Page 30 of Off-Limits as Puck

“Honest. I’m being honest.” I stand too, maintaining distance but not backing down. “You want to talk about my issues? Fine. I can’t sleep because I see you leaving every time I close my eyes. I get angry because everyone else feels like settling for less. I have focus problems because you’re here, in my space, pretending we’re strangers.”

“We are strangers.”

“Bullshit.”

“One night doesn’t mean—”

“It meant everything.” The words explode out of me. “And you know it did. That’s why you ran. That’s why you’re terrified now.”

She backs up until she hits her desk. “You don’t know me.”

“I know you bite your lip when you’re nervous. I know you laugh with your whole body. I know you have a freckle shaped like—”

“Stop.”

“I know you’re scared of feeling too much, so you schedule and control and analyze everything to death. When’s the last time you just felt something without thinking it through?”

“That’s not—”

“When’s the last time you let someone in?”

“You’re one to talk.” She finds her fire, pushing off the desk.“Mr. Anger Management. Mr. Suspended-for-Violence. When’s the last time you dealt with a feeling that wasn’t rage?”

“Right now.”

That stops her. “What?”

“Right now. Looking at you. Wanting you so bad I can’t think straight but knowing I can’t have you. That’s a feeling I don’t know how to handle with my fists.”

The air between us crackles. She’s breathing hard, face flushed, looking like Chelsea instead of Dr. Clark for the first time since Vegas.

“This can’t happen,” she whispers.

“It already happened. We’re just dealing with the aftermath.”

“I could lose my job.”

“I could lose my career.”

“Then why—”

“Because you didn’t seem to mind how noncompliant I was in Vegas.”

The words hang between us, loaded with memory and promise. Her eyes darken, pupils dilating, and for a second I think she’s going to either slap me or kiss me.

Instead, she moves to the door, opening it with shaking hands. “Get out.”

“Chelsea—”

“Get. Out.”

I move toward the door but pause beside her. Close enough to feel her warmth, see the pulse hammering in her throat.

“This isn’t over,” I say quietly. “We both know it.”

“It has to be.”

“You bite your lip when you lie.”

---