23. Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Three
Beck
I’m blaming getting skewered in the face with the volleyball on the fact that I let myself get distracted. I didn’t have my head on straight.
That’s the only logical explanation for why I wasn’t able to get out of the way in time. Though I had turned my head so that it avoided my nose, my jaw smarts as I’m now flat on my back in the sand, the moon above me looking blurry, the wind completely gone out of my lungs.
Dallas screams and drops to the ground next to me. “Oh my gosh. Are you alive? Are you breathing?”
She shakes my shoulders, and I can’t help but laugh. It comes out sounding funny though because I think I got the breath knocked out of me on impact. I curl to my side, and it takes a second, but eventually, I can fill my lungs with air. I laugh, a good, soul-filled belly laugh, with the edge of a painful whine. I put my hand on my jaw and open and close my mouth.
“Why are you laughing? Did I break your jaw? What are you doing?” Now she’s scolding me, trying to turn me around by the shoulder onto my back. I’m shaking so hard with laughter, I can’t turn. Instead, I curl into myself even more, trying to concentrate on my breathing through the wheezes of laughter that are plaguing me.
“Beck! Stop.” She chuckles a little. “It’s not funny. I could have killed you,” she insists.
This makes me laugh even more, and she groans. “I’m starting to think I injured your brain.” She shoves my shoulder lightly then leans over me so that she can better see my face.
Dallas leaning over me in her short, sexy dress? That’s too hot of a thing to consider right now, but it does sober me enough to catch my breath.
She scowls. She peels my eyelids back, shoving her face close to mine so she can study me. I doubt she can even see anything in the dark. “How many fingers am I holding up?” she asks.
This sends me into another laughing fit, and now she’s chuckling again. She’s sitting back on her heels, her green dress pooling up on her thighs, looking more gorgeous than ever. Her hair’s a messy halo around her head. The sheer sexiness of the image helps me manage to stop laughing long enough to get a few words in.
“I like your hair like that.” My body’s still tensed up from the laughter.
She sends a hand through it as it gets lifted again by the wind. “It’s frizzing up.” She bites her lip, trying to scowl through the laughter. “Beck Billingsley, you are such a hot mess.”
This has me laughing again, and to this, she holds up both palms. “I’m just not going to say anything because apparently everything I say is completely hilarious. I’m starting to think you really do have a concussion.”
“I don’t.” I say it with a wheeze. “You’re just funny.” I wheeze again. “And fun,” I add, wiping tears from my eyes.
Her shoulders shake and a trinkle of a laugh escapes her. “Beck, what am I going to do with you?”
I could think of a lot of things she could do with me…and things we could do together. But trying to double down on controlling my thoughts makes me laugh even harder.
“I thought you weren’t going to say anything else?” I say in between laughs. “But you can’t help it, can you?”
Her mouth drops open in surprise and she pushes my arm again. “I will say I’m sorry about hitting you in the face.”
I shake my head. “The jaw. It’s fine.”
“The jaw, then. And it’s not fine. It’s going to be black and blue! Or it could even be broken.” She tenderly palpitates my jaw.
Even though it stings, I want her hands on me. As she kneels above me, slowly pressing her fingers against my jaw, her gaze catches mine. The moonlight casts shadows over her face, but her eyes blaze into me as her fingertips slide lazily over the rest of my face. I close my eyes, and I’m not able to stop the light groan of pleasure at her touch.
“Dallas,” I say with a growl. All I hear is the airiness in the waves of water nearby and her breaths, still rapid. I force my eyes open. There’s such an undercurrent of concern in her expression that I can’t help but laugh again.
“You’re impossible.” And with that, her laughter starts in earnest, and this time, she collapses next to me on the warm sand, chuckling so hard, she can’t contain herself either.
“I can’t breathe,” she wheezes, and I feel a light splatter against my cheek.
“I think—” I say in between laughs. “—You’re crying on me.”
She wipes her face with both hands before curling them against her, hiding behind them. “Gushing. I’m gushing…tears!” She cannot get a grip, and neither can I.
Finally, I manage to speak. “Focus on the stars.” I pause. “And breathe.”
“I can’t,” she bursts out, dissolving into tears again.
“Dallas, breathe. Count the stars and breathe.” I know I need to take my own advice, but it’s hard when I’ve got this wiggly, gorgeous, infuriating woman lying beside me.
She calms her breathing a little. “One, two, three…”
It takes her far too long to get to ten because she keeps having to stop to laugh, but once she does, her breathing goes back to a steady rhythm and she calms.
It’s the most fun I’ve had in a very long time.
And the warmth of her next to me shuts out everything else but her.