‘Nope.’
She settles back on her elbows, stretching her body out languorously, and I’m caught up in her, my brain and voice silenced by the heat that rushes into my veins. I forget myself, forget what we’re talking about, and too late, she’s caught me looking where I shouldn’t. Heat streaks my cheeks, my pulse pounds...
Not that she cares. She’s revelling in it. Her breathless chuckle is all flirtatious, the nip she gives the corner of her mouth even more so.
Speak, you fool, before she labels you as one.
‘September. I’m staying until September. When term starts up again.’
‘Edinburgh Uni, right?’
I nod and she gives a low whistle, her gaze raking back over me. Her own pulse flickers in her throat as her eyes darken. I know that look. I know it and I want to act on it. The urge burns through me even as I acknowledge that it’s a line I should not cross...even if it’s a line she has probably crossed herself many times over.
‘So...’ she breaks the heated silence, rakes her teeth over her lower lip ‘...we have the entire summer together. How fun.’
Swallow. Speak.‘You think so?’
‘Don’t you?’
Her eyes collide with mine and images dance through my mind. Wrong. Tempting. Crazy. It’s like she’s projecting her idea of fun at me—but her kind of fun and my kind of fun are not one and the same.
Maybe they should be, the devil on my shoulder argues.
She gives a soft hmm. ‘You know, my stay here just got a whole lot better.’
I focus on her words and not the heat she’s stirring up. ‘You sound like it’s just a fleeting visit for you?’
She shrugs, but there’s an edge to it, an awkwardness that doesn’t fit with her confidence. ‘It always is.’
I don’t contradict her. I don’t tell her that Gran’s track record of long-term fostering says otherwise. I’ll let her believe what she wants to believe until life proves otherwise.
She turns to me then, a curious look in her eye. I wait for her to say something, but nothing comes. Instead her blue eyes draw me in, deeper and deeper still, until I can’t quite catch my breath and I’m forced to break her spell.
‘What?’
She smiles, her eyes alight with it. ‘We really are chalk and cheese, you and I.’
I give a tight laugh. ‘That’s one way to put it.’
‘You say that like it’s a bad thing.’
‘No, not bad...’
Risky. Because she intrigues me, fascinates me. To the point that my body is overriding my good sense and all the warning signs telling me to keep her at a safe distance.
‘What, then?’
I smile as I find my voice, my mind made up. ‘Well, to use your phrase, it either makes me as dry as chalk or as pungent as cheese, and personally I don’t fancy being classified as either.’
Her laugh is as brilliant as the sun and my body thrives on it.
‘Oh, Edward, we’re going to get along famously.’
‘You think?’
She gives me a playful wink, leans in close, her voice a husky whisper. ‘Oh, I know.’
She pinches her lip in her teeth, her eyes fall to my mouth, and I swear I could kiss her...
I want to—my entire body thrums with the energy to do just that—but I don’t.
I want something more.
I want to get to know her.
I want to dig beneath the confident rebel front with its hairline fractures and get to the girl beneath.
And now I have the entire summer to do so...