Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
JESSE
The subway ride hummed in my stomach—sensation crashing in after hours in a sterile room.
Someone’s unwashed body scent wafted past while ad posters peddled credit cards, the blink of a dozen phone screens all around.
Next to me, a woman promised her toddler a pink lollipop if he just please stopped darting around people’s legs.
Finn was three feet away, one hand holding on to the same pole.
Not touching. We’d changed in different locker rooms and left in different elevators, then entered the same train as if by accident.
His reflection in the window was drained of color—dark jacket and curls a little flattened.
When I glanced at him, his eyes held the same after-surgery brightness I could feel buoying inside me, like he’d swallowed a star and now it was shining through the cracks in his skin.
I wanted him, God. So much I needed to curl my hands around cool metal to keep from reaching out right here and now.
Some corner of my mind still counted seconds to the echo of monitor beeps. Under that, Novak’s voice replayed in a loop. “Solid assist, Dr. Maddox.” And then the Jacksons’ faces after she’d given them the news—looking like they could breathe for the first time all day, or maybe all year.
“You’re glowing,” Finn said into the rattle of another passing train, the words low enough they were just for us. Like when he’d replied, “Yeah, yes, of course,” as if it had never even been a question. Yes, he’d come home with me. Of course he would.
“Feels like that should be my line,” I told him. “You did great, by the way.”
His mouth curved, self-deprecating. “I passed stuff, held stuff, and didn’t faint.”
“Hey.” I nudged the tips of our sneakers together, just quickly. “You held steady under high pressure. That’s no small thing.”
He didn’t reply, but his dimples staged a comeback, small twin craters pressed into his cheeks.
At my stop, we exited together, pushed close by the crowd, and immediately sprang apart again. Just in case. Two guys heading in the same direction, maybe off to grab a triumphant beer, talk through the adrenaline crash. Nothing untoward.
His jacket ended just above the delicious swell of his ass.
I dragged my attention away while a busker crooned a vaguely familiar pop cover into a microphone, minor-keyed and wistful. An incoming train threw a gust of stale, damp air at me.
We emerged into the night three blocks from my place.
Rain-slick pavement reflected neon lights and broke them into fragments of color, the road quiet at this hour—quiet enough that I dared to shift a little closer, our elbows bumping with each step.
Still enough of a distance that we’d pass for colleagues about to exchange a half-muttered, “What a day, huh?” before talking about sports.
Finn laughed, sudden and quick. “Man. Novak saying ‘no cowboy nonsense’ in that tone of hers.”
I failed to stifle a smile. “Like she’s the smartest person in the room and opposing her would be sheer and utter madness?”
“To be fair, she probably is the smartest person in the room at any given point.”
“I mean, yeah. Valid.” I grinned, blinking through another echo of her offhanded praise. “Solid assist, Dr. Maddox.”
What a day.
Finn stumbled on thin air. Or maybe it was exhaustion, a crack in the pavement—either way, he pitched forward.
Fuck. I grabbed for him, instinct before thought, clamped his elbow and yanked him toward me.
He got a foot under himself just in time, and we breathed together, pressed close, gazes catching.
Then he laughed—a low, ragged burst that felt like fireworks, sudden and beautiful.
I didn’t let go. His fingers were curled into my jacket as if he’d decided I was his solid ground.
Jesus, we were in public. But the sidewalk stretched empty on our left, and the couple to our right were a half block away, strangers in an animated conversation, their dog skipping ahead to lavish attention on a parked van. When I turned back to Finn, his head was already angled for a kiss.
Not a crash. We’d done that—but not tonight. This was soft like an intake of air, warm and familiar. I thumbed the hinge of his jaw as our mouths opened, tongues nudging together. Easy, almost sweet, even while something strange and heavy pulled at my stomach.
A car’s headlights dragged a ribbon of light across us.
We startled apart, glanced over as it kept going, uncaring and indifferent like the streets around us.
Finn huffed a small laugh, holding on to my shoulder, and I drew him back for another kiss—smaller, featherlight.
Another car slowed next to a parking spot about three feet too short, our reflected outlines briefly distorted by tinted windows. Then it was just us again.
“We should—” I jerked my chin in the direction of my building.
“Yeah,” Finn agreed, his nod and smile quick.
We let go, my hands oddly empty for a second before we started walking again, shoulder to shoulder now. Our steps measured, my pulse tripping in my ears.
Yes.
From one minute to the next, exhaustion pulled me sideways and frayed the edges of my vision. I slumped against the mirrored wall of the elevator.
“You all right?” Finn asked.
“Post-adrenaline crash.” I exhaled through the vertigo and reached for him. He came easily, leaned into me as red numbers counted floors—six, and seven. The doors slid open, and we straightened.
His voice dipped low. “You want me to leave? If you’re too tired.”
“No.” I circled his wrist. “No. Stay, please?” An echo of the last time he’d been here, but this felt different—tinged with a soft kind of radiance.
“Of course,” he said, as if it was really just that easy now, as if it couldn’t possibly be anything but yes. Not anymore.
I tugged him into my side and along with me, down the corridor and to my door. He hugged me while I unlocked it, one arm snaking around my middle, nosing at my cheek, his breath warm. We stumbled into my dark hallway, the door falling shut behind us.
For a beat, we simply pressed close. Silence. Just… us. Here. Together. I was a balloon, ready to float to the ceiling, and he was the tether that kept me on the ground—except he lifted me up, too, made me feel like flying, and Jesus, get it together.
“Shoes,” I said. “C’mon, babe.”
“Did you just…” The city glowed through the windows, just bright enough to see him scrunching up his face. “Did you just call me a pet name?”
Huh. Yeah. Not my style.
“So what about it?” I asked.
“Nothing.” His smile flashed like the first light of a new day. “Just checking.”
“Might want to start moving instead.”
“And they say romance is dead.”
“Tomorrow, I’ll run to the café down the road and serve you lemon bars and coffee in bed. But tonight?” I curved an arm around his waist, brought him close with my fingers tucked down the back of his jeans. “Tonight, I just want you. Simple, right?”
It didn’t feel simple. It didn’t—but then Finn laughed and pressed further into me, and suddenly, maybe, it was.
We took our shoes off and dropped the jackets.
My apartment smelled fresh and beautiful, like the floral detergent my cleaning lady always used.
Home. Had I ever—? Oh, whatever. Didn’t matter if this was new, if the place felt warmer with Finn here, more alive.
It just absolutely didn’t matter, the day’s leftovers swimming in my veins like lilac wine.
Two babies, separate and healing.
“Solid assist, Dr. Maddox.”
Finn.
I kissed him like the world was ours, like gravity couldn’t hurt. He tipped into it, his hands grappling at my waist, lips parting on a shaky sigh. “Bedroom?”
God, yes. I smiled through a dizzy haze of exhaustion. “You know the way.”
“Yeah.” His grin pressed against the corner of my mouth. “Feels polite to let you lead, though.”
I laughed. “Polite? You?”
“Hey, my momma raised me right.” The words were slow like dripping honey, a hint of cheek tucked underneath. “I know how to say please and thank you. Thank you for taking me home. Please take me to bed.”
It felt a little like that first night—all playful charm and magnetic body. He was more than that, though. So much more. I swallowed against a stupid wave of warmth, twining my fingers into the curls at the nape of his neck. “Anyone ever tell you that you talk too much?”
“My exes, yeah.” He said it lightly, like a joke, but… Ah, fuck.
“Well, they were idiots. I was kidding, babe.” It came out fierce, as if I could convince him by sheer force of will that it was them, not him. He looked down, shadows pooling under his lashes, something pleased only just visible in the curve of his mouth.
“Okay,” he muttered—not teenage-obstinate but shy, like he didn’t fully believe me. Well, Rome wasn’t built in a day.
I kissed him until he lost all tension, until it felt like my chest might crack open as he clung to me, his pulse fast where I traced the tendon inside his wrist. Want you, I thought or maybe said, no longer sure where he ended and I began, tired and happy and grateful, God—so fucking grateful to be here, with him.
We drifted toward the bedroom like ships in the night, like a tide coming in.
I got a hand under his sweater and followed the bumps of his spine up, palm flat against warm skin.
Clothes—off. I nearly tripped trying to shuck my jeans.
Reality seemed to stutter around the fringes each time I blinked, then froze when he fell back onto my bed, thighs splayed to invite me in.
Long lines and clean angles, bare skin, a smile like cloudless summer skies.
Golden light washed over him, and I remembered the first time he’d been here, how he’d teased me for my fancy indirect lighting.
Six weeks ago? Seven? A lifetime.
“You look like a dream,” I said—stupidly, foolishly, my usual filter worn thin by white OR lights and overspent concentration, by having Finn right here at the tip of my fingers, finally.
He flushed and failed to hide a smile. “That’s such a line.”
“But deeply felt.”