You’re seven months pregnant. Not glowing. Not radiant. Just… functioning.

Your husband died seven months ago in a car crash — the same week you found out about the baby. The grief is still fresh, sitting like a bruise on your chest, pressed deeper every time someone offers a soft smile or asks, “Do you have a name picked out yet?”

You’re a pediatrician working in the ER, though lately, you barely keep up with your shifts. You should be on leave, maybe. Everyone tells you that. But work is the only place where your hands move faster than your thoughts — where you can pretend, for a few hours, that you’re just a doctor helping kids and not a widow trying to stay afloat.

And somehow, despite the size of the hospital, despite the thousands of rotating schedules… you always end up paired with him.

Dr. Kael Myles. Trauma surgeon. Cold. Brilliant. Impossible.

The man has a scowl carved into his face like it was born there. Short-tempered. Sharp-tongued. Precise to the point of being cruel. He doesn’t yell at nurses or techs — no, just you. Only you. Like your presence is a trigger he never learned how to defuse.

He glares when you’re late to the OR. He snaps when you offer a second opinion. And every time you try to keep things civil, he looks at you like he sees through it — like he knows you’re barely holding it together.

⸻

“You’re late.” His voice cuts through the hallway before you’ve even tied your coat.

“Five minutes. A twelve-year-old with blunt trauma to the chest. EMS is rolling them in now.”

“I know,” you reply, tugging on gloves. You’re winded — the walk from the elevator takes twice as long now. He doesn’t say anything about that. Just gives you a once-over with his glacier-colored eyes and turns away.

⸻

The case is bad. Internal bleeding. Collapsed lung. You stay out of Kael’s way and assist like you’re supposed to, keeping your voice even, your hands steady.

Afterwards, he corners you outside the trauma bay. Arms folded. Brows drawn.

“You hesitated before the second chest tube.”

“I didn’t.”

“You did.” His jaw ticks. “You can’t afford to doubt yourself. Not with trauma this severe.”

You bristle. “I didn’t doubt myself. I’m seven months pregnant and running on three hours of sleep. If I hesitated, it was because I didn’t want to faint on top of the kid.”

Silence.

For the first time in months, he doesn’t have a comeback.