Tempted by Dr. Off-Limits

He was still coming to terms with what Janine had told him this last time they’d met.

Fitz was still lost in his thoughts as he split off from the soldiers heading out of the front door for the coaches, and instead strode out of the side door of the hangar, which led to the senior officers’ parking area. And then he saw her in front of him, resting, in civvy clothes that reminded with startling clarity of that first night, on the bonnet of her car.

He stopped dead, then slowly, very slowly managed to instruct his legs to work again as he walked up to her.

‘Major.’

‘Colonel.’

That slight quirk of her mouth tugged at his chest.

‘Elle.’

‘Fitz.’

She walked around to the driver’s door, letting herself in and clipping her seatbelt on. When he still hadn’t moved, she lowered the window.

‘Are you getting in or not?’

So calm, and cool, as though she knew exactly what she was doing and wasn’t plagued by even one of the doubts that collided inside his head. She made him want to believe it would all be okay. She made him want to see himself through her eyes.

She made him want to be the man she saw through her eyes.

The piece of paper with her address on it fluttered in the breeze, still held in his fingers. He smiled wryly and passed it through the window to her before opening the boot and putting his pack in. By the time he slid into the passenger seat, she had already started the engine.

‘So,’ she asked a few minutes later as she pulled away from the gatehouse and onto the main road, ‘were you going to use it?’

‘Your address? I honestly don’t know,’ he answered. ‘I kept telling myself to be a better man and let you go, but I suspect I couldn’t have stayed away for the entire two weeks.’

She didn’t answer at first, then she dipped her head in a simple nod.

‘Good.’

He let her drive, watching out of the window thoughtfully. It was only when she pulled up in a quiet road and he saw the house numbers that he realised they matched the address on the paper. She’d brought him to her home.

It gave him an irrational surge of satisfaction.

Her smile was like a beacon of light as she unclipped her seatbelt and, wordlessly, he followed her into her house. He couldn’t help taking everything in, from the muted, sophisticated colour scheme on the walls and floor to the vibrant splashes of colour in fun paintings or soft furnishings. It was all so essentially Elle. Every last photograph, every last knick-knack—not that there were many of either—but the selective few only emphasised her personality all the more. Her home reflected every different facet of her personality, solid and consistent yet quirky and dynamic.

Oddly, it felt like the closest thing to a home he’d ever known, and he’d barely been here for a few minutes.

It only made him want to be with her all the more.

‘About Janine—’ he began, but Elle silenced him.

‘I don’t want to know about your past. At least, not right now. You still have stuff to work through and, since I thought about it, so do I. I’ve already told you that you can’t underestimate guilt, Fitz. Believe me, I know how complicated and confusing it can be. But what I want to know is if you want us to work through it together. I want to know if you see a future for us.’

‘I don’t know how to build a future with someone—my whole adult life all I’ve ever concentrated on is my career, or it was until you came along—but I want to try. For the record, I never said it back that day but I know I love you. I just don’t know if love is enough.’

‘That’s still a great start.’ Her breath whooshed out as she took a step towards him.

‘But is it enough?’

‘Who knows? It will be if we want it to be. It will depend on us, I guess.’

He wanted to believe as she did. More than anything.

‘And if it falls apart?’ He barely recognised the strangled voice as his, echoing all the fears in his soul. ‘If I can’t be the man you need, the man you deserve, if it’s not in my DNA?’