quickly followed. Still chuckling, he unlocked the armrest, shifted it out of the way and reached over and placed his hand on the shower bench.
“Shit,” Chase grunted as he pushed himself out of the wheelchair and with some effort, he shifted to the shower bench on trembling arms.
Once he was settled, Chase leaned forward, turned on the shower and couldn’t help but smile when he heard his favorite nurse curse his name.
*-*-*-*
She was done.
There were a lot of things that she’d put up with for her job, but the bullshit that he’d pulled tonight wasn’t one of them. Normally, Sloane prided herself on her ability to work with the tougher patients, but even she knew where to draw the line and tonight, she’d been shoved about a mile past that damn line.
She didn’t care that she was out of a job or that she was going to have to stay with one of her brothers, live off her savings for a few weeks, and that her next job might end up being in Alaska. She was done. His sister could throw his ass in a nursing home for all she cared. She’d tried and the asshole had decided to play with her.
He didn’t want help, then that was more than fine with her, because there were plenty of people out there that did. She’d just pack up her life, call the agency, and get assigned to someone who wasn’t a direct decedent of the devil, and that’s exactly what Sloane would have done if she hadn’t heard something fall in the bathroom.
Frowning, she opened the bathroom door and got the shock of a lifetime. Chase was in the shower, making an attempt at taking care of himself.
“Damn it,” Chase groaned as he placed his hand on the wall and tried to lean over to pick up a bottle of shampoo that had landed on the bathroom floor just a few inches out of his reach.
“Here,” Sloane said, picking up the bottle and handed it to him.
“Thanks,” he mumbled around a yawn as he accepted the bottle from her and tried to open the cover, but his fingers kept fumbling with the top.
“Want some help?” she asked, shocked when he actually nodded and handed the bottle back to her.
With a smile, Sloane popped the bottle open, squeezed some shampoo in her hand and set to work, deciding that perhaps she’d give him another chance.
Chapter 10
One Week Later…
“It’s Sunday,” Chase groaned into his pillow as he pulled the covers back over his head.
There was a heavy sigh and then his blankets were once again taken away by the bitter woman who was clearly struggling to accept that he’d won this little war of theirs. “It’s Tuesday.”
“Whatever,” he said, blindly reaching back until he found the soft blanket that he would marry if he could, yanked away.
“You need to get up.”
“I really don’t,” Chase informed her, wondering how she was having such a difficult time understanding that she needed to see to his needs as he pulled the blanket back over his head.
Maybe he needed to lock her in another linen closet, Chase thought, chuckling only to growl when the evil woman stole his blanket again. When he reached back for it this time, he came up empty.
“Blanket!” Chase snapped, only to have his demands ignored.
“Get up,” Sloane said, nudging his arm.
“Not happening,” he grumbled, determined to go back to sleep now more than ever simply because it would piss her off, and god, did he love pissing her off.
“It really is,” Sloane said as she placed her small, yet surprisingly warm, hands on his shoulder and arm and made him do a little sighing of his own because this was just fucking pathetic.
“What are you doing?” Chase couldn’t help but ask when she began jostling him.
“Moving you over,” she bit out as she struggled to turn him over onto his back.
“By yourself?” he had to ask because even she had to realize that he had a good sixty pounds or more on her.
“Yes!” Sloane snapped, sounding winded as she continued jostling him, lulling him back into a deep sleep.
Deciding that he was too comfortable to explain the difference between dead weight and using momentum and gravity to help move him, Chase kept his eyes closed and continued to lay there while the woman that was proving to be the most entertaining part of his day continued to manhandle him. One of the first lessons he’d learned from the academy was all the