“You were naked with Jeanine!”
“Better yet, give me your cornbread. I’m eating it all and leaving you none.”
This gets her attention. She clutches the wedge to her chest. “I’ll be good.”
“Mm-hmm.”
Madison is quiet again for all of two minutes, and I know her head is still stuck on me and Jeanine. “I’m sorry, I just . . . I’m trying to picture you having sex.”
“I’d rather you not.”
She tugs her lips from one corner to the other in thought. “I had a dream we kissed the other night.”
My elbow slips off the door ledge where it was resting. I want to ask her roughly a million follow-up questions. “You did?”
“Yeah.” She laughs. “It was chaste. It took place in Hank’s bar. And then . . .” She trails off, apparently deciding against continuing. “Never mind.”
“Uh, no. You have to finish that sentence now.”
“You’re gonna get weird about it.”
“I swear I won’t.”
“Okay . . .” She winces preemptively. “I asked you to take me back to your house so we could—you know—and you said no because you were too shy. And then I woke up.”
I am silent. Dead silent. And then I pull over on the side of the road, park, leave the key in the ignition, and jump out. The door is yawning open behind me as I hike to somewhere. Anywhere.
Madison is out and behind me in a flash, laughing her ass off. “You said you weren’t going to be weird!”
“I lied.”
Her hand wraps around my elbow and tugs me to a stop. “James! Stop! It’s not a big deal.” She’s still laughing so hard as I spin to look at her.
“No big deal? I just found out your subconscious thinks I’m too shy to have sex. That’s appalling.”
“It’s probably because I’ve never thought about . . . you . . . like that.” Her voice jumps an octave. “I’ve never considered what you’d be like in bed, so I guess my brain just filled in a blank to wrap up the dream.” She shifts on her feet, hand falling away, eyes scanning the cornfield like she’s hoping to find an escape hatch hidden in the stalks.
“I mean, we’re friend-friends, right? So why would I know what you’re like—or what you like—in bed?”
But the second she says it, her gaze flicks away and her lips press tight.
I’ve seen that look a hundred times. It’s the one she makes when she’s trying to hold the truth inside her mouth.
And just like that, I know she’s lying.
She’s thought about it and is trying to pretend she hasn’t.
I should let it go. Climb back in the truck and pretend none of this happened.
But something is shifting between us. I’m almost sure it’s not all in my head anymore.
I want to chase it.
“Friend-friends or not, I know you well, Madison. I knowexactlywhat you’d like in bed. And believe me . . .” I tip a little closer. “I would not be shy about giving you what you wanted.”
She sucks in a breath. So I give in, just a little, to what my body is screaming for.
I press a kiss to her temple, letting it linger only long enough to cross the line from friendly to something else.
