#merder

Mark stepped up beside her, turning on the charm. “You know, if your coffee takes longer than an appendectomy to make, that’s how you know it’s not really coffee.”

She didn’t even look up. “Or maybe it’s just how you know it’ll be good.”

His grin widened.

“I’m Mark.”

That got her attention. She lifted her head and pinned him with wide blue eyes that sparkled like mischief and caffeine. “Oh,” she said sweetly. “One of those.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Those?”

“You know.” She waved her hand lazily. “The ‘I’m Mark’ types. Strong jaw, smug smile, charming in a you-know-you-are way. Probably a doctor. Plastic surgeon? Definitely not pediatrics.”

Mark actually laughed. “Wow. That was… a disturbingly accurate personality autopsy.”

“I watch a lot of Dateline,” she replied breezily, accepting her drink with a smile. “Thanks for the diagnosis, Dr. Mark. Enjoy your lukewarm, personality-free drip coffee.”

She walked off without a second glance, sipping like she won the war.

Mark stood there, stunned into something dangerously close to impressed.

When he walked into the attendings' lounge forty minutes later, Mark was still thinking about her. Her voice. Her sass. Her mouth. What that mouth would look like saying his name—under very different circumstances.

Then Owen Hunt came in behind him and said, “Dr. Sloan, this is Dr. Cameron Blake, our new trauma attending.”

Mark turned.

There she was.

The coffee cart woman.

In scrubs. Hair pulled back properly. Badge clipped to her top. Looking tiny next to Hunt, but standing with the confidence of someone who’d held a heart in her hands and told death to wait its turn.

Mark blinked. “You’re Dr. Blake?”

She smiled slowly, like she knew exactly what was happening in his head.

“I am. And you must be Dr. Mark.”

Owen looked between them. “You two know each other?”

Cameron—Dr. Blake—sipped her coffee with that same smug satisfaction. “Briefly. He made fun of my order. I destroyed his ego. It was very bonding.”

Mark opened his mouth, but Hunt clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Play nice. She’s got trauma experience from Mercy West, Hopkins, and two years with Doctors Without Borders.”

Then he left them alone, because Owen had the social skills of a brick.

Mark turned to her, arms crossed. “You could’ve told me you were a surgeon.”

“You could’ve not assumed I wasn’t.”

“Touche.”

He leaned against the counter, studying her. She was shorter than he’d realized, but she carried herself like someone who didn’t need height to be commanding. She had this deceptive sweetness to her face—big eyes, soft voice, a smile that made people underestimate her right before she metaphorically (or literally) elbowed them in the ribs.

It was a thing. And now it was his thing.

“So, trauma?” he asked.

“Yep. Bleeding, guts, adrenaline. All the good stuff.”

“I usually try to put people back together without the guts.”

“Let me guess—boobs and butts?”

“Faces too,” he said, mock-offended. “I’m an artist, not a perv.”

She laughed, and it was a real laugh. Not polite. Not condescending. Just surprised and warm.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Dr. Sloan.”

Over the next week, Mark tried to get her out of his head—and failed spectacularly.

She was everywhere. In the pit, calling trauma codes with blood on her gloves and fire in her voice. In the attendings’ lounge, stealing the last clean mug and grinning at him like it was a game. In the OR board, somehow already on everyone’s radar for being good.

Bailey liked her. Hunt respected her. Callie said, “She’s a chaos gremlin and I adore her.”

Meredith, of course, said, “She’s like if Izzie had Cristina’s backbone.”

And that was the thing—she was soft and sharp, pretty and ruthless, warm and smart enough to see through every line Mark tried.

She didn’t avoid him. But she didn’t fall for his usual flirt-and-flatter routine either.

And that just made him want her more.

It finally came to a head on a Thursday.

They were in an elevator, post-trauma, both covered in blood. He had a tear in his scrub top. She had a smear across her cheek she hadn’t noticed.

Mark looked over at her and said, “You’ve got something…”

She turned her cheek toward him automatically.

Instead of wiping it with a sleeve, he used his thumb, brushing the streak gently. Too gently. It lingered a second longer than it needed to.

Cameron blinked.

“…Thanks,” she said.

He didn’t move back.

“You’re dangerous, Dr. Blake.”

“I’ve heard.”

“You pretend to be all sunshine and cinnamon. But you’ve got knives in your smile.”

“And yet you keep showing up.”

“Maybe I like the danger.”

The elevator doors opened. She didn’t move.

Then she leaned closer, just an inch. Close enough that he could smell her—coffee, shampoo, and adrenaline.

“I’m not interested in being another name in your phone, Mark.”

“What if I said I want to learn your coffee order instead?”

She stepped out of the elevator, walking backward.

“Then I’d say I hope you like cinnamon oat milk with a caramel drizzle.”

She winked.