He reaches over and, for a moment, I think he’s going to take my sandwich, but instead he swipes his thumb over the bottom of my lip and holds it in front of me. It has a huge dollop of marshmallow on it.
“Here,” he says.
I must flush beet red. He wants me tolick his thumb? His eyes narrow slightly, as if he’s daring me. I open my mouth a little, and he slips his thumb inside. My insides turn into gooey sugar as I close my lips around him. My heart is thundering in my chest, and Hunter’s eyes flare.
Fisher starts to play another tune, and the change in tempo breaks the spell between Hunter and me. We turn back to the fire like we’ve both been caught doing something we shouldn’t.
Hunter’s tapping his foot with the music of Fisher’s new song, then starts to sing along. The lyrics are about sugar and spice and all things nice. Hunter has a good voice—low and husky—and the vibrations spread between us. Fisher starts strumming more loudly as he and Hunter sing about Sally Cinnamon. It’s not a song I’ve heard before. Hunter turns to me as he sings, and I grin up at him. He smiles around the words, then slides his hand up my back. Our elbows and knees were touching before—parts of our bodies making contact almost by accident. But this isn’t an accident. Hunter is touching me like he’s my friend, like he’s myboyfriend. But I don’t stop smiling. His large, warm hand spans across my back, keeping me steady.
The song finishes, and we’re looking at each other. If this was another time—if we were different people, I can’t help thinking—then he’d kiss me about now. He pulls me against him, and I let my body sink into his, like we always do this. Like we know each other. Like he’s my boyfriend. He places a kiss on my head, and sparks from the fire fly out like miniature shooting stars. Are we acting? Is he taking his role as my pretend boyfriend to the next level?
“You okay?” he asks so only I can hear. Fisher has put his guitar away, and pockets of low conversations are being held around the fire.
“Yeah,” I say, pulling away from him to sit up straight.
He grabs an unused blanket from the basket and wraps it over my shoulders. “Beautifully coordinated blankets, by the way.” He shoots me a grin, and I can’t even be irritated with him. Maybe I’m desensitized from insults due to spending the evening with my cousins. Or maybe I know he’s not being mean. Maybe it’s even a compliment. He understands it’s important to me, and he accepts that. Warmth spreads in my chest at the realization.
“Thanks,” I say. “For the blanket.” His gaze dips to my lips and then back up to my eyes. “I didn’t know you could sing.”
He chuckles. “I can’t, really,” he says. “I just like that song.”
“I’ve never heard it before.”
He nods. “It’s pretty obscure. It’s from the eighties, by a British band who never made it in America. Fisher’s British, so I guess it makes sense he’d know it.”
“You like British music?” I ask. We’ve spent a lot of time texting over the past few weeks. Well,I’vespent a lot of time texting over the past few weeks, and he started responding at some point. We’ve also spent a lot of time fighting. But I don’t know Hunter very well. And I want to.
“Some of it, I guess. My dad was a big Beatles fan.” His expression shifts a bit, and I can’t quite place it, but it makes me reach my hand out and curl my finger around his arm.
His gaze falls on my hand and then back up to watch me.
“Are you close?” I ask. “With your parents?”
He shrugs. “Yes. No. Maybe.”
I let out a huff of a laugh. I know that feeling. “Life’s complicated,” I say.
“That yellow dress looked really ... nice on you,” he says.
I let go of his arm and draw a small circle in the sand between us. “Yellow isn’t really my color. I think you need to be a goddamn beauty queen to pull it off. I don’t know why I tried.”
Studiously, Hunter draws his own circle, overlapping the edges with mine, like a Venn diagram. “You pulled it off.”
I glance up at him, and he meets my gaze. There’s a part of me that wants to dismiss his compliment, to pass it off as him teasing me, but I don’t. I can tell he’s being sincere. “Thank you,” I say.
“It’s true. I figure you’d look beautiful in anything, but lemon yellow brings out the amber flecks in your eyes.”
I flush with heat, and it has nothing to do with the fire. No one’s listening to Hunter talk about my eyes or how I look wearing yellow. But here he is, saying it anyway. Being nice to me, despite me not being so nice to him at times. He’s nothing like I thought he was when I first met him. Nothing like the man I assumed he was.
He’s so much more.
Chapter Thirteen
Hunter
I don’t know what it is about ocean air, but it relaxes me. I really should think about getting a place in the Hamptons next summer. Between the tourists and the humidity, summer weekends in New York can get stifling. I end up going into the office because there’s nothing else to do. Maybe I need more ocean breezes in my life. I turn the light off in the bathroom and open the door to the bedroom. The bedside light is on and the curtains are drawn. But the bed is empty.
“Lucy?” I ask.
