A sharp stab of pain rippled across his shoulder, and he gasped. Maisie tossed aside the piece of metal.

“Jesus, you could have warned me.”

“Did you think I was just going to leave that in there?”

“No, but—” He almost laughed. “Never mind.”

“Take off your jacket and pull this arm out of your shirt, will ya?” She tapped his right arm.

He shrugged out of the jacket and gingerly pulled his arm out of the sleeve. He pushed it up closer to his neck, so she could see his shoulder.

Her fingers brushed against his back, soft and gentle, and he took in a sharp breath.

“Sorry,” she said, her hand disappearing from his back. “Did that hurt?”

“Uh, no.” It actually hurt less when she touched him like that. “How does it look?”

“It’s not too bad. Just a little…gaping wound.”

“Sure, doesn’t sound too bad at all.”

He tried to think of something else as she cleaned it. The burning intensified.

“You’ve done this a lot?” he guessed.

She laughed shortly. “Yeah. My dad had me patching him up pretty much as soon as I could hold a bandage. He was a practical guy. Didn’t believe in coddling me.”

“Was that…okay? Couldn’t have been easy, patching up your bleeding father as a little kid.”

“Eh, it was fine.”

The way she said it was too casual, and he looked over his shoulder. Their eyes met, and her hand stilled on his back.

“Sounds tough,” he said quietly.

One side of her mouth lifted, as if to acknowledge he was right. “I’m guessing your father didn’t get into a lot of bloody fights? Or your mom?”

He laughed, turning back around. “No. I got into a fight in middle school once, and my parents made me go to the kid’s house to apologize—he punched me first, by the way—and then write an essay about toxic masculinity.”

“Wow,” she said, her voice full of amusement.

“It was a pretty good essay for a twelve-year-old, if I do say so myself.”

“Did it work? Did you get into more fights?”

“No, punching people was never my style. I preferred to piss off my parents in other ways.”

“Like playing naked tennis?” she guessed.

“Like that,” he said with a chuckle. “Though, in my defense, strip tennis was not my idea, and I didn’t know there were cameras around. We were just being ridiculous.” He glanced over his shoulder again, his lips curving up when he saw the smile on her face. Her fingers lightly grazed his shoulder in a way that felt intimate.

“Why’d you want to piss off your parents?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he lied. “Didn’t you enjoy pissing off your dad?”

“God, no.”

“Right. Not really the kind of guy you want to piss off, I guess.”

“He never would have laid a finger on me. I just…I guess I preferred to make him happy. Kind of desperate for his approval, actually.” She muttered the last line, almost to herself.