‘You can have a shower here,’ she offered. ‘Maybe wear some scrubs.’
She didn’t get it, but it wasn’t her fault. ‘I can’t look as if I’ve been out all night,’ Cort said, because, well, he couldn’t. ‘You know what they’re like.’
‘God, yes.’ Because she did—the whole clique of them, with their noses in everybody’s business—and she could understand why he wouldn’t want them in his, especially if it involved her.
‘I can get you something to wear from Adam’s room,’ Ruby offered, and Cort closed his eyes. God, had it really come to this? But reluctantly he nodded and then headed down the hall to a very cluttered bathroom, brimming with straighteners and make-up and tampons spilling out of a box and beach towels instead of towels. He was too bloody staid and sensible to be doing this.
Ruby had to go back downstairs, because that was where Adam’s room was.
‘Poor Adam.’ Jess grinned as Ruby came out with a black casual shirt that looked the sort of thing a registrar might wear on a Sunday. ‘No wonder he’s always moaning he can’t find his things when he gets back.’
Ruby met Cort in the bedroom, wrapped in a beach towel, and she averted her eyes as he dropped it and pulled on his clothes.
‘Thanks for this,’ he said as he pulled on Adam’s shirt.
‘No problem.’
He picked up his jacket and was obviously wondering what to do with it.
‘You can pick it up later,’ Ruby said, and because she knew he didn’t want that awkward moment where he had to face her later, she added kindly, ‘I’m on a late shift so I won’t be here. I’ll leave it on the porch.’
‘It’s just …’
‘I know.’
She did.
‘It’s not just for me,’ Cort said. ‘I don’t want it to be difficult for you at work—and, believe me, it would be.’
‘It won’t be,’ Ruby said, ‘because no-one will find out.’
He could hear the chatter from the kitchen, the little gaggle he’d have to walk past on the way out, but she must have read his thoughts. ‘It’s just my housemates, they won’t say anything.’
‘Ruby …’
She shook her head, because she didn’t want the big speech or promises that wouldn’t be kept and she really didn’t want to examine last night with him.
In fact, confused as to her own part in this, her own behaviour with him, Ruby didn’t want to examine last night at all.
‘Go on,’ she said. ‘Get back to being crabby.’
And he’d do that.
He had no choice but to do that, but it would be a hard ask to forget last night.
He went to go, but he couldn’t quite yet.
Couldn’t just leave it at that, as if it had been nothing.
He walked over and took her into his arms and she let him hold her, and she knew he would soon be back to crabby, knew at work he had to ignore her and that was a blessing because she felt as if he had exposed her last night, but it was nice that it ended with a cuddle.
Okay, a kiss, Ruby thought as he searched for her lips.
Why couldn’t he be a bastard? Ruby thought as his lips roamed hers.
Bastards were gone when you woke up, or chatted up your friend on the way out, or ‘borrowed’ twenty dollars for a taxi. Every girl knew that. There was even a coded list on the fridge downstairs, and now that he was kissing her, and so very nicely too, she couldn’t even add him to it.
It really was a lovely kiss that tasted different from last night. It was slow and tender and laced with regret because she’d be back at work this afternoon and so would he and last night wouldn’t have happened.
Except, Ruby realised as he let her go and walked out her bedroom door, it had.
‘RUBY …’ He did not look up as the nurses did their handover and Sheila did the allocations. He’d deliberately avoided the staffroom as the late staff arrived, but Cort knew there really was no avoiding her. ‘You’re with me in Resus.’
‘Sure,’ came her voice and still he didn’t look up.
Just this awkward first bit to get through, he told himself, but really he knew that for as long as she was there, awkward was how it was going to feel.
Still, no one would notice if he ignored her. He wasn’t exactly known for his small talk, or for flirting with the nurses.
‘Where did you disappear to last night, Cort?’ Siobhan wasted no time in asking. ‘One minute you were there …’
‘I wasn’t aware …’ Ruby found she was holding her breath as Cort stood up and ended Siobhan’s fishing with a very frosty response ‘… I needed to hand you a sick note.’
Sheila’s eyes widened as Cort stalked off. Siobhan’s face reddened and Connor let out a low whistle.
‘Someone got out of the wrong side of bed,’ Connor explained. ‘He’s been like that all morning.’
Or just the wrong bed perhaps, Ruby thought. As the afternoon wore on, crabby was actually a very good description that she’d come up with, because he growled at any member of staff who approached, whether on foot or by phone, although he was very nice to the patients, not that they had many in.
Resus, to Sheila’s clear annoyance, was quiet. One chest pain came in and Ruby attached him to the monitors and ran off a trace, her hands shaking as Cort came over and she handed over to him.
‘ST elevation …’ Cort spoke to her just as he would any student, pointed out the abnormalities in the tracing and took bloods as an X-ray was performed, but the cardiologists were quiet too, and the patient was soon taken up to the catherisation lab, leaving Ruby just to clean up and then mooch around, checking and double-checking everything.
‘The ward’s ready for Justin.’ Hannah came off the phone and Ruby saw her chance to escape.
‘I’ll take him,’ Ruby offered, because it wasn’t Resus she wanted to avoid now but Cort, who was sitting nearby.
‘Hannah can take him,’ Sheila said. ‘I want you to stay in Resus.’
‘There are no patients, though,’ Ruby pointed out.
‘There will be,’ Sheila said. ‘For now you can check all the equipment.’
‘I just have,’ Ruby said.
‘Double-check,’ Sheila said, ‘and then you can re-check the crash drug trolley.’
It was possibly the longest, most excruciating shift of her life. Sheila was determined that Ruby was not going to get caught up, as she so often managed to, in other things, and Cort watched, while trying not to, and simply couldn’t make her out.
Ruby was competent and certainly not lazy. If anything, she was looking for jobs to do, and she was smiling and happy with all the patients, more than happy to stand and talk to them. He didn’t get why she annoyed Sheila so much.
‘God, it’s