His smile widens, and I know he thinks I’m full of shit. Before he can respond, the announcer begins talking over the loudspeaker, introducing the bareback racers who will open the show. It’s too loud for us to talk after that, other than the occasional comment about one of the racers, but I’m okay with that. I feel like I’ve laid myself too bare today, and taking bets on the competitors, or screaming with the rest of the people in the stands when someone wins feels normal. Good. Easy. Like it should.
When the bull riders come out, I pick the most attractive one to bet on, and tell Grey, “Him.”
He looks down at me, brow wrinkled. “They said he’s least favored to win.”
“But he’s prettiest,” I say with a cheeky smile.
He rolls his eyes, looking back out in the center of the grandstand. “He’s going to lose.”
“Careful, Grey. You sound jealous.” I mimic his words from earlier, on top of the Ferris wheel.
The look he gives me makes my insides quiver, the hairs on the back of my neck stick up. It’s heated, warm fudge on the top of an already steaming brownie. “And if I am? What does it mean?”
This feels dangerous, like propping your feet up on the edge of the fire pit with your shoes on, feeling the rubber soles grow hot and sticky. Once again, I repeat his words from earlier, throwing them back at him. “I don’t know, Grey. You tell me.”
It’s a challenge, one I desperately want him to take me up on.
The words feel taut between us, a live wire humming with electricity, and I want to see which one of us is going to be shocked.
But before he can respond, the crowd around us changes, the energy growing excited. The elderly man beside Grey taps him on the shoulder, motions to the other side of the grandstand. We follow the line of his finger, seeing a giant image of us in this moment, red faced and nervous, plastered on the Jumbotron. We’re encased in a red heart, with the wordsKiss Camabove it.
I watch my eyes go wide on the screen before I rip my gaze away, fixing it instead on Grey. He’s already watching me, but he’s not smirking like I would have guessed. Instead, there’s a determined look on his face. One I only see when he’s concentrating or on the clock.
He leans in until he’s close enough that only I can hear, face hidden from the camera so no one can read his lips. “I think I better kiss you.” He pauses, and the weight of his breath on my neck is heady, making heat pool in all the tender places of my body. “But only if you want me to.”
I don’t allow myself to overthink it. I don’t allow myself to wonder what this means or why I want it. I just say “yes.”
He doesn’t hesitate either. The moment the word has left my mouth, his lips are on mine.
It would be a lie to say I’ve never imagined what it would be like to be kissed by Grey Sutton. I would have expected it to be practiced, for him to have a technique. He does this enough to be a pro at it, I would imagine. He’d go slow, work his way up to atempo that feels right, leave me weak in the knees and wanting more.
I never would have imagined it would be like this.
This kiss ishungry. He devours me in a way I’ve never experienced, his hands on my face, turning it just how he likes it. His teeth sink into my bottom lip, then his tongue is in my mouth. And I don’t feel weak-kneed at all.
I feel electric. On fire. Burning everywhere we’re touching, aching everywhere we’re not. It’s all-consuming and somehow still not enough.
When I let out an involuntary moan, my hand fisting in the collar of his shirt, he rips his mouth from mine. His eyes are wide, wider than I’ve ever seen them before. I think he says something about dreams, but now that he’s not ravaging me, consuming my every bit of attention, the rest of the world seems to trickle back in, filling in the barely there gap between us.
I hear the sound of the crowd cheering. Whistling and hollering. The elderly man who tapped Grey on the shoulder now telling us to get a room. His wife asking him why he’s never kissed her that way before. Him saying he would have if she’d looked like me.
“Oh, gosh,” I say into the fabric of Grey’s shirt, burying my face there to hide the redness of it.
He chuckles, his chin landing on the top of my head, arms banding around my middle. Somehow, despite everything, this doesn’t feel weird. I just made out with my older brother’s best friend, with the man I had a massive crush on when I was too young to even have an idea of what I wanted. I just had his tongue in my mouth, and mine was in his. I know that he tastes of the fresh lemonade we split at dinner and that he feels even more solid than he looks and that the way he kisses is unexpected and all-consuming and perfect.
And I know that I want to do it again.
“You want to get out of here?” he asks, and my heart stutters. I don’t know what he’s asking, what this means, but I know that I don’t want to be here with him, surrounded by hundreds of people.
I want him alone. I want to see if he will kiss me again when the whole town isn’t watching.
“Yeah,” I say. “Let’s get out of here.”
Leaving hand in hand after our performance is even more embarrassing than coming back to earth, remembering we weren’t alone, and that the kiss had been projected to everyone in the grandstand. The same people who were cheering for us during the kiss make suggestive comments as we pass, elbow their partners in the side, shoot us winks, like they know what we’re leaving to do.
I wish I knew, but there’s also something about the anticipation of not knowing, of guessing, of using my imagination, that’s somehowbetter.
Are we going to talk? Is he going to kiss me again the moment we’re alone? Are we going to regret it? I don’t think I will unless he does. It’s Grey and it’s complicated, but it was good in a way I could have never imagined.
