Page 109 of The Potter

She snorts out a bitter laugh. “Why can’t you just say what you mean? Why do always have to be drunk to say what you really feel?”

“You don’t want to know how I really feel.”

Suddenly, we’re chest to chest, each of us panting against the other.

“Yeah, I think I do, Dr. Potter.” Her eye twitches as her hands ball at her sides. “Don’t be shy now.”

She tries shoving me, and I grab her wrists. “Okay, fine.” Fuck it. “I love you, goddammit!” I yank her to me. “I don’t want to know you’re happy here with fuckboy. I want to sling you over my shoulder and drag you from this shithole and back to Bloomfield, where you belong. In. My. Bed.” I drop one of her hands and grip her chin. “You were mine the minute you insulted me.”

Her lips twitch as she fights off a smile. “And you were going to what? Bow out like a gentleman since I didn’t answer you?”

There it is, that bullshit that pushes my buttons, inciting a level of excitement than can only be worked out between the sheets. “I was trying to do the right thing.” My lips hover over hers.

“Never take no for an answer, Dr. Potter. I thought you would have learned that by now.”

I smash my lips against hers, my hands roaming around to her backside as I soak up every inch of her that I’ve missed.

Finally, I come up for air with reality settling in. “Hollywood could use another plastic surgeon, don’t you think?”

Pressing a finger to my lips, she shakes her head. “No, I think you’re right where you belong in Bloomfield.”

“But…”

How am I supposed to see her and run my practice in Texas at the same time?

“I’m coming home, Dr. Potter.”

I rear back. “To Bloomfield?”

She nods. “I might have gotten fired for punching my producer in the face.”

“Oh, shit,” I lift her in my arms in this ridiculously small bathroom, “you are vicious. Does that mean we can get out of here before we’re eaten up by bedbugs?”

She slaps my chest and presses her lips to mine. “On one condition.”

Vance

Two years later…

“Iwon’t say I’ll miss you.”

“Vance!”

Halle smacks my arm, and I grin at the little prick in front of me, his arms stacked with boxes.

Remington can barely see over the top of the cardboard when he stops in the center of the room and unceremoniously drops them. “Fuck you, Potter. No one is missing your hateful ass, either. I feel sorry for Hal having to stomach you all alone.”

I cast a wicked grin at Halle, who has decided to fret over the packed dishes that Remington likely broke by dropping the shit on the floor. “Oh, she’ll stomach me a lot more now that you’re out of the house.”

“You’re disgusting,” he notes, grinning, not offended in the least. This sort of talk, we’re used to. It’s how we’ve managed not to kill each other all this time.

“And you’re a pain in my ass. Happy college life, kid.” I pull out the package in my jacket pocket—a box of condoms—and toss it to him. “Don’t knock up anyone. Babies are expensive, and so are you. I can only afford one.”

Halle frowns at me then at Remington. “I’ll never understand your relationship. You would think you two hate each other.”

Maybe at first, we did.

Like me, Remington is a sucker when it comes to persuasion by a certain blonde. When it came time to leave California, Halle refused to leave Remington at the squatty motel. He tried arguing, but when Halle started crying, he got in the car like a good little boy.

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