Ellie Carter makes quiet feel possible again.
Sunshine with steel.
Boundaries like bedrock.
A mouth that says no while her eyes say remember.
We used to be everything.
Best friends.
Rivals.
A future we named like it was already ours.
Then she left.
I let her.
Pride makes a clean cut and calls it mercy.
Now she’s here to save the Children's’ wing.
Now she’s Lucy’s doctor.
Now she’s in the guest suite off my kitchen because Manchester ran out of rooms and I ran out of excuses.
Shared hallways turn into shared late nights.
Shared coffee turns into shared secrets.
Shared air turns into shared heat that burns through grief like antiseptic on a wound.
Lucy chooses her fast. Her cat chooses her faster.
My control chooses violence every time Ellie laughs in my living room.
Then Ellie finds numbers that don’t add up.
Opioids.
A powerful family.
A hospital board that wants silence more than truth.
The complaint hits like a monitor flatline.
The threats come like aftershocks.
Ellie becomes the easiest sacrifice in the building.
I become the problem nobody can contain.
I tighten security.
I call in favors.
I stand in front of her like my body is a barricade and my name is a warning.
I tell myself it’s protection.
I tell myself it’s for Lucy.
I tell myself anything except the truth.
A public hearing turns my hospital into a courtroom and my heart into evidence.
Grief taught me how to survive.
Ellie teaches me how to burn.
Genre: Romance
Sunshine with steel.
Boundaries like bedrock.
A mouth that says no while her eyes say remember.
We used to be everything.
Best friends.
Rivals.
A future we named like it was already ours.
Then she left.
I let her.
Pride makes a clean cut and calls it mercy.
Now she’s here to save the Children's’ wing.
Now she’s Lucy’s doctor.
Now she’s in the guest suite off my kitchen because Manchester ran out of rooms and I ran out of excuses.
Shared hallways turn into shared late nights.
Shared coffee turns into shared secrets.
Shared air turns into shared heat that burns through grief like antiseptic on a wound.
Lucy chooses her fast. Her cat chooses her faster.
My control chooses violence every time Ellie laughs in my living room.
Then Ellie finds numbers that don’t add up.
Opioids.
A powerful family.
A hospital board that wants silence more than truth.
The complaint hits like a monitor flatline.
The threats come like aftershocks.
Ellie becomes the easiest sacrifice in the building.
I become the problem nobody can contain.
I tighten security.
I call in favors.
I stand in front of her like my body is a barricade and my name is a warning.
I tell myself it’s protection.
I tell myself it’s for Lucy.
I tell myself anything except the truth.
A public hearing turns my hospital into a courtroom and my heart into evidence.
Grief taught me how to survive.
Ellie teaches me how to burn.
Genre: Romance
Used availability for Kiki Voss's Stuck With the Trauma Doctor