She Dims the Stars(26)

“Wait,” she says quietly, and her grip on my hair tightens.

I go still and close my eyes, exhaling through my nose, dropping my forehead to her chest.

“I’m sorry. I’m just really …”

“What?” I ask, raising my head to look her in the eyes. She averts her gaze and then closes her eyes tightly.

“You said you wanted know something about me, right? Well … I don’t really like how I look right now, so I’m kind of self-conscious about being naked around people.”

I rest my chin on her chest and smile, waiting for her to open her eyes. “You don’t like your body? That’s what you want me to know?” She meets my gaze and frowns. “This body?” I run my right hand down her side and over her hip, settling her leg around my waist again as I press into her once more. “That’s a shame, because I really, really like it. In case you couldn’t tell.”

She presses her lips together to stop from smiling, and her cheeks burn brighter.

I nudge her breast with my nose and kiss the skin below it, flicking my tongue out to taste my way across to the other side. She’s soft and trembling beneath me as I leave a trail of kisses down her side and then across her stomach, stopping to look up from her belly button. “Look at this,” I say and run my finger around her innie. “How could you hate this?” Her hands cover her face as she laughs, and I smile at the sound, shifting lower and kissing below the spot I was just touching. My tongue traces the top of her bikini bottoms, and her hands fall away from her face, finding the back of my head again.

I press my lips to the inside of her thigh and brush an open-mouthed kiss over where heat is rolling off of her. Making my way back up, I kiss her lips again, tracing her tongue with my own. With a flattened palm, I slide my hand down her stomach, and my fingers stop just above the elastic to her bathing suit bottoms. Her eyes open and hold contact with mine as I inch down the smallest bit. She holds her breath, and the tent is silent as her knees widen and allow my hand to slip beneath the fabric.

“You’re beautiful, Audrey,” I whisper, hoping she believes it as my fingers seek and explore. I hold her close and kiss her more, even when she begins to shake and whimper. Even when her legs jerk and she digs her short fingernails into my shoulder. Even when she clings to me and cries out my name and God’s name and something else that may not be a real word, but makes me feel like a man anyway.

Her body goes limp, and she cradles my face in her hands as she stares at me, breathing heavy and shivering. “I’m going to ruin the mood here by saying this, but if you ever make a video game and your character needs a super power—what you just did should be it.”

“Nope. Mood not ruined at all. Hard-on still intact. And ego boosted to a thousand percent,” I say, chuckling then laying on my back and flexing my fingers.

Audrey rises up on shaky knees and leans over to give me another kiss. “Give me a second to recover, and I’m gonna repay you for that.”

“Okay—“

“What the f*ck is taking y’all so long?” Cline’s voice cuts through the air like a bomb going off, and Audrey flies back like she’s been physically hit, landing on her butt. She’s covered in red marks, her chest bright pink, and hair a knotted disaster. I’m lying on my back with a raging boner, fingernail marks all over my back, and my hand curled into a fist.

We’re so busted.



Cline’s not speaking to either of us. The look on his face when we came out of the tent was enough to make my dick go soft in an instant. He didn’t believe for a second that we hadn’t had sex. It didn’t matter that he had just told me that September was his soul mate. It didn’t matter that he hated Audrey. No.

“Treason,” is all he said before he turned and stalked off toward the boat.

We’d followed behind silently like two kids caught in the act by their parents. I wanted to reach over and grab her hand, take her to the side and tell her it was okay. Instead, we’re dead silent as we walk.

September let Cline drive the boat, guiding him toward the waterfall and cliff that Audrey’s mom had written about in her journal. I watched from a distance as Audrey sat at the front of the boat, her attention on the horizon, posture rigid, waiting for the falls to come into view. As soon as they did, she began fidgeting. Tugging at her hair and clothes. Tapping her fingers.

I cross the boat as we drop to a lower gear and go to sit by her side. “Hey, are you gonna be okay?”

She smiles like everything is just fine. “Of course. This is what we came for.” Her fingers trace the marks on my shoulder and she winces. “I’m really sorry about that.”

“I’m not,” I respond, tucking a piece of wayward hair behind her ear.

September jumps from the side of the boat and pulls it to the shore with a rope and ties it off. The waves from our wake cause the boat to rock roughly, and Audrey slides into me, arms flailing. I catch her, and from the corner of my eye, I can see Cline shoot me a look. I flip him the bird in response.

The look of shock on his face is almost worth not getting off half an hour ago. Almost.

The girls are already off the boat and headed up to the cliff, but I stay behind and wait for my best friend, because even though he’s being a shithead, he’s still my shithead.

Cline takes his sweet-ass time doing absolutely nothing on the boat until he doesn’t have anything else he can’t not do anymore, and he’s forced to get off. He’s still not making eye contact with me, but that’s his problem. It’s not the first time I’ve experienced one of his tantrums. It’s just the first time one’s been directed at me.