Chapter 1
One
Tabitha
Funny.
The drive from Boulder to the Western Slope was beautiful.
Wild.
Going the other direction?
The sky, once wide open, narrows. The air gets heavier, almost like it knows I’m carrying something I didn’t have on the way there.
The little towns I thought were so quaint a few days ago now look worn down.
The silos and grain elevators aren’t rustic anymore.
Instead they seem dull and gray. The neon sign for the diner with the D burned out doesn’t make me smile this time.
Instead, it only reminds me of everything falling apart.
I should be excited—I am excited—about the surgical seminar. I’m honored to have been chosen, even though someone had to drop out for me to get a spot. After the month-long workshop, the fall semester will begin, and I’ll get back into the rhythm of classes.
That’s what I’m meant to do.
This is the life I chose, the life I’ve fought for, and I can’t afford to get distracted.
But he’s still there, in the back of my mind.
Henry Simpson.
His voice. The way he looked at me—if only once or twice—like maybe I was the one thing in his world that made sense. And then the way he pulled back, like it was all too much.
I keep telling myself it’s better this way. I have enough on my plate. I have an entire career to build, a future that doesn’t leave room for heartbreak. But the knot in my stomach doesn’t care about logic. It tightens every time I replay how I fell asleep curled into him.
Then I woke up alone this morning.
He’s probably already convinced himself I was nothing more than a summer mistake.
I grip the wheel tighter, force myself to focus on the road ahead. The seminar starts tomorrow. New faces, new challenges, the reminder that I belong in medicine, not with a man who can’t let himself be loved.
Still, my chest aches. Because for a split second, I thought Henry Simpson might be worth the risk.
It’s early afternoon when I pull into the parking lot of my apartment complex in Boulder.
I kill the engine and sit in silence for a moment. Everything seems different somehow. I exit the car, grab my bag from the trunk, and step out into the warm Colorado sun.
My apartment is on the third floor. I trudge up the stairs, each step heavier than the last. In my apartment, the quiet is even more pronounced. It’s like stepping into a void.
I should feel at home here, surrounded by my medical textbooks, my ridiculously organized notes. This is where I’ve planned my future, where I’ve dreamed of the great surgeon I will become.
But the quiet wants to smother me. I feel empty.
Only days ago, this space felt like a haven, my sanctuary amid the commotion of medical school.
Now?
It feels foreign.
Except it’s not.
It’s the same as it’s always been.
I’m the one who’s changed.
My desires, my expectations, my needs have all been upended.
I drop my bag on the floor with a thud. It reverberates through the apartment, mirroring my own state of mind. Echoing and unsettled.
“Cut it out,” I tell myself out loud.
I take the bag into my bedroom and unpack, piece by piece. Each item reminds me of what I left behind on the Western Slope, especially when I get to the gifts for Angie. Something borrowed and something blue. I never got the chance to give them to her.
The periwinkle-blue lace panties.
Identical to the ones Henry ripped off me…
After the bag is empty, I wander into the kitchen. I open the refrigerator…
Nothing. No leftovers, no half-eaten containers of takeout. Only a jar of pickles and a carton of milk past its expiration date. I close the door with a sigh.
Henry.
What I wouldn’t give to hear his voice.
I grab my cell phone, pull up my list of contacts—
I don’t have his number.
Why would I?
I didn’t ask for it. He didn’t offer it.
I could call Angie. Ask to speak to Henry—
Uh…no.
Angie and Jason left this morning for their honeymoon in Switzerland.
I don’t have any other contact information for any of—
Except yes, I do. I have Sage’s number from the bachelorette party she planned in Boulder for Angie.
I find her name in my list and—
No.
I won’t be that woman.
The woman who calls an acquaintance and asks about her brother.
That’s not me.
I’m the woman who takes advantage of the amazing opportunity that just landed in her lap.
The surgical seminar.
I have an advanced reading assignment and only one evening to get caught up.
I won’t pine over a lost love that was never anything more than in my mind.
I will study. I will learn. I will excel.
I gather my reading materials and settle in at my desk. I try to immerse myself in the world of medicine again. Each word should be a lifeline, pulling me back to the world where I thrive, where I have a future mapped out, where there is no room for uncertainty or emotional turmoil.
But Henry Simpson has permeated even this stronghold. Every term, every theory, every case study… Somehow they all remind me of him. His intense blue eyes. His touch. The warmth that spread through me every time he looked my way.
I shake my head, try to chase away the thoughts. But they’re persistent.
I need to focus. I’ve got to get back on track. This isn’t a place for Henry. It’s a place for me.
I try to concentrate on the case studies spread before me, to lose myself in the intricacies of the human body. I rub my eyes and force myself to reread the same line for the third time.
“Patient presents with a perforated duodenal ulcer, requiring an emergency laparotomy.”
I trace the words with my finger. Ulcer. Perforation. Surgical repair. Blood loss, sutures, cautery. I should be thinking about anatomy, about the steps I’d take in the OR if I were holding the scalpel.
But instead, my brain keeps circling back to Henry. How he cut me open in a way I never saw coming, and how I’m the one left trying to stitch myself back together.
“No!” I say out loud again. “You won’t waste this opportunity!”
I bring my focus back to work when my phone buzzes.
My heart leaps.
It’s Henry.
I know it is.