“No, what is it? Tell me, please. I’ll try to make it happen.”
“I’ve always wanted to learn to surf. When I decided on USC, I thought maybe I’d do it while I was in school, but there was never any time, and you don’t realize how far the beach is even though you’re in LA before you live here and I just never got around to it.”
“This is amazing.”
“Why? I don’t strike you as the surfing type?”
“Do I?”
“Do you what?”
“Strike you as the surfing type?”
“Uh, not really. I mean, you’re clearly in great shape,” he says, clicking his tongue as his eyes travel up and down for a moment, making her wish that looking would lead to touching again. It doesn’t. “But . . . shit, are you like some kind of championship surfer and you’ve been hiding it this whole time?”
“Championship? No. I haven’t been in forever, but I do know how. We could go to the beach one day and I could teach you?”
“Sweet. It’ll be nice to actually see the Pacific.”
“Wait. You’ve lived in LA for five years and you’ve never been to the beach?”
“I’ve never been a ‘sit in the sand for hours’ kind of guy.”
“You’re an archaeologist.”
“That’s . . . not the same thing.”
“Sure.”
“It’s not.”
“Okay.”
“Stop pretending to agree with me.”
“Alright.”
“Bianca.”
“Yes?”
“You’re such a . . .”
“Thinkveryhard about how you want to finish that sentence.”
“Mmm,” he hums and then moves in, jutting out his lower lip and opening his eyes as wide and pitifully as possible. “What about now?”
“Jesus, it’sincredibleanyone ever tells you no.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised.”
And suddenly the air between them crackles and when did they get this close again, so close she can feel his ragged breathagainst the top of her hair, ruffling the shorter curls near her temples. He reaches up, brushing one of them behind her ear, trailing his fingertips over her cheek to run along her jawline.
“We shouldn’t,” she manages to whisper raggedly and instantly he pulls away, a step back, his hand falling to his side.
Her chest aches, but then he smiles ruefully and rubs at the back of his neck. “See? Easier than you think.” He backs away even further and she feels like she has to say something or she’ll lose it.
“Xavier, it’s not that I don’t . . . it’s not that I don’t want to . . .”
