He hadn’t checked her.
That was on him.
He kneeled in front of her and took her foot in his hands. Her foot was small, fine-boned and cold against his palm. He adjusted his grip, keeping it practical and clinical.
It didn’t help.
He cleared his throat. Smoke from the fire. Obviously.
He took a breath to recalibrate and cleaned the blisters with antiseptic. She hissed, and her foot twitched in his hand.
“Sorry.” The word sounded unfamiliar in his mouth. He ignored it and kept working.
She was watching him. He sensed it—the weight of her gaze on the top of his head, on his hands, on the place where his fingers held her. He didn’t look up.
Instead, he applied the blister plasters, smoothing the edges with his thumb, sealing them against her skin.
“The blisters on my left heel are worse.” Her doctor voice. Trying to take back control. “You’ll need to?—”
He flicked his gaze upward. Just a second. “I can see.”
“Okay…”
He placed her left foot in his lap. “You should have said something.”
Seconds passed.
“It wasn’t relevant.”
Pav lifted his head.
She looked down at him, amusement lifting the corner of her mouth, her eyes bright and challenging. Despite her exhaustion,she’d just thrown his own words back at him with a precision that a sniper would envy.
Something pulled at the edge of his mouth?—
Pav focused on the dressing as if the world depended on it, before the expression fully formed. He finished and smoothed the last plaster back into place.
“Keep them dry,” he said. “And tell me next time.”
He released her foot, crossed to the other side of the fire. Distance felt safer.
