Chapter 28
28
“I might hang out with Charlie later tonight,” I say to Nan over dinner. She sets her fork down.
“Do you want to come?” I ask, trying to sound casual. “I think we’ll probably just watch a movie.”
We’ve made no such plans.
My grandmother surveys me with amusement. “I think I’ll stay put.”
A little after eight, I buckle my sandals, fingers shaking.
“Alice?” my grandmother calls before I step outside.
I pause with my hand on the doorknob.
She’s sitting in her chair with a book. Her eyes stay fixed on the page as she speaks. “It gets awfully dark at night.” A hint of a smile crosses her lips. “If you want to stay there instead of walking back, I’d understand.” She doesn’t lift her gaze to see me blush.
I wish her good night and step into the evening. The light is dim in the woods that grow around the driveway. It’s slightly brighter when I get to the road. The air is sweet and warm, the sky painted in lavenders and blues. A walk through the bush on a stunning summer night should be relaxing, but I’m not sure I breathe the entire ten minutes. I’m going because my pulse hasn’t settled since Charlie whispered in my ear earlier today. I’m going because I can’t stay away.
The lights are on inside, their warm glow beckoning me closer. Charlie passes by the living room window wearing his gray lounge pants and a T-shirt. I’m in shorts and a sweatshirt. I didn’t dress for seduction. I dressed to climb a tree.
With each step I take, my pulse becomes more urgent. I step onto the porch and put a hand over my chest to calm it down. I see Charlie again. He’s sitting in the dining room, his forearm resting on the table. There’s a cuff around his bicep attached to a small monitor. I take a step back, but not before Charlie lifts his head. I feel like I’m witnessing something he didn’t want me to. We stare at each other.
“I’m sorry,” I say, loud enough for him to hear me through the glass. “I’ll just…” I turn to leave. I’ve just stepped onto the gravel driveway when I hear the door open behind me.
“Alice. Stop.”
I turn around, wincing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
Charlie walks across the porch, not stopping until he’s right in front of me. “You don’t have to apologize. It’s not a big deal. I’m supposed to monitor my blood pressure,” he says. “It’s been a little higher than it should be.” His tone is casual, but his expression is anything but.
“Is everything okay?” I ask.
He stares down at me for an almost uncomfortable length of time, lips pressed together. “Why are you here?”
Without the buzz of wine or the toasty haze of an edible, it’s hard asking for what I want. But I’ve come this far. “I want to see your tree house.”
Charlie stares into the forest. When his eyes return to mine, conflict swirls in the shades of green and gilt. He’s going to turn me away. I lift my head, set my hands on my hips, and pull my shoulders back, bracing myself for rejection.
“You look like you’re about to fight me,” he says.
I narrow my eyes, and he lets out an exaggerated sigh and then tips his head toward the water. “Come on, Rocky.”
I follow Charlie down the hill to the edge of the bush, where we stand side by side, staring at the most stunning tree house I’ve ever seen. It’s built over two levels. The first ladder leads to a round platform around the trunk, and a second connects it to an upper deck and the tree house itself. It has a door and screened windows and a cedar-shingled roof. Charlie folds his arms over his chest, grinning at my slack-jawed expression.
“So,” he says, nudging me with his hip. “What do you think?”
I blink up at him. “Whoa.”
His smile lures his dimples. “I can’t take all the credit. Harrison helped me design it, and he’s done the trickier parts.” Charlie points to a little break in the bush at the base of the tree. “There’s a path that leads to the cottage next door, the one that used to be Percy’s. She and Sam would go back and forth between our house and her place all summer long. I love the idea that their kid will play here, in the spot where they became friends.”
I smile into the woods, but when I glance at Charlie, he looks melancholy.
“You’re a good brother.”
He shakes his head. “Not really.”
“And a romantic,” I add, ignoring his comment.
He raises two skeptical brows. “No one who knows me would ever say that.”
“Maybe they don’t really know you, then.”
“I’m not a very good person, Alice. I’ve made more mistakes than most.” He takes a deep breath, then says quietly, “Sometimes I wonder if I’ve ever done anything good in my entire life.”
“ This is good,” I say. “The way you’ve helped Nan and me is good.” I want to tell him that he ’s good, but I’m not sure words would be enough to make him believe. So I link my arm in his. “Come on, Sad Boy. Take me up to your tree house.”
“The view,” I say. “It’s spectacular. It’s almost like we’re on the water.”
There’s a slash of bright red running on a diagonal across the sky, disappearing behind the hill of the far shore, but otherwise the night is indigo and growing darker by the second.
“Almost as good as the view from your boathouse,” Charlie says behind me. He’s leaning against the door to the tree house. It’s a squat, round-topped entrance, like it leads to an enchanted hideaway.
Everything about this moment is spellbinding. The pine-kissed air. The distant call of a loon. Floating high in the trees with Charlie. I look back to the lake. There’s a bonfire on the beach near John’s cottage. Laughter rolls across the bay. A fish jumps closer to shore.
“No, this is better. It feels like we’re somewhere magical,” I say.
“It does.”
I turn at the tenderness in Charlie’s voice. I take a step closer, and every muscle in his body seems to tense. I find his hand clenched at his side and raise it between mine. He doesn’t breathe as I stare up at him and uncurl his fingers, lacing them with my own. When I bring his knuckles to my lips, a low hum vibrates in his chest. I desperately want to know all his sounds.
“Take me inside?”
His eyes sweep across my face. “Are you sure?”
“About seeing your tree house?”
“About this .” He steps into my body, and I’m forced to tip my head to look at him. His fingers skate down my arm, from shoulder to wrist, and goose bumps rise in their wake.
“Are you?”
“No.” His gaze darkens as his fingers continue trailing along my arm. “Even though I can’t stop thinking about all the ways I could make you scream my name.”
His admission lands straight between my legs. “What’s holding you back?”
Charlie cups my chin in his hand, and stares at me, his gaze stormy. “I was hoping you would.”
I shake my head slowly. “I have another idea.”
Charlie’s thumb traces my jaw. “That sounds risky.”
“Maybe it is.”
Charlie lowers his head to mine. My heart thrashes as his lips graze the corner of my mouth. But he doesn’t kiss me. Instead, he whispers “I knew you’d be trouble” against my ear.
I shut my eyes before pulling away. “Take me inside,” I say again.
This time Charlie opens the door.
I duck to pass into the space, but inside the ceiling is high enough for even Charlie to stand. I turn around in a circle. It’s a small square room with two single-pane windows looking onto the lake and another out to the bush. It has that amazing fresh lumber smell. There’s not much in the way of furnishings—just a bamboo-framed couch and a low table beside it. I hear the flick of a lighter and turn to see Charlie ignite an old-fashioned oil lantern. It makes the whole room glow. There are two rolled-up sleeping bags in the corner.
“Were you expecting me?” I say, gesturing to them.
He shakes his head slowly. “You are the last thing I expected,” he says.
I stare at the lamplight blazing in his eyes. Has my heart ever beat this fast?
“I bought the sleeping bags so you and Bennett could camp out here,” Charlie continues. “There’s a blow-up mattress kicking around the basement of the house, and if you position it under the window, you’d be able to see the stars.”
It’s as if there are a hundred tiny fireworks exploding in my chest. I walk toward him until there’s only a breath of space separating us.
“I never thought I’d be happy that my sister canceled, but I’d rather sleep under the stars with you. I like you. I like being with you.” Every inch of my body feels like it’s on fire. Each cell is alive. I can feel my pulse in my lips, my neck, my wrists. “And you like me.”
He’s deadly still. “We’re friends.”
“Do you think about making your other friends scream your name?”
He pauses but doesn’t concede. “I started sleeping around when I was fourteen. I’ve made a lot of people scream my name.”
He’s trying to scare me off, but I won’t scare easily. “That’s not what I asked.”
Charlie’s eyes drop to my mouth, and when they return to me, there’s no mistaking the desire in them. His gaze is unflinching. For a moment, we remain that way, focused on each other, chests moving with short, shallow breaths.
“No,” Charlie says. “It isn’t.” Quivering golden light caresses the contours of his face. He steps closer, head tilted down to me. The space seems to close in around us. My stomach flips, and I think that’s what he wants. He’s trying to make me nervous, to call my bluff.
“I see you when I close my eyes at night,” he says, eyes burning. “You fill my dreams. I think of you when I’m in the shower. I imagine how it would be to have you on top of me, how your hair would feel falling against my chest. I’ve thought about how many times I could make you come with my mouth. With my fingers. With both.”
My lips part. My knees go weak. “Don’t stop.”
The twist of his mouth becomes wicked.
“I’ve wondered how long I could hold out when I finally had you. And if I could make you beg for me. I’ve fantasized about how you would taste. How you would feel around me. Since I met you, you’re the only person I’ve imagined screaming my name.”
It is an effort not to launch myself into his arms and ask for everything he’s just described.
“Can you use the rest of your body as well as you use your mouth?”
Charlie’s eyes glimmer. “Better.”
“And you like me.” I reach up, running my fingers over his hair. The newly shorn strands tickle my skin.
Charlie takes my face in his hands. “I think I might like you more than anyone.”
I turn my face in to his palm and lay a kiss there. Charlie closes his eyes briefly and inhales through his nose.
“But you deserve someone who can give you more,” he says, looking at me with new determination. “You’re smart and kind and funny. You’re a good person and, god, you’re beautiful, Alice.” He tucks a curl behind my ear, his eyes turning sad. “I love spending time with you, but I’m not in a place where I can get involved with anyone. I’m not built for a long-term relationship.”
Charlie is unlike anyone I’ve ever known. I’m unlike the Alice I know with him. I want more. And the way he’s holding himself back is more exhilarating than anything I’ve experienced. Confused eyes follow the curve of my mouth as I smile.
“I’m not looking for a boyfriend,” I say. “And in the name of transparency, I’ve also thought about you naked on occasion.”
His gaze crackles. “Oh yeah?”
“I blame that book you gave me.” I loop my arms around his neck, and Charlie places his hands at the base of my spine. It’s almost like we’re dancing.
“Alice Everly.” He turns my name into a full sentence. “What do you want?”
“This,” I tell him. “I want to kiss you, and touch you, and be touched by you. I like you, and I trust you. And neither of us wants to be anything more than friends.”
What I want is to be the person who makes Charlie come undone. I rise on my tiptoes and press my lips to his neck. “I want you,” I say into his skin. I whisper in his ear, “It doesn’t have to be complicated. It can be just for the summer—another activity on our list. No expectations past the end of August.”
He turns his cheek to meet my eyes. “I don’t want to mislead you. This ,” he says, tugging my hips to his, “is all I can give you.” He tips his head closer. “I don’t want you to regret me.”
“If you think that’s a possibility, then I haven’t been making myself clear.” I brush my nose against his. A thread of space separates our mouths. I’ve never wanted to lay claim to another person’s lips so badly. “It’s not just your remarkable face or ridiculous body—you’re pretty great, Charlie. I could never regret you.”
His eyes flare. “You might be the biggest surprise of my life, Alice,” he says.
And then he crushes his lips to mine.