“What?”
William leaned his head toward me. “That maybe you wouldn’t . . .”
In the dark, the glint in his eyes elicited an emotion in me that I’d never felt before.
I held my breath as his lips softly grazed mine. It was a soft, delicate kiss. The only kiss I’d ever gotten in my life. We pulled away from each other abruptly, as if there was a spark between our lips that was too intense to bear.
I instinctively closed my eyes, and he kissed me again. But this time it was a real kiss. I opened my lips and collided with the sweetness of his, our tongues mingling. I felt my shoulders shake, my stomach tingle, and my knees go weak.
Silence surrounded us, broken only by our panting.
“You can tell me whatever you want, Will,” I whispered.
But the moment of peace didn’t last long because suddenly we heard a scream. I turned and saw a group by the pool. The girls, some of whom were in bikinis, were dancing; others had revealing dresses on. They were painted bright colors that glowed in the dark.
“Oh, no. James and his obsession with body painting,” groaned William, annoyed.
And obviously Hunter was there too.
I tried to lower my gaze but his physique was too darn perfect, even in that moment full of colors and lights. I stared at him breathlessly. I didn’t know what was getting me so worked up. His abs seemed to burst out from under his skin. I noticed that his face was still a little black and blue, and he had a few bruises on his body, but it didn’t look like the girls cared at all.
One was breathing down his neck, immersed in the curve of his neck, as if she wanted to suck in his scent.
“Quiet time’s over,” announced William, watching his friend.
“You’re so different . . .”
I was telling him, or maybe myself.
“You know, June.” William’s reflective tone clashed with the nearby chatter. “I was scared of James in elementary school. He always acted like a bully, the typical extrovert who was always angry. Every time I had to go to school, I hoped I didn’t run into him in the hallways. I was shy and clumsy, and he wasn’t scared of anyone. The truth is that I wanted to be like him. Everyone at school respected him. Even the teachers loved him, even though he made them lose their patience.”
“Really? They lost their patience with him? I’m shocked,” I grumbled.
“I’m not a saint, June, but you have no idea how many times James made me lose it. He does it to his dad, his friends, to women. But you end up loving him anyway. And he’s the most generous person I know.”
“He suffers from main character syndrome,” I said.
“You could say that. James doesn’t know what danger is.”
Because he’s insane, I thought to myself even as I was unable to tear my eyes away from him.
I watched as James raised a bottle of beer to his mouth and chugged the contents. His Adam’s apple moved quickly as he downed the contents greedily, but I was distracted by the ring-clad hand caught on the triangle bikini top that the brunet dancing in front of him was wearing. James put his lips on her neck. She closed her eyes, but soon after he moved to the blond who was whispering something in his ear, and he started kissing her.
I’d never seen those two in my life, and he probably hadn’t either.
“He doesn’t exactly seem like a great example to follow,” I commented, looking away from the grotesque scene.
“Absolutely not. He’s always had his own way of having fun. One moment he’d be jumping off a roof and the next minute he’d diving in a pool. He was trashed, but he didn’t care. He did it anyway.”
“So what does he care about?” I asked curiously.
“People he loves. And the fact that he’s so crazy, you have no idea how much good that does me, June.”
He said that last sentence with a jolt of relief. I wondered what he was talking about but didn’t have the courage to ask him.
“Want something to drink?” William’s question threw me off.
“Just a soda.”
