Page 59 of Clinically Awkward

I moved. My legs carried me toward my office on autopilot while my brain tried to catch up. Emergency. ER. Nathan needed help. Okay. I could do this. This was my job. This was—Wait!

I stopped halfway down the hall. This was a reprieve. A temporary, beautiful, possibly divine reprieve from the conversation I absolutely was not ready to have. Thank you, medical emergency. Thank you, universe. Thank you, whatever cosmic force just saved my ass.

“VIVIAN!” Julien’s voice echoed through the clinic. “I need you too! Grab your kit!”

My stomach dropped.

Oh no.

Oh no.

I turned slowly to see Vivian emerge from the supply closet, her face pale, her eyes carefully avoiding mine. “What’s going on?” she asked.

“Major accident on I-95,” Julien said, already moving toward the exit. “New Haven Hospital is calling in everyone. All hands on deck. Let’s go.”

Vivian’s eyes finally met mine. For exactly half a second. Then she looked away, grabbed her bag, and headed for the door.

“Quinton!” Julien barked. “Why are you still standing there?”

Because I was having a minor existential crisis about the fact that I was about to spend the next several hours working alongside the woman I had mind-blowing sex with last night while her overprotective brother—who didn’t know about said mind-blowing sex—supervised. “Coming,” I said as I grabbed my emergency kit from my office and jogged to catch up with them in the parking lot. Julien was already in his car, engine running. Vivian was climbing into the passenger seat.

Which left me in the back.

Like a child. A child who’d defiled the driver’s sister.

This is fine. Everything is fine. Just act normal.

I slid into the backseat and immediately regretted every life choice that had led me to this moment as Julien peeled out of the parking lot, his jaw tight, his knuckles white on the steering wheel.

“What do we know?” I asked, forcing my voice into professional mode.

“Multi-car pileup. At least fifteen vehicles. They’re triaging on scene, but the ER is already overwhelmed.” Julien’s eyes flicked to the rearview mirror. “Nathan’s there now. Gabriel’s meeting us. They need all the help they can get.”

I nodded, trying to focus on the medical emergency and not on the fact that Vivian was sitting two feet in front of me, her shoulders tense, her hands gripping her bag like a lifeline. She hadn’t looked at me once. Not once. Which was fine. Totally fine. We were professionals. We could absolutely work together despite the fact that twelve hours ago I had her pressed against my hallway wall while she—FOCUS, WESLEY!

“ETA five minutes,” Julien said.

Five minutes. Five minutes until I had to walk into an ER and save lives while pretending I hadn’t completely destroyed my friendship with my best friend by sleeping with his sister. Five minutes until I had to work alongside Vivian while she actively avoided eye contact. Five minutes until I had to be a doctor instead of a disaster.

I could do this. Probably.

“Quinton.”

I looked up. Julien was watching me in the rearview mirror, his expression unreadable.

“Yeah?”

“Are you good?”

No, I’m spiraling. I’m in love with your sister. I’m terrified you’re going to murder me. I’m—“I’m good,” I said.

Julien nodded and turned his attention back to the road as Vivian shifted in her seat, her hair falling forward to hide her face. And I sat there in the back of Julien’s car, hurtling toward a medical emergency, knowing that the real crisis was still waiting for me on the other side. Because eventually this emergency would end. Eventually, we would save who we could save. Eventually, Julien would find out the truth. And when he did? I was absolutely, completely, irreversibly fucked.

The car screeched into the hospital parking lot, and Julien was out before the engine had even stopped. “Let’s go!” he barked.

Vivian and I scrambled out, grabbing our kits, and followed him toward the ER entrance.

She still hadn’t looked at me.