“You’re going to save a lot of lives, aren’t you?”
He tosses me a smile. “That or I’ll be busy doing checkups. That’s the brunt of the work. It’s not as exciting as working in an ER, but it pays the bills.”
“It’s exciting to me,” I say, wrapping my arms around my neck.
He gazes down at me. “Promise me you’ll keep yourself fed.”
“I promise,” I whisper.
“You’ll sleep a solid eight hours a night,” he demands.
“Seven and a half,” I counter. “Maybe I can sleep here one or two of those nights?”
His arms drop from my body. “I’ll be on call, and I don’t want my phone waking you up.”
The excuse doesn’t sit with me, but I brush off my reservations.
He’s only looking out for me.
“I need to get to the clinic.” He presses a kiss to my mouth. “I’m not going to complain if you shoot me a text message now and again, FU.”
“One with a picture attached, maybe?”
Both of his eyebrows perk. “You’re going to distract me with a nude selfie, aren’t you?”
“Who knows?” I sigh. “You’ll just have to wait to see.”
He slaps my ass before he ushers me toward his apartment door. “You’ve made me hard, Faith. Now I have to ride the subway like this.”
I look down at the noticeable bulge in the front of his black pants. “Oops.”
We part just outside his door.
“I’ll miss you,” I say softly.
He reaches for my hand to kiss my palm. “Last night and this morning were a gift to me.”
They were a gift to me too, but before I can tell him that, he’s racing toward the open elevator doors without a single glance back in my direction.
Chapter Forty-Four
Matthew
I dart toward a lecture hall on the campus of NYU, cursing at my phone every step of the way.
I’ve been playing telephone tag with Faith for two days.
When she’s been in class, I’ve had a minute to talk to her, and when I’ve been engrossed with surgery or an appointment, she’s tried to reach out.
I’ve longed for the nude selfie she teased me with, but I’m glad in a way that she didn’t follow through. I don’t know how the hell I’d stay focused on work if I had that to stare at all day.
I round the corner and spot Erin standing alone gazing out of the window of the lecture hall.
Goddammit, I must have missed my chance. Class is already over.
I look down at the six yellow roses in my hand.
I picked them up for Faith because I read in her diary that yellow roses are her favorite.
In one of her first entries, from years ago, she wished that some sixteen-year-old kid would bring her some.
I’m stepping into his shoes to fulfill that dream.
I’m determined to make every dream she’s ever had a reality.
“Matt?” Erin calls my name as soon as she catches sight of me over her shoulder. “What are you doing here?”
I freeze.
I fucking freeze because I’m not ready to confess that I’m head over heels for one of her students.
“You do know that Delia hasn’t been enrolled here in more than two years, right?” She laughs. “I remember how you’d always buy her a few flowers to put a smile on her face.”
I did do that.
I did it when I was eighteen, and Delia had a bad day.
I did it when I was twenty-five, and Delia had a tough week.
And I did it the day she came back from Paris with her heart shattered.
I don’t correct Erin’s assumption.
“How are you?” I ask her to steer her in a direction far away from the flowers in my hand.
She moves toward me. The black skirt she’s wearing sways as she walks. “I’m so good, Matt.”
I have a feeling I know why. The brightness in her smile likely has a hell of a lot to do with the famous molecular biologist Faith told me about.
“For any particular reason?” I press.
Her hand reaches out so she can run a fingertip over one of the petals of a rose. “I finally found him.”
Him.
The guy she’s been searching for since I met her.
“You’re in love,” I say. “Erin, that’s amazing.”
“He’s incredible, Matt.” Tears brim in the corners of her eyes. “We have so much in common, and he loves me with so much force. I can feel it as soon as he walks into the room. It’s hard to explain.”
It’s not that hard to explain.
I love Faith with just as much force, with just as much heart.
She glances up at me. “In some ways, I owe it all to you.”
“No.” I shake my head. “This is all you, Erin. You were patient. You stayed the course, and you found him.”
“Because of the advice you gave me when you were…how old were you?” She laughs. “Eighteen or nineteen, I think.”
“Nineteen.”
Her gaze falls to the flowers. “Back then, I was so crazy about Jimmy Ferguson.”