Prologue #2
I wasn’t sure if this was the best fit for what I had planned tonight, but it was an offer I was willing to make whether or not Adam was going to be my first. “Well, if you ever need the money, and you’re not married by the time you’re thirty, then we can get married.”
His head spun to face me. “What?”
I lifted both the bouquet I was still holding and the bottle of Dom Pérignon. “If you ever need the money, then I will marry you.”
He let out a laugh, but I didn’t smile.
“I’m serious.” I stared straight into his eyes. “Deal?”
He shook his head as the corner of his mouth curled. “Deal.”
His lopsided grin told me he had no plans on taking me up on my offer, but he’d agreed, so I clinked the bouquet to the garter that was wrapped around the bottle of whiskey and then downed quite a bit of champagne.
As I drank, I realized I should have clinked the bottles together, but I was nervous, which was not an emotion I was used to.
I was used to being in control. I was used to being the smartest person in any room.
I was used to having the upper hand in situations.
But this was a situation I’d never been in before.
How did one broach the subject of relieving them of their V-card with their best friend?
I sat there for a long time, trying to muster the kind of foolproof confidence I’d always had around Adam.
It was my armor: sarcasm, dry wit, the airs of a woman two decades older and three times less invested than I actually was.
But now, with champagne making my tongue less sharp and my hands less steady, I realized I had no retort or clever play.
Not when what I wanted was him, and the wanting was burning a hole right through me.
He’d gone quiet. Rested the bottle on the carpet, hands loosely encircling its neck.
Staring through the sliding door, its glass opal with condensation and the twinkle of party lights.
I could see our reflections, his profile strong and clean, mine shadowed beside.
I tried to imagine what I looked like to him.
Did he see something worth wanting? Or just the neighbor girl, the best friend, the one who patched his wounds and made late-night boxed mac and cheese when his dad forgot dinner?
I bit my lip and counted down from ten, then five, then one, then just breathed.
I tried to catalog each sensation—the bite of the night air through the glass, the hot flush of my skin, the way my knees tingled with anticipation and nerves.
I wanted to ask him so many things: Did he ever think of me when he was with his girlfriends?
Did he ever dream about us, like in the movies, wrapped up together in someone’s rumpled sheets?
Was he scared of how blindingly obvious I’d made my feelings, or had he actually been oblivious for years?
Instead, I just looked at him.
He turned, slowly, squinting a little because of the glare from the yard. “What?”
I was half a breath away from chickening out, but then a song came on through the speakers, “To Make You Feel My Love” by Billy Joel.
Adam stood up, all broad-shouldered and loose in the way only Adam could ever manage and extended his hand to me.
“Can I have this dance, Billy Joel?” he asked, his smile—lopsided, a little wary, and yet devastatingly genuine—robbed me of the plan I’d been rehearsing.
I left the champagne and flowers abandoned on the floor, put my hand in his, and let him draw me up to standing.
His mom’s favorite singer was Billy Joel, and he met me a year after she left, so he called me that a lot when we were kids.
He hadn’t in a long time. We faced each other, not even a foot apart, and for a second it felt like we were standing at the edge of something enormous, a cliff, a sea, a future that neither of us could see past.
Adam grinned and snaked his hand around my waist, pulling me close to him.
His other hand found my shoulder, one finger grazed a single line down the exposed skin of my bare upper arm until they met the edge of my dress and then the soft underside of my arm, making every tiny hair stand up in electric salute.
His palm splayed across my lower back, warm and certain, and he nudged me just a little closer, enough so our bodies could match the slow, shuffling rhythm of the song.
I could feel his heart thumping through the button-up he’d hated wearing—rapid and out of character. I wondered if he could feel mine, too.
I tried to keep my eyes on his, but he was looking everywhere but my eyes.
He was staring at my chest, my neck, my lips, so I returned the favor.
I took the initiative and studied him. The scruff on his jaw had gotten darker and more pronounced even since Christmas.
There was a fresh cut on his cheekbone, probably from a stupid dare made by one of the idiots he hung around with at school, and it made me want to touch him even more.
His lips were red and slightly apart. I could feel his breath escaping in and out between them as it fanned on my face.
When I finally looked up at his eyes again, his gaze was locked on mine.
His pupils were blown wide, and the whole world shrank to just the two of us, in that two hundred square foot room, moving in slow, uncertain circles.
The scent of his cologne—a woodsy, not-trying-too-hard kind of smell—mixed with the smoky-sweet tang of bourbon made my head spin.
I wasn’t thinking, truly, not in any conscious way.
There was no plan, no posture, no retreat.
I just let my arms float up and around his neck, felt the familiar tension in his shoulders, and on an impulse that must have come from the most ancient, reptilian part of my brain, I rose up on my toes and pressed my lips to his.
For a moment—one or two seconds—he froze, the way a deer freezes when it knows it should run but can’t recall the reason why.
Then, slowly, he relaxed into the kiss, his lips parting just enough to pull my lower lip between his.
His left hand slid up to cradle the back of my neck, and the tips of his fingers dug into my flesh.
I felt the shockwave of it in my whole body: a rush of adrenaline, a flood of heat.
Adam tasted like whiskey and sugar, and then it was over.
Then, Adam broke the kiss apart and rested his forehead against mine like he was catching his breath or trying to say something he couldn’t.
The air between us was thick with something wild and precarious.
My heart hammered so loud I could hear it in my ears.
We lingered in that tiny space between wanting and having, with our bodies still close, our hands locked around each other like a lifeline.
“Billie,” he finally whispered, and my name felt like a secret.
I waited. I could taste our desire, jagged and electric, but I wasn’t going to lean in again. I’d made my move, the next one belonged to him. I inhaled a shaky breath that came out as a whimper, and it must have urged him on.
This time, he closed the space between us, and his actions were more desperate now. It was all heat and hunger. His hands speared into my hair, knotting and unknotting, pulling me so close it felt like my body was collapsing into his.
Without warning, he shifted his weight, hooking an arm under my thighs and lifting me, pressing my back to the cool plaster of the wall.
My legs went around him on instinct, ankles locking us together.
The skirt of my dress bunched up, and I felt the roughness of his slacks against my bare thighs.
A thrill ran through me, a surge of want that made my skin feel alive.
He kissed me again, slower now, deeper. His tongue exploring me as his hands were everywhere—tangled in my hair, sliding down my back, splayed across the tops of my thighs.
I let my hands roam, too. I traced the line of his jaw, the stubble there rough against my fingers, the slope of his neck.
I skimmed his shoulders, then down his arms, marveling at the way his muscles flexed under my touch.
If there was a single moment I could pinpoint when my childhood fantasies crashed into adult reality, it was this one: the way his hands roamed me, ravenous and uncertain, as if he were afraid I’d disappear at any second.
The way his lips moved, gentle then forceful, devouring every inch of my mouth and then my jaw, my neck, and the hollow just below my ear.
He kissed like he was starving for something only I could give.
My own hands were greedy, too. I traced the line of his spine, the hard plane of his shoulder blades, and gripped the back of his neck. I could feel his heart racing against my chest, a wild animal caged and frantic. Every instinct told me to let myself go, to surrender and not be in my head.
He kept kissing me, deeper and deeper, his tongue sliding against mine, his lips firm yet soft, and I lost all sense of time.
Our breaths mingled, sharp and shallow. Urgency overwhelmed me, and I bit his lower lip.
He made a sound, a low, needy groan that sent a jolt through both of us.
He shifted his hips, and I felt him, rock hard and insistent, pressing against my core, and it made me want to climb into his skin.
One of his hands slid down, finding my lower back. The other traced the line from my shoulder to my wrist, then took my hand and guided it to his chest. He held it there, like he wanted to make sure I felt every heartbeat. I did.
“Billie,” he said again, a warning this time, but I didn’t want to listen.
I kissed him harder, tasting his frustration, his longing. The world outside the pool house might as well have been another planet.