His lips hover over mine.
“Uh-huh,” I breathe.
He kisses me deeply then, letting his hands tangle in my hair like he never wants to let go. His mouth is warm, and our breaths mingle as his tongue dances over mine. It’s slow and savory, filled with relief. Filled with a promise of the future.
He pulls back, his forehead pressing to mine, and sucks in a deep breath. Then he pulls back to look at me, studying me, tracing his fingers along my jaw, around my lower lip.
“Are you sure this is what you want?” he asks, his voice low and cautious.
I nod, placing my hand over his beating heart. “I’d go anywhere with you,” I whisper. “You feel like home.”
The smile that blooms across his face then is one I’ve never seen—so full of hope it steals my breath away. It says,we found our way home.
“Okay,” he says, his voice hoarse. He pulls me close again and then we’re the only people in the world. I lean into his embrace, listening to the crashing of the waves, and inhaling the salty sea air.
And I savor it. All of it.
“Okay.”
Then
“Okay, fine.”I huffed, folding my arms across my chest. “Onlyif Josh wants to.”
“Only if Josh wants to what?” Josh asked, poking his head out the back door.
I sighed, rolling my eyes, working hard to hide my feelings for Josh from his sister.
“Cara wants to hear what we’ve been working on every day,” I said through clenched teeth.
Josh laughed, his eyes lit up. The truth is, the song had been perfected a long time ago. Josh and I had been figuring out everything else…like which parts of each other’s bodies drove each other crazy. But Cara couldn’t know that. Our relationship was still a secret, and I intended to keep it that way for as long as possible.
“Let me get my guitar,” he said, disappearing inside.
It was one of those late summer evenings where the sun lingered too long and everyone was desperate for nightfall just to cool things off.
Cara sat crossed-legged on the porch swing, sipping lemonade and swatting mosquitoes, completely unaware that the song she was about to hear wasn’t just any song. It wasoursong.
I waited as Josh fiddled with his guitar, tuning it. I watched him carefully, desperately wanting to tell him that my period was late and that I was so unbelievably in love with him but also terrified.
“This one is new,” he said, looking up. “Still rough.”
Cara laughed, rolling her eyes. “You two always say that.”
I moved next to him on the steps, our knees almost touching. But I didn’t dare look at him as he strummed the first notes. I kept my voice steady and then he joined in, his harmony wrapping around mine like it always did. But we still didn’t make eye contact because every word of this song was a confession we couldn’t give.
Cara swayed, captivated by every line. When the song ended, she gaped at us. “That was like…a love song.”
My face heated and a wave of nausea surged through me.
Josh coughed. “Yeah. It was.”
“It’s like you lived it,” Cara said, clutching her glass of lemonade.
“It’s just a song,” I said tersely, desperate to hide my feelings for Josh.
Cara eyed me curiously, but she grinned. “Okay, okay. But how cool would it be if you two really did make it to Nashville one day? You’d be stars, I just know it. Your voices belong together.”
I smirked. “Okay, Cara.”
