Within weeks of my thirty-ninth birthday, I lost my thirty-ninth patient and all feeling. I was certain it would pass, only it continued into the next day and the weeks after.

In order to treat my patients, I needed to feel something. Without feeling, I couldn't stay. Not in oncology and not in Baltimore.

So, I'm back in Dallas after more than twenty years gone. Home, my mother keeps saying with happiness. Happiness I still can't feel more than four months after that day. I'm beginning to accept feeling isn't coming back.

Until the moment I walk into an exam room and look into her eyes. All at once, feeling comes rushing back as suddenly as it disappeared. She's my patient. It's all kinds of wrong to want her, no matter what television portrays. Add in the fact she's running from an abusive husband. I should be staying far away from her, not taking her and her daughter home with me.

But I can't walk away from her. They're living in a crappy motel, barely surviving. I have a room, a safe place for her to recover and heal. She needs time and patience before she's strong enough for me to tell her the way I feel.

I'll give it to her. And hopefully, she'll grow strong enough to trust in me and fall in love with me the same way I've fallen for her and her baby daughter.

There's one shadow over our growing happiness: the man who beat her badly enough to send her running. I'll do whatever it takes to ensure he never gets close enough to Amy or her daughter to ever hurt them again. My money should be enough to get him to leave us alone, but if it's not, I have no problem using any means necessary.

***Trigger warning for domestic violence on page. I apologize in advance to all those who've gone through abuse (I have as well, and it hurt like heck to write.). This will break your heart. But I promise it will be put back together by the end.

Another warning for my long-time readers. I'm sorry to say this is a slow burn. Nothing else made sense after all she's been through. But I promise, it's still a me story, and once we get there...it's all there. All the yummy bad/goodness you expect to find in every story I write.