Chapter 487
[ 497 words ]
Chapter 487:
She turned her head, not bothering to face them fully. “Do you have something you want to say to me, Vivian?” Her voice was quiet, but it cut through their chatter like a shard of ice.
Vivian Rusk, the ringleader, was taken aback for a second, but her surprise quickly morphed into a sneer. “I was just wondering how much of your heroic little reputation came from nursing skill, and how much came from being Mrs. Romero.”
The insinuation was clear, but not new. Not surprising. Just small.
Disgust coiled in Caroline’s stomach. It was pointless to argue. She had seen too much death to waste her breath on this kind of venom. She shifted the weight of her duffel bag to her other shoulder, preparing to walk toward the main hall, toward Alistair.
But Vivian wasn’t done. She took a step forward, her voice rising, deliberately playing to the small audience of onlookers they had attracted.
“I mean, it’s a valid question. A junior nurse comes back from a national response deployment suddenly married to a decorated colonel, with Romero cars waiting at the curb and people whispering about Army Medical Corps recommendations. Are we all supposed to pretend that looks normal?”
Caroline stopped. She turned slowly, fully facing them now. She let her gaze fall on Vivian, and the look in her eyes was not one of anger. It was something else entirely. It was the flat, empty gaze of someone who had looked into the abyss and was no longer impressed by the shadows. The look she had given looters in the disaster zone just before the National Guard arrived.
Vivian flinched, an involuntary step back. The bravado in her face faltered, replaced by a flicker of fear.
S𝖺𝗏𝘦 𝘆𝗈𝘂𝗋 𝗳𝖺𝘷o𝗿𝗂te 𝗇о𝘃𝖾l𝘀 𝗈𝗇 𝘨𝗮𝘭𝗻𝗈v𝘦𝗅𝘀.с𝗈m
To cover her sudden cowardice, she doubled down, her voice becoming shrill. “What? It’s the truth! Some people treat disaster work like service. Some people treat it like a marriage market.”
Before Caroline could even form a response, Brenna was there, a flash of red-headed fury.
“You shut your filthy mouth, Vivian!” Brenna’s voice was a whip crack. She jabbed a finger toward Vivian’s face. “You spent half the deployment chasing photo opportunities and crying about canned food. Do not stand here and lecture Caroline about service.”
The confrontation exploded. Voices were raised. An older couple stared, wide-eyed. A station security guard started moving toward them.
From the edge of the crowd, Dr. Croft, who had been about to leave, turned back. A deep frown creased his forehead as he saw Caroline at the center of the ugly, escalating scene. He started walking toward them, his expression a mixture of concern and disappointment.
Caroline just stood there, a sudden, profound weariness washing over her. She felt a million years old. These were her peers, her colleagues. And they felt like children squabbling in a sandbox, utterly oblivious to the real world of pain and consequence that existed just outside their privileged bubble. She sighed, the sound lost in the noise of the argument.
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