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“Thanks for walking me home,”Lacey says. She shoves her hands in the pockets of her jacket and shivers. “We probably should’ve taken the car.”
“What? Twenty degrees isn’t invigorating to you?” I ask. I drape my arm over her shoulder and pull her against my side. “Makes me feel alive.”
“You’re also two hundred and twenty pounds of muscle and hot all the time. You’re not allowed to comment on not being cold.”
I laugh and guide her around a patch of ice on the sidewalk. “Fair. What do you have going on this week? Anything exciting?”
“No. I go back to work on the fifth. You know I love my job, but it’s been nice to take a step back. To have a minute to breathe. I’ve been trying to take care of myself, and I want to make sure I do that when I get back in my routine, too.”
“I’m proud of you. Have you heard anything about the chief physician position?” I ask. “Has Hannaford said anything?”
She snorts and shakes her head. “Please. He’s skiing in the Alps right now; his out of office email is on until halfway through January. On the plus side, your silent auction items brought in a million dollars. I guess I’m going to have to bring you back next year. See if we can make it a million and a half.”
“Yeah?” I tug on her hand and stop her in front of her apartment building. It’s quiet out here, everyone already in for the evening and out of the cold. “I’ll go back with you, even if I don’t donate anything. I like being by your side.”
Lacey lifts her chin, and her eyes meet mine. “Do you want to come up?”
I do.
More than I want anything in this world.
I want to lay her on her bed and whisper in her ear how much I love her. I want to put my head between her legs and tell her I’m going to take care of her for the next fifty years. I want to hold her through the night and give her whatever she asks.
But I don’t want her to think how I’m feeling is a heat of the moment thing. Said for the first time because I’m buried inside her after a couple of beers late at night. I’m going to get this right, because Lacey deserves it.
“I do, but I think I’m going to head home,” I say, and she bites her bottom lip. Disappointment flashes across her face, and I rest my palms on her cheeks. “Do not think for a second I’m rejecting you, Lacey girl. I’m tired, and I have a little bit of work I need to catch up on.”
“Okay.” She nods and glances over my shoulder. “When do you leave? Tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Tomorrow night. We’ll be back on the second.” I take a breath and swallow away the lump in my throat. “Can I see you when I get back?”
“Oh.” Her eyes light up and twinkle under the street lamps. “Yeah. I would—that would be nice.”
“What did I tell you about nice?” My hand moves to her chin, and I tilt her head back. “You deserve so much better than nice.”
“I do. I know that now. Thanks to you.”
“Good. Let me know when you make it upstairs.”
“It’s ten floors, Shawn, not ten miles,” she says.
“Don’t care.”
“Worried about me, Holmes?”
I bend down and kiss her. I loop my arm around her waist and dip her toward the ground, never letting my lips leave hers. “Always, Daniels,” I whisper against her mouth, and she grabs me by the collar of my coat.
“You can’t kiss a girl like that then leave,” she says, her tone ripe with irritation. “That’s cruel.”
“Is it?” I kiss her again, more heat behind the press of my lips and the hand that roams under her sweater. My fingers fan out across her stomach, and she squirms in my hold. “I don’t want to be cruel.”
“I hate you,” Lacey grumbles, and I chuckle.
“No, you don’t.”
“No, I don’t.” Her gaze locks on mine, and I see it in the outline of her smile. In the pink staining her cheeks. In the way she won’t let me go, not even when she’s shivering from the cold. “Will you let me know when you get home?”
“Of course.”
