Scandalized(41)

“My turn.” I reach up, tracing his mouth. “I claim your bottom lip.”

He blows out a breath against my touch. “You have to pick something new.”

“Shh. You don’t make the rules.” Moving my fingertips down over his chin, I stroke lower. “Your throat. I have a thing for throats and yours is perfect. The back of your neck.” I trace down. “Collarbones. This muscle right here,” I stroke just inside his hipbone, and he shifts away, ticklish. I pull his hand up, kissing his palm. “And your hands.”

He laughs. “Of course my hands.”

I squint at him. “I’d say your dimples, too, but everyone says that.”

“Do they?” he asks, already knowing.

“There is a Twitter account called AKDimples that has, like, three hundred thousand followers and it’s almost entirely just pictures of your dimples when you’re smiling in various photos.”

He laughs again. “You’re making that up.”

“You know I’m not.”

“How do you possibly know about it?” he asks. “You won’t even watch my show.”

“Eden showed me.” I take a deep breath, pressing my hand to his chest. “She follows it. Asked me if they really do taste like candy.”

He takes a second to process this.

“Asked you whether my dimples taste like candy?” His next laugh comes out as a quiet puff of air, and he looks mildly horrified. “People wonder this?”

“That’s probably the most innocent thing they imagine tasting, Alec.”

He frowns, and I kiss his sweet pout. “Well, do they?” he asks, finally, grinning.

“Do they what?”

“Taste like sugar.”

“No.”

“What do they taste like?”

“Happiness.”

Beside me, he goes still. I think I’ve made it weird; we were being silly and playful until I got sincere. I’ll have to do a better job at tucking away these new spring-green feelings, because they’re too exuberant. They want to burst out into the sky.

Finally he says, “I’ll start the account Gigi’s Bottom Lip.”

A relieved laugh erupts from my throat. “You’ll get one follower.”

“No way. Wait till you see my profile pic.”

“Do you even know how to use Twitter?”

His Shhh is as good as a no, but he waves me off. “I’ll have more followers than that guy on your new hat.”

“You only need one follower: AKDimples. They’re already well acquainted.”

“They are,” he says, kissing my chin. “Best friends, even.”

Something foreign clutches my heart, twisting the organ in its grip.

“Have you ever really been in love?” I ask, out of absolutely nowhere.

But the question doesn’t seem to surprise him at all. “I don’t know.” He looks down at his hand as it roams up my waist, coming to a gentle landing over my breast. “Have you?”

I close my eyes and coax his head to my neck, answering just before sleep pulls me under. “I don’t know, either.”



* * *



Alec’s alarm goes off at five, and we drag our eyes open, doing everything from the night before in reverse. We touch and cuddle for a few drowsy minutes, wordlessly, with slow, sleep-heavy hands. We stand at my bathroom sink, brushing teeth, making foamy-toothpaste faces in the mirror. And then we pad out to the kitchen, where I insist on making him some coffee before he goes.

“You could still be in bed,” he whispers, careful to not wake up Eden only two doors down the hall. “You don’t have to get up, too.”

“Then I wouldn’t get more time with you,” I say, “and you wouldn’t get to taste my coffee.”

“It’s good then?”

I reconsider while filling up the kettle. “Maybe I shouldn’t brag. I bet you have a robot that handpicks your beans and roasts them to order before brewing.”

“I usually drink whatever Yael brings me or whatever’s on set. I’m not that picky, actually.”

I point to a stool at the kitchen counter, set the kettle to heat, and reach for my canister of beans. “Do you have to return the car today? I can do it for you.”

He shakes his head. “I think Yael picked it up last night.”

“What?”

Alec clearly doesn’t understand my astonishment. “What what?”

“She came over while you were hanging out here last night and stealthily returned the rental car?”

“What else did she have to do yesterday?” he asks, laughing. “She was more annoyed that I took off than she was to be given something to do at, what? Seven at night? It isn’t like I called her at three in the morning to drive to San Diego and back.”

“I guess.” I measure out some beans, pouring them into the grinder. “Plug your ears.”

He does, cutely, bringing his shoulders up like the sound of the beans grinding might actually be earsplitting. The sharp cracking and metallic whir cut through the quiet, and then I pour the grounds into the filter and glance over my shoulder at him. “Yael,” I begin, treading carefully. “What’s she like?”