“Can’t argue with that logic. I just came to make sure you got home okay.”
I was really starting to think my crush on him wasn’t one-sided. Between all of his check-ins and our occasional flirting, it was getting harder to keep myself in check.
“You know I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I really wish you’d stop treating me like a stupid child.”
“I would never treat you like a stupid child.”
I glared at him. He sighed in response.
“I know you can handle yourself, but working with us… Violet, there are a lot of people that might want to get ahold of you to get to us. We just want to make sure we’re keeping you safe like you’ve been keeping us safe.”
“Well, fine.” I sighed again. “I suppose I could put up with your company as long as you don’t mind watching me scarf down these chocolates.” I waved to the bowl in the door. “I haven’t eaten since lunch.”
“Deal.” He grinned.
10
THE VOLUNTEER
So,I actually started at 10 a.m. the next day.
Was it petty to make the officer wait? Yes. Did I feel bad about it? Not one bit. The police didn’t do jack shit for this city anyway, so what if one cop wasted an hour of their time? It wasn’t like they would have helped anyone anyway.
Amber called at 9 a.m. to let me know that an officer was waiting outside my office and spent five minutes telling me howhot he was—rambling on and on about a man in uniform. I just shook my head as I took my time getting ready. It was a twenty-five minute walk from my apartment on 45thto the hospital on 49thso I decided to ditch the subway and go for a stroll.
Rivermount was an easy city to navigate, most of the city streets were just numbers—odd numbers ran north to south, and even numbers ran east to west. It was broken up into five official districts, but the area affected bythe incidenthad become its own unofficial district. The only kind of confusing thing was the streets ended when you crossed districts. But you got used to it.
The smallest district was City Core which was dead-centre, and the only place to have actual street names. The way the districts had been split made me laugh a little bit because it looked like a pizza slice on the map.
Milky Way was technically the sector I lived in (45thto 65thodd and 12thto 50theven,) but unofficially 45thto 49thwas considered Villains’ Way. It was the largest district. It took up the entire west side along the river. It used to be called Riverside, but the water got murky about fifteen years ago and people started to call it Milky—things spun out of control from there.
On the upper east side, Steelview was from 69thto 79thodd and 52ndto 60theven. It was about half the size of Milky Way, but it was mostly factories, a few small farms, and the mayor’s house, so there were fewer blocks.
The northern district was mostly for the uber rich and more farms. (I grew up there, but most of my classmates considered me poor instead of middle class.) Officially, it was called Mountainside because of Mount Veecy; unofficially, it had been referred to as Avalanche’s Cove since his debut attack on City Core, even though the area remained mostly unscathed. He’d needed the mountain to create the momentum, but he’dmaneuvered his attack around every building, sticking mostly to the parks and fields as much as he could to get to downtown.
Finally, on the lower east side from 81stto 99thodd and 60thto 88theven, was Bridges. I have no idea why it was named that—there wasn’t a single bridge in the whole district.
We were a large city area-wise but our population was on the lower end—around 400,000. I guess that tended to happen when villains were running around, completely unchecked. Plus,theincidenttended to give prospective movers pause. It had been nearly six years, but it could happen again. They still don’t know how it happened the first time.
I was glad I decided to walk. It was a rare sunny winter day (sure November was technically fall but this was northern Ontario, we’d had snow for a couple weeks already). Snow littered the ground from last week’s storm, but with the mild temperatures and sun beating down, it was starting to melt. It was a bit slushy, but that was what winter boots were for.
I arrived at the hospital five minutes early and took my time getting up to my office, stopping to talk with everyone who asked about yesterday. By the time I actually approached my door, it was half past 10.
My day was instantly ruined. They sent Officer O’Neill. I hadn’t seen him since the mugger I took down a week ago, I thought he was finally taking the hint. I bet he volunteered for this. Stubborn jerk. He wouldn’t take no for an answer.
He was patiently waiting, leaning against the wall with his hands tucked into his bullet proof vest, his eyes lazily scanning the lobby. He almost looked happy to be here. That made me irritated.
“Officer O’Neill, sorry to keep you waiting,” I said in my friendliest tone.
His gaze met mine, and he gave me a warm smile. Damn it, he was turning on the charm. He’d been trying to get me toagree to another date for over a year and, honestly, I was close to cracking. All the time I was spending with Avalanche was making me irrationally horny, and I seriously needed to get laid before I did something I couldn’t take back.
Come on, the guy was a supervillain. I was just asking to get my heart broken.
“It’s no trouble Miss Hayes.”
“I’m sure you have more important things to do than wait around for a phone all morning.”
I unlocked my door and slipped into my office. This was the main hospital I worked out of, so I actually had a room here. For the hospitals on 56thand 65th, I shared a space with all of the other volunteers so I didn’t have the same set-up.
