A mantra that plays on repeat in my head, but as hard as I search for regret, it’s not there. It’s hard to regret something that blew my mind the way Tam’s kiss did. How hot andrighthis body felt against mine. His soft lips and rough palms. With how prone I’ve been to catching feelings for dudes who make me feel good, it’s hard not to be scared to death of it too, but that’s a worry for another day. Right now, all I can think about is how he felt in my arms even before I kissed him. How he relaxed into me like he’d been waiting for my embrace his whole life.
And how badly I want to hold him again.
It’s a far cry from the casual sex I’ve spent the last few months convincing myself is all I want out of life, and that’s probably the part that terrifies me. But as the rest of the week unfoldsand I manage to eat dinner with Tam twice more without laying a hand on him, I begin to calm down.
Friends.
Yeah.
I can do this.
“Is this a five or an S?”
I jump out of my skin, startled out of my Tam-themed daze by my boss bearing down on me, a stack of patient charts clutched in her hands. “Show me?”
Marla dumps the offending chart on the desk, tapping the chicken scratch that’s irrefutably mine. “This one.”
“It’s an S. Why would it be a five?”
“Your writing is terrible.”
“I know, but—” Nope. Not doing it. What’s the point? Logic doesn’t come into it if you can’t get the basics right, and I’m the one who can’t write a simple sentence without confusing the heck out of people who don’t have time to chase me around. “Sorry.”
Marla’s a tough crowd. She ignores my smile and crosses out my scrawl. “I need you to stay late. Constance has a childcare issue and she needs to go home.”
It’s already late. Midnight came and went a while ago, bringing with it an influx of patients booted from ICU to make room for the victims of a house fire in the city. HDU is full to bursting. Even without losing a nurse from the night shift, I wasn’t expecting to leave any time soon. “It’s fine. I need to eat, though.”
Understatement. The last real meal I consumed was the potato and ham thing—thetartiflette—Tam brought to my door yesterday morning. He didn’t hang around to eat it with me, but it was still good enough that I ate the whole thing andfell into a carb coma for the rest of the day before I rocked up here.
Good enough that I daydream about it at any given moment.
Any moment I don’t daydream abouthim.
I don’t have time for anything but a jaunt to a nearby vending machine. I buy three packets of crisps and a can of Pepsi. Scran it all and get back to work. Marla pulls me up on my paperwork three more times before I finally leave.
It’s early morning. Dawn, in fact, a reality that won’t be beautiful until I escape the city and reach the pretty little town Tam calls home. ThatIcall home—at least for the next few months. But I have to scrape a thick frost from my car—the one that’s still running like a dream thanks to Tam’s healing hands—before that can happen, and it just about kills me.
I’m tired and I’m hungry, two things that ravage my ability to manage my emotions, and by the time I pull onto Stardust Lane, I’m too frazzled to figure out if I’m happy or sad. Then I see a tall figure headed my way, a tiny dog at his feet, and my mood brightens with the glittery winter sun.
Tam.
I pull up beside him and open the window.
He braces his good arm on the car roof and lets me see his scruffy jaw and dry half smile. “Morning.”
“Morning.” I kill the engine. “What are you doing up so early?”
“Walking Rudy before the postman’s out and about.”
“He doesn’t like him?”
“Doesn’t like anyone, except you and Sab.”
“That must be awkward when you have other friends around.”
“You see me letting anyone else in my house?”
He must do sometimes. To have themad sexhe alluded to the night we kissed. But I let it go. If Tam wants to play lone wolf, who am I to stop him?
