The Boyfriend Project Read online

  “Seven. Crack of dawn. But I’ll take care of it. You should enjoy your time here.”

  “We are enjoying it. We’ll get up with the dogs.”

  “Okay, I won’t argue. Thanks.”

  “Argue,” Jeremy groused teasingly.

  I pulled him toward the hallway. “We’ve got it.”

  When we entered our bedroom, he closed the door, and I started to feel a little bit nervous again. We were actually going to sleep in the same room. We’d studied in my bedroom—with the door open. But we’d never slept in it.

  I stepped away from him and rubbed my hands on my shorts. I could still hear the ocean. It was a soothing lullaby.

  I sat on the bed nearer to the window. “I’ll take this one.”

  “So will I,” Jeremy said.

  I know my eyes widened as he sat beside me. “I figured we’d make out for a while,” I told him, “but as for sleeping—”

  “I want to sleep with you.”

  “Should we move the beds together?”

  “I checked out that possibility earlier after my shower, but because of the headboards, they’re not going to fit together perfectly. There’s going to be a gap in the middle.”

  “We could put the mattresses on the floor.”

  “Or we can just scrunch up.”

  I smiled. “Scrunching sounds good.”

  After reaching over and turning off the lamp, Jeremy rolled me onto my back and stretched out beside me, his mouth covering mine as though he knew exactly how I’d be positioned, as though he’d thought about it a lot.

  This was so much better than a car.

  I heard a door close in the hallway and stiffened. Jeremy lifted up slightly.

  “I guess they’ve gone to bed, too,” I whispered.

  “Sounds like.”

  We heard a bed squeak.

  “Glad we came to bed first,” I said.

  “Me too,” he responded, before settling back down and drawing me in against his side.

  “This is nice,” I said, resting my hand on his chest. Even if this was all we did, it was nice to be held, to be together.

  “Until we get up at the crack of dawn with the dogs.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  He skimmed his fingers along my arm. “I’m teasing. I’m taking the dogs out with you.”

  “They’re sweet girls.”

  I heard a scratching on the door.

  “Where do they sleep?” Jeremy asked.

  “I saw dog beds in the master bedroom.” Still, I scrambled out of bed, turned on the lamp, and walked to the door.

  As soon as I opened it, both dogs trotted in. The golden jumped onto the bed with Jeremy and settled down. The chow hopped onto the other bed, circled twice before curling up.

  I put my hands on my hips. “Ladies, there’s not enough room for all of us.”

  Jeremy laughed as he petted the golden. “We can’t get a break.”

  I sat down on the edge of the other bed and stroked the chow. “I can get them out of here, but they’re probably missing Dot, so I hate to shut them out. I could bring their beds in here.”

  “Think they’ve claimed their beds,” he said. “What about the cat?”

  “Cats don’t miss anyone.”

  Then as though he needed to prove me wrong, the cat sauntered in, leaped onto the bed with the chow, and curled up on the pillow.

  Jeremy chuckled. “What now, Pet Whisperer?”

  I sighed. “We make the best of it.”

  With a great deal of goading, we got the golden to the other bed, which caused the chow to abandon its spot and move over to the free bed.

  “At least she’s small,” Jeremy said as he climbed back into bed.

  I turned off the light and snuggled up against him, felt Duchess settle across our feet where they were intertwined.

  “Not how I thought tonight would go,” I admitted.

  “You’re sleeping in my arms,” he said. “That’s a win.”

  Yes, it is, I thought as I snuggled closer to him.

  Chapter 14

  JEREMY

  I woke slowly, lethargically, with the sun barely peering into the room. I fought not to move, not to disturb Kendall. She was snuggled against me, her nose buried in my chest. Her eyelashes rested on her cheeks.

  Even in sleep she had a little furrow between her brows, and I figured she was trying to organize her dreams or something. I’d known that she’d created an itinerary for our vacation. She wasn’t a fan of surprises. Respecting that, I’d never given her one, but now I wondered if maybe that was part of the reason she seemed discontented. I was predictable. We were predictable.

  Knowing my mom wasn’t happy, I wanted to be the complete opposite of my dad. I wanted Kendall to be happy.

  I probably should have picked the bigger bed. But then it probably wouldn’t have mattered. We were so close together that we weren’t using all of this one.

  Slowly she opened her eyes. Her mouth curled up. “Hey.”

  Her voice was raspy with sleep, and the sound of it shot straight to my gut. Placing my hand against her throat, I tilted her head up slightly and kissed her. She released a soft sigh. I loved the way she always managed to sigh when we kissed.

  I could stay here forever. Holding her, kissing her. I usually wasn’t a fan of the morning, was a grump until I’d had my first cup of coffee, but Kendall made me glad to be awake. She was better than any dark roast. I became lost in her, lost in the sensations. She was breathing heavily, her breath warming my ear—

  Wait. I broke off the kiss, glanced back, and was greeted with dog breath. “Whoa!” I covered my mouth and nose. “Dog, go lap up some mouthwash or something.”

  Kendall laughed. “Pooh Bear, down.”

  I released a puff of air as the golden leaped onto the bed, straddling me to nudge at Kendall’s shoulder. The dog weighed a ton. Kendall shimmied away from me and got up. The golden jumped from the bed.

  “Think she needs to go out,” Kendall said as she clipped up her hair.

  “I’ll come with you.” Guess putting on our shoes was a signal because both dogs rushed to the door and slammed against it.

  “I’ll meet you by the front door,” Kendall said as she let them out and followed them into the hallway.

  I finished putting on my sandals. When I caught up with them, she already had them leashed. I took the bigger dog. She strained against the leash as we went down the stairs, and immediately did her business once we hit the sand.

  “The sun’s just coming up,” Kendall said. “Why don’t we take a short walk along the beach?”

  “Sure.” I took her hand. “Even though I shouldn’t reward them for interfering with my moves this morning.”

  “It was nice waking up next to you,” she said. “I wish we were sharing an apartment at college. I don’t know why I thought we should get the full college experience by spending at least a year in the dorm.”

  She’d researched all the dorms and analyzed the campus map before deciding which one we should request for our residence. While we couldn’t share a room, we’d still be near each other. “We’ll have enough adjustments without trying to set up an apartment,” I said.

  “I hope we have roommates who don’t hang around much.”

  “We’ll make it work.” We left the dunes and walked over the packed sand to the water’s edge. The sun’s glow was casting the sea in gold. The sky was streaked with deep blue, orange, and pink.

  “So pretty,” Kendall said.

  “Like you.”

  She looked at me. “You’ve never told me I was pretty.”

  “Haven’t I?”

  She shook her head. “No, I would have remembered. I mean, I didn’t think you thought I was a troll or anything, but I don’t really think of myself as pretty.”

  “You are. You and your seventeen freckles.”

  With a laugh, she covered her face and peered at me through her fingers. “You counted them?”