Free Behind The Mask (Nurses Book 2) by Renee Adams

weird way, I get excited to see him because he has this soothing effect on me. Like seeing my parents’, I know  there is a level of caring that nobody else has for me. This is Martin, he cares about people. For that, I’m appreciative because it’s nice to have someone care outside of Olivia, Damian, and Jack.
    “Good morning, Cori. I take it you are adjusting well here?” The warmth that radiates off this man envelopes me and gives me a small piece of serenity.
    “Yes, so far I’m liking it here. Allyn keeps me on my toes, but I gotta get my chops busted by someone.” I keep my head down as we walk into the rehab, force of habit and all, I guess. Martin has never made me feel different with the scars on my face. He hasn’t stared or looked at me with any pity. Maybe that’s what I like about him so much.
    “Allyn, that man is a character. Good guy, though, actually one of the best I know. But I told you, we’re like a small family here, and we take care of our own. You, now, are one of our own, so if you ever need one of us you sound the alarm, and we all come running.”
    Just the thought of having people who seem to want to look out for me has the ice around my heart melting some. I never expected this when I started working here. I pictured in my head that this place is just a job, but now I see it’s more. It does seem to have a more family vibe to it, I guess because the residents are longtime residents and they are not acutely sick. So they’re not going to the hospital daily, compared to places like retirement homes where doctors roam the halls and patients are bussed out in ambulances daily. That’s the kind of place I worked when I was fresh out of nursing school, and at the time, the amount of death I saw made the prison a welcoming change until I realized that inmates kill each other daily.
    Those places have residents with one foot in the grave and the other on a block of ice just ready to slip up. Here, besides yesterday, it seems that most of them are not on death's door. Thank goodness for that because death was all around me at the prison.
    Getting inside I run into Sam, who is her normal chipper self. I hate it, but it works for her. She’s incredibly nice and has been nothing but helpful to me.
    “How’s it going?” she asks in her overly enthusiastic voice and wide toothy smile. It grates on my nerves, but the residents like her and she has been friendly towards me.
    “It’s going, how are you?” I try to add as much bubble to my voice as hers. It doesn’t work, I end up sounding like an over pepped cheerleader.
    “Oh you know, always a different day to make good choices .” Gag me. “Guess who came out of his room finally? Knight, I was shocked, to say the least. But man, that guy is a flirt! The things he said to me would make an old lady blush!” With that little nugget of information, she bounces off in her bubbly, ponytail swinging kind of way.
    Wait, what? That man is pompous and arrogant, I certainly wouldn’t classify his ass as a flirt, well he must not want to flirt with me.
    I can’t focus on that now, I need to focus on my upcoming work day. I don’t care whether that pompous asshole is a flirt. But walking into the nurse’s station, I keep thinking about it. He didn’t flirt with me unless he has a real shitty way of showing it. He just was crude to me. My brain is screaming at me to stop thinking about him. He isn’t worth it, even if we were interested in each other it could never work. Having someone touch me makes me want to vomit. Hell, even thinking about it has my stomach doing somersaults, and sweat drips down my spine to my butt crack.
    Not watching where I’m going and total clumsiness has me running straight into the med cart and falling. It’s one of those comedic relief moments you see on TV. I laugh while holding my hip because ow that shit hurt. But this laughing isn’t a normal chuckle, no this is that insane, maniacal laugh that makes it