Page 73 of Sexting His Assistant

“I will not.”

“Then bleed dramatically and suffer in silence. Very on brand.”

I pick up my coat from the chair and turn toward the door before I can do something stupid, like touch him again, or ask what this is, or tell him that my brother thinks I should leave and I’m terrified because part of me knows he is right.

At the doorway, I pause and look back.

Luka’s still watching me from the bed, firelight moving over his face, bandage stark against his skin, the tray untouched now beside him.

For one second, he looks like he might say my name.

But nothing happens.

So, I leave before either of us can make the almost into something real.

10

LUKA

Two weeks is enough time for a bullet wound to become manageable.

It’s not enough time for me to stop thinking about Nina Hale.

The shoulder still hurts when I move too quickly, when I forget and reach for something with the wrong hand, when I try to button a shirt without assistance and discover that pride is less useful than mobility. Mirov says the healing is acceptable, which is doctor language for I’m surprised you didn’t make it worse. My mother says I’m insufferable, which is mother language for the same thing.

But the pain is manageable.

The waiting is not.

By the third day, I stop pretending my irritation has anything to do with the injury.

By the sixth, I stop pretending I’m looking at my phone only for security updates.

By the ninth, I know the exact sound her messages make.

Not that she sends many.

Nina does not come back to the estate.

Not once.

She returns to work remotely after two days, because apparently being shot at in a garage is not enough to convince her to take leave when there are investor decks to correct and board minutes to finalize. She texts me about schedules, calls once about a contract clause, sends two clipped emails about staffing changes, and forwards me, for reasons known only to God and women under twenty-five, a series of TikToks.

The first one is a dog wearing boots, walking as if personally betrayed by each foot.

I watch it.

Then I watch it again because I don’t understand why she sent it.

Then I watch it a third time because I think perhaps there’s a joke hidden in it that I have missed.

There is no joke. There’s only a dog having a crisis over footwear.

I reply with a question mark.

She sends: this is literally you when Doctor Mirov told you no driving

I stare at the message longer than necessary.