Chapter 12
POV: Brennan
I don’t remember a time when I didn’t notice her.
That’s the problem with growing up seven years younger than the girl who teaches you what devotion feels like before you even have the language for it.
Marina was never just the neighbor’s daughter.
She was sunlight, loud and alive, the kind of girl people gravitated toward without understanding why.
I watched her from the sidelines of my childhood—her blonde hair tied in a messy ponytail, her laugh carrying across the yard when she played baseball with her friends, her blue eyes always finding mine when she noticed me watching.
She always waved.
She was always kind.
That was enough to ruin me.
I was a boy who knew he didn’t stand a chance, and I never pretended otherwise.
She was older, smarter, already moving toward a future that didn’t include the awkward kid next door.
But seeing her every day—hearing her voice through the open windows, catching glimpses of her in the driveway—felt like a privilege I didn’t deserve.
When Alex told me she was leaving for college, I locked myself in my room and didn’t come out for hours. I didn’t cry because she was gone. I cried because the world had taken her somewhere I couldn’t follow.
Med school didn’t surprise me.
Neither did her brilliance.
I watched from a distance after that—social media, articles, academic highlights. Not in a way I’d ever admit out loud. Just… keeping track of her orbit, checking if she looked happy, if she was smiling in photos, if she was still that girl who waved at the neighbor’s kid.
Then she posted a picture with a ring.
A diamond on her hand. A man’s arm around her waist.
I stared at that photo for a long time.
I remember hoping it would last. Not because I wanted her with him—because I wanted her happy, even if it wasn’t with me. She deserved permanence. She deserved devotion.
I just didn’t think I’d ever be the man to give it to her.
When she got married, I closed that chapter in my head and pretended I’d grown out of her.
I hadn’t.
She was the first thing I ever wanted and the only thing I never outgrew.
So when her name popped up on the cardiology fellowship list, I signed the application without hesitation. Didn’t overthink it. Didn’t ask myself if it was a mistake. Some decisions are instinctive. Some obsessions never fade.
Seeing her in that bar was not a surprise.
I never believed in fate. But I believed in her.
She had always been beautiful. Time didn’t soften her. It sharpened her.
She walked into that place like something out of a painting—classic, composed, devastating in the quiet way that made men stupid.
I knew she’d be my superior. I knew it would complicate everything.
I also knew it was the only chance I’d ever get.
I had enough alcohol in my system that night to believe flirting with my teenage obsession was reckless rather than inevitable.
And when I kissed her—
Her mouth was softer than memory. Warmer than fantasy.
Everything I’d imagined and nothing I’d prepared for.
I’d waited years for her without calling it waiting. Without expecting anything in return.
But the second her lips met mine, I knew I was never letting her go again.
Of course I’d had sex before.
I wasn’t inexperienced. I wasn’t naive. Desire had never been foreign to me.
But nothing—nothing—felt like her.
With Marina, it was as if our bodies had been built for each other long before we understood what that meant. As if every year I spent watching her from afar had been my body learning how to recognize hers.
Kissing her felt unreal. Like I was still that teenager staring through a window, except now she was in my hands, her mouth moving against mine like she had always belonged there.
She was reason incarnate—controlled, measured, brilliant.
And yet, with me, her instincts surfaced first. Her body answered mine before her mind could catch up.
That alone was enough to unravel me.
Being with her that night felt like stepping into something I’d been waiting for without admitting it. Her warmth. Her breath against my skin. The way she fit against me like she’d always known the shape of my hands.
I remember waking up with her in my arms and thinking this had to be a hallucination. Her skin was soft, warm, real. She murmured in her sleep, moved closer, as if she instinctively sought me even unconscious.
I could’ve stayed there forever.
But then she was gone.
And life resumed like nothing sacred had happened.
I knew she’d be at the MacArthurs’ barbecue. Of course I went. Alex is family. My parents adore his parents. And I was back in town for residency—she didn’t know that yet.
When my mother noticed the marks on my neck and raised a brow, I saw Marina’s cheeks flush across the yard. She tried to hide it. She never could hide from me.
I could read her. Always had.
She wanted me.
She just didn’t believe she deserved to want anything again.
That knowledge didn’t make me smug.
It hurt.
The morning she found out I was one of her residents, I wish I could’ve photographed her expression. Shock, disbelief, something dangerously close to desire—and fear.
She drew boundaries immediately. Professionalism. Distance. Control.
Her words said one thing.
Her body said another.
She stood too close. Her gaze lingered on my mouth. Her eyes tracked the rise and fall of my chest like it meant something to her. She never noticed how obvious she was.
I noticed everything.
But I respected her boundaries.
If she wanted me, she’d have to be the one to cross the line.
The elevator moment nearly broke me.
She told me she’d wanted ortho, not cardiology. That cardiology had swallowed her whole because she was too good at everything and everyone expected her to be the hospital’s golden girl.
When I saw the ortho residency opening, I sent it to her without hesitation.
She deserved to be happy.
Even if that meant moving away from me.
She leaned in. I leaned in.
I stopped.
If she kissed me, it would be her decision.
I wasn’t going to be the man who pressured the woman he’d worshiped his entire life.
Then I heard about girls’ night.
The same bar where everything had started.
Of course I went.
An old friend from school stopped me, talked too close, laughed too loudly. And suddenly Marina was at my side, eyes sharp, body tense.
Jealous.
God, she was beautiful when she was jealous.
She kissed me like she was claiming territory she’d always owned but never dared to touch.
And the world snapped back into place.
I didn’t say a word until we were inside the car.
Not because I had nothing to say—
but because silence gave me control.
She climbed in, eyes a little too bright, breath a little too shallow. She knew what she was doing. She just liked pretending she didn’t.
The moment my door shut, I leaned over and took her mouth.
No hesitation. No softness.
I framed her face and kissed her like I meant to claim something that had been mine long before she ever touched me. I bit her lower lip and felt her melt against me.
God.
“Relax,” I murmured against her mouth, and it wasn’t advice. It was a command.
I pulled back before I lost myself and started the engine like I hadn’t just torn through every boundary she’d built between us.
She sat back, trying to breathe. Trying to think.
I didn’t give her the chance.
My hand settled on her thigh, warm, heavy, deliberate. She tensed, then didn’t move it away. Good.
I traced slow circles, watching the road, pretending this wasn’t driving me insane. Her pulse fluttered under my palm. Her breath changed. She always betrayed herself physically long before she ever admitted anything.
My hand drifted higher, inch by inch, testing how far she’d let me go without saying a word.
“Brennan.”
It came out as a plea.
I smiled.
“Yes?” I asked quietly, fingers still moving. “You were saying something, Doctor?”
She swallowed and grabbed my wrist—not to stop me. To ground herself.
That was adorable.
My thumb brushed over her through the fabric, and she gasped like I’d lit her on fire. I could feel how wet she already was. How ready.
She still thought she was the composed one.
I exhaled a low laugh.
“God, you’re so responsive,” I murmured. “And you still pretend you’re in control.”
She shot me a glare that didn’t fool either of us.
I slid my hand higher, brushing the hem of her panties aside, touching her properly. She arched slightly, breath hitching, and I felt the tension coil through her body.
I stayed perfectly steady.
“You should be driving,” she whispered, voice wrecked.
“I am,” I replied calmly. “Multitasking. Unless you want me to stop.”
Her answer came too fast.
“Don’t you dare.”
My grip tightened just enough to let her know I liked hearing that.
“You’re going to regret giving me permission,” I murmured. “You always do.”
She was shaking now, gripping the seat, pulse loud in her throat. I felt her unraveling under my hand and pushed her further—slow, deliberate, controlled.
“Oh my God,” she whispered, voice breaking. “You’re going to make me lose my mind in this car.”
“Yes,” I said simply.
“That’s the point.”
She came undone under my hand, breathless, moaning my name like a confession.
I didn’t even look at her when I pulled my hand away.
I parked.
“We’re here.”
My voice was calm, steady, surgical.
Inside, I was burning.
She stared at me like she’d just been through something violent and holy and irreversible.
I met her gaze like I’d planned every second of it.
Because with Marina, I always did.