She rolled her eyes. “Please, you just got one of the most prestigious awards a plastic surgeon can get, and at what? Thirty-two? I’d say you have a good reputation, Doctor.”
My entire body came alive when she called me that. She’d never in all the weeks I’d known her—even the entire month we’d dated—called me “Doctor.”
I think my dick liked it a little too much.
My body was literally straining in her direction. And the throbbing I had been feeling in my nose very conveniently went somewhere else.
Hell.
“Okay.” Austin cracked her knuckles. “So, show me. I’m your patient, where do you cut?”
“Cut?”
“Slice.” She made a quick motion with the side of her hand. “You know, where do you cut the person open? How many incisions? How deep? Are you really tucking?”
“Whoa, that’s a lot of questions.”
“Give the readers what they want.”
“So,” I said, then licked my lips and leaned forward. We were inches apart as my pointer finger grazed her hipbone and moved inward. “Typically,” I said, my hands shaking, “I ask a patient where they wear their swimsuit bottoms or underwear, as most incisions are made too high.”
She gulped, “Oh.”
“So”—yeah, I was going to do it—“since you wear a lot of bikini-style underwear with the occasional boyshorts—”
“You remember my underwear?”
I didn’t dare look at her. “How could I not? One pair said ‘Slap me’ on the ass.”
She grinned at me, and I tried to fight the smile, but I couldn’t, not when it was Austin, not when I was touching her, when we were that close.
“What’s next?” Was it just me, or was her voice a bit breathless?
“Next”—I cleared my throat, keeping my hands pressed to her stomach—“I make the incision based on what I think garments will cover up.” I noticed her breathing pick up. “The central point of the incision has to be at least seven to nine centimeters above the top point of the . . . vulva.”
Her breath hitched as my hand moved from her stomach lower toward the juncture of her thighs.
“That’s very . . .” She gave me a once-over. “Technical.”
“Surgery usually is,” I answered. My hand hadn’t moved, but I wanted it to; I wanted to dip lower, to feel her heat, to kiss her senseless and forget about all the shit that was keeping us apart and just love her.
“I should go.” She didn’t move.
“You probably should, but . . .”
We were both silent; her eyes searched mine. “But?”
“You don’t have to.”
“I think I know what happens when I stay, and I don’t think I can stand your telling me that you only want to get laid when you meet me. So”—she put her feet on the ground—“I think I will go.”
My heart sank.
“Look on the bright side, you won’t have to ride with my dad tomorrow, since you have an injury.” She pointed at my nose, and I stood to walk her to the door, every step heavy with dread.
It was my fault.
And there was no way out of it.
“Honestly, I’d forgotten all about the bike ride,” I admitted. I’d been too focused on all things Austin and seeing my dad in the hospital.
She reached up and kissed me on the cheek and backed away, but not before I pressed my lips to her forehead.
“Bastard,” she grumbled.
“What?” Confused, I watched her grimace and then make a face of complete disgust.
“You!” Austin rammed her finger into my chest. Hard. “You aren’t allowed to do that anymore! It means something to me, the forehead kiss, okay? So don’t do it! Don’t, because it’s mean, and you’re mean, and it makes me forget that you broke my heart and stomped all over it and for some sick reason think that it’s super fun to repeat the process on a daily basis, and I really need to pass this class and get through these next few weeks without waking up in the middle of the night with a stupid ache in my chest that refuses to go away whenever I think about what happened between us—what broke, and why I wasn’t able to fix it.”
Completely stunned, I reached behind her, locked the door to my apartment, grabbed her hand, and led her away from the one and only exit.
“Thatch, what are you doing?”
I didn’t answer.
I was too angry at myself to answer, angry at the situation—pissed at my parents, and ridiculously enraged with hers.
When we reached my room, I shut that door too and drank her in. “If I told you I wanted to make love to you today and forget about it tomorrow, what would you say?”
“I’d say you were an asshole.”
I smiled at that. “But?”
“There’s always a ‘but’ with you,” she grumbled. “The small part of my heart that you still refuse to give back would probably jump with joy and make my life a living hell if I didn’t at least think about it.”
“Small part?”
“You choose to focus on that part rather than the thinking-about-sex part?”
“The heart matters more than sex.”
“Says the guy who said he just wanted to get laid.”
“I lied,” I admitted. “You know me better than that.”
“Words hurt regardless of whether you mean them, Thatch.”
“Stay.” I reached for her.
She jerked away. “And tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow, you can try to teach me how to ride a bike again.”
“I sense another ‘but.’”
“Don’t ask me why we broke up. I won’t tell you. And you’ll just get pissed. Trust that I’m protecting you in the only way that I know how.”
“And the cheating?” She just had to ask. “The reason you kissed Brooke?”
I shrugged. “I like kissing.”
“You’re an unbelievably horrible human being.”
“And yet you’re still thinking about it . . .” I smirked and started walking toward her. “About how good it was between us, about how good it could be tonight if you just say yes.”
Austin narrowed her eyes. “My hand is literally itching to slap you.”
“May make you feel better.” I shrugged.
I shouldn’t have given her the opportunity. Her hand went sailing through the air and met my cheek with such a loud slap that I stumbled to the side.
And then her little fists were beating at my back, shoving me against the nearest wall.
I let her.
And when she slowed down.
I swept in for the kill.
And kissed her.
Chapter Twenty-Two
AUSTIN
Thatch kissed a woman as if he knew her body better than she did. It was like his lips could sense the perfect amount of pressure to apply in any given kissing scenario. Moaning, gasping, begging for more weren’t just options; they were necessary.
It was survival.
I’d been a victim of his kisses.
Just like I’d been a victim of every inch of his sexual prowess, and I knew, if I didn’t stop the kiss, I would be a victim again.