"You want to see him, don’t you? This is the only way past the guards. You’re a nursing assistant for the next twenty minutes. Change. Now."

I pulled on the scrubs, my movements clumsy and numb. Nick handed me a surgical mask and a tray of instruments. "Keep the mask up. Don’t look at the guards. Look at the tray. If you speak, we’re both finished."

We walked. Each step I took felt like my heart was being squeezed by a giant hand. Nick walked beside me, his pace brisk. "You owe me for this," he muttered under his breath. "This is my career. If Charles Wolfe finds out I smuggled a civilian into his son’s ICU, I won’t just be fired. I’ll be erased."

"I know," I whispered through the mask. "I know."

Nick glanced at me, his tongue clicking against the roof of his mouth. "You’re too pliant, Noah. That’s what you are. You’ve always been. Even when we were children. You’re too ready to fold for anyone who looks at you twice. It’s pathetic, really."

The word pliant settled over me like a heavy blanket. He was right. I was the person who faded into the background until someone noticed, and then I clung to that notice like it was oxygen.

Lila had noticed me and saw a convenience. Cassian had noticed me and saw... what?

What did he even see in me? Something that made me worth keeping by his side...

I didn’t know. But he had looked at me like I was actually there.

Not a version of what he wanted, not an idea, but me. Actually me.

And that was why I was here, in stolen scrubs, risking everything for a man who might never wake up to see me.

Three guards stood outside the double doors of the private wing. They were massive, silent, and positioned like a warning to the rest of the world.

Nick didn’t flinch nor hesitate. He stepped forward with the arrogance that only a top-tier surgeon can possess.

"I need to check on my patient," he said.

"You were just here, Dr. Bennett," the first guard countered, his voice like gravel.

"Yes, and I need to check again. That’s how medicine works in the real world," Nick snapped. "The vitals showed a fluctuation in the drainage. I’m not waiting for the morning shift to find out his lung has collapsed."

"Where’s the other nurse?"

"Attending to the three other emergencies on this floor. I brought this one," Nick gestured vaguely at me. "Are we done, or do I need to call the Chief of Medicine to explain why security is practicing surgery today?"

The guard didn’t move. Nick didn’t move.

They stood in a specific, terrifying stillness, two predators deciding who would yield first.

I held the tray, my knuckles white, my heartbeat so loud in my ears I was certain the guards could hear it echoing off the walls.

The second guard leaned in and whispered something to the first. The first guard’s expression shifted. Whatever was said, it changed the calculation.

"I apologize, Dr. Bennett," the guard said, stepping aside. "Please go ahead."

"Follow me," Nick said, not even acknowledging the apology. I followed.

The door opened with a soft hiss of air.

The room beyond was large and bathed in a soft, dim light, far removed from the harsh white of the corridors.

It was the luxury of the Wolfe family on full display... private, quiet, and perfectly maintained.

The first thing I heard was the sound of the monitors. The steady, rhythmic beep that told the world he was still here. Then, the hiss of the ventilator.

I saw the bed in the center of the room. I saw the shape beneath the blankets.

My breath simply vanished. It felt like my lungs had forgotten their primary function.

I stood there, the tray trembling in my hands, staring at the man in the bed.

This was Cassian Wolfe. The man who filled rooms just by standing in them.

The man who made the world rearrange itself to fit his shadow. He had never looked anything less than invincible, even when he was tired, even when he was angry.

And now, he was this.

His face was a terrifying shade of gray, the skin tight over his bones.

Bandages were visible at the edge of his gown, stark white against the bruised purple of his shoulder.

There were tubes everywhere... lines running into his arms, a tube in his throat, a monitor taped to his finger.

He was being maintained by the specific architecture of modern medicine, a body fighting a war it was too tired to win.

It was the stillness that broke me. Not the controlled, dangerous stillness of a man choosing his moment, but the heavy, absolute stillness of a body that had used every resource it had just to keep the heart beating.

Nick stood beside me for a moment. "Ten minutes," he said, his voice unusually soft. "I’ll be outside the door. If anyone comes, you’re checking the IV bag. Don’t touch the monitors."

The door closed, and I was alone with him.

I sat in the chair beside the bed. The distance between us was only a few inches, yet it felt like an ocean. I reached out, my hand hovering for a long time before I finally let my fingers touch his.

His hand was still warm. That was the first thing I noticed. It was the same hand that had touched me, that had guided me, that had held me.

Now it lay there, heavy and unresponsive.

The crying started again, quietly this time.

It was a ragged, messy sound that I couldn’t suppress.

I had held it back through the meeting, through the drive, through the lobby, and through the guards. Now, there was nowhere left to hide it.

I looked at his closed eyes, the lashes long and dark against his pale skin. "You’re not allowed to do this," I whispered, my voice breaking on every word. "You’re not allowed to leave me here. You didn’t finish... We didn’t finish..." 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

I clutched his hand, burying my face against the edge of the mattress. I felt like a small, broken thing in the shadow of a fallen giant.

I thought about the photograph in my drawer, and the jealousy that had felt so important yesterday seemed like a fever dream now.

I didn’t care who he had loved before. I didn’t care what secrets he kept. I just wanted him to breathe on his own.

I wanted him to look at me and call my name, even if it was only to tell me to leave.

"Please," I sobbed into the sterile blankets. "Please... Cassian. Just come back."

The monitors continued their rhythmic, indifferent tally of his life. The numbers stayed stable, a small mercy in a room filled with grief. I stayed there, my hand in his, letting the tears fall until the scrubs were damp.

Ten minutes wasn’t enough. A lifetime wouldn’t be enough.

I sat there in the silence, holding onto the only person who had ever made me feel like I wasn’t just a shadow, waiting for a heartbeat that wasn’t controlled by a machine.