Chapter 26
When I wake up, I’m alone on the couch. I blink sleepily as I push myself up on my elbows. The room is dark, but a new day has begun to dawn outside the big windows.
“Benjamin?” I say as I stumble to my feet, looking around the quiet room. The fire went out a long time ago, and all that’s left is a gray pile of ashes. “Benjamin?” I try again, but I’m still met with silence. “Audrey?” Still nothing.
I wrap my arms around my body as I walk over to the windows. They must be out on a walk, but this early? I squint through the glass; the dawn is foggy but beautiful. Soft waves roll in with white crowns on their heads, and the air looks like something out of a fairytale.
A warm sparkle unfurls in my belly when I spot two shadows walking along the shoreline.
I stand still, watching them for a moment before I turn. I find one of Benjamin’s sweatshirts thrown over a chair in the kitchen and pull it over my head. I skip shoes (obviously—I only have heels with me, and Benjamin’s are not quite my size) and walk out barefoot.
I follow the small path down to the beach and enjoy feeling the cold early morning sand between my toes. As if he can sense me, he turns before I’ve reached the beach, and the smile splitting his face makes me weak in my knees. Making Benjamin Reyes smile is a new favorite thing of mine.
I run up to him and throw myself around his neck, and he catches me with open arms. A quiet chuckle brushes my temple as he leans down to kiss me. “What are you doing up?”
“I could ask you the same,” I say, leaning back and leveling him a look.
“Someone needed to pee,” he says with his nose in my hair.
“And Audrey was sweet enough to accompany you?”
Another chuckle that makes my stomach tingle and glow again. “Yeah.” We stand still for a couple of minutes before Audrey comes to sit at our feet, and I free myself to bend down and scratch her behind her ear. Benjamin releases me reluctantly.
“Are you collecting my hoodies, Collins? Is that why you’ve been stalking me?” he says, ogling me up and down with a grin. He doesn’t look like he disapproves.
“Yes,” I say seriously, stretching to my full length again. “I’m a crazy hoodie collector, and I heard you had some real goodies.”
He bites back a smile as our gazes meet again. “To be a crazy hoodie collector you’re kinda cute, so you can keep them.”
“Really? So, I can stop stalking you now?” I say, sounding hopeful.
“No. You should keep doing that.”
I laugh as he lunges himself down and kisses my neck. “I knew you were a freak, Reyes. Getting turned on by a stalker,” I say under my breath as I almost lose it when he’s placing soft kisses on my collarbone.
“I’m the freak, miss High Heels From The Big City?”
“Definitely.”
“You leave me with no choice then,” he mumbles between two kisses and before I have time to react, he throws me up on one shoulder. I squeak and laugh until I realize where he’s going.
“Benjamin Reyes, you put me down immediately,” I yell from his back.
He doesn’t answer but keeps walking toward the water.
“Don’t you dare,” I yell again when we reach the edge, and I see it dark and wet (!) under me.
I expect him to stop here, but he doesn’t; he just kicks off his shoes before continuing.
I squirm violently, but I don’t get anywhere.
He keeps going, totally unbothered by my attempts to free myself.
“Benjamin!” But he only ignores me. No, not only—he also spanks my butt.
I laugh in panic when I see the water closing in on my face. “I swear to god, Benjamin, if you drop me here, I’ll . . .”
“You’ll what?” The amusement in his voice is impossible to miss. I try to think as the water comes closer and closer.
“I will something! I swear you’ll regret it forever. I will—” I don’t have time to finish that sentence before I’m on my way down, headfirst. The water is wet and cold and yeah, it’s a complete shock for my poor body. It was sleeping fifteen minutes ago.
I hear his laughter before I dive under the surface and don’t need to think before I know what to do.
As soon as I’m on my feet, I lunge forward, attacking quicker than the shark in Jaws.
He’s still laughing at my drenched misery—so pleased with himself—that he has no idea I’m coming for him.
My counterattack takes him so completely off guard that I don’t even have to use all my muscles to pull him down with me.
The look on his face when we emerge again is so funny and miserable that I can’t stop the laughter bubbling out of me. I laugh so hard my stomach hurts. “You look like a drowned cat,” I pipe when I manage to get some air.
He glances down at me, a smile dancing around his mouth before raking both hands through his hair.
Water flies around him, looking like small pieces of diamonds in the streaks of the first sunlight.
My laugh gets stuck in my throat and I stare at him.
He’s beautiful. Unbelievably beautiful. Even looking like a drowned cat, he still manages to take my breath away.
An odd and unfamiliar feeling sizzles through my chest and makes my cheeks warm.
His eyes shoot to mine, and the sudden eye contact takes me aback.
I smile gently at him, shy that he caught me staring.
When his lips twitch in response, a warmth settles in my legs and arms and stomach, making me soft and gooey everywhere.
We watch each other quietly while the sun rises next to us.
He stretches out his arm, caressing my cheek with soft fingers. “You’re more beautiful now than ever before,” he says, his voice still and sincere. His previous laughter only left in the creases around his beautiful green eyes.
“Thank you,” I whisper, droplets of water rolling down my temples. Something roams behind his eyes that I can’t interpret. Hesitation? Something else?
His hand travels down my face, down my arm, the light touch causing a trail of shivers before he reaches my hand. He knits our fingers together before pulling me closer. My eyes flutter shut as our lips collide.
Clouds of butterflies shift just behind my navel, and I forget all about being soaked and cold. I forget about everything else. It’s impossible to do otherwise when Benjamin Reyes is kissing me. I’ve learned that now.
I’m dizzy when we finally draw apart. Without a word, we start walking back, hand in hand, all while the sun is climbing the horizon higher and higher, inch by inch.
Audrey is waiting for us back at the beach, calmly watching us like a patient parent waiting for her kids. That makes me think of something. “Do your parents still live here?”
It’s barely noticeable, it’s a small shift in his shoulders, but I see it. He shakes his head. “No.” A pause. An inhale. “My mom isn’t alive anymore, and my dad lives a couple of hours from here.”
I halt. “I’m so sorry, Benjamin.”
Benjamin stops, too, turning to me. “It’s okay.”
“Losing a parent is . . .” I swallow, I’m not used to speaking about it out loud. I usually avoid even thinking about it. It hurts too much. “I know how . . .” My voice trails off.
Benjamin braces himself with a deep breath. “I don’t think it’s the same—”
“No, I know. I’m sorry. Losing a mother is of course . . .”
“No.” He shakes his head. “You misunderstood. I don’t think it’s the same for you and me because you were close to your dad. I can only imagine how hard it must’ve been for you to lose him.”
I think back to that day and try to ignore the knot in my throat. Besides, this is not about me, this is about Benjamin.
“You weren’t close?”
“No.” His voice is curt, harsh almost, and his jaw is clenched.
His whole demeanor is changing, and I don’t even know if he’s aware of it.
He gazes at the horizon, something like steel moving behind his eyes.
I wait, patiently, while I study him carefully.
His gaze shifts back to me, and the look in his eyes tells me he’s evaluating me, deciding whether or not he wants to give me this piece of him. His chest heaves with another breath.
I have accepted that he doesn’t want to tell me, and ignore the sting of disappointment, when he finally speaks. “My parents never really loved each other. They fought all the time. Drank a lot. They never really loved each other and therefore they never really loved me.”
I open my mouth to protest, but he interrupts me immediately with a shake of his head and a squeeze of my hand. “You don’t have to do that, June. I know they didn’t. They told me so many times. I was the result of everything that didn’t work between them. And that’s okay.”
Okay? It’s okay that his parents told him many times they didn’t love him? An urge to say something rises in my throat—to tell him that this is terrible. That it’s not okay. But he squeezes my hand again, and somehow, I know that it means he doesn’t want me to.
“It’s many years ago now,” he says, like it makes it more okay.
I want to tell him it doesn’t, but I don’t.
I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want me to. Suddenly, I remember what he told me about knowing self-defense, how he sort of practiced it growing up, and it all dawns on me.
What it meant. And for lack of words, I almost crush his hand in mine, blinking away some tears before he can notice them.
The sky above us is becoming more stunning every second, shifting into something between orange and pink. The scenery feels strange, a total mismatch for the seriousness of the moment.
“But you’re still seeing your dad . . . ?” I ask at last, not sure if he’s going to answer. But he does, with a short nod and another clench of his jaw.
“Occasionally. When he needs me. He’s sick and can’t get to the doctor by himself. That’s where I was this week.”
“Oh . . .” I can only imagine how that must feel for him. I squeeze his hand again. Hard. “How is he?”
“Not good. Still drinking, even though the doctors tell him to stop.” His voice gets another level of hardness to it. It sounds like iron. And I guess with a heart like Benjamin’s, you don’t stop worrying for your old, mean dad, even if he’s made your childhood a living hell.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
His eyes are back on the horizon. A quick head shake. “Don’t be.”
I watch him quietly when something else dawns on me.
Something that, for some reason I can’t explain, makes my heart plummet to my feet.
“That’s why you don’t do relationships.” It comes out barely more than a whisper.
It’s not a question, it’s a statement. Because I know I’m right.
I understand it now. And it makes sense.
Watching your parents hate each other—and believing they even hate you—naturally makes you believe that relationships are no good.
His eyes remain on the horizon for a moment longer before they finally land on me. Just one look at him is confirmation enough. The green eyes roam over my face before they finally settle on mine and when they do, I know this conversation is over.
And I’m right, because his eyes change back to normal. The steel in them disappears and is replaced by something else. Warmth maybe.
He caresses my cheek with his thumb. “You hungry, gorgeous?”
I hesitate only for a second before I nod. “Yeah,” I say and make my mouth turn into a small smile. He wants to drop the subject, and I have to let him.
He tugs my hand. “Come on, let’s go home and feed you,” he says with an easy smile. I follow him without another word. Thoughts swirling in my brain, and something else swirling in my chest.
I’ve known for a long time that Benjamin Reyes doesn’t do relationships, so why does that make me feel uneasy all of a sudden?