Page 103 of Leave a Mark
“Did you have any tattoos back then?” he asked, hungry for every moment of her history. He was jealous of every minute she’d lived before he met her. If he lived to be ninety, it wouldn’t be enough time to know Wren Blanchard.
“I got my first tattoo at twenty.” She nodded proudly. “And I dropped out of UL at the end of that year.”
Lee was about to ask why when he caught himself. She’d used the difference in their educations as a wedge before. He wasn’t about to feed that insecurity.
“What did you do then?”
Her smile grew. “I started apprenticing with Rocky because I wanted to be a tattooist.”
“Apprenticing? Like… you didn’t get paid?”
Pride lit her smile. “Yeah, I waited tables at Agave and apprenticed for three years.”
“Wow, I’m impressed,” he said honestly.
Wren shrugged, ducking her chin. “It’s nothing compared to going to medical school.”
Lee shook his head. “I didn’t put myself through med school. I didn’t have to hold a job while I was learning my profession,” he said with humility. “I had Thomas Hawthorne for that.”
She searched his face. “Is that where you were when I was twenty?”
Her question sent a thrill down his chest. Her body had relaxed against his as they’d talked. Her tears had dried, and she seemed unburdened. Lee let go a sigh of relief and nestled them down deeper into her pillows, pulling her quilt over them.
At this, Wren reached back and turned off the light. She rolled back into him and hitched her left leg over his hip.
Lee bit back the moan this triggered and focused on answering her question. “When you were twenty, with half your head shaved and candy colors in your hair,” he said, running his fingers through her untamed waves, “I was in my fourth year of medical school, which is actually the best and easiest year.”
“Why’s that?” she asked in the darkness.
“Third year is the killer. That’s when your brain is about to explode from everything you’re supposed to be learning, and you’re working eighty-hour weeks for the first time and trying to impress everyone in the world so they’ll recommend you for a residency.” He paused to find her face in the dark with his lips. He tasted the softness of her cheeks and kissed the flutter of her eyelashes. “Fourth year is about applying for residencies, but you get to travel and have a social life again. It’s like an oasis.”
Lee felt her fingertip meet his chest, and she began to trace an invisible design on his skin. The sensation made him inhale sharply and close his eyes.
“Were you single then?”
“Y-yes. I mean, I went on dates, but I wasn’t with anyone. Too much going on.”
Her finger circled his left nipple, just under her tattoo, and adorned it with imaginary curlicues.
“That feels amazing, by the way.”
“Does it? I had no idea.”
He could hear the smile in her voice, and he took it as an invitation to let his fingers make their own journey. At her shoulder, he found the ruffles of her sleeveless nightgown and followed them down over the curve of her breast. The tremors in her words served as his reward.
“A-and it’s easier to date someone now?”
“It will be in about a week,” he said, feeling the contour of her waist through the impossibly thin gown.
“What happens then?” Wren sounded almost breathless, and Lee needed to rein them both in.
He’d told her that sleeping in bed next to her was all he needed, and that was the truth. Of course, he wanted more, and perhaps she did too, but his desire could wait for another day.
“My residency ends,” he said, pressing a chaste kiss to her forehead. He took a deep breath and concentrated on keeping his hands still. “I’ll start working for UMC as an attending in June, and my schedule will be a little better.”
“Better how?”
“Less hours. More days off. Plus, I’ll get a few weeks off before I start.” As soon as the words left his mouth, Lee knew what he wanted. “Wanna go somewhere with me?”
