Leaving Amy (Amy #2) by Julieann Dove Page A

okay.” I glanced at Mark. His eyes were tired and his lips seemed glued shut…in the shape of a frown.
    Mark didn’t say anything on the way there. I knew he was saving it all for when we were alone. Lucky me. Just do it, already. Smack me around a little bit for being a schmuck and delivering that horrible note. Pull out the tiny hairs next to my ears—the ones that make your eyes water if the hairbrush gets a little tangled in that area. Just do something more than look at me with the pit of sorrow in the pupils of his eyes. It wasn’t my fault he was moving to Chicago. I didn’t make a call to a friend, who knew of a guy, who would be quitting in the next day or so.
    When we made it there, I walked toward the corner of the boathouse for my flogging. It was damp in there. The dark boards allowed little light to shine through. And it smelled like wet bird feathers. I tried not to turn up my nose. I didn’t want it to be construed as the feelings I had about this impromptu discussion.
    “Amy.”
    Oh, gosh. I loved and hated the way he said my name. There used to be so much joy in hearing him say it. Now it echoed like death in this dank structure.
    “Before you say anything, Mark, I’m sorry for the note. I know it was immature and completely not cool to have it delivered. And then to leave so you couldn’t see me.” I looked at my feet. They didn’t know where this was going either. All they did was keep pressing harder on the knots in the wood. “It was stupid.”
    “No, what was stupid was me taking a job in Chicago. Especially without talking to you first about it.”
    Okay, so this was not what I was expecting. He was taking the blame? True, it was his fault, but I thought we were discussing my handling of the situation. Good to know I wasn’t the worst one in the room.
    “That would’ve been nice.” I looked at where he stood motionless.
    “I don’t know what was going through my mind.”
    He was doing such a nice job of beating himself up, it made me want to protect him from further browbeating of himself.
    “What was going through your mind was being the chief of neurology, Mark. Someone flashed a dream job in front of you and you acted on it. I don’t fault you for that.”
    He stepped closer to me, reaching out to me—his hand slid behind my damp hair and cupped the back of my neck. “You must be cold. Here, put on my coat.”
    He slipped off his coat and draped it around my shoulders. I was caught in his trance.
    “Amy, I would never do anything that would result in losing you. You know that, don’t you?”
    “I do.”
    This is the part where I melted into a puddle by looking into his baby-blue eyes and forgot just where Chicago was. Forgot that being a new chief meant never being home. Forgot that I had no friends or life there…. Forgot all the dreams of a future I thought we’d have.
    “In fact, I thought it would be healthy for our relationship to move away from here.”
    “What? How could it be healthier in Chicago than it would be here?”
    I saw his Adam’s apple bob before he spoke. “I felt like if you were away with me, that you wouldn’t be able to see Tom anymore.”
    My face did that thing. The “say what” look, with tons of folds in my brow. My eyes squinted with “what in the world are you talking about” stamped on my forehead.
    “Tom? What does Tom have to do with any of this?”
    Okay, okay. I know Mark and Tom are not the best of friends. Okay, they really don’t like each other, period. But I make a conscious effort never to bring up the other one’s name when I’m with them.
    “Don’t act like you don’t know how I feel about you and Tom, Amy.”
    “You don’t like him because of some sort of male dominance thing.” I imagine gorillas in the jungle beating their chests over what trees are the domain of the leader. Mark was the one beating his chest now.
    “I don’t like him because I know his agenda with you. And no matter how many times I