He gave a nervous laugh. “I missed you. I wanted to see you. Needed to see you, actually.”

She nodded. Reed was here. In her elevator. Well, not her elevator, the hospital’s elevator. Her hospital... Her mind was spinning. She’d been prepared to deal with a stab wound or a heart attack. Another car accident victim. Not Reed. Nope, definitely not Reed. She felt slightly dizzy. Her chest hurt and her palms were sweaty.

Shit. Maybe she was having a heart attack.

His expression looked anxious as he kissed her palms. “I’ve really missed you.”

Yes, he’d said that already. She winced. Her palms were sweaty. She simply nodded again. He’d come all the way from Wild River to tell her he missed her?

“Can you say something please?” The elevator doors reopened. He hit the button to close it and then the one for the bottom floor.

“That’s the maintenance floor,” she said.

“I don’t care.” He pulled her closer. “Erika, I don’t care where this elevator takes us. I just care about you. Seeing you, touching you...wishing you’d say something.”

“Um...yeah, sorry, I just wasn’t expecting you.” Understatement. He’d barely contacted her at all these last few days and she thought... What had she thought? That he’d let her off easy? Let what they had just fade away without having to verbalize a breakup?

The cowardly way she’d been planning to.

His shoulders sagged and the smile slipped from his lips. “Well, I would have given you a heads-up, but you don’t seem to be checking your messages frequently...”

His annoyance immediately snapped her out of a trance. “So, you thought a visit was better?” The edge in her voice was unfair and unintentional. She was excited to see him, her heart was filled by the sight of him, but what exactly was he expecting from her? Showing up unannounced when she was working wasn’t the best way to get her attention.

Though it may have been the only way. It had worked.

The elevator stopped, the doors opened and closed and she hit the floor for emergency again.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared at the floor. “Sorry to just show up like this. Admittedly, it wasn’t the smartest idea. But I didn’t know what else to do. I guess I thought if I was standing here, you’d have to make time. Would want to make time for me.”