Page 89 of Alphas Like Us

I could easily make a joke back, but I contemplate something else. And then I watch him skim his palm down my palm, our hands almost the same exactsize.

His fondness for my hands ropes me in. And warmsme.

I lift my gaze to his. “You said that I need to do what I love, but I love security, wolf scout. That hasn’t changed. So why do you think that I want medicinemore?”

He sees the path that I can’t seeyet.

Maximoff clasps my hand tighter. “Medicine is a part of you, and unlike security, that’llneverchange. Christ, I know you hate believing that medicine is who you are, but I don’t think it ever left you even when you leftit.”

He lists off all that I’ve done just while I’ve been on his securitydetail.

Including treating his sister’s infected tongue piercing to setting his dislocated shoulder and triaging an entire car crash. I could do more if I were a conciergedoctor.

I’d have a license to prescribe medicine. I’d be on-call for allemergencies.

But Iwaver.

Maximoff sees. “If you’re only fighting yourself on this because you love me,” he says, “I’m telling you to go. It’ll eat at you for the rest of your life if you don’t. So I need you to go.” His voice almost breaks. “Fucking Christ.” He knocks his head back to the rock wall. He’s conditioned himself to bottle up a certain kind ofemotion.

He could marbleize his face. But he’s actually wrestling to let go and be morevulnerable.

Quickly, I pull my hand out of his. Only so I can hold his face between my palms. “You don’t need to pretend that it won’t be hard. Not being your bodyguard will be just as hard on me.” I keep swallowing a lump lodged in mythroat.

His eyes redden, and he clutches the back of my neck. “You know, the hardest things are usually the rightthings.”

I nod a couple times, my thumb stroking his cheek. “A philosopher talking to youagain?”

Maximoff starts to smile, and it’s drop-dead gorgeous. “If you want to call my dad and uncle philosophers, then yeah. A couple philosopher kings told methat.”

I wrack my brain.Should’ve known.I’ve heard Lo and Ryke say that phrasebefore.

“Farrow.” Maximoff captures my gaze. “You better choose medicine. Because if you don’t, I’m going to kick yourass.”

I almost let out a laugh, but I breathe deeper with him. And in the tender quiet, my fingers skate through his hair, down the angles of his cheekbone and jaw. To his neck that aches to unwind, and up again. Maximoff closes his eyes, relaxing into mytouch.

I pull him closer, a breath apart, and when his eyes melt into me, he whispers, “You know what’s strange? I havezerojob options, and you suddenly havetwo.”

I push back his hair, my fingers trailing down the back of his head. “Can’t be that strange, wolf scout,” I breathe. “I am better than you ateverything.”

His grip strengthens on my neck like he’s hanging onto what hasn’t changed.That.In years of time, that back-and-forth has neverchanged.

He breathes easier. “Tell me the plan formedicine.”

I’ve tried to explain what I’ve done in terms of medicine, but it’s confused him a little bit. I’ve graduated from medical school, and I’ve completed a month of myresidency.

“I need to finish my three-year residency at Philadelphia General. I also need to pass my USMLE exam andboards.”

He nods, confident. “You’ll doit.”

There’s something else. I haven’t thought about what returning to medicine means in terms of myfamily.

I didn’t want it to influence mychoice.

But now it slings back atme.

“And I need to talk to myfather.”

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