“What’s funny?”
I pulled away, letting the laugh die out. “Nothing. Everything,” I said with a shrug.
He narrowed his eyes and wrapped his arm around me. “Mysterious little minx.”
Everything, everything, everything,my brain repeated as he dragged me closer and hugged me to him tightly before asking, “How about we go wander, see what we see, and find some dinner?” He tipped my chin up and drew me in for a single kiss. “Then we can walk on the beach, and I can show you what I’ve been meaning to. Tell you what I need to tell you.” Another kiss,followed by a smirk. “And then we can come back and desecrate the hot tub.”
At my enthusiastic approval, we parted ways to finish getting dressed, and I took a moment to myself in the bathroom.
A few deep breaths as I took in what had just happened. That Cody had been inside me. That, even though he had nothing to prove when it came to how I saw him, he’d still been utter perfection.
I didn’t have tons of experience with physical intimacy, but the few encounters I’d had were hurried and unfulfilling. I’d never wished to take them further, to let someone else connect with me in such a way.
And I hoped Cody would be the only one I shared this with.
As I freshened up, I wondered what Cody planned to show me, to tell me, all the while not having the slightest clue that when we walked out that door, another change was waiting just around the corner.
I didn’t know that when we stepped outside—hand in hand and Cody with his inscrutable notebook tucked under his arm—and the sun set on our day, the world would tilt before the next sunrise.
37
Liem
The waves crashedagainst the darkened beach as an odd question was put forth.
“Is restless toe syndrome a thing?”
I scrunched my toes in the sand as I considered, not nearing any conclusion before the man beside me continued his musings.
“Sometimes when I’m not walking, my toes try to keep going.”
I’d had my doubts about the possibility of this day getting any better. Not after a morning at the Locc painting Cody, painting Cody again, and then an afternoon wrapped up in each other.
The quiet dinner we’d enjoyed together at the seafood shack was pleasurable in its own right, starting with Cody’s brief shyness that dissolved as he directed me to a booth at the beachfront restaurant and guided me to sit on his left, then continuing with the way he reached for my nondominant hand, gripping it between us as we ate.
And concluding now, with the rambling.
I’d never known him to talk like this, save for once. And even then, on that early January day over a year ago, it wasn’t so much a ramble as it was a cascading avalanche of worries that he’d held onto for much too long.
I glanced up at the man beside me on the beach, at the agitation written all over his body.Closing the short distance between us, I shuffled through the sand and stopped right in front of him, the choppy tide only a few feet from us.
Then I stepped onto his restless feet.
He stilled and frowned down at them. “Huh.”
I smiled. “Better?”
His hands found my hips then, squeezing once before smoothing around to my lower back. “No. It really isn’t,” he said, a sharp edge to his words as he pressed against me.
I didn’t bother holding back my laugh, bouncing on top of his feet experimentally as I went for a distraction. “Have you heard from our best friend today?”
Cody’s eyes narrowed deliciously; then he reached down and swatted my ass, the jolt brushing our bodies together. “Don’t test me, Ti Bet.”
I maybe should consider workshopping this with my therapist whenever I next saw her because the possession in Cody’s voice turned my blood to lusty flame.
Even the way he guarded his friendship with Bree was triggering in the best way, if my blatant physical arousal was anything to go by.
“Hmm,” he mused, lightly grinding against said arousal. “Didn’t I say I wanted to walk with you on the beach so we could talk?”
