My fingers twitched, desperate to commit the curve to my notebook. And inside my brain. On my skin. But instead of picking up my pencil, I hummed, feigning cool and calm.
It was the only shield I had against such a display.
He turned his head toward me with a smirk. “When I make it to Mount Doom, I win a prize.”
Angling my head in return, I inquired, “And will you argue about accepting it as you did with the key chain?”
His hazel eyes narrowed on me, and his chest visibly rumbled as he answered, “No.” A faint smile played on his lips as he reached into the pocket of his running shorts and pulled out his key chain, resting it on his thigh. He fiddled with the keys before snaking the macrame leaf between his thumb and forefinger and stroking his thumb across it. “No,” he repeated. “I’ll have earned it.”
I swallowed roughly as my gaze traced the curve of him again, but as much as I sometimes liked to breeze past social cues, in this instance, I respected it.
Cody had shared, but he wasn’t inviting more right now. Not by his body language, and not with his words.
Instead of probing further, I sat my notebook aside and joined him in his silence, resting my head against the rail and bathing myself in the shared quiet.
The sunrise may have been shrouded this morning, but Cody’s warm presence beside me felt so much like one that I didn’t mourn it.
I basked in that warmth until my phone vibrated across the wooden bench, signaling that it was time to go.
I peeked over at Cody to find him already looking at me, a frown on his tanned, slightly flushed face.
“Headed to Ari’s?” he asked, guessing mostly correctly as he handed me both my phone and forgotten pencil.
I pocketed them before stretching luxuriously, my shoulder popping loudly with the effort before I scooped up my notebook and stood up. “Yes. Southern Mississippi calls for biscuits, and I must answer. I’ve just gotta go by the cottage first.”
He rose, our arms brushing as we exited through the narrow gazebo opening and stepped down into the muggy, early March morning. As we strode across the dewy lawn, Cody remained close enough that my shoulder brushed his bicep every few steps.
I’d been so focused on my mindful breathing exercises that when Cody suddenly yanked me back and I collided into his chest, I had no automatic reaction. My mind was blank. But based on how rapidly his chest was heaving underneath my cheek and how wild his eyes looked when I carefully pulled back and looked at him, he must’ve been doing whatever the opposite of conscious breathing was.
“Hands and feet inside this mortal plane, Ti Bet,” he gritted out, his hands flexing where one grasped my bicep and the other my lower back.
I tore my eyes away and saw the cyclist I’d nearly been clipped by zooming down the road. I glanced back at Cody, my eyes wide and heart catching up, beating more rapidly by the moment. Even if I did leave this mortal plane, Vinh would probably manage to find and chew me out there too. And based on how fiercely Cody held me and how his grip tightened when I tried to step back, I thought he might be there right alongside him.
We locked eyes for a tense moment, his hazel eyes somehow seeming mossier in the faint light, and just as I opened my mouth to thank him in some way, the heavens opened up and dumped a barrage of water over the entirety of Bay Springs.
Cody jumped into action, scooping up his jacket and wrapping it around my notebook—both items having fallenwithout my notice during the incident. He glared at the sky as best he could with raindrops pelting his face and tucked the cocooned notebook under his arm before grabbing my hand. His grip was firm as he tugged me across the street—after pointedly and rather dramatically looking both ways, even in the downpour—and towed me as quickly as possible to the short side street near the cottage.
And then his hold changed.
I thought he was going to let go, and maybe he did too. At first, he relaxed his grip and let his hand slide down mine. But when he reached the tips of my fingers, his gaze flicked from the path ahead down to our hands, and he grasped my hand again instead and then tightly interlaced our fingers.
He pulled me to his side and whispered in my ear, “Tell me if this hurts your palms.”
Never. I would not respect those wishes.
Cody continued tugging me along, his long legs having not broken their stride at all during any of it. Trusting him to steer us true, I kept my gaze locked firmly on my left hand, at the line tattoos of flowers across my knuckles that were obscured by his long fingers and the droplets of rain cascading down our skin.
I lost my breath.
“Careful,” he rumbled as my toe hit the first step to the cottage door, and I followed his direction, shifting my gaze to my booted feet and carefully stepping up onto the porch after him.
The door swung open before we reached it, and Bree and Vinh stepped out, the quiet chatter between them ceasing as they noticed us, drenched and holding hands.
“Breesoph, Vinhdiagram,” Cody greeted before brushing past them right into the house, pulling me along and kicking the door behind us once we were inside.
He released my hand, and I just stood there, letting the water drip from my clothes and hair as Cody did the same in front ofme, close enough that I could reach out and touch the droplets if the desire struck.
I was certainly stricken.
