Page 18 of Rescuing Dr. Marian (Made Marian Legacy #1)

“Foster?” Tommy’s voice cut through my spiraling thoughts. I looked up to find him standing beside my chair, most of the other instructors already heading out. There was something careful in his expression, like he was trying to read my mood. “You want to head back?”

I glanced around the nearly empty dining room, surprised to find that dinner was over and I’d barely touched my food.

Trace caught my eye and lifted his brow.

I gave Tommy a half smile. “Er, yeah. Let’s go.”

The walk back to Cabin 8 felt like the longest quarter-mile of my life. Chickie trotted between us, blissfully unaware of the tension crackling in the air. By the time we reached our door, my hands were sweating, and my heart was hammering against my ribs.

When Tommy opened the door, Chickie bounded inside and immediately collapsed on her spot in the corner, exhausted from the day’s excitement. Tommy stopped in the middle of the small space and turned to me until we faced each other like gunfighters at high noon.

“Listen,” I said, running a hand through my hair. “I’m sorry about?—”

He cut me off by holding up a hand. “I’m going to go stay at my sister’s and leave you in peace. I’ll be back in the morning for breakfast.”

The coldness in his voice, the exhaustion in his eyes—it was undoing me piece by piece. “Tommy—” I began, wondering how to beg him to stay without acting like I gave a single shit.

“I cannot stay here with you like this,” he continued, his voice low and intense.

“I have wanted you for six fucking months, Foster. And I get that you don’t want me back, okay?

” He stepped closer until I could see the flecks of gold in his hazel eyes.

“But nothing good will come of me staying here. Believe me.”

“Stay.” The word came out rougher than I’d intended. His proximity was making my brain blink and fizz. I couldn’t think when he was this close. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

Tommy’s eyes flashed. “Stay for what? Another evening of you pretending to be professionally indifferent?” He let out a humorless laugh. “Because I’ve gotta tell you?—”

I grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him in for a kiss, the kiss I’d waited a hundred and sixty-two days to repeat. A small, shocked sound escaped him, followed by the softest whimper.

And then his hands reached up and grabbed handfuls of my shirt to pull me in closer. The kiss deepened, and my blood roared.

How was it possible for this to be so good again? I’d replayed our other kisses so many times, I’d convinced myself I’d overblown them in my memory.

But I was wrong.

The grip I had on the back of his neck loosened so I didn’t hurt him, but the moment I eased up, he pulled me closer and made a frustrated sound in his throat. “Don’t fucking stop,” he urged against my lips.

My fingers slid through his hair as I pulled him into another kiss. This time, our tongues dueled, and I realized he didn’t seem to have any hesitation about kissing another man.

Absolutely nothing was holding Tommy back.

They say a peacefulness follows any decision, even the wrong one, and fuck was that true. Once my lips were on Tommy’s, once my hands were molding the trim muscles of his body, it was impossible to regret it.

I kissed him with reckless wonder. With months’ worth of pent-up frustration.

With a consuming need to brand myself on him permanently the way he’d done to me.

And with the knowledge, deep in my soul, that our parting was inevitable…

so I was going to take everything he had to give.

I’d soak in enough of his greedy fingers, his hot mouth, and his harsh moans of my name to last me a lifetime.

I’d enjoy every fucking second of the ride for as long as it lasted.

Tommy moved one of his hands down my chest to my stomach and then my hard cock. I jerked back in surprise while simultaneously groaning at his touch.

“Please,” he whispered, his breath warm against my lips. “I want you so fucking bad, I can’t sleep at night.”

“Tommy.” His name came out like a sigh of surrender, a warning, a plea all rolled into one.

“If you don’t want me, I’ll let it go,” he said. His forehead rolled against mine. “I promise. It will be the hardest fucking thing I’ve ever done, but I don’t want to make you miserable. You have to tell me if you don’t want this.”

I closed my eyes. With his hands on my skin and his body so close I could feel his heat, I had no concept of self-preservation. So I told him the truth.

“I want this,” I admitted, my voice barely audible. The confession felt like jumping off a cliff. “I’ve wanted you since that first night in Hawaii. Even when I thought you were married, even when I hated myself for it. ”

Something blazed in Tommy’s eyes—triumph, relief, pure desire. “Fuck, Foster?—”

“It can’t be more than this,” I added quickly, the words coming out harsh and desperate. “Sex. Hooking up. Whatever you want to call it. When SERA is over, you’re gone. I know that. You’ll be at your fancy job, and I’ll be back in Majestic, dealing with lost hikers and small-town bullshit.”

His hands moved back up my chest to my face. “Eight weeks.”

“Seven and a half.” I nodded once. “And then it’s over. No long-distance bullshit. No promises we can’t keep. You go to your city life, and I go home. Alone.”

His thumb traced my cheekbone, and I saw something flicker in his eyes—hurt, maybe, or disappointment. But then he nodded. “What if we?—?”

“No.” The word came out harder than I meant it to. “I can’t do maybes with you, Tommy. I can’t do hope. I’ve been down that road before with guys who lived somewhere else, and it nearly broke me.”

Tommy’s face darkened. “Matthew.”

He had no clue. Matthew leaving had been a paper cut. The brief flash of pain that came from ripping off a Band-Aid.

Losing Tommy—after a single fucking evening—was an aching wound that hadn’t healed.

I swallowed hard. “This is all I can give you. Take it or leave it.”

“I’ll take it,” he said, his voice rough with want. “I’ll take it, Foster. ”

Tommy’s thumb stroked across my cheekbone, his eyes were dark with promise, and I shuddered out a breath.

“This is such a fucking bad idea,” I said, even as my hands came up to rest on his waist. My fingers immediately snuck under the hem of his shirt to touch the same warm, golden skin I’d dreamed about since Hawaii.

“Maybe.” His smile widened, and for the first time since Hawaii, I saw the full force of Tommy’s charm directed at me. “But I’m tired of good ideas. They got me engaged to the wrong person and working a job I hated.”

Before I could voice any more doubts, Tommy rose up on his toes and kissed me again.

It was nothing like the desperate, hungry kisses we’d shared moments before. This was slow, deliberate, a question and an answer all at once. His lips were soft and warm, moving against mine with a confidence that made my knees weak.

I groaned and pulled him closer, my hands sliding up his back to tangle in his hair. He tasted like chocolate and mint but also like relief, like finally getting everything I’d been denying myself for the past six months.

When we finally broke apart, both breathing hard, Tommy rested his forehead against mine again.

“So,” he said, his voice slightly unsteady. “Eight weeks.”

“Seven and a half,” I corrected again, reminding us both that the clock had already started ticking.

But as Tommy smiled and leaned in to kiss me again, I found I didn’t care. Temporary was better than nothing. And, as my mom used to say, it would be a learning opportunity.

Maybe I’d learn Tommy wasn’t as special as I’d thought. That I’d been suffering the lingering effects of a terrible, tropical love fever that wouldn’t survive a month and a half in close proximity during a Montana summer. That I could scratch this itch and get Tommy out from under my skin.

Or maybe I was about to learn that some kinds of wanting only got stronger when you fed them.

Maybe I was about to discover just how much a heart could break when it had everything it wanted and then had to let it go.