22. Keeping the Professional Nurse Hat On
Keeping the Professional Nurse Hat On
Josie
A girl could get used to this , I think while brushing my teeth after breakfast.
The kind of deep, satisfying sleep that comes from exhaustion, made sweeter by the gentle rock of a boat. A lazy, early morning on the water, drinking coffee and talking with Wyatt about books.
Holding his hand was a surprise bonus. Also surprising: what he shared this morning.
And last night. Especially last night. The things he said. The way his eyes darkened to slate as he spoke. How good it felt when he pulled me against his chest and held me.
I’m still processing all of it.
Too bad my processing is taking place at the speed of a ten-year-old PC where someone clicked on every pop-up and sketchy email link.
It’s dumb to think about getting used to this, though, considering the fact that after this trip, we’ll head back to our respective cities miles and miles and miles apart.
Where Wyatt is a famous hockey player and I am me—a woman who spends her days putting My Little Pony Band-Aids on skinned knees and looking at real estate she can’t afford.
Correction: couldn’t afford.
It’s weird, though, how I can house hunt for real now...but still haven’t. Not once since coming to Kilmarnock. Now, the idea of buying a house and settling into my life the way I always planned has started to sound like a consolation prize. A participation trophy.
That is not good.
Because if my life plans now seem underwhelming with a side of meh, there is one reason. And that reason is up on deck somewhere, waiting for me. Probably with a scowl on his handsome face.
Somewhere, I can imagine Toni cackling. A very I told you so kind of laugh. A Finally kind of laugh.
As much as I like to downplay this, my last serious relationship was in high school. How serious can a high school boyfriend be? In my case, not very.
But until now, until spending all this time with Wyatt, I haven’t wanted to consider being in another relationship. Even thinking about it now has my stomach cramping with the kind of dread that always accompanies change and new things.
“Josie! Are you ready to cast off?” Wyatt sticks his head down the hatch. He’s frowning—of course—but even his downturned lips and flinty eyes feel softer aimed my way. My stomach flips as I stare up at him, the sunlight splashing over his cheeks.
I join Wyatt on the deck, where he’s messing with the GPS.
Today we’ll pass Mile 0 as we head through Norfolk and officially enter the ICW.
I know this from The Intracoastal Waterway, Norfolk to Miami: The Complete Cockpit Cruising Guide , which Wyatt teased me about earlier.
Right before listening to me ramble about books for far too long.
When I finally came up for air and realized I’d been talking for maybe ten minutes straight, I wanted to dive overboard. But Wyatt was watching me with an expression I’d never seen before—one that made heat creep up my neck to my cheeks. Rapt attention mixed with what looked like...hunger.
When he glances up from the GPS now, he’s wearing the same expression. I don’t know what to do with it. With him.
So I blurt out a boat question. “Did you switch our GPS from nautical to statute miles?”
A smile lifts one side of his mouth. “Were you like this in school?”
“Like what—a total nerd and know-it-all?”
“I was going to say someone who loves learning, but okay.”
“That does sound better. Jacob preferred to call me a nerd and know-it-all.”
“And were his grades always as bad as they were in college?” Wyatt asks with an arched brow.
I laugh. “Yup.”
Wyatt nods, and instantly he’s back in serious sailor mode. A relief, since I know how to handle this version of him.
“I took Jib for a walk. But maybe today she’ll start using the turf,” Wyatt says.
We both glance up and laugh at Princess Jib-Jabberwocky, still in her ballerina outfit, lying on the fake grass, back flat on the ground and belly toward the sky.
“I should put her in her bikini for sunbathing,” I say.
Wyatt’s gaze swings my way. “Tell me you didn’t buy the dog a bikini.”
“I didn’t buy her a bikini.”
There’s a pause. “You bought two.”
Three, actually, but who’s counting? I don’t answer, only smile.
Wyatt shakes his head, taking a long drink from a water bottle. The sun is barely up, but the day’s already hot. My skin feels tight and sensitive in the places I couldn’t reach with sunscreen yesterday. It’s not a full, angry burn, but I definitely don’t want it to be worse.
“Before we go, could you put sunscreen on my neck and shoulders? I missed some spots yesterday. I don’t want to get more sun and—”
“Come here, Rookie.”
This shouldn’t make me nervous. It’s just rubbing on sunscreen. It could almost be considered a medical thing, considering skin care prevention and all. Basically skin-cancer prevention.
Or so I tell myself as I walk over to Wyatt and hand him the tube of sunscreen. I almost believe it too.
But when I turn my back, anticipation sparks across my skin, like every cell is now a live wire.
It’s torture facing away and waiting, listening to him open the cap.
The noise the bottle makes when he squeezes some sunscreen on his palm should break the tension, but apparently not even sounds that would make my elementary kids giggle can dampen my mood.
I’m about to move my hair—I need to pull it back into a ponytail anyway—but Wyatt’s hand gets there first. His fingers gently move up my neck as he takes my hair in his hand.
“Hold your hair back,” he commands, voice low and rough.
My eyes flutter closed. Yeah...the way I feel about his touch is anything but professional.
His hands are big and lightly calloused, but they’re gentle as they glide over my skin. He smooths the lotion on my neck, then my shoulders, his fingertips just barely slipping underneath the neck of my tank top and the holes of my sleeves.
“I’ve got to be thorough,” he murmurs, and now he’s leaning down, his breath a whisper on my skin. “Can’t have you getting burned.”
“Do you, um, need me to get your neck or anything?”
“Sure,” he says, and he says it so easily, like he’s unaffected by this.
I guess his insides aren’t trembling like he’s standing on a fault line.
When Wyatt finishes, rubbing the last of the sunscreen down the length of my arms, I have him sit on one of the benches so I can stand next to him.
“Too tall,” I tell him. “Or I’m too short.”
“You’re just right,” he says with a small smile.
And then he tugs his shirt right over his head.
Well, then.
I know what I’ll be writing about in my journal tonight. And maybe dreaming about for nights to come.
Look—I’m not the kind of woman who’s ever been into thirst traps. Especially not after hearing a fifth-grade girl casually drop the term. Why a fifth grader knows about thirst traps , I don’t know. But I’m guessing it has something to do with her newly divorced mom.
My point being: I’m not someone who considers herself superficial about guys and their looks.
I’ve never had a type and have always placed physical attractiveness somewhere down the list of things that matter to me, way after character traits.
In fact, big, muscular guys have long been on my absolutely not list.
But maybe I’m shallower than I thought, my absolutes now more relative. Because I can’t stop myself from taking a good long look.
It’s impossible to view Wyatt’s bare torso with anything but admiration. And a little disbelief, because I really thought maybe the shirtless abs I’d seen in his ads were airbrushed. Like maybe his abs were actually drawn by AI.
Nope. I can now confirm every one of those abs exists in reality.
And they’re right here, inches away.
I saw them during physical therapy, but that was mostly while Wyatt was at a safe distance, in a pool.
He clears his throat, startling me into putting way too much sunscreen on my hand, and I swear I catch the edge of a cocky smile as he gives me his back. Which, of course, is as astonishingly muscular. I didn’t know backs came like this.
Wyatt has to clear his throat again before I set the sunscreen down and rub my palms together until they’re both coated, reminding myself that I have a job to do. A medical job. Totally professional and not involving any feelings or anything personal.
He stiffens as my palms touch his shoulders. “Cold,” he says.
“Don’t be a baby,” I tell him.
He grunts at this, or maybe it’s more of a groan as my hands slide over his back and shoulders. His muscles feel even better than they look, and I am struggling to locate my nurse hat. The metaphorical one I pull out when I’m engaging in professional tasks.
It’s just a back , I tell myself. Skin, muscle, bone. Nothing to see here, folks! Just a perfect specimen of a man!
“I think I’m good,” Wyatt says, startling me as I realize the massive amount of sunscreen I used is almost totally rubbed in.
How long have I been touching him?
I give his shoulders a pat with a little too much force. Wyatt flinches.
“Skin cancer sucks. SPF matters,” I say, like I’ve been suddenly turned into a commercial touting the benefits of sunscreen.
“Yes,” Wyatt agrees, “it does. Thank you.”
When I step away, he grabs his shirt and pulls it back over his head.
“All that and you’re wearing a shirt?”
“For now,” he says. “But I’ll be ready for the sun. Grab the bow line.”
“Aye, aye, Captain Bossy,” I mutter.
“I heard that.”
“What was the highlight of your day?” Wyatt asks.