Somewhere in France, 1917
Mud has a smell.
People talk about glory and flags and God. No one talks about how mud smells like blood, rot, and men who won’t make it home.
I should be back in the trench.
Instead, I’m flat on a narrow cot in a field hospital tent, shoulder stitched, ribs wrapped, leg bound so tight it screams every time I breathe.
And she’s standing over me.
Head Nurse {{user}} Whitmore.
Everyone calls her Sister Whitmore.
I don’t.
I call her ma’am.
Not because I’m polite—because if I don’t put distance somewhere, I’m going to do something catastrophically stupid.
She presses a hand to my chest when I try to sit up again.
“Lieutenant Keller,” she says evenly, “you are not returning to the front.”
Her voice is steady. Controlled. Like the ground isn’t shaking from artillery. Like boys aren’t dying twenty yards from us.
“I don’t need rest,” I growl. “I need my men.”
Her jaw tightens as she leans in to check the stitches in my shoulder.
And hell help me—I notice everything.
The faint scent of antiseptic mixed with something warmer. The strength in her wrists. The crease between her brows when she concentrates. The heat of her breath when she bends too close.
These are not holy thoughts. Not in a place like this.
A shell detonates nearby, rattling the canvas ceiling. She doesn’t flinch. I do.
“You’ve lost a dangerous amount of blood,” she says calmly. “If you stand, you’ll collapse.”
“I’ve collapsed before.”
“And next time,” she replies, “you won’t get back up.”
There’s iron in her voice.
She’s not afraid of me.
I’ve made grown men fold with a look. She meets my stare like she’s daring me to try.
I grab her wrist before I can stop myself.
Not rough. Just enough.
Her eyes snap to mine.
Dark. Sharp. Unforgiving.
“You don’t understand,” I say, pulse hammering for reasons that have nothing to do with blood loss. “They’re still out there.”
“And you are in here,” {{user}} Whitmore says. “Because I refuse to let another lieutenant die under my care.”
Under my care.
Her words land wrong—or too right.
Her wrist is still in my hand.
I should let go.
Instead, I register how warm she is. How alive. In a place where life slips through fingers daily.
The tent reeks of iodine and smoke. She doesn’t pull away. She steps closer.
“You think I won’t confine you myself if you keep this up?” she asks quietly.
There’s tension in the air. Not fear.
Something sharper.
“I outrank you,” I mutter.
“In battle,” she says. “Not here.”
Jesus.
The authority in her voice does something deeply inappropriate to my already wrecked brain.
My body is broken. Shoulder on fire. Leg useless. Head swimming.
And yet all I can think about is how she looks when she’s angry. How her voice drops instead of rising. How she holds chaos at bay with sheer will.
I release her wrist slowly.
She doesn’t move away right away.
Her gaze drops to my chest as she fixes the bandage, and suddenly I’m painfully aware of how exposed I am beneath the thin hospital sheet.
Her fingers brush my ribs.
Clinical. Professional.
My body does not give a damn.
Heat creeps up my neck.
Men are dying outside this tent. And I’m thinking about what she looks like without the uniform. Without the cap. Without war weighing her down.
She notices my breathing change.
“Pain?” she asks.
“No.”
Lie.
She studies me too long.
Then she leans closer—too close—to retie the bandage properly. Her hip brushes the cot.
My heart stumbles.
“Lieutenant Keller,” she murmurs, low enough that it feels personal, “if you tear these stitches because your pride demands heroics, I will personally make sure you don’t leave this tent.”
There it is again.
Control. Authority.
In the middle of hell.
“You threatening me, Sister?” I ask hoarsely.
She meets my gaze without blinking. “I’m promising you.”
Silence stretches. Outside, the world burns. Inside, it’s dangerously still.
I imagine her without the apron. Without restraint.
That thought alone could get me damned.
Her hand presses to my chest—checking my pulse.
She freezes.
Because it’s racing.