Her eyes flash as they connect with mine. “Hmm…maybe you should find out.”

My heart trips in my chest. I want to take off those jeans and see what she looks like in her panties. I want to cup her between her legs. To feel her there. I want more. “Are you sure?”

She lifts her hips. A tease. An invitation. A request.

Leaning forward, I press my mouth against her collarbone and kiss my way down her body. Placing an open-mouthed kiss over each nipple, I suck at her through the cotton until she cries out. I kiss along her ribs and over her navel. And when I reach the button on her jeans, I watch her as my shaky hands unbutton. I keep my eyes on her deep brown ones and draw the snug denim off her h*ps and down her legs.

“They match,” I whisper, taking in the little penguins decorating the thin strip of white cotton between her legs.

“William?”

I swallow. Hard. I just want to lean forward and kiss her there. Open my mouth against the cotton. I want to explore that sexy strip of skin where her inner thigh meets this private piece of her, and then I want to slide my tongue under her panties and taste her. “You’re so beautiful.”

I graze my fingers over her stomach and down to her panties, my touch whisper soft as it reaches the apex of her thighs. My patience is rewarded with her cry, so I keep my touch light. “I want to make you come like this.” My voice is rough, threaded with need.

She lifts her h*ps again, pressing into my touch. Then she surprises me by sliding her hands to her h*ps and pushing down her panties. “Please.”

“Oh, damn,” I murmur, but I peel off her underwear.

She’s bare and exposed to me, and I can hardly breathe. I want to spend hours looking at her, but I can tell by the way she’s shifting under my gaze that she’s uncomfortable with this. I draw my body up until I’m lying beside her. She kisses me, and I’m lost in it for a moment. The sweetness of her breath, the soft glide of her tongue.

My hand slides between her legs and I gasp, swallowing her breath. I would give anything to know what it’s like to feel myself inside her.

She shudders under my touch, and I still.

“Are you scared?” I hate the thought.

“Yes.” She smiles at me and tangles her fingers in my hair. “But not scared about this. I just… I think sometimes I’m still afraid I’m going to lose you.”

“You have me. I’m not going anywhere.”

She closes her eyes.

“Is this okay?” I ask, circling that sensitive spot between her legs.

“If you don’t mind.”

I press my face into her neck and groan. “Why would I mind touching a piece of heaven?”

Chapter Eight

Cally

I want to touch him, make him feel like he makes me feel, but I have no idea what I’m doing and—

“Let’s get you home, beautiful,” he says, cutting off my thoughts. He gathers the plates, empties the glasses, and wraps up the food, placing it all back into his backpack.

I swallow back my disappointment. His grandmother is hardcore about his curfew—unlike my parents, who act like they’ve never heard the word. I fasten my bra and slide into my shirt.

He walks me home, touching me the whole time, like he’s afraid I might disappear. At the front door, he kisses me softly. “Goodnight, Cally.”

“Goodnight. Thank you for tonight. It was amazing.”

He looks down at me and grins. A blond curl falls into his face. “You can say that again.”

As I watch him walk away, something nags at me. In my dark house, I make my way to the shower. The nagging remains as I undress and step under the hot spray of water.

I told him I was ready to move forward, to do more, but I wasn’t. I mean, we physically did more together, but I haven’t truly moved forward from my previous position, from my fear that my worth to him would be tied up in giving him pleasure. Until I touch him, the fear won’t release me from its grasp.

I dry myself off and hurry to my room with my phone to send him a text.

I’m sorry I didn’t return the favor tonight. I should have. I think I’m scared.

I send it before I can overthink it and change my mind. I didn’t have to wait long for his reply.

I don’t want you doing anything that scares you. Anyway, now I have something new to think about while I take care of myself.

For a second, I’m not sure what he means by that, but then I understand, and the realization of his meaning causes something to stir in me. My ni**les tighten. I never would have imagined the idea of a guy doing that could turn me on, but when I imagine William…

I hesitate, then type, You…do that? It’s not that I don’t believe it. He’s a guy with a girlfriend who doesn’t put out. Of course he does that. But I don’t want to change the subject. Not yet.

His reply comes fast. Don’t you?

My stomach flips and my heart kicks up a notch. I don’t know what to say. I’ve never talked about this with a guy before. The girls joke about it, but this is different. I’m careful with my reply. I guess. When it’s necessary.

And when’s that?

I shift uncomfortably in my bed. If we keep up this conversation, it’s going to be necessary very soon. After a heavy makeout session sometimes. When I’m lying here wishing I were brave enough to do more with you.

My heart pounds in my ears as I wait for his reply.

Damn. I didn’t expect you’d actually tell me.

My cheeks burn, but even embarrassed, I’m not sorry I told him. I want more of this conversation. More of him. So maybe next time he’s close to me, I’ll find the courage to touch him in return. Does it make you uncomfortable? I type. I like that idea—him shifting in his bed thinking about me like I do him.

I grab my phone greedily when it buzzes with a reply. I want you twenty-four seven. I’m uncomfortable as hell, and it’s worth every second.

Are you sure you’re okay with waiting? I type quickly. Just until prom. Then I’ll be ready. As I hit send, I realize I want him to say no. I want him to tell me he needs me now and doesn’t want to wait anymore. I want him to show up at my window again, but this time I want him to come inside.

But his reply is even better than that fantasy. Because I know he means it.

I’d wait forever for you, Cally.

***

“What are you doing?”

Dad is packing books into a small suitcase when I walk in the door after school. There are two more suitcases at his feet.

“Cally.” He looks at me for a long time before saying more. His face is sad, those dark eyes, so much like mine, a little desperate. “One day, you’ll be older and you’ll understand that sometimes we just have to do things, even if not everyone in our life will understand or approve.”

“It’s true? You’re really going overseas? You’re leaving us?” In the weeks since I’ve caught Mom packing, she’s mentioned Vegas a few times, but never with any definitive plans. I’ve let myself believe that and the half-packed house meant the move wasn’t going to happen.

He doesn’t answer but drops his gaze to his hands.

“You can’t do this.” My words sound panicky. Wild. “She’s going to make us move, and that’s not fair. My life is here. I don’t want to leave.”

“I’m sorry,” he says to the floor.

“Cally!” Drew’s voice comes from her bedroom and she shuffles out and wraps her arms around my leg. “Come play Barbies with me?”

“Daddy has to go now, Drew,” my father says, nearly choking on the words. He squats to his haunches and opens his arms for her.

Tears burn the back of my eyes.

Drew runs into his arms and wraps her arms around his neck. “Bring me back something cool,” she demands. “And maybe next time I can go with you.”

“Maybe,” he manages, but Drew seems oblivious to his emotion.

Gabby toddles out from the bedroom next, and Dad scoops her off the ground and nuzzles the side of her neck. She squeals with delight.

“I’ll call,” he says. “And if you want to move back here with me when I get home, let me know.”

Drew frowns. “Cally’s going to Las Vegas with us. She can’t live here with you.”

“We’re not going to Las Vegas, Drew,” I scold, as if it’s her fault my parents have lost their minds.

“Yes we are. We’re leaving at the end of the month.”

My heart plummets, falling far past my stomach, past the floorboards, and deep into the dark and fiery part of the earth. “No.”

Mom wasn’t failing to say anything about the move because she’d changed her mind. She wasn’t talking to me about it because she didn’t want to argue. And waiting until the last minute to pack the house? That’s just her M.O.

Drew’s eyes light up. “But you should come to Las Vegas, Daddy! Mom says it’s a super fun place.”

She can’t comprehend the permanence of my parents’ separation. Maybe it’s for the best.

“I need to get to the airport,” he says quietly, settling Gabby to the floor and picking up his suitcases. “You girls be good.”

He heads to his beat-up old hatchback, and the girls rush to the window to wave at him as he goes. They don’t understand. Or maybe he’s been absent enough in their lives that they truly don’t care. I don’t know.

I watch his car back out of the driveway, and I feel like he’s taking part of me with him. Not because I’m that close to my father, but because he was my last chance to stay here in New Hope. To stay with William.

“Have you packed yet?” Drew asks me. “Are you excited? Do you think we’ll get to see the lights in Vegas? How long will the drive take? Can I take my Barbies?”

Her questions nearly shatter me. Even if I could talk my mother into letting me stay here without her, I know I can’t do it. Mom’s just a couple of orange pill bottles away from being an unfit mother. My sisters need me.

I can’t put it off anymore. I need to tell Will.

The birds sing the whole walk to his house. Their happy tune contrasts so painfully with the dull knife sawing through my heart that I just want to close my eyes and listen until their hopeful song fills my ears and my head.

Will’s car is in the driveway, and I don’t ring the bell. I go to the back of the house and through the mudroom door he keeps unlocked when he’s home. His grandmother is in Indianapolis visiting her cousin this week, and he made it clear I could come over any time I wanted. Made it clear that he’d like me to stay over. Why haven’t I? What am I waiting for?

The mudroom leads to the kitchen, and I find a banana peel and an empty cereal bowl, milk lining the bottom, on the counter. He must have made a snack after getting home from track conditioning.

I head to the front of the house and find him on the couch, hair wet, bare from the waist up, and sleeping. One hand is behind his head. The other rests on his abdomen, right over that faint trail of hair that marks a path from his chest into his sweatpants.

Between football and track and general self-discipline, Will pushes his body hard, and he exhausts himself in the weight room.

I approach the couch quietly and lower myself to my knees on the floor beside him. He’d want me to wake him up, but I want to look at him first, memorize the shape of his chest and the flat of his stomach, the way his thick blond lashes curl against his cheek, and the untamed curl of his hair.

Before I realize what I’m doing, my hands are on him, tracing down his body, following that path of hair to the waistband of his sleep pants. I’ve touched Will before. I’ve given him massages, put my lips to the bare skin of his back, kissed my way down his spine while my hands rubbed at his sore muscles. I like massage. Despite the ugly things Mom has done to her massage business, I admire the art of human touch. With William, massage feels like this gift I can give him.

He shifts, and I lift his hand from his belly and start to work my thumbs into his palm. I work my way up to his forearm, and he moans appreciatively in his sleep. I stroke his arm, kneading the shoulder and the bicep, keeping my touch light and easy. When I finish his arm and he’s still sleeping, I straddle him and start on his chest. His pecs are always so tight, and he shifts under me when my fingers press into those muscles.

I shift to catch my balance, and when I settle back down, the hard length of his erection is settled right between my legs. I draw in a breath at how good it feels and flick my eyes back to his sleeping face.

I’ve wanted to touch him for so long now, and I’ve been too self-conscious. This could be my last chance. I could be leaving at the end of the month. Will wanted us to keep seeing each other while he went away to college, but the nearly two thousand miles between New Hope and Las Vegas is a far cry from the few hours between here and Notre Dame. We’ll be lucky if we see each other a couple of times a year.

The thought tears through me savagely, and I swallow a sob. I’ll anesthetize the pain of the future with the beauty of the moment.

I shift back and lower my head to his chest, following the same path my fingers just took with my mouth and kissing my way down that downy-soft hair on his belly. When I reach his waistband, I lift my head to see him staring at me. His chest rises and falls in a rhythm faster than his sleeping breath and his blue eyes have gone smoky. I don’t say anything, just lower his pants down his h*ps with a light tug.

He isn’t wearing underwear beneath his sleep pants, and my breath catches at the sight of him. I’ve felt him before—between my legs and through our clothes—but I’m still surprised at his size. But it turns me on too. Seeing how aroused he is. Knowing he’s watching me. That he wants this.