“Yeah. No. I think I should warn you. Monica Mann should come with a warning label. Caution, Ice Queen on board. I cut guys out when they get too close.” Everyone knew that about her.
Trent ran his hand down her back, and hesitated on her hip before moving back up. “Am I getting too close?”
“You already broke through the imaginary line,” she said.
He brought both arms up to hold her face with his hands. “Uncharted territory?”
She nodded, the sheer terror of knowing she didn’t want him to leave unsettled her.
“I can deal with that. I want to deal with that,” he said.
“I’m scared.” Her words were barely above a whisper.
“Oh, Monica. Standing outside the door and wondering if you were ever going to open it… that was scary. This.” He kissed her briefly. “This isn’t scary at all.”
“What if this, the physical, is all we are?”
He laughed at that and let her go. “We can abstain. Test your theory.”
Monica was positive a look of absolute horror passed over her face. “No sex?”
“Sure.”
“You’re serious.”
He seemed to be liking the idea as the seconds ticked by. “Yeah. Why not?”
Had she ever had a romantic relationship without sex? Not since high school, and those dates didn’t really count.
“I like kissing you,” she confessed.
“Kissing isn’t sex,” he said and placed a hand on her arm.
“So kissing and holding, but no sex.”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “Yeah.”
“For how long?”
“Until you know this is more than just physical. Until you stop referring to yourself as the Ice Queen.”
Talk about uncharted territory. This was safer, somehow, and if their experiment didn’t work Monica would know that she hadn’t ruined him for other women.
She reached down and held his hand. “So, what do two people, who want to jump each other’s bones, but can’t, do on a Tuesday night?”
“I don’t know. What were you doing before I came over?”
“I had the TV on, but I was on the Internet.”
“Playing games?”
“No. I was searching for schools.”
The smile on his face fell. “You’re going to get your license back.”
She squeezed his arm. “I’m sure you’re right. I’m looking into going back to school, getting my masters in nurse practitioners. That way no one will ever be able to accuse me of working outside of my license again.”
He motioned toward the couch. “Show me.”
They walked to the couch and when she sat down beside Trent he pulled her into his side and looked over her shoulder as she showed him the different schools that offered NP classes. “At first I thought someplace close by. But I’m not going back to Pomona General. I can’t, not after all this.”
“So where are you thinking?”
“There are a couple places in San Francisco. I’m not sure if I’ll like living in the city and it’s so expensive.” She clicked the next page and Trent pointed at an East Coast location. “That’s close to our headquarters.”
Monica found herself grinning at him. “There’s always San Diego. Warm beaches. Sunshine.”
Trent clicked the page back to the East Coast selection. “Don’t be afraid of a little snow. Warm fires and hot cocoa. It’s an option.”
They spent the next couple of hours talking about schools, locations, all the while not having sex.
“I should get some sleep,” Monica finally said when it was close to midnight.
“That’s my cue, huh?”
Yet she didn’t want him to leave.
“I need to call a cab.”
“A cab?”
Trent itched the side of his face and glanced at the floor. “Yeah, I left my car at Joe’s.”
“The bar?”
“Yeah. Kind of a dive.”
“Very much a dive. What were you doing there?”
He still didn’t look at her. “I may have ‘accidentally’ run into Walt.”
“Accidentally?”
“And I may have told him that you and I hooked up and I was staying with you.”
She wanted to be mad at him, but his confession was said with such a cute face all she could do was grin. “Is that right?”
“And I may have had one too many and asked him to drive me here.”
“Wow. I’m impressed. Seems you got over the don’t tell white lies rule you had.” It was nice to know he worked so hard to find her.
“I guess I did.” He stood and stretched his arms over his head with a yawn.
The thought of him leaving emptied something inside her. “It’s late. Why don’t you just stay?”
He cocked his head to the side. “You sure?”
“Yeah. It’s not like we haven’t slept beside each other without… you know.”
“That would have proven difficult under the circumstances.”
She closed her laptop and set it aside. “If you want to go back to the hotel…”
“I didn’t say that.”
She wanted to clap but settled for a smile. “You can’t sleep naked. That would be like dangling a carrot before the horse.”
He lifted a brow. “A carrot?”