dim lighting, but the whites of them were strikingly bloodshot. He blinked, the movement exaggerated, as he stared at her from the hallway. She clearly wasn't the only one tired. Dark circles, puffy eyes, pale skin… had the guy slept at all since leaving the hospital over two weeks ago?
She opened the door further as a slight smile turned his lips, barely detectable, before his expression fell again. He cleared his throat, his voice gritty as he whispered, "Nurse Russo."
"I thought you were going to call me—"
Gabriella didn't finish her sentence, getting a good look at him, her gaze settling on his filthy white shirt. His bloody white shirt. A patch of red covered the side, where one of his blood-covered hands gripped, while streaks were smeared along his stomach like he'd finger-painted with it.
Gabriella undid the chain before yanking the door open the whole way.
"What happened?" she asked, reaching for him as her gaze darted along the hallway, hoping nobody was around to see him. She grabbed his arm, anxiously pulling him into her apartment before slamming the door. "You're bleeding!"
"I got stabbed." Dante glanced down at his side. "Again."
"You got stabbed?" she asked. "Again?"
Was that seriously what he said?
"I didn't know where else to go," he explained, looking back up at her.
"The hospital. You get stabbed, you go to the hospital. You go to the emergency room. That's why it exists! For emergencies!"
"I couldn't."
"Why not?"
"Because they ask questions."
She groaned. Mandatory reporting. Any gunshots or stab wounds have to be reported to the police by the hospital. "Yeah, well, you've proven before that just because they ask doesn't mean you have to answer."
"I just… I can't do it." He shook his head. "If you want me to leave, I'll go, but I've had my fill of hospitals, and at this point, I'd rather bleed to death than walk into that fucking place, so I came here hoping…"
"Hoping I'd help you?"
"Yeah."
"This goes against everything I stand for," she said. "This is wrong on so many levels. It's unethical. It's dangerous. I can't just help you when you've been stabbed. That's crazy! You're crazy!"
As she ranted, Gabriella dragged him through the apartment and into the small bathroom, flicking on the bright light, both of them squinting from the harsh glow. Dante leaned back against the white counter as Gabriella dug her first aid kit out of a drawer and grabbed a clean towel.
"I need to..." She stood in front of him, flailing her hands toward his side. "You know."
Did he know? Did it make sense to him? Gabriella had to wonder, because nothing about any of it made any sense to her. What she needed to do was call the guy an ambulance. What she needed to do was the opposite of what she was about to.
I can't believe I'm doing this.
Dante nodded, like he understood, and yet he hesitated, like he wasn't sure what was going on. After a moment, though, he pulled his bloody shirt up, gritting his teeth as he tucked it beneath his chin. He stood still as Gabriella put on a pair of rubber gloves.
"You should really lay down." Gabriella glanced around her minuscule bathroom. There was barely enough room for the two of them to squeeze in there, much less space for him to lie down. "The bedroom is, uh, right through there…"
"I'm fine," he said. "I don't need to lay down."
"But—"
"Just do what you have to."
"You seriously need a doctor," she told him, kneeling in front of him. "There's no way for me to be sure that they didn't hit anything."
"I'll take my chances."
She rolled her eyes. "Maybe what you really need is another psych consult, because this isn't normal. This isn't what normal people do when somebody stabs them."
"I never claimed to be normal. Besides, I'm pretty sure normal people don't get stabbed at all."
"Oh, they do. Just not as often as it seems you do. Something about you I guess just makes people want to stab. Kind of like stick a fork in it, you know, but with a friggin knife."
Dante laughed at that, his hands gripping the counter on each side of him as Gabriella washed the wound. "If it makes it any better, it was the same person every time."
"That doesn't make it any better."
"You sure?"
"Positive." She glared up at him. "If anything, it makes you an idiot for going near them."
He stared down at her, his expression unruffled, like her calling him an idiot didn't bother him. His gaze