Again, he looked up at me with humor in his gaze. “Do you want to chance an infection in your string fingering finger, Rockstar? I’m a trained medic, and it’s my duty to prevent infection. You don’t want it to swell up and form oozing pus, do you? Or, god forbid, gangrene. Your finger could fall off in the middle of a song. Then what would you do?”
He was killing me in the very best way. “From a splinter?” I howled uncontrollably, my body shaking with every breath.
He-Man looked up at me from where he was bent over my lap, his high-powered reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. All I could think was ‘God, I love him’. With all the seriousness he could muster, he stood up from where I was seated on the granite countertop.
“I can see I’m gonna have to restrain you to get this out. Hand me the tape.”
Laughing harder, I shook my head no. I itched to take him by the face, yank down that stupid mask he wore, and kiss him. And I would if it wouldn’t contaminate his sterile field, making him start all over.
I rolled my eyes at him and shook my head. He was being ridiculous, and I loved this side of him. Loved moments like this that were light and a bit silly.
“I’ll give you the finger,” I muttered, waiting for him to look up. But he continued on, carefully pricking my skin with a sterilized needle—that he’d boiled in water—before going in with the pimple-extracting pointed tweezers I’d seen onTikTok.
“This might hurt, Rockstar. But I’ve got you. Want a shot of whiskey to dull the pain?”
I smiled. “Again, fuck you,” I laughed as he continued to mess with the splinter I’d gotten from Cole and Patrick’s deck.
He-Man dabbed his brow to remove the imaginary sweat he’d worked up from this outrageous procedure. “I’m going in, Rockstar.”
“Okay,” I chuckled as he easily grasped the brown splinter with the TikTok tweezers.
He held the villainous sliver of wood pinched between the tweezers into the air like he’d just won a gold medal. Dabbing my skin with multiple cotton balls soaked in rubbing alcohol, he covered the almost invisible break in my skin with aSupermanBand-Aid before kissing my boo-boo.
That was the moment I knew I could no longer deny that I was in love with Michael Coleman. No one has ever treated me the way he did. He was the one for me. The one that would protect my heart and never leave me. I knew I wasn’t good enough for him, but he was all I wanted.
Grinning the goofiest grin I’d ever grinned, I reached up and pulled down his mask. I took his face in my hands and looked him in the eyes. My heart was pounding a new rhythm in my chest that belonged to him.
“What?” he asked, settling his hands on my hips.
I took a deep breath and stared at him. “I need to tell you something.”
His face paled. “Are you pregnant?”
I laughed at this wonderful man and it made me even more resolved to tell him what I felt. He put me at ease in the most difficult of situations, and I never wanted to lose him.
“No, not pregnant, He-Man.”
“Whew,” he sighed dramatically, reminding me of my own dramatics. When he looked at me like I was the best thing he’d ever had, I melted.
Michael brought his still gloved hands to my face and murmured against my lips, tickling the skin. “Then what is it, Rockstar?”
Staring into his warm hazel eyes, all my doubts seemed to lessen. “I like you isn’t enough anymore. And even though I’m scared shitless, I need you to know. And I need to be able to say it to you.”
He-Man blinked at me as the secret smile he saved for me graced his beautiful face. “Say what, darlin’?”
I closed my eyes and pressed my forehead to his. My hands found his face as he leaned into the intimate moment. I held on to him as his latex-covered thumbs skated across my skin and I savored the scent of his cologne.
“You can say anything to me, sweetheart,” he murmured. “You’re safe with me.”
I knew he was right, and that this sweet, loving man would protect the most fragile part of me, no matter what.
Nodding, I pulled back just enough to meet his eyes. When I found what I was looking for in them, I smiled. “I’m in love with you, Michael. I love you more than you could know. You make me so happy.”
The grin that spread across his face was beautiful. “I know, Rockstar. And I’m in love with you, too. Head over heels, stupid in love with you.”
Pulling his face to mine, I kissed him like I’d never kissed him before. I let all the fear and pain from always being everyone’s second choice go.
For the first time in my life, I felt like someone’s first choice.
