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“These guys jumped me for my watch, a Rolex my dad gave me for graduation. They demanded I let it go, that it was nothing to me but precious to them. I told them no. I didn’t think they’d actually shoot me over a watch.”

Precious.

That word hits like a trigger pull, and the ER dissolves into the Benedetti main hall, where Tomas has the cold circle of a gun barrel pressed to my temple and his arm locked around my throat. His lips are close enough to my ear that I can feel his breath against my skin.

The only question is whether I take something precious to you with me.

“…Dr. Romano? Dr. Romano!”

I blink to find Noah staring at me, his young face pale beneath the trauma bay lights. The room has gone quiet. Everyone’s frozen in place, their attention fixed on me.

“I need…” My voice scrapes out wrong. “I need a minute.”

I’m out of the bay before anyone can respond. I don’t stop moving until I reach the supply closet at the end of the hall. The door clicks shut behind me, plunging me into darkness broken only by the thin strip of light beneath the door. I slide down against the shelves, my back against boxes of gauze and tubing. My breath comes in short, sharp gasps that won’t slow no matter how much I fight them.

Breathe… You’re a doctor. You know physiology. Four seconds in, hold, four seconds out. Control the autonomic response.

It doesn’t work. My hands shake, my heart races, and Tomas’s face consumes my vision.

Jenna opens the door, slips inside, and engages the lock. She doesn’t speak. She just sits beside me on the cold linoleum, close enough that our shoulders press together.

“I’ve got you.” Her voice is quiet. “Just breathe. I’m right here.”

We stay like this until my pulse steadies. Eventually, I remember how to draw air into my lungs and the world stops tilting.

“Want to talk about it?” Jenna asks.

“No.” My voice is hoarse and raw. “Yes. I don’t know.”

“Start with Marco. I know he’s the one you’ve been with. The sparks between you two practically set the hospital on fire every time he came in here.”

A short, surprised laugh escapes me as I teeter on the edge of hysterical. “I think I’m in over my head, Jen.”

“In over your head how? Are you romantically confused or in actual danger?”

“Both.” I press my palms to my eyes until I see stars. “I know exactly how much danger I’m in, and I’m choosing to stay anyway, and that terrifies me more than the danger itself. He’s not what I thought he was. He’s good, Jen. Really good, in ways that matter. But his world is⁠—”

“Violent? Scary? Full of people who might kill you?”

“Yes.”

Jenna stares at me for a moment before dropping a bomb. “Do you love him?”

The question hits like defibrillator paddles to the chest. My heart lurches, stutters, then races.

“Yes.” The truth escapes me in a raspy tone. “God help me, yes.”

Jenna is quiet for a while. Then, very carefully, she puts her arms around me and holds me tightly.

“Okay.” She nods rapidly. “Then we figure it out. But Lu, whatever happens, you won’t go through it alone. I’m here for you. That’s the deal, right?”

I put my head on her shoulder, glad to have her on my side.

We wander back out together, and I wave her off because she has duties in another wing. I labor through the rest of my shift, and by the end of it, my brain is fogged and my nerves frayed with exhaustion.

I don’t even notice a clean-cut Mason Dellinger until he blocks my path.

He unfurls himself from the wall outside the doctors’ lounge, his eyes flickering with a look that’s too fast to read.