A Brush with Love(8)

Dan closed his eyes and blew out a breath. He’d done it wrong. Again. What should have been an oozy mixture was a solid block in the tray, not budging against the plastic teeth. He’d moved too slowly, the alginate setting before he even had a chance to use it.

It was a rerun of every other lab experience. He would sit and watch his classmates pick up techniques and perfect procedures while he fumbled his way through the lab manual, botching every assignment in an endless parade of frustration and failure with just enough embarrassment for it to physically hurt. But suffocating guilt and familial duty always stopped him from quitting.

“Try again.”

Dan opened his eyes. Harper was looking at him, her deep brown eyes warm and crinkled at the corners with a gentle smile. She touched his wrist, making the hair on his arm stand up straight. He felt the warmth of her fingers through her gloves, and the sensation coursed up his arm in a golden buzz.

He nodded, flicking the rubbery material out of the tray, and started again.





CHAPTER 4





HARPER

Harper held her breath as she watched Dan mix the alginate for the sixth—no, seventh—time.

Brow furrowed in concentration, he scooped it out and filled the impression tray, moving with a new, fragile confidence that made a balloon of pride float into her chest. He stood behind the dummy and slid the tray into place. His eyes met hers, and she felt almost as desperate as he looked for this try to work.

The defeat bruising his face after that first attempt had fissured through her heart so deeply, she actively resisted the urge to push his hands away and do it for him while simultaneously cradling his troubled, gorgeous face against her chest and whispering that it would all be okay.

She’d settled on gentle encouragement, thinking face cradling was slightly in the realm of inappropriate lab behavior. She ducked her head to look into the mannequin’s mouth, taking careful note of the angle of his hands holding it in place. She nodded at him and smiled.

“I have a good feeling about this one.”

His eyes lifted to hers for an anxious moment before returning to bore into the dummy as though glaring at it hard enough would force it to cooperate. She took a moment to observe the tight clench of Dan’s chiseled jaw, the tension in his broad shoulders as he held his fingers against the tray in the dummy’s mouth, small knots of muscle rising gently along his forearms in focus and frustration.

“Here, just…” She pressed against Dan’s side, sliding one arm along his and moving the other beneath his chest to meet his long fingers on the other side. She gently moved to relax the angle and pressure of his fingers, twining theirs together in a way that felt far too familiar while they waited for the alginate to settle.

The proximity slapped her senses, every nerve ending bubbling up in a golden pop of excitement where her body pressed against his side. Harper could feel Dan’s eyes on her, but she kept her gaze fixed on the dummy. Dan shifted on his feet, and her heart pounded against the side of his broad chest. Her palms were clammy in the latex gloves, and she felt her fingers buzzing and humming where they twisted with Dan’s.

She heard him swallow and couldn’t help but glance up. His eyes were hot and bright as they roamed her face.

It was overwhelming and intense—far too intimate while not being intimate enough. It didn’t feel possible to look away.

“This is probably set,” she whispered.

“Okay.” He didn’t move.

They stared at each other for another moment before Harper sucked in a deep breath and dropped her arms, stepping away. She felt the immediate loss of the closeness and wanted it back. Dan looked at her for a second longer before straightening up and rolling his shoulders.

Harper tugged at her hair, the delicate pull working to center her ceaselessly frazzled nerves. She watched as Dan pried the tray out of the dummy’s mouth. He stared at it for a moment, tilting it at various angles before thrusting it at Harper.

The look he gave her was so vulnerable, it made her heart stutter. She took the finished product and held it under the station’s fluorescent light. Her eyes traveled over the canyons punctuating the mold, small peaks and deep valleys dancing across in the familiar pattern of anatomy. No air bubbles. No voids. Her heart swelled then exploded in tooth-shaped confetti.

“It’s perfect.” She beamed at him.

“Really?”

Relief flooded Dan’s features, and a lopsided smile broke across his face. He closed the distance between them and enveloped Harper in a hug. She gave a squeak of surprise as his arms wrapped around her. He pulled back to grin even broader down at her. She stared at her hand and wondered how it had made its way to his cheek, framing that ridiculous dimple. Harper couldn’t seem to move it. Dan didn’t seem to mind.

“I’m really proud of you.” She was surprised by how genuinely she meant it.

“Couldn’t have done it without your help.” Their gazes held for a second too long. At the same moment, they felt the familiarity of their closeness collide with the sharp reality of being near-strangers to each other.

Harper cleared her throat, and Dan dropped his hands from around her body. She attempted a casual eye-roll and gave his cheek a gentle, old-lady pat before moving back to her seat, Dan following.

“I would say you’ve officially joined the ranks of the lab goddesses.”