Page 61 of Remember Me

It wasn’t a question, and I was okay with that.

“I care not about lost firsts, but I will fight, knuckles bloody and teeth sharpened, for your lasts.”

Tyler Knott Gregson

December 14¦Birdie

IWAS HOT WHENIAWOKE, REMNANTS OF A DREAM CLINGING AND BRIDGING THE GAP BETWEEN CONSCIOUSNESS AND SLUMBER.

No, not a dream. A memory.

A sexy one.

So, I was hot. Bothered. Burning up. Aching and unfulfilled and desirous of companionship. Specifically, I wanted Hayes.

My unexpected remembrance had shown me what I was missing. It had revealed our vulnerability with each other, our devotion. I loved him. I remembered, but more — I knew. The knowledge settled deep within me, sweet and painful all at once.

I had been so awful. So distant. So cool.

It wasn’t that I had set out to deliberately hurt him. On an academic level, I knew that my feelings, or lack thereof, were appropriate to the circumstances. And I knew Hayes understood. But now I saw his pain, knew from where it stemmed, and the realization triggered shame.

I didn’t bother getting dressed. I climbed out of bed, realizing with a distant pleasure that for once, nausea wasn’t sitting on my shoulder demanding a cracker. I glanced into rooms as I passed by, looking for Hayes, but he wasn’t in any of them. I needed him. Needed to tell him everything I had remembered, everything I had realized.

In the kitchen, I forced myself to pause and fix myself a cup of tea, knowing I needed something in my stomach before the nausea decided to return. I blew gently across its steaming surface, waiting for it to cool enough to drink.

The elf was sitting in front of me on the island, tucked carefully inside a champagne glass. I picked it up, wondering what on earth this represented.

That was when I heard it: a mutedthwack, deliberate and oddly rhythmic. It was coming from the side of the house. I set the elf down and carried my tea to that section of the porch while I looked for the source of the sound.

It wasn’t difficult to pinpoint. Hayes stood over a stump, upon which a segment of log had been placed end to end. In defiance of the forty degree temperature, he was naked from the waist up, and as I watched he swung an ax in an arc over his head, bringing it down across the center of the log to neatly bisect it.

Thwack.

I leaned against a column at the steps and watched, riveted. His back glistened with sweat even in the chilly morning air, lats and deltoids bunching and rippling with each movement. After chopping each log, he picked up each half with a single hand, tossing it with ease to a growing pile several feet away.

I’d never thought of firewood as sexy, but watching Hayes was fast changing my opinion.

I wanted him. The awareness annihilated the remains of the defenses I’d kept stubbornly raised since awakening in the hospital, sent them crashing to the porch. Watching him did nothing to curb the flush of heat I’d awoken in. My eyes traced the heavy, powerful lines of his body with a hunger I couldn’t ignore. Broad shoulders tapered to a narrow waist and lean hips. The globes of his buttocks were rounded and strong inside the worn jeans he wore, and I stared. Was it weird of me to want to curl my hand around him? To squeeze?

A fresh log was on the stump. As I watched, he swung the axe up and behind him, his right hand sliding along the shaft toward the axe head. He made a circle as he brought the ax back down, his hand sliding to meet his left at the base of the handle. Every muscle in his body worked in concert to create the action and effect the result. It was a symphony of movement.

He was beautiful.

He was mine. All I had to do was choose him the way I wanted to be chosen. Choose him today, and every day. Embrace him as fiancé and father and eventually husband. I had no reason not to do so, and every cause to love and let him love me.

At that moment Hayes half-turned, searching for another log to split, and caught sight of me standing on the porch. I brought the mug of tea to my lips and blew across the surface of the steaming liquid, allowing my eyes to drift down his body.

His regard curious and assessing, he stood straighter under my perusal, his chest rising and falling with exertion and, if I was lucky, something more.

Excitement roared through me at this arrested expression, and I let the tip of my tongue swipe at the corner of my lips. With exaggerated care, I turned and bent from the hips to place my mug on the porch. I flicked a glance over my shoulder, as if to ask, “coming?”

Then I asked, “Coming?”

I heard the dull thunk of the ax as he tossed it to the ground.

I heard the scuff of his boots on the winter grass as he stalked toward me.

I felt his heat at my back as he caught up to me inside the door and closed the distance between us.

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