The Exception by Lauren H. Mae

Twenty-six

Trav set the lantern on the dock railing and took a deep pull of the lake air. He could still feel water sloshing around in his ear from his last wipe out on the skis and it made him feel like a kid on summer vacation.

Footsteps crunched in the dirt behind him, and he turned to see Sonya approaching on the footpath with her own flashlight tucked under her arm. She had a glass of wine and the neck of a beer bottle in one hand, the baby monitor in the other.

“Romantic,” she said, nodding at the blanket he’d laid out on the dock. The one he’d swiped from the back of the couch to keep splinters from their asses. It suddenly looked like a lame-ass attempt impressing her. Smooth, Trav.

“I wasn’t trying to—”

She smiled, handing him the beer. “At ease, soldier.” She sat cross-legged on one end and he took the other. “This is nice.”

“It is.” He took a small sip of the beer. His body was already on high alert with this ambiance he’d inadvertently created, and the last time he and Sonya shared drinks, it turned out very well for him, and very poorly for them. Their friendship. The one she wanted to maintain status quo on.

Even after a weekend spent basically proving that she was his dream woman, and an evening acting out the sort of future he’d always wanted, he was still committed to doing the right thing here.

But, fuck, it was getting harder by the minute.

“Thank you for staying behind with me to babysit.”

He chuckled into his beer bottle. “You think I’d go out with your friends and leave you here alone?”

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t have blamed you. I told you, I know what it’s like not knowing anyone. I’m glad y’all are getting along.” Her eyes snapped to his, widening with some sudden realization. “They’re being cool, right?”

He suppressed a smile at the fake hazing Adam had led yesterday. Even if it had been for real, he would have gladly endured it. Sonya deserved a pack of friends who had her back. She deserved everything.

“Of course,” he said. “Your friends are cool. So tell me why you empathize so much with my ‘new kid in town’ plight.”

She propped the monitor up against a deck chair and stretched out onto her back, staring up at the stars. They were like silver dust on a blue carpet, and it reminded him of the mountain villages in Afghanistan, where the nights were so pitch black that every star had its own piece of the stage.

“I’m an Air Force brat,” she said. “I lived on lots of different bases when I was a kid.”

“For real?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Wow. I guess I can see you being a military kid, you’re more straightlaced than me—” She poked him in the side and he took that as an invitation to sprawl out on his belly beside her. “I guess I’m just surprised it hasn’t come up yet. We’ve talked a lot about Frank. Now I see the connection, why you care so much.”

“I care about all of my patients,” she said, maybe too quickly.

“I know. But you’ve got a soft spot for him, same as me.”

She lifted one of her braids between her fingers, twisting. “Having soft spots isn’t good for anybody. And it’s not something that’s encouraged.”

A few weeks ago he would have let her slink back behind that professional wall, but they were way past pretense. “Maybe not, but it’s human.” He paused, and when she didn’t fire back, he took a chance. “Did your dad have trouble coming home? Like Frank?”

“Not exactly like Frank. But interpersonal relationships were… affected.”

He nodded at the water, thinking. “The best relationships are always under construction.”

“That’s very insightful.”

“I stole it from my therapist.”

She turned her head to look at him and the moonlight draped over her cheekbones, making her skin glow. “I heard you tell Frank that you talked to someone.”

“I’d already made a mess of a lot of my interpersonal relationships by the time I joined up, which made coming home pretty lonely.”

He thought of the night before he was to fly home to D.C., of how he’d been more terrified than his first time being dropped in a warzone. Over those fourteen years, he’d built real bonds, finally found his place, and coming back home felt like being introduced to an alien planet. Alone. He’d changed, but everything here was the same. Hence his decision to dive head first into a new career, a new neighborhood.

New friendships.

“It was good to have someone to talk to,” he said. “My best friend Mike lives a ways away. Most of my other buddies are still deployed.”

“Your dad’s here.”

He scoffed. “And you’ve met him.”

“Touché.” She blew out a breath, and had she moved closer? “I always thought that if my dad had talked to someone, things would have been different for us.”

“Is that why you went into psych?” She’d avoided that question earlier and he was good enough at this by now to see there was a reason for it.

“Partly. What about you? Why paramedic school?”

He shrugged and sipped his beer. “I’m addicted.”

She arched an eyebrow. “To what?”

“The adrenaline. Always have been, and I’m good under pressure because of it. I’m going to take that and do something good with it.”

She seemed intensely interested in that answer. She turned her head, exposing her neck and the curve of her shoulder to the moonlight. He fully admitted it was weak, but he couldn’t stop himself from staring.

“I think maybe you’re addicted to the good too,” she whispered.

He swallowed, letting his gaze drift down her arm to her hand flat on the blanket between them. He moved his closer until the tips of their fingers touched. “Why?”

“Everything you do has someone else’s good in mind. You’re nothing like what your dad thinks. You’re good with the patients. With Frank.” She smiled. “With little babies.”

He chuckled. “Who doesn’t love little babies?”

The look on her face said she wasn’t leaving it at that, but before she could analyze him any more, a low whine sounded from the baby monitor and they both bolted upright, holding their breath.

Lucia kicked her feet and made a fist, then just as quickly drifted back to peaceful sleep.

Back to just him and Sonya. He glanced sidelong to see her staring out at the water, her bottom lip between her teeth. She had to be thinking the same thing he was, that this tension between them wasn’t easing no matter how hard they ignored it.

He understood her hesitation. If he were Sonya, he wouldn’t take the risk either. But he wasn’t Sonya and he’d learned some hard lessons about putting things off until some undetermined “later.” Maybe he should suck it up until his internship was over, ask her out a few months from now, but then this moment right here would be wasted.

The sound of a party happening somewhere across the lake drifted over the water. Music, laughter. The entire night, hell the entire trip, felt like a set-up for them to fail at keeping things platonic. He’d never been afraid to fail if taking the chance was worth it. This was worth it. She was worth it.

Taking it for the sign it had to be, he got to his feet and offered her his hand. “Dance with me.”

She raised an eyebrow at him and his heart slammed in his chest. “Here?”

“Yes. On this dock, under this moon.”

“I thought you said you weren’t trying to be romantic.” She was trying to be a smart-ass but her voice was weak and it was doing things to him.

“Would it be horrible if I was?”

A parade of emotions crossed her expression before she finally took his hand and stood, her chest flush with his.

When she set her cheek on his shoulder, he dipped his head to whisper in her ear. “This is stupid.”

“What is?”

She knew exactly what he meant or she would have challenged him. It only pushed him to get this out in the open. He laced their fingers and set his other hand on her back, turning her slowly to the music. “Pretending I don’t want to take this further. You’re a good friend, Sonya, but I’d be lying if I said friendship was what I think about when I look at you. Staying on my side of this line we’ve drawn is torture.”

Her mouth hovered over his collarbone and he felt it when she spoke again. “We drew it for a reason.”

“I can’t for the life of me remember what that reason was.”

“Trav—”

“Can I kiss you again? Maybe the reason will come back to us.”

She tilted her chin, her eyes hooded. “I really, really doubt it will.”

He lowered his head as she pushed to her toes, parting those pretty lips, then before either of them could rethink it, he slanted his mouth over hers, sighing like a starving man at a buffet when he tasted her again.

He remembered everything now. Not why they shouldn’t, but all the reasons why denying this was a failed mission from the beginning. Her mouth on his felt like a paddle to the chest. That same adrenaline he’d admitted to chasing coursed through his body, but on the heels of the rush was a longing he couldn’t ever remember feeling for a woman. For anything, really.

Sonya parted her lips, and their tongues met immediately, but just like before, she let him take control. Even when she was kissing him, she was letting herself be kissed. He had an aching feeling that he was on a very small list of people who saw this side of her, this part of her that needed something and showed it. And because the thing he needed was to be needed, the connection burned so much brighter.

“I still can’t remember,” he said, smiling against her mouth.

She laughed, completely unrestrained, and his last shred of discipline fell away. They were absolutely doing this.

He banded an arm around her waist, hugging her to him while he dove back into that pretty mouth. He couldn’t get enough, and clearly she couldn’t either because her hands wrapped around the back of his head, holding him to her.

“You definitely still have that trouble switch, soldier,” she said, her words muffled against his mouth.

He slid his hands beneath her, lifting her into his arms. “That’s not my trouble switch,” he said, rolling his hips. “I’m just happy to see you.”

Sonya fell into a fit of giggles and he was torn between wanting to keep them coming and wanting to get his tongue back in her mouth. He took the opportunity to slide a hand beneath her shirt, stroking the warm skin of her back, and her laughter melted into a sigh of pleasure.

She wrapped her legs around his waist as he hoisted her up higher, groaning at the friction. Their kisses were getting sloppier, needier. Her hands were all over him, on his chest, in his hair. When she bit his bottom lip, he was done for. “We need to get horizontal.”

“Yes,” she said, kissing him again.

“Preferably not on this dock.”

Sonya pulled away, glancing over her shoulder at the baby monitor. “I wonder if she’s a sound sleeper.” She giggled again. “Oh my God. We’re such bad babysitters.”

“Nah, she’s good.” He nodded at the black and white image of a peacefully sleeping baby. “We’ll bring it. My room or yours?”

“Definitely mine. It’s farther away from—”

The sound of a car door made her jump in his arms, and he nearly tripped over the blanket. “Woah,” he said, his heart pounding. “We almost just took a swim.”

“Shhh.” She pressed her fingers to his lips. “Did you hear that?”

“Yeah, but it can’t be them. It’s only been…” He shifted her weight to look at his watch. “Oh, shit. It’s midnight.”

“Nooo,” she whined. “No, no, no.”

Her forehead fell to his shoulder in defeat, and he had to agree. Their timing sucked.

“It’s fine,” he said. “We’ll go be social for a few, and wait for them to go to bed. It can’t be that long.”