Of course, we’d kissed.
I mean, who wouldn’t have? Just an item on the bucket list.
Right?
A FAIRYTALE
Of course, there were questions when we rejoined the group. Noah answered most of them—calm, even, utterly unbothered.
“Luna slipped and fell into the water.”
He made it sound so simple.
He’d jumped in after me. To make sure I hadn’t cracked my head on a rock and drowned, obviously. And afterward… Well, neither of us got into that.
Aside from a few doubting glances, nobody seemed too suspicious, just concerned that I was okay.
Babs was a different story. Of course, she suspected that there was more to it. The woman was a freaking mind-reader sometimes.
Her eyes flicked to the shirt hanging past the hem of my shorts—Noah’s shirt—and then skimmed over Noah’s damp hair and his bare chest beneath the jacket before nodding in approval.
She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to.
And the details about my and Noah’s little hike mattered even less when a yellow school bus pulled up in a cloud of dust.
“Our chariot awaits!” Tay called, all business now that we were moving again.
But not on the Love Bus.
That silver beast with its cushy seats, funky upholstery, and dependable AC had somehow become home. And now we were abandoning it on the side of a mountain. I felt a ridiculous ache in my chest as we boarded the school bus, a jolt of nostalgia I never would have expected.
It only got worse when I found myself wedged beside Babs on a sticky vinyl bench, the kind that made your thighs feel sweaty on contact, bouncing and swaying as we wound our way down the Million Dollar Highway. It was louder, rougher, and had a faint scent that took me right back to junior high.
Noah sat two rows up and across the aisle, next to his mom.
That’s why he was here, after all. For her. Not me.
We barely spoke at check-in. Just a few throwaway lines—easy, friendly, meaningless. Like we hadn’t been wrapped around each other in a freezing pool of water just hours earlier. Like he’d never called me beautiful.
Which, honestly? Was impossible.
As soon as I got my room key, I made a beeline for the elevator, not bothering to make any excuses. Just needing…
I wasn’t even sure what I needed at this point.
When the door clicked shut behind me, I stripped out of my damp clothes and, barely taking time to grab my shampoo, stepped under the hot spray of the shower.
Steam wrapped around me like a blanket. I tipped my head back and let the heat work into my scalp, down my spine. But instead of relaxing me, my pulse ticked upward.
Every droplet reminded me of earlier. Of him.
Of the cold that had shocked my system, waking me up from some weird kind of sexual slumber, and then reintroducing it to the heat of Dr. Noah Grady.
I lathered soap over my arms, over my chest. My skin felt more sensitive than usual, like it was remembering things I’d tried to forget. Had it really been that long since I’d had feelings like this?
Had I ever? And if I had, when did they stop?
As my hands drifted lower, I closed my eyes and let the images rise—Noah’s hands on me, his breath at my neck. His voice in my ear, low and concerned. His mouth?—
