This Summer Will Be Different(69)

“My strongest feature.”

“They’re lethal.” I heave an exaggerated sigh. “It’s a real conundrum.”

“Let me know when you solve it. I was trying out the clean-shaven thing for the wedding. I wanted time to grow the beard back in case it was a mistake.”

“That’s shockingly vain of you, Felix Clark.”

“Well, I was going to see you.” He pulls me, hauling me over his lap so I’m straddling him. He squeezes the backs of my thighs. “I wanted to look my best.”

“I bought a very sexy dress, with an extremely high slit, but the neckline goes up to here.” I point above my collarbone. “I didn’t want you to see . . .”

He finishes my sentence. “You blush?”

I feel my chest heat. “Uh-huh.”

“It’s happening right now, isn’t it?” He dips his hand under the bottom of the sweatshirt. His fingers creep up my stomach.

“No.” A pinkie grazes my nipple.

Felix places his palm flat on my sternum. “I can feel how hot your skin is. Your heart is beating so fast.”

“You’re imagining things,” I say as the flush spreads beneath his fingertips.

“Really?” He arches a brow. “Arms up, then.”

I pause, then raise my hands over my head. Slowly, Felix works the hoodie off, sucking air between his teeth. I watch him soak me in, first with his eyes, then with his hands, following the scarlet with his fingers.

I dip my head so I can kiss his cheek and mouth and neck. When I pull the collar of his shirt to the side so I can taste his skin, he lets out a low moan. I reach for the hem.

“I showed you mine.”

When I’ve got his top off, I shimmy from his lap, bringing him with me. I lie back, wanting to feel his bare chest against mine. I love how he’s hard where I’m soft. He traces my moles, he kisses the indent at the base of my throat, then, eyes finding mine, positions himself between my thighs. Even though he’s still half-dressed, the way he’s pressed against me—all of him and all of me—and even though I’m sore from the beach sex and the shower sex, I’m already throbbing.

“I want to make something clear.” He rocks his hips against me, and my eyelids flutter closed.

“Mmm?”

“Look at me, Lucy.”

My gaze finds his.

“You and me—we’re very good at this, but we’re more than this.”

“Okay,” I whisper.

He strokes my cheek with his thumb and then my bottom lip. “I’ll go as slow as you want.” He kisses me once, brushes his nose against mine.

“Thank you,” I tell him. I snake my legs around the back of his thighs and give him a long kiss. “But right now, I’m not interested in slow.”





30





Now

Four Days Until Bridget’s Wedding





There’s no four thirty alarm. No sneaking out. There’s only me and Felix in a bedroom dappled in dawn. His body is wrapped around mine, naked. Memories of last night stir as Felix kisses my shoulder good morning.

His tongue and mine. Palms on flesh. His hands on my waist.

I’ve waited so long for this.

You feel so fucking right.

Muscles shaking. Eyes meeting. Ecstasy. Relief.

“Stay here,” he says now. “There’s no rush. There’s nothing to do. There’s nowhere to be.”

I fall back to sleep, and he’s gone when I pull myself from the bed and slip on my nightgown. I feel stomach muscles I thought you had to pay a trainer to identify. My thighs ache. Felix’s head and hips were between them countless times yesterday.

I find him in the kitchen, hulling strawberries. There’s an empty milk glass vase and a heap of flowers on the counter.

“What’s all this?”

“Good morning to you, too.” He holds a strawberry to my lips, and I open my mouth. I taste the berry, that burst of summer, and then his finger.

“Lucy.” He’s biting his lip, and I’m thinking about how dropping to my knees first thing in the morning sounds like a very good way to start my day when he says, “Later. I brought you supplies. I liberated them from my mom’s garden, and they’ll need water.”

I let his finger go, and survey the delphiniums, snap dragons, sweet peas, and daisies.

“Your mother wouldn’t be happy about this,” I tell him. Our love of gardening is something Christine and I bonded over. I helped her divide and replant peonies when I visited at Thanksgiving three years ago. But I know she prefers seeing her blooms outdoors, rather than on her table.

“If I were the one putting her flowers in a vase, she’d kill me. But you? She’d be thrilled.”

“Really?”

“Really.” He kisses my temple. “I have an idea.” A Clark sentence if there ever was one.

“Uh-oh.”

He grins on the left side. “I thought we could cook tonight, for Bridget and Miles. I have a feeling everything will be okay there, and we can tell them about us. Toast the future.”

“You,” I say, kissing him, “are a very thoughtful man. I’d forgotten Bridget and Miles existed. I forgot the rest of the world existed.” But it does, and Felix and I are going to be together within it. We’re going to tell Bridget the truth. There’s nothing left to hide. It’s hard to fathom how different things will be.