Golden Hour (Crescent City) Page 4

  “You may think you can bully anyone you want because you’re some hotshot from the army, but you’re not bullying me. I’ve had just about enough of your—”

  “Zoe!” I cut in. She and the Warren both look my way. This time his eyebrows are set flat over his eyes—a light, magnetic blue—and his mouth is pulled taut. “He saved this girl’s life and got Dean to us when he was in shock. You know how a long night at the bar can leave you smelling strong. Lay off of him and let’s take care of our patients, okay?” My words are quiet, but I back them up with firm authority.

  Zoe’s face softens, and she looks at me like she’s about to placate a child. “Elise, you don’t have to go easy on him just because—”

  “I don’t even know this nurse, so she’d have no good reason to go easy on me,” he snaps. “And I’m damn tired of your accusations. As far as I’m concerned, we all have pretty much the same job, which is not killing people, right? Between you letting nearly Dean fall off the table and your fellow nurse about to give that patient three times the dose of Narcan she’s supposed to have, I guess I’m the only one succeeding.”

  I look at the syringe in my hand and my heart punches in my chest. What the hell am I doing? My hands shake. I picked this up when I was thinking about Lawson. I should have been thinking about the patient on the bed. Shit.

  “You need to get out of here, now,” Zoe snarls, pointing one thin finger, her childlike arm making an arrow that directs him into the hall. “If Nurse Dupuis almost made a mistake, it’s because you’re standing there, getting in her damn way! Out. Now. Get out!”

  He’s got both hands up and is walking back to the door. “I’m so sorry my very presence makes experienced nurses lose their edge. Look, I’ll gladly leave. Just tell me when Dean is alright. And don’t let that kid die. I had a hell of the time bringing her back from the dead once tonight. I’ll be out here if either of you nurses need me.”

  He has one boot in the hall when I finally stop trembling and manage to call, “Wait!”

  He shakes his head. “I’ve had about all the damn scolding I can handle for one day, Nurse Dupuis.” He says the last bit curled up in a sarcastic tone.

  I walk over to him and stand right in front of him, so I can be sure he hears me when I say what I need to say. “It’s Elise. And thank you.”

  “For?” There goes that eyebrow, raised in a slow, arrogant arch.

  “Stopping me before I did something I could never undo.” I watch his face jolt at my words.

  His nod is slow when his eyes meet mine. It feels like an electrical surge powers through us and blows a fuse. “Glad I was there to help. Keep sharp when I’m not.” He says the words like he’s disappointed in me.

  Which makes no sense. We don’t even know each other.

  But I look at him again, and realize I may have misread. That disappointment may not be about me. It looks like he’s fighting some kind of bitter war inside himself.

  Lord, I know how that feels.

  “I will,” I say, and spin back to administer the right dose of medicine to my patient.

  I do it with my nerves absolutely shot. For the first time in my career, I wonder if I have any business doing what I’m doing. I wonder if the whispers are true—if I got this far based on the Dupuis name and not my skill.

  I wonder if I should talk to someone about this. I wonder if Warren will report me. I look at Zoe and realize she’s purposefully looking away. She wants to forget and move on. Everyone I care about wants to forget and move on.

  A cleared throat makes me jump, and I look at the doorway. Warren is standing there, the arrogance that made his face look so sharp and hard replaced by a weariness that underlines the five o’clock shadow on his wide jaw and the dark circles under those blue eyes.

  “Sometimes a shift is so fucked-up, the only way to deal with it is to forget it. My favorite forgetting tool happens to be whiskey. Sylvain has two for one drinks tonight. If you wanted to come by, first one’s on me.” His pushes off the doorway and strides out before I can give him an answer.

  I’m left in the room with Zoe, her mouth hanging open, and Dean, who looks like he’s about to vomit.

  “What the hell was that?” Zoe hisses. “After he threw you under the bus, does that idiot really think you’re just going to waltz out of here and have a drink with him?”

  I hand her an emesis basin and she rubs Dean’s back as he pukes. Zoe said Warren threw me under the bus. Strange, because I feel like he finally jolted me out of my stupor.

  It’s the first bit of realness I’ve felt in months.

  And I want more.

  I shake the ice around in my glass and polish off my first drink, feeling one-hundred percent certain she isn’t going to show. I reach for my second and hear a clear, sweet voice ask, “What’s he having? A Sazerac? I’ll take two, please.”

  I twist around on the leather-covered barstool, and there she stands—petite, dark haired, cheekbones like a Cherokee, and a mouth I bet is damn near irresistible when she smiles.

  If she smiles.

  Because there’s also a quiet sadness in her eyes. I’d prefer to pretend I never noticed it, but I’m not good with lies. Plus, I’ve seen its rageful cousin in my own eyes whenever I catch my reflection, so I know it too well to just dismiss it. I also know it refuses to be ignored for long.

  I start to wonder if meeting up with her isn’t the worst idea I’ve ever had.

  It’s too late to second-guess now, so I do my best to be the gentleman my mama expected me to grow up to be.

  “Have a seat,” I say, pulling hers out. I’ve got a damn good poker face, but I’m having a hard time keeping it up right now. I can’t believe she showed. “Glad you made it, Nurse Dupuis.”

  She slips in next to me and sets her bag on her lap. “It’s Elise.”

  I’m shit with names, but I remember hers.

  I extend my hand to properly introduce myself. “Caleb Warren. I’m surprised you showed. I honestly wasn’t holding out much hope.”

  Her hand is small but strong, calloused in certain places, and dry. I know nurses tend to have dry hands from washing them in harsh soap all day, and I like it. I like that she doesn’t have the soft hands of the giggling socialites I’ve been rolling in and out of bed with.

  She’s capable. She’s tough. That’s good. It’ll be nice to share a drink with a girl who’s got brains in her head and won’t take offense if I fail to spend our entire time together kissing her ass and making her feel like some pampered princess.

  The bartender slides her two drinks across the bar, and I watch her gulp down half of one before she responds.

  “I wasn’t sure I was going to until I walked in,” she admits, shifting on her stool. She clears her throat in this delicate way, touching her fingers to the spot just below where her pulse is jumping under her skin. “I think you’ll be the talk of the ER for quite some time.”

  I can’t quite read what she means by that.

  Is she flirting with me? Warning me? Is she at this bar because she felt the same curiosity I did, the same need to know a little more? Or is she coming here with all the answers, about to deliver them to me, a stupid roughneck who never quite figured out how to shut up and fall in line?

  “Why is that?” I cross my arms and lean back.

  Elise lets out an uncomfortable laugh. It's not a happy one, it’s...grim. She takes a quick swallow of her drink and keeps her eyes trained on the glass when she answers. “Because you dared to call me out on my shit.”

  I open my mouth to apologize, even though I really have no reason to, when she reaches over and presses her hand to my arm, stopping me dead in my tracks.

  Her eyes lift from the ice, and they’re spitting and licking like a raging fire. “Don’t. Don’t you dare say you're sorry. I’m so goddamn sick of hearing everyone apologize for shit they have no business apologizing for. I never want to hear, ‘I’m sorry’ again. You saved that girl. Twice. Once from herself and onc
e from...me. The person who was supposed to be looking after her.” Those eyes, dark as night and molten hot, go calm as she breathes deep, steadying herself. She looks down again, and I can’t see anything by the curl of her lashes, so long they shield her eyes completely. “I can’t thank you enough for that.”

  She’s pouring her heart out, and I want it to stop. That’s not why I asked her to meet me. I don’t want her accolades.

  I stamp down the urge to pull her close and offer whatever small comfort I might have to give. I know the ache she’s feeling and worse.

  I know what it’s like when there is no final reprieve. I know what it’s like to watch a person’s life soak into the dirt when there isn’t a damn thing you or anyone else can do to help.

  I take a big gulp of my drink, savoring the bite of the rye whiskey that just might blur the worst of my memories. For a while anyway.

  I nod to Elise. “Don’t mention it.”

  “Okay.” I expected her to try to get this moment resuscitated, really dig deep into our emotions and all that, but her okay sounds relieved.

  We both relax for a second before we struggle to follow-up her heartfelt thank you and my ugly brooding with conversation that’s less life or death.

  I glance down at her small hand, still curved around my forearm like it was made to fit there. She shirks it away and grabs for her glass.

  “I think I’ve only been here one other time,” she says, pushing the lemon peel into the amber drink. “It’s a great place.”

  I agree. It’s just far enough off the beaten path that it isn’t full of tourists slurping syrupy hurricanes, there’s no bass-thumping music, and the drinks are crazy good. The bartenders know their shit and serve you without an attitude.

  “It’s one of my favorite spots. I’ve guess I’ve sort of outgrown dive bars in my old age,” I joke.

  “How old are you? Twenty-five?” She raises a dark, arched eyebrow.

  “Ouch,” I say, clutching my heart dramatically. “Twenty-four. I’m not halfway to my thirties just yet.”

  “I haven’t,” she says, sipping on her drink and smiling over the rim. Or not quite smiling. It’s a tease, and it lets me know my initial guess was right on: if her half-smile is that gorgeous, the full version could bring a grown man to his knees. “Outgrown dive bars, that is. I still make it into the Quarter at least once a month to do karaoke.”

  I chuckle hard. “Karaoke? Come on! A nice, sensible nurse like you? How’d you get sucked into that deviant crowd?”

  I try to imagine what that rich, soft voice sounds like when she sings. I don’t go too hard on myself when my imagination leads me right to burlesque. There’s something unexpectedly sexy about this prim little nurse.

  Those cheekbones light with a soft blush, but she narrows her eyes at me, and shakes her head. “Hey, you said yourself, sometimes a shift is so bad, you have to blow off steam somehow. Don’t judge.”

  She may withhold her smile, but I’m finding it hard to do that around her. We just met, but there’s a comfortable sense to her, like we’re old friends. I try not to get too wrapped in that idea. My friends don’t have the best survival rate.

  “Fine, fine, you got me there.” I take another drink.

  She presses her lips together. “You could come,” she says in a rush. “To karaoke. You might like it. I bet you have a nice singing voice.”

  “That’s sweet of you to say, but, trust me, no one wants to hear me sing,” I tell her. “I can make dogs howl and babies cry.” I have no clue what possesses me to say what I do next. “But I bet you have a hell of a voice. And it is a bar, right?”

  She nods. “Not as good as this one, but you can get some alcohol. Sometimes you can even luck out and find a bartender who won’t stick a tiny umbrella in your glass.” She winks.

  It’s not quite a knock-you-on-your-knees smile, but it’s a hell of a cute wink.

  “You’ll have to tell me next time you go out.” I shrug, her wink making me feel uncharacteristically hospitable. “I bet my partner would jump at the chance to get up and sing. He seems like he had a career as a choir boy in his youth.”

  “So, what’s with your partner? Dean is it? It looked like he’d seen a ghost today.” As soon as the words leave her mouth she cringes, like she chose the wrong ones.

  Medical people tend to be pretty callous about the words they use to describe the sick and dying. Seeing so much death and pain makes you develop an armor that’s just necessary if you want to do a decent job. I can’t imagine she’d think I’d be offended by something like that unless she knew about me, about my past.

  Which is impossible. There’s no way she could know how I’m haunted by the memories of watching Major Lopez die in front of me. I shake my head and let it go.

  “No.” I take another sip, thinking of the way Dean froze today, the way he told me—after he puked his guts out—that he was thinking of quitting the job. I told him if he wanted out, I’d beat him out. Otherwise he’d better be behind the wheel of our truck like the directionless asshole he is next shift. “He’s just young. New. I think he just started a week or two ago. And he knew the girl today. She’s friends with his kid sister, so you know how it’s always…” I suck down the rest of my drink. “You know when it’s someone you know…”

  This conversation is harder than I thought, and it shouldn’t be. It’s just me and this girl...this carefree girl who I was supposed to show a good time. My expectations of this date couldn’t have been further off.

  “I do know,” she admits. She gives me a smile that I think she hopes looks real, but she forgets reading bodies is what I’m trained to do.

  She could fake it with someone who hasn’t spent any amount of time trying to distinguish whether a person really hurt his neck in that minor fender bender or is looking for an insurance payout. Or whether or not that seizure patient is just a drug seeker who will resort to any lengths to score her fix—even urinating on herself to make it seem real.

  I know damn well there is nothing authentic about that grin.

  “Did you know this place is haunted?” she asks, her voice high and tight like she thinks I’m about to ask for the story behind her confession and that manufactured smile.

  “I’ve heard that.” I don’t press. I’m grateful she opted to change the subject, even if we’re still talking death. “By one of the old owners, right?”

  Elise nods and raises both eyebrows, her dark eyes wide like she’s about to tell a ghost story around a campfire. “Yep. Madam Aunt Rose. I imagine these walls have some stories hidden in them. They say she’s still upstairs, tending to her brothel.”

  “My English teacher in high school told us that Faulkner based Miss Reba off of Aunt Rose,” I say, remembering Mrs. Randall for the first time in years.

  She wanted us to all love Faulkner as much as she did. Back then I thought he wrote about depressing, unrealistic craziness. Now I realize he was just writing about life.

  “I’ve heard that, too!” Elise says, then tilts her head to the side. “Where’d you go to high school?”

  “Good old Tchoupitoulas High,” I say, dredging up more memories. Of rarely attended classes, barely passing grades, and an administration that was only too glad to see the backside of my head when they handed me my diploma. “Go warriors,” I deadpan.

  “Ah, so you’re an Orleans native, huh?” She leans forward a little, like we’re compadres, like we have some secret handshake in common.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I say, tipping my baseball cap. “Born and raised.”

  “Same. I went to Arlington Prep. Go warriors!” She swings her fist and laughs.

  I wonder if her school days were filled with prom queen crowns and AP classes. I’m betting we couldn’t be more different.

  But I want to know for sure. I want to ask her. Which is not a good tactic. Digging never gets you what you went looking for—you always uncover things better kept hidden.

  Small talk, jokes, work bullshit—th
at’s all kosher. I’m open to jawing to make my time here go quicker till I move on. But she looks at me, square in the face for the first time, and it makes me crazy nervous that she’s about to say something that’ll force me to open up too much. I’m already touching on memories I’d much rather keep under lock and key.

  So I say nothing and the silence stretches awkwardly between us.

  She reaches for her drink, but it’s empty. She holds it in her hand, then puts it down and starts to stand. “Well, it’s getting late. Thanks for inviting me out. I mean, I don’t get out a lot, other than for work, so this is a nice change. So, yeah, thank you…”

  She tries to smile, tries to leave, and I should let her. I should leave well enough alone and be glad we had this nice, civilized conversation. I lucked out, making peace with the one person at Crescent City Memorial I could have had hating my ass.

  But I’ve never been great at doing what I should.

  “Don’t be thanking me yet, doll. Rick! Two more!” I call to the end of the bar.

  She throws me a tiny smile and settles back like she wanted me to ask all along. “Fair enough.”

  “Alright, if you’re from here, other than right at this bar stool, sharing my company, what is your favorite place in New Orleans?” I ask, cracking open a Pandora’s box just because I don’t particularly like following the rules. Even when they’re my own.

  “Favorite place to get a drink?” she asks, thanking the bartender as he puts a fresh Sazerac in front of her.

  I shake my head. “No, favorite place. Period. And please don’t say Pat O’s, because I feel like we were getting off to such a great start here, and I don’t want to have to walk out on you.”

  She presses her hand to her chest, feigning heartache and pops her lower lip out. Holy shit, I have to resist the urge to lean forward and nip at it before I kiss her good and hard.

  “I’m hurt that you would think there was even a chance I’d say that. Clearly you don’t know me at all.”

  “Maybe not yet.” I gulp down bit of liquid courage, feeling fuzzy around the edges already. I lean close and let my voice fall low enough that only she hears my next words. “Maybe I’d like to though.”