by Rachel Jonas
“It’s not all on you. You told me you were sending the message and I didn’t stop you,” I say back, thinking to myself that one reason I hadn’t protested was because I didn’t actually think she’d go through with it.
“I know, I just… haven’t felt right about it since,” she admits. “We’re friends, but damn it, Dane.”
There’s a long pause that follows. One that has me tempted to face her, but I’m certain she’d lose her nerve to continue the second we make eye contact.
“We’ve entered some kind of weird, gray area that has my head all fucked up, and my nerves are shot to hell.” She’s breathless now and I don’t miss how her voice quivers with each syllable.
My heart races and I’m shocked she’s said so much. No, it’s not an admission of love or anything like that, but it’s more than what I’ve been given in the past. More than being made to feel like I’m losing my mind thinking there’s more to us than friendship.
I let out a breath and finally face her, feeling the tug in my chest when I meet her dark eyes. With so much emotion swimming in them, it guts me knowing she might always keep me at arm’s length. The thought of never having her like I want her feels like hell on Earth.
She lifts her hands, fidgeting with her nails, but doesn’t look away.
“Dane, both our lives are all over the place right now, so I know I don’t need to explain what that feels like, but I don’t have family a few miles away. So, for me, you’re the only stable thing I’ve got, which means I can’t afford to mess this up.”
Without saying much, she’s said it all—admitted that I’m not the only one who has a hard time keeping my distance. It hits me that I’ve only been looking at this from one angle, and none of them were her angle. Aside from having me—or people connected to me—she’s alone in this city.
Another breath rushes from my lungs, and guilt sets in for only seeing what I wanted to see.
“Let me change, then I’ll come to your room.”
She smiles a little, then nods. “Okay.”
We part ways and I do exactly what I said I would, swapping out ripped jeans and a tee-shirt for a pair of dark basketball shorts and a white tank. When I pop into Joss’s room, she peers up through thick, long lashes, sitting cross legged on her bed.
She’s got the face of an angel, and the body of a goddess. I take in how the tightness of her waist draws attention to the flare of her round hips. The shorts she wears are tiny and don’t hide much, sort of like the cut-off hoodie that stops right beneath her tits. When I drop down near the edge of her bed and rest my back against the post, I pretend not to notice any of that.
“So, tell me about Shawna,” she says, but there’s an air of sadness within the request that isn’t lost on me.
“She seems cool, I guess. It was nice talking to her about things no one else really understands where work is concerned, but other than that, it’s still kind of early to tell.”
Joss smiles and it’s more sincere this time. “Did you two make plans to meet up again?”
“Not yet. I might message her in a few days. Might not.”
She holds my gaze and neither of us blinks. “Well, it sounds like you two hit it off. Pandora seems to think so, at least.”
It’s not until she says this that I even realize something’s already been posted. I shouldn’t be surprised, though. Nothing’s a secret in this city. Guess Shawna’s figuring that out as we speak.
“What about you? Having a good night?” I ask, turning the spotlight off myself and onto her.
She sighs before answering. “Guess you could say that. I got some reading done.”
My eyes flicker to the book left open, face down on her comforter.
“And… you were talking to Carlos when I came in, right?” I try to say that as chill as possible, but it doesn’t matter. She knows I hate the guy by default. Simply because they have some sort of connection.
I leave out that I overheard his reaction when she blew him off so we could talk. Little does he know, I’m not a threat to whatever he’s trying to build with her.
Not that I don’t wish otherwise.
“He wants to come here.”
I shoot her a look. “To the city?”
She nods. “Yeah, despite me telling him not to.”
My gaze lowers to the floorboards and I don’t really know what to say to that.
“What’s that look mean?” She laughs a bit when asking.
I fix whatever facial expression just gave me away and meet her gaze. “It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just that, the other night, you seemed pretty certain there’s nothing between you and him. Guess I’m just wondering when that changed.”
Damn, dude. Wrangle it in a bit. You sound like some jealous, possessive asshole and she’ll hear it if you’re not careful. She wants to just be friends, so just be a friend.
“I am certain,” she sighs. “But he seems to think time apart has just dulled what sparked between us when we met in Cuba last summer. I, on the other hand, think that spark is dead in the water. I’m gonna keep working on him, trying to convince him not to waste his time or money.”
It’s hard not to relate to the guy, maybe even feel a little sorry for him. Joss is incredibly hard to pin down. I should know. I’ve been trying since we were twelve.
I’m still watching when her gaze drifts to the nightstand. Then, I’m confused when her eyes land on a sheet of paper there, and she snatches it up before I can read any of the words written out in bold, purple marker.
“What the hell is that?” I ask with a laugh.
Well, I’ll be damned. If how red she just turned is any indicator, whatever she’s hiding must be pretty fucking good.
“It’s not—”
“You’re about to lie to me and we’ve been friends way too long for that shit. Tell me what you’re hiding.”
She stares at my hand where it lingers in the air, then one of the hardest eye rolls I’ve ever seen is aimed right at me.
“Fine, but keep in mind that I was super bored tonight, and I might’ve gotten into whatever alcohol that is in that bottle you keep in the cabinet over the fridge. So, I can’t be held responsible for anything that paper says.”
She unfolds it a little but doesn’t hand it over. My confusion surrounding whatever this is I’m looking at must be evident, because the next second, she explains.
“Like I said, I had a little too much time on my hands tonight, so I may or may not have made a list of all the things I’ve never done. You know, because my dad would’ve freaked-the-fuck-out if I had,” she adds.
I keep scanning and an idea hits me.
“Well, shit! Let’s cross some of this stuff off,” I say with a grin. “Pick your top three and we’ll have them done before summer ends.”
She eyes me and I see her wavering.
“Where’s the marker?”
I don’t get an actual answer, just her digging in the drawer to hand it over. Then, she grabs her book and lays the sheet flat on top of it.
“Ok, so we’re circling ‘smoke weed’. You know I’m good for that one,” I say with a laugh.
“But you don’t smoke during football,” she speaks up, knowing I swear off anything I think might impair my game during the season, including weed.
“It’ll just be once. I’ll be fine,” I say distractedly, scanning for something else to circle. “How about this one—a tattoo. I’ll take you to the place my brothers and I go. They’ll hook you up.”
She’s watching as I move down the list, glancing up at her when I find the third thing. “You never mentioned wanting another piercing. Where?”
“My ear. The cartilage,” she clarifies. “My dad said it was tacky, so I just figured I’d live without it.”
Her eyes are on me when I mark that as the third and final thing on the list. “Well, get ready, because that shit’s happening.”
She laughs a little—a clear sign the mood has lightened since the tense moment
in the hallway. But as I stare at the sheet, I notice more of the deep-purple ink bleeding through from the back.
“What are you doing? We already have three,” she speaks up when I snatch the sheet from her hand, realizing part of the list was hidden.
I don’t fully understand why she’s redder and suddenly leaping all over me, trying to snatch the paper away. That is, until I see what’s made number eleven on the list, apart from the original ten. There, printed on the back, is an addition I didn’t expect to see.
She wants to lose her virginity.
Burying her face, it looks like she’s holding her breath. “I only made the list to vent,” she rambles, speaking muffled words from behind her hands. “It wasn’t real, I was just getting my feelings down on paper, and—”
“Joss… you don’t have to explain,” I cut in, holding back a smile. If she saw it, she’d only feel more embarrassed.
“It didn’t mean anything,” she continues to say, probably wishing she could crawl underneath a rock.
My thoughts drift back to the day Sterling and I helped her move, back to the sex toy hidden in the black shoebox. It isn’t a surprise that she owns one, but between that discovery and now this, I’m pretty sure I’m reading the signs right.
She’s held out her whole life, been a good girl because she thought she had to be. But now, after years of waiting… she’s ready to fuck.
Something inside me awakens—the part of me that’s always been more protective of her than anyone else. All at the thought of the many ways this could go, now that I know she’s given this some thought. It wouldn’t take much for her to fall for someone this summer, then think that asshole’s worthy of staking his claim. I don’t say this out loud, but I’ll be damned if I’m not thinking it.
Something I really have no right to think.
That, if she’s going to trust anyone with her body, her heart… it should be me.
At the sound of the marker moving over the paper, Joss peeks through her fingers, seeing that I’ve just circled number eleven. There’s confusion in her eyes when she looks up again.
“It’s contingent,” I say, weighing my words. “If you don’t meet someone, or if you change your mind, we’ll still get your top three picks crossed off the list.”
I stay unnaturally still, hoping I made that part about her finding someone sound like a real option, something I’d actually allow.
After the shock of me being in on her secret starts wearing off, Joss and I lock eyes right before she nods, letting me know she’s in.
“…Okay,” she says with a deep sigh that turns into a smile.
I return the paper and she tucks it inside her drawer before meeting my gaze again. She doesn’t speak, but the air in the room is charged with sexual tension. I suppose we’ve said a lot tonight without actually saying it. So, the only thing left to do from here is to find out if she knows what I know.
That she is now, and was always meant to be, mine.
11
Joss
“Just hang in there a few more seconds and…. Done.”
I breathe easy for the first time in an hour, glancing up at the artist who just permanently marked my skin. Dane insisted on coming straight here, not even twelve hours after learning about my list. He thought I’d chicken out if too much time passed, so here we are.
“You good?” he asks, drawing my attention to him and away from Max, the artist.
“Hurts like hell, but I’m good.”
Dane glances down at the daisy inked on top of my foot and laughs. “Probably wasn’t a good idea to get your first one right over bone.”
When he warned me of this over breakfast, it hadn’t fallen on deaf ears. However, I wanted something that won’t be the first thing someone notices when meeting me. Or the first thing my parents see when I finally lay eyes on them again.
I brush off that thought before it can make me sad and glance up to thank Max for his work. He tops the tattoo with ointment, wraps my foot, then I hop down from the chair. Dane insists on paying since he was the one who suggested I knock a few things off what I’ve officially dubbed the ‘Never Have I Ever’ list. Then, once he’s done, we cross the parking lot to his car.
“You gonna be all right?” he asks with a smirk, watching me wince with every step I take.
When I give him the finger instead of an actual response, his smirk turns into laughter.
“Here. Hop on.”
He says those words, but it takes time for them to register. Even when he stands in front of me and reaches back, drawing me closer by my wrist. I’m trying not to overthink things as I’m hoisted up onto his back, with his rock-solid arms wrapped around my legs as I cling to him.
My cheek presses against his hair and it’s hard to ignore the closeness. His scent is something I think of often, following a close call we had this past Christmas. Visiting his family in Louisiana led to a game of Truth-or-Dare with his rowdy cousins, and that game ended up being the closest Dane and I ever came to crossing the line. It began with a dare to kiss him, and it ended with me being mortified when I couldn’t follow through.
Now, as my arms rest over his broad shoulders, as I squeeze him between my legs, it’s on my mind again, and so is last night’s conversation. I hardly slept because it was all I could think about. When Dane added the fourth item to the list, I was admittedly confused.
Did he mean he’d help me find some random guy to lose my virginity to? Or… did he mean to make it sound like it should be him?
If I’m being honest, I only agreed to it because I assumed he meant the latter, but I know that makes me sound like a walking contradiction—agreeing to sleep with him when I’ve spent so much time and energy trying to convince us both I don’t want that.
But as the sun breathes its sweltering heat over us, and as Dane’s muscles flex and roll beneath his skin, I feel him everywhere. When I exhale a breath near his ear, he responds by lightly brushing his thumb down my thigh.
Resisting him sure as hell won’t be easy.
He carries me all the way to the passenger-side door and doesn’t put me down until he opens it. When I slip off his back, the action of my body moving against his has me letting out another of those ragged breaths. Especially when I climb into the seat and meet his green stare. It tells me I wasn’t the only one thinking things I shouldn’t have been.
He keeps that look trained on me as he closes me in, not averting his stare until he rounds the hood of his car. By the time he gets in, I’ve decided it’s probably best that I focus my gaze out the window, but that lasts for all of ten seconds. We’re not moving, so I peek over to see why and find Dane posting the pics from today’s adventure. Including the one of me crying actual tears.
“You dick! Did you seriously just share that?”
I’m yelling, but laughing as hard as I am, he doesn’t take me seriously.
“Sure did. And it’s my favorite one of the day.”
“Of course, it is. Because it’s the one I hate most.” When I roll my eyes, he nudges me playfully.
“Relax. You still look good in it.”
The compliment makes my heart flutter even though its innocent enough. It’s just that, coming from him, things like that always feel so much more weighted.
“You should come with me to my shoot. It starts in an hour, but I like to get there a bit early. You down?”
I’ve never tagged along for one of these gigs, but I have been curious about how they go.
“You sure that’s okay?”
He laughs a bit. “Why the hell wouldn’t it be?”
I shrug, imagining I’d be in the way, making him uncomfortable in front of the camera.
“Just say yes,” he croons with a smirk. “It’ll be fun.”
I blink into the sunlight, weighing my options—chill at home alone, or hang with my best friend the rest of the day. It’s kind of a no-brainer.
“Can we stop for food first?”
He glances down
at the clock before answering. “We should have time, but I’ll just get something for you. Rose insists we show up to shoots on an empty stomach. And seeing as how I already cheated and had breakfast, I probably shouldn’t push it.”
He smiles after that, but I don’t. The more I hear about her, the more I hate the woman’s guts. However, I keep my thoughts to myself.
“Sure, okay. I’m in.”
“Good.”
His gaze slips to my lips when he wets his own and I feel heat from more than just the blazing sun when he scans me with a look. Hopefully, this shoot is rated-PG, but… is it bad that I’m secretly hoping it isn’t?
Damn. On second thought, maybe this isn’t such a good idea after all.
12
Joss
We hit a drive-through quickly, and I eat while Dane drives. I’m done by the time we pull into the small lot of a brick building that looks like a scaled-down version of the one that houses our loft.
We step back out into the heat, and I trail behind him, moving toward the entrance. We’re hit with a blast of cool air the moment we step inside, and my sandals glide over the smooth, polished concrete floors. Hanging back while Dane checks in with the woman at the front desk, I take in the beautiful black and white portraits hung high on the brick wall near the door. This place has a whole vibe going on. From the minimalist décor, to the low-fi instrumental pumping from mounted speakers. The whole thing makes me wish I’d worn more than jean shorts and a pink tank top, something posh.
Heat from Dane’s palm when it rests against my lower back is jarring, but only because he doesn’t usually touch me that way. Meeting his gaze, he seems to notice I’m hyper-aware of the contact, and he casually pulls away.
“She said it should only be a few minutes, so it sounds like they’re taking me back early.”
The smile I offer feels tight and awkward. “Cool. Should I just wait here? Or…”
He shakes his head. “Nah, you’re allowed to come back. I’d like for you to come back,” he adds, amending his first answer.
