I forced myself to focus, scrutinizing his nose to assess the extent of the damage. My fingers ghosted across the bridge, checking for breaks or displacement. "You're lucky; it's not broken."
"I don't think that's the reason I'm so lucky right now."
I tried to ignore what his words and touch were doing to my pulse and focused on controlling my breathing because I needed to treat his injury properly. But it was increasingly difficult when all I could think about was how good his hands felt on my skin, how right this moment felt despite everything, how desperately I wanted him to kiss me again.
Get it together, Lily. You're supposed to be healing him, not thinking about?—
"My friends in college used to call me 'the wannabe doctor,'" Kyle said with a small laugh. "Whenever someone got hurt at a party or scraped themselves playing basketball, they'd come find me. I'd patch them up and tell them if they needed real medical attention. I think part of me liked pretending I was still connected to that world. To the hospital. To you."
I felt something twist in my chest at his words. "I never tried to play nurse again after I decided not to pursue medicine," I admitted quietly. "Even when my friends needed help with something basic, I'd tell them to go to urgent care. I told myself it was because I'd moved on, but really... I didn't want to admit I still liked it. That giving it up hurt more than I wanted to acknowledge."
I took a cotton swab, applied some rubbing alcohol, andbegan cleaning the entire affected area. I checked for signs of a deviated septum and examined the surrounding area for hematomas, but everything looked normal. The blood had stopped completely, and while there were some bruises around the impact site, there didn't appear to be any serious trauma.
"There you go," I whispered as I finished my examination. "We're all done."
But neither of us moved. His hands stayed on my thighs. I stayed positioned between his legs, close enough that I could count his eyelashes if I wanted to. And neither of us needed to say why we weren't moving, why we were prolonging this moment. His gaze traveled slowly from my eyes down to my mouth, and the intensity of it made heat pool low in my belly. I didn't know where to put my hands anymore. They hovered awkwardly in the air between us, not quite touching him but not pulling away either.
"Lily," he said, his hands slipping away from my legs to release me completely from him.
"Yeah?"
"I need you to leave. Now."
"But I?—"
"Because if you don't," he interrupted me before I could say anything else, "I'm going to break the promise I made to never kiss you without permission again."
CHAPTER 33
Lily
"Three,"Kyle said.
I didn't move.
"Two."
I put both hands around the back of his neck and began stroking his hair. He closed his eyes to feel it better.
"Lily..." he said in a whisper.
"I want to," I said before he could say anything else. "There's nothing in the world I'd love more right now."
The truth was, no matter how much I'd tried to stay away from Kyle, he'd found a way to break through every wall I'd built and claim the space that had always been meant for him in my heart. After him, no one was good enough. No one was able to make me feel the way he did, like I was completely seen, completely understood, completely cherished.
I’d tried to forget him.
I’d tried to convince myself that what we’d had was just teenage infatuation.
I’d tried to make my mind believe that he didn't exist.
But you can’t erase someone who became part of your soul.
He opened his eyes suddenly and stared at my face, searching for any sign of doubt, as if he couldn't believe what I'd just said. His chest rose and fell unevenly, and his voice came out low, hesitant. "You don’t have to say that just because?—"
"I mean it," I cut him off, smiling softly. "There’s never been anyone else. You’ll always be the first and only one in my life. And it would be a privilege if you could be my first kiss again."
For a few seconds, he just stared at me, as if he was waiting for me to take back my words. But I didn’t move. Then, he laughed softly and grabbed me from behind, making me lose my balance slightly. He picked me up and sat me on his lap so effortlessly that my pulse wasn’t wild.
