Iwantedher.
The wanting itself was not the problem. I had wanted plenty of people in my life. Wanting was human. Predictable. Containable.
This wanting was different.
This wanting came braided with protectiveness. With pride. With a dangerous urge to be the one she turned to — not just professionally, but personally. I found myself thinking about her when she wasn’t in the room. Wondering how she was holding up on the night shift. Noticing the subtle exhaustion in her posture before she eversaid she was tired. Filing away tiny details that had nothing to do with patient care and everything to do withher.
That was not clean.
That was not safe.
And yet.
I wasn’t blind. I had seen the way her breath changed when I stood too close. The way her gaze lingered just a fraction too long before she remembered herself. The way her tone softened with me in a way it did not with anyone else. I wasninetypercent sure — dangerously sure — that the current ran both ways.
That was what made it hardest to ignore.
If it were unrequited, I could shut it down. Redirect. Distance. If it were onlymyproblem, I could manage it.
But if she felt it too?
That changed the equation entirely.
I had built a life on managing risk. On making calculated decisions. On knowing when to step forward and when to hold the line. This did not feel like a situation that I could manage by pretending it didn’t exist. The more I ignored it, the more it pressed against me, present in every shared glance, every moment of quiet guidance, every time I said her name and felt it settle somewhere it shouldn’t.
I didn’t want to hurt her. I didn’t want to confuse her. And I damn sure didn’t want to jeopardize what we were building professionally.
I also didn’t trust myself to keep pretending that what I felt was nothing. There was a kind of honesty in naming things before they grew teeth.
The way she listened with intent, the way her body just…movedto execute my instructions. It was almost without thinking that she responded to me.
What would that look like behind closed doors? Would Anya Volkov be as… eager to follow directions if I were buried deep inside her?
Or would she rebel? Would there be a bite to her words, a bratburied beneath her professional obedience? And worse still… I was equal parts exhilarated by either idea.
I straightened, exhaling slowly, the decision forming with reluctant clarity. If this was going to exist between us — and I was no longer willing to pretend it didn’t — then it needed to be handled deliberately. Cleanly. With boundaries that acknowledged the truth instead of suffocating it.
One time. Simple terms. No illusions.
It was a lie I was already half-aware of. But it was a lie that felt safer than silence.
I gathered my coat, my expression settling back into its familiar, controlled shape. The attending. The mentor. The man who did not make impulsive choices. Inside, though, something had already shifted.
I knew what I was going to say to her. And I knew — because I was not nearly as blind as I pretended to be — that she might not say no. Which was the most dangerous thought of all.
Chapter 7
Anya
I’d almost made it to my car when his voice rang out across the quiet morning.
“Volkov!” he called after me, and I turned just to see him half-jogging to catch up. “Do you have that study handy? You snuck out before I could have you send it to me.”
I scoffed, rolling my eyes as I hiked my bag farther up on my shoulder. “Oh,nowyou want to hear about the credible research I found.”
“Don’t be contrite,” he laughed, and I ignored the way it sent a chill down my spine. I didn’t know I could have this… could have friendly banterwith an attending. “I’m always willing to hear about up-and-coming practices. You just mentioned itwhilewe were placing the catheter on that poor gentleman.”
“So my timing was off!” I shot back, maybe grinning a little more than I should have.
