She was crying.
Over a kiss.
She squeezed her eyes shut so he wouldn’t see, but it was no use. Her tears spilled over, dampening his fingertips where they caressed her cheek.
“Don’t cry, sweetheart,” he whispered against her mouth. Then he made a slow, lazy trail over her bottom lip with the pad of his thumb, sending shivers through her entire body. “I’m perfectly fine and honestly, it was worth falling out of a tree to get you into my bed. I should probably send Fancy a thank-you note.”
She laughed, and he pressed gentle kisses to her tear-stained cheeks. But suddenly, his tenderness wasn’t quite enough. She wanted more of Jack Cole. She didn’t just want calm and collected. She wanted the brave, burning heart that beat inside a man who wasn’t afraid to walk through fire. She wanted the aching kind of passion that she’d never let herself experience with anyone else.
She wanted all of him.
So she balled the front of his hospital gown into her fist as their kisses grew deeper, needing something to hold on to—something to anchor her into this moment, lest she lose herself.
Too late, she thought, I’m already lost.
And she finally understood what Alice and Sarah had been trying to tell her at knitting class the night before.
You’ve got to let go...sometimes whatever we’re creating doesn’t turn out the way we planned. It might look different from anything we’ve imagined, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t good or valuable.
She’d made a life for herself in Lovestruck, and it didn’t look anything at all like the life she’d had planned. It didn’t look anything like the life the email in her in-box was promising. And that was okay.
Because right then, with Jack’s hands buried in her hair and his bold, heroic heart beating fiercely against hers, it looked even better.
A soft knock on the door to Jack’s hospital room put an abrupt end to the kiss Jack felt like he’d been waiting on for a lifetime. But that was okay—the kiss had definitely been the beginning of something, not the end. And he supposed he could tolerate the interruption if it meant he might be able to go home.
“Come in,” he said, biting back a smile as Madison scrambled out of the bed and smoothed down her dress.
“Good morning, Lieutenant.” The nurse who’d been looking after him since he’d first been brought to his room was still on duty. She winked at Madison. “And good morning to you, too, Ms. Jules. Or should I address you as Queen Bee?”
Jack’s headache returned with a vengeance.
Somehow, he’d managed to conveniently forget about his alter ego since he’d fallen out of the tree and hit his head. Perhaps not entirely, but Fired Up in Lovestruck’s antics had certainly taken a backseat in light of recent events. The respite was apparently over though, and all too soon.
“Please call me Madison.” She let out a little laugh and shook her head. “It’s so strange that you know who I am. Until a few days ago, no one did. Not even anyone in Lovestruck.”
“Oh, believe me. All the nurses here know exactly who you are. We saw you on that morning show, and practically the entire hospital has been talking about it nonstop. Have you identified that big jerk who’s been writing the letters yet? What was his name again?”
Big jerk? Jack coughed. The nurse glanced at him, but her attention moved swiftly back to Madison.
“Fired Up in Lovestruck.” Madison rolled her eyes. “And no, we haven’t a peep from him lately. Actually, the reporter who gave me a ride to the hospital last night wants to try and find him so he can convince him to come out of hiding. I’m just not so sure that’s a good idea.”
It was a terrible idea—the worst Jack had ever heard. Thank goodness he wasn’t hooked up to a heart monitor or else alarms would have been sounding all over the building.
He shifted in the bed, and Madison and the nurse both eyed him with concern.
“Oh, no. You’re as white as a sheet all of a sudden.” Madison’s eyebrows drew together. “I thought you were feeling better.”
“It looks like it’s time for another neuro observation,” the nurse said, pulling a checklist and a penlight from the pocket of her scrubs.
He held up a hand. “Ah, can it wait a second?”
He needed to talk to Madison in private. Immediately, even if it meant laying all his cards out right there in his hospital room.
“No, it cannot. The queen is right. You look terrible.” The nurse glanced down at the checklist and back up at him. “Can you tell me your name?”
Fired Up in Lovestruck. What would happen if he just blurted it out? He’d rather do a slo-mo walk through a burning building drenched in kerosene. “Jack Cole.”
The nurse checked off a box on her list. “And your date of birth?”
He sighed mightily. “Is this really necessary?”
“I’m going to tell you the same thing that I told you last night when you didn’t want to spend the night here—yes, it is.” The nurse arched a brow. “Your birthdate?”
“I should probably go. It looks like you have a lot going on here, and I have work in a little while.” Madison waved a hand in the general direction of the door.
“No!” Jack sat up ramrod straight. Thankfully, his head felt much better this morning, so sudden movement no longer had him wincing in pain. “Stay, please.”
She gave him a slow smile that built until it bloomed into a joyous grin. “Okay. I can probably stay for another hour or so before I have to head back to Lovestruck and get to the office. I’ll just run and get a cup of coffee from the cafeteria while you finish up here.”
And then with a flippy little wave she was gone, and Jack could only hope
