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“Wait, you’ll help me do what?”
“My car’s right outside. We’ll be at the ER in ten minutes.”
“I’m not going to the ER.”
She stopped and looked at me, all openmouthed and horror-struck, as if I’d just told her a moon-sized meteor was going to crash on our head in the next eight seconds.
“But you have to!” she gasped. “You need stitches. You need a tetanus shot. You might have severed a tendon.”
“I didn’t sever a tendon,” I said in exasperation. “I have a goddamn scratch.”
Melanie put her hands on her hips and glowered at me. Then she reached out and seized the roll of toilet paper. “See?” she said, triumphantly pointing to the trickle of blood that still flowed from the ugly wound.
“Yeah, I do see. Now if you move aside, I’ll get to the bathroom, wash it out, and slap a bandage on it from the first aid kit.”
“We have a first aid kit? Tell me where it is,” she demanded.
“Why, did you forget to add your MD credentials to your resume?” I asked sarcastically.
Melanie drew herself up to her full, unimpressive height and glared up at me. “I was a nursing major for two semesters.”
“Which of course qualifies you to dispense medical advice and even perform routine surgeries now and again,” I muttered.
Her face reddened. “Are you going to stop being a macho show-off and seek medical care, or do I have to call your brother?”
I pushed past her and headed for the men’s room. “Call away, sweetness.”
And believe it or not, she stepped right in front of me. “Don’t run water on it. You might wind up embedding the glass more deeply.”
“I’m not sure you have any idea what you’re talking about, and besides, I already pulled the glass out.”
“Let me see,” she said, grabbing my hand and examining my palm. Even in these strange circumstances, the feel of her soft touch did weird things to me.
I swallowed. “You’re getting my blood all over you.”
She smiled vaguely. “I’m not worried about that.”
“No? How do you know I don’t have hepatitis or something?”
She paused, those deep-blue eyes surveying me intently. “Do you have hepatitis?”
I sighed and withdrew my stinging hand before I did something really off-key like grab her left breast. It was time to end this conversation. I was bleeding; I was exhausted; and there was a sexy, bossy busybody standing between me and the men’s room.
“No known communicable diseases,” I said tersely, and sidestepped Melanie to get to the bathroom. Then I locked the door behind me just in case she had ideas about bursting in to fulfill her caregiver fantasies.
Once I’d tossed the bloody toilet paper roll in the garbage and run some water over the wound, I could see that Melanie was right about needing medical care. The jagged cut was about two inches long and would need stitches to close properly. Plus a dose of antibiotics to prevent infection wasn’t a bad idea.
“Dominic!” Melanie called in a high-pitched, officious voice. It sounded like she was two inches away from my ear.
I finished cleaning up in the sink and grabbed some paper towels, pressing them against the cut. When I opened the door, Melanie fell into the room.
“Shit,” I sputtered as I caught her and got hit in the face with a flailing arm in the process.
“I’m sorry. So sorry,” Melanie gasped as I set her upright.
I took a step back and peered at her. “What the hell were you doing?”
The blush started around her breasts and traveled clear to her hairline. She fidgeted and crossed her arms. “I, uh, didn’t realize I was leaning against the door. Sorry.”
