“Anyway, one time when I was there with my father, a woman ran in carrying a boy who’d been hit by a car. Blood was everywhere, and nobody moved as the kid’s mother screamed for help. Even Dad had frozen. Can you imagine that? A Warden like him, rendered incapable by an unexpected human accident?”

“No,” I whispered, though I couldn’t imagine what I would have done, either.

“And then this woman stepped out of somewhere in the parlor and just took over. No fear of the blood or that she was going to do something wrong. She knew to keep the boy’s head and neck immobile and was able to keep that kid’s heart beating until paramedics showed up. I was about six or maybe seven, and I was fascinated. I overheard her tell the paramedics she was a doctor before she started talking in medical jargon that sounded like a different language.”

He leaned toward me, pale eyes intense. “I have no idea if that kid survived, but all I could think was how amazing the woman was. I wanted to be that random person in the crowd who could step up and save a life. So, I wanted to be a doctor.”

“Did you ever tell your father that?”

“No.” He laughed under his breath as he reached for his glass but didn’t lift it to his mouth. “There’d be no point. You know that. I was raised and groomed to take... Yeah, well, you know that story. It’s not like he’d have laughed or gotten mad. Knowing him, he would’ve picked up medical textbooks for me to read. But I knew that wasn’t why I was here.”

I nodded slowly, understanding that what he meant by here was not a place so much as a purpose. “You know, you might not have become a doctor, but you are that person.”

His brows knitted in confusion.

“That random person in the crowd who can step in and save someone’s life,” I explained, finding myself leaning toward him. “You’ve done that before. Probably more times than you can count. You’re not a doctor, but you are that person.”

Zayne stared at me for so long that I started to worry I’d said the wrong thing.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Always,” he murmured, and then he caught that lower lip of his again. “I just never looked at it that way.”

“Look at me.” I smiled. “Being all useful and stuff, showing you a whole new way of thinking.”

“You’re always helpful.” Thick lashes lifted, and I felt pierced to the core by his stare. “And you’ve already been showing me a new way of thinking.”