“Don’t,” was all Eric said, when John tried to get up.

John growled at him. They’d had him sitting on the back bumper of an ambulance for the better part of an hour now for nothing more than a graze of his arm.

“It’s been an hour and it’s a flesh wound.”

“It’s been five minutes,” Eric countered. “And that’s more than a flesh wound.”

John turned to the EMT. “Did it hit bone?”

“Uh.” The EMT turned to Eric. “No?”

“Ligaments?” John asked.

The EMT shook his head.

“Muscle,” Eric said with a look at the EMT.

“Uh, yeah,” said the EMT. “It definitely entered the muscle.”

“I’m fine,” John bit out. He knew damned well it was highly likely he was going to need some physical therapy on that arm. You didn’t walk away from a bullet wound like that without some kind of damage, but he wanted to see Ava.

She’d been in with the detectives from his unit answering questions for too damned long. Those guys might be like his brothers, but right now, he wouldn’t even trust his brothers with Ava. He needed eyes on her.

John moved to stand again, glaring at Eric when his partner moved toward him like he’d hold him down. That’s what it would take at this point.

Then Ava was there, walking with her arm around Janna and Rhys beside them. If Rhys didn’t escort her straight to John, he was going to tear the guy a new asshole.

John scanned her, looking at her face as she moved toward him. She was stressed, he could see that, and there was some bruising on her neck that made him see red, but she looked like that was the extent of her injuries.

His hands itched to roam over her, to check every inch of her to be sure she was okay.

Janna was holding ice to the side of her face where she’d been hit, but other than that, she looked uninjured.

“John,” Ava said, sinking down next to him. “You’re hurt,” she said, her large eyes going to his bandage.

“Flesh wound,” he said, in unison with the EMT and Eric.

John flashed a smile. “I’m fine. But, listen, Ava, we have to talk.”

She raised a hand up, palm out, as her eyes flashed. “Oh no you don’t. You don’t get to do this, John Sevier. You don’t get to take this all on yourself. You don’t get to blame yourself and tell me I’m better off without you. That your job puts me in jeopardy and that my life will be better without you in it. You don’t get to do that to me.”

She looked him up and down. “I have news for you. You’re not a god. You don’t control my life, and you aren’t responsible for everything that happens in it. That had nothing to do with you being in my life. That guy would have come into my world trying to hurt me with or without you. So you can shut your mouth and save the speech. I’m not letting you leave me now that I finally have you back in my life. I won’t let you play the martyr here.”

John raised a brow as she finished, looking at her flashing eyes and flushed cheeks. God, he loved this woman. “You about done?”

She grunted a response that said she could probably say more but was willing to give him a turn.

John could see Eric’s amusement in the background. He couldn’t wait for his partner to be the one who was blindsided by his feelings for a woman. When Eric was the one who would let that woman rail at him day and night, so long as she was with him. So long as she was safe and in his arms.

John kept his focus on Ava. Eric’s turn would come someday, and John would be there to laugh his ass off at him.

“I was going to say,” he said, using his good arm to pull her closer, running a hand over her cheek before brushing his thumb over her mouth. “I was going to say that I don’t want to waste another minute without you in my life, Ava McNair. I want you with me. I want to be with you. I want to share everything, good and bad, with you.”

He didn’t give a shit that half his damned department was there to witness it. John leaned in and kissed her shocked face, putting everything he was and had into that kiss. Because he meant it. Going forward, he wanted her in his world. He wanted to be with her and know she wanted to be with him.

He held his breath until he felt her sink into him and kiss him back.