The Summer We Fell (The Summer, #1)(64)

“Shhh,” I say, overloud. “I’m going swimming.”

He laughs. “It’s three a.m. Also, that water is cold as fuck.”

I keep walking. Now that I’ve decided to live my own life, I’m not allowing anyone, not even him, to stop me.

He walks alongside me. “Haven’t you ever seen Jaws? A hot girl swimming late at night—

guaranteed great white attack.”

I frown at him. “Then go away so you won’t have to watch.”

“What’s gotten into you?” he asks. “Since when do you sneak out to swim late at night?”

“Oh my God,” I groan, running my hands through my hair. “You’re as bad as Danny. Jesus Christ.

I’m almost nineteen, and I can’t even walk out of a vacation house without a million questions about my safety and motives!”

I’m too loud now, but we’re close enough to the beach that it’s drowned out by the crashing waves. I can see him clearly in the moonlight—his arms crossed over his chest, biceps bulging, an amused smile on his face.

He’s laughing at me.

“Fuck you,” I say on an exhale and start walking again.

I go down to the shore. The water is so cold that it burns. There’s no way I’m going in. Another

attempt at independence foiled. Inexplicably, I feel like I’m going to cry.

“Is this big and bad and dangerous enough for you, Jules?” Luke asks. His smile is a slight thing, belied by the misery in his eyes. He’s closer than I realized.

There’s a lump in my throat growing, and growing, so fast I can’t seem to make it stop. It’s not about the fucking water. It’s simply as if this past miserable year has finally caught up with me, along with the miserable years preceding it. The world has been crushing me a little more with each passing day, and I feel pinned under its weight. That ache in my chest and throat gives way at last, not in quiet, subtle tears but huge rolling sobs that make my shoulders shake.

He pulls me against him. “Jules. Stop. It’s okay.”

His hand runs over my hair as he shushes me, then he pulls me back to the sand to sit beside him.

“You remember what I said last summer, about you needing to be willing to leave the cage?”

I nod, still too upset to try to speak.

“It was what I thought the day we met. Watching you at the Allens’—it reminded me of this lady on our street who got a macaw. You know—the big blue ones with all the feathers? But she treated it like a little bird. She didn’t let it fly, she kept it in a small cage, fed it the same shit. It started to lose its feathers, but she kept right on treating it like a regular bird until finally it died.”

I look up at him through my tears, waiting.

“You’re the bird,” he says softly, his fingers brushing my mouth. “You’re something wild and magnificent, and he has no idea how to take care of you, so he spends all his time making sure your cage is secure because he has no idea what else to do. And that’s why this kills me, Juliet. Because I think I do know how to take care of you, and I want to take his place so bad that it fucking hurts to look at you sometimes.”

My heart hammers, ready to burst.

His mouth lowers and I don’t stop him. His lips are soft, his skin is warm. A thrill starts deep in my gut and seeps through my bones. I’ve wanted this for a very long time, since it first happened last winter. Since the first day he walked into the diner.

I’ve wanted nothing but him for going on two years, and I can’t say no.

My mouth opens beneath his and he groans, pushing his fingers through my hair.

I slide my palms under his shirt and over his chest, the beautiful expanse of skin I’ve wanted to touch a million times and could not. And now I am. It’s really happening and I can’t move fast enough.

He lays me back in the sand and pulls me against him so I can feel the effect this has on him. He’s hard as a rock and he’s not ashamed of it or blaming me for it. His eyes are bright, feverish, and he’s not ashamed of that either. He wants this so much he’s going to combust, just like I am, and he thinks that’s a good thing.

His fingers slide lower, between my legs, beneath my loose shorts, inside me.

“Oh, fuck, Juliet,” he rasps. “You’re so ready.”

Is there a part of me that thinks I should stop him? Of course. But there’s a bigger part of me that

knows I could no sooner stop this than I could stop a freight train or the planet’s orbit around the sun.

He doesn’t remove the shorts but continues to drag his fingers back and forth, dipping inside me, swirling around my clit. It’s different than anything I’ve felt before, electric and raw. His mouth is at my neck, his teeth sinking into my skin, his hand moving faster, and then out of nowhere I shatter, crying out, digging my nails into his arms.

I feel the hard press of his erection against my hip and reach for him blindly, sliding my hand beneath his waistband. He’s throbbing, so big my palm doesn’t quite wrap around him.

“Jules,” he groans, breathing heavy. It’s a question, one I answer by pulling him above me and pushing his shorts down.

“Yes,” I whisper.

He checks my face one more time before he tugs off my sleep shorts and lets his weight settle, his cock nudging between my legs. I shift just enough that he can push in.