Authors: Lorelei James
Tags: #Contemporary, #Coming of Age, #New Adult, #Military, #Romantic Comedy, #Romance, #Fiction
Unbreak My Heart
Dedication
—
to all my readers who worried that Sierra McKay and Boone West wouldn’t get their happily-ever-after, and who waited patiently (and sometimes impatiently nagged me) for it the past four and a half years…this love story is for you.
XOXO
Lorelei~
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Lorelei
on release day!
I
blamed everything
on the fever.
Everything.
My nausea.
My surliness.
My weepiness.
My utter lack of reaction when he strolled into the exam room.
He gaped at me like I was an apparition.
I continued to stare at him blankly, as if it was no big deal he was here, right in front of me, wearing scrubs and a cloak of authority.
But the truth was I hadn’t seen him for seven years.
Seven. Years.
I should have been in shock—maybe I was in
too
much
shock. This definitely fell under the heading of trauma. Because on the day he waltzed back into my life? I looked worse than dog diarrhea.
I mentally kicked myself for not going to the ER. Or perhaps just letting myself die. Anything would have been better than this.
Screw you, universe. Fuck you, fate. Karma, you bitch, you owe me.
This chance meeting should’ve happened when I was dressed to the nines, not when I was sporting yoga pants, a ratty Three Stooges T-shirt, dollar store flip-flops and no bra. And the bonus? My hair was limp, my skin clammy, my face shiny from the raging fever I couldn’t shake.
Wait. Maybe this
was
a fever-induced nightmare.
“Sierra?” The beautiful apparition spoke my name in a deep, sexy rasp.
Pretend you don’t know him.
Not my most stellar plan, but I went with it.
I cocked my head and frowned as if I couldn’t quite place him.
His expressive brown eyes turned hard. “That’s really how you’re gonna play this? Like you don’t know me?”
I returned his narrow-eyed stare because I was too sick to fake an air of boredom.
“Fine. I’m Boone West. Your nurse,” he said sarcastically. “I’m here to take your vitals.”
I shook my head. My inability to respond wasn’t from pettiness—I’d lost my voice the day before due to the fever. But my middle finger worked fine and I used it to point at the door as I mouthed, “Get. Out.”
“Nice try. But keep your arm out like that so I can take your blood pressure.”
My heart rate skyrocketed, so no freakin’ way was he putting a blood pressure cuff and a stethoscope on me.
Boone moved in cautiously as if I were a feral creature. He smiled—not the sweet, boyish grin I once loved, but one brimming with fake benevolence.
My belly flipped, which pissed me off. And I wished projectile vomiting were my superpower instead of this uncanny ability to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, every time.
I jerked away from him.
“Look, Sierra,” he said reasonably. “I wasn’t expecting to run into you here. Not like this. Let me do my job and we’ll talk afterward.”
I shook my head so hard my vision went wonky.
“It’s not like you have a choice.”
Wrong. In full panic mode, I bailed off the exam table and hugged the wall, facing him as I crept toward the door.
“Whoa. Slow down. You came into the clinic because you’re sick. You can’t just leave.”
My throat felt like I’d gargled with gravel, but I managed, “Watch me.”
Then I threw open the door and booked it down the hallway.
But my fever had the last laugh.
My body chose that moment to fail me. Chills erupted as if I’d been plunged into a deep freezer, followed by sweat breaking out as if I’d been baking in the Arizona desert. White spots obscured my vision.
I swayed before everything went dark.
“She’s coming around.”
I recognized that voice.
Doctor Monroe.
I peeled my eyes open and noticed I was back in the exam room.
“Hey girl. How’re you doin’?”
Girl. She seemed to have forgotten that I was not a girl, but a twenty-three-year-old college graduate with the world by the balls.
“I need to poke around, so lie still.” She lifted my shirt and started palpating my belly. For such a tiny thing, she pushed hard enough on my innards that I swear I felt her fingers poking the
inside
of my spine.
“Nothing out of the ordinary. Can you sit up?”
As soon as I was upright, the whooshing sensation started in my ears. My eyes burned but I could clearly see that Boone blocked the door. I gritted out, “He goes.”
Doc Monroe got right in my face. “A patient who acts like they’re trying to escape and then passes out in a waiting room full of people is hell on my reputation, Sierra McKay. Boone stays. You’re lucky he acted so fast and caught you before you hit the floor.”
“How did I…?” I gestured to the surrounding area.
“I carried you,” Boone said. “You snuggled right into me. Strange behavior from someone who doesn’t
know
me.”
Goddammit. I hated this. I hated him. I leveled my best glare at his smarmy face.
He remained stoic.
Yeah, you were always good at hiding your emotions, weren’t you, West?
“Sounds like you have laryngitis too,” Doc Monroe said. “Boone, you didn’t get her vitals?”
“No, ma’am. Under the circumstances, maybe it’s best if you do that.”
The doc looked at me with a raised eyebrow.
“He has to go,” I croaked out.
“Sergeant West is here by government order, finishing the last few days of his training stint in rural healthcare that the army requires for medical personnel at his level.”
She didn’t have to explain that to me. In fact, I really didn’t want to know
why
he was here.
Doc sighed and took my temperature, which tipped the thermometer at a toasty 103 degrees. She checked my eyes, my ears and my nose. She pressed her thumbs down the center of my neck and beneath my jaw. She listened to my lungs. Lastly, she shoved a tongue depressor in my mouth and shone a light in my throat while demanding I say
aaaaah
.
She patted my knee. “It appears you’ve got strep. But I’ll send Sarah in from the lab for a throat culture to make sure.”
No wonder I felt shitty and none of Rielle’s natural home remedies had worked on me.
Doc Monroe poked the call button before she plopped on the rolling stool and typed on her laptop.
I stared at my knees, grateful I wasn’t wearing a drafty exam gown that left me even more exposed.
To Boone fucking West.
Two knocks sounded on the door.
Boone stepped aside as the lab tech hustled in.
“One quick swipe is all I need,” she chirped merrily.
I gagged when she jammed the long cotton swab into my throat and swirled it around.
Then she took a blood sample and said, “All done,” with
way
too much fucking cheer.
She exited the room and Doc Monroe stood in front of me. “It’ll be about fifteen minutes until I get the lab results. Why don’t you lie down?” Doc pulled out the exam table extension.
After I curled up on my side, she covered me with a blanket. Part of me wished she acted cold and clinical instead of showing maternal concern.
The door shut with a soft click.
Everything ached. My throat was almost swollen shut so it hurt twice as much to cry. But the tears leaked out anyway.
“I’m still here,” Boone stated.
Go away.
“Since you can’t talk, you’ll damn well listen.”
He’d gotten bossier from his years in the military. But he must have struggled with whatever he wanted to say since he remained quiet longer than I expected.
“Of all the places in the country I could’ve chosen to complete this training assignment, I elected to do it here, in my hometown, because I wanted to see you again. Even when I suspected you’d kick me in the balls at best, or you were in a relationship with some undeserving douchebag at worst.”
I hated that he admitted that his worst-case scenario was seeing me involved with someone else. Right then, I wished I had a hot, rich boyfriend with a big dick to flaunt at him.
“I don’t know what surprised me more,” Boone continued. “To find out that you actually changed your last name from Daniels to McKay—which is why, with all the damn McKays around here, I didn’t know the
S. McKay
on the patient chart was you—or that you no longer live in Sundance.”
Even if my vocal chords hadn’t been raw and nonfunctioning, I wouldn’t have responded. What could I say? He expected me to defend my choice to test my business skills beyond the Wyoming border? Screw that. He’d left for the very same reason. I owed him nothing.