Page 60 of No One But Us

“We don’t need a ride,” she says. “Idrove.”

He looks only at me when he replies. “Then I’ll just be waiting athome.”

She rolls her eyes. “You don’t need to wait, James. I’m19.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m still going towait.”

She frowns after he leaves. “He’s acting weird,” she complains. “The sooner he and Allison get back together, thebetter.”

I choose to ignore that last bit. “Weirdhow?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “He’s acting all, like, happy and mellow. I’ve never seen him like this. You don’t think he’s doing drugs with Max, doyou?”

I try to hide my smile, and I can’t. Joy spreads through me, makes me feel airborne. I make himhappy.

So I’ll continue doing something dangerous: hoping I can change his mind about what this mightbe.

Chapter 35

JAMES

I’ve spentthe past 24 hours feeling like my dick’s about to break off. It’s too much, and it’s been building up for too long. Elle makes me feel like I’m nothing but hormones and need, at the mercy of a primitive brain that wants nothing more than to keep her locked up in my room allday.

Max raises a brow when I slide into a stool at his bar to pass the hour. “I’m surprised to see youhere.”

“I’ve come inbefore.”

He hands me a beer. “Yeah, before you had someone to go homewith.”

“What are you talkingabout?”

“You and Elle, dude. It’s abouttime.”

I stiffen. I really thought Elle understood she needed to keep it a secret. Max is the opposite ofsecret. “I still don’t know what you’re talkingabout.”

“I saw you two on the beach today. If I had ovaries, I’d have gotten pregnant from all the eye fucking that went on there. Not to mention the effort you expended applying lotion to her back. I’ve had full-body massages done in shortertime.”

“You’re imaginingthings.”

His jaw shifts, and he looks away for a moment. “I can’t believe I’m the one reminding you, but here it is: she’s 19. And I don’t know why you’re pretending nothing is going on, but you’d better realize that all the pretending in the world won’t mean it’s not real for her. So if you don’t like her well enough to admit you’re with her, then you don’t like her enough to sleep with her. That girl likes you, and it’s going to fuck her up if you just take off at the end of the summer like it didn’t mean anything. And if you do it, I’ll fucking killyou.”

“You can’t kill me. I’m taller, and I weighmore.”

“For her sake,” he says, “I’d manageit.”

He walks away before I can reply. And as appalling as it is to be lectured by Max, of all people, I know that he isright.

But if I can’t sleep with her, and I also can’t give her up, where does that leaveus?

Chapter 36

ELLE

I spendthe ride home with Ginny feeling like a kid who’s just won a shopping spree in a candy store. There are so many things I want from James, I don’t know where tostart.

I go straight to the shower when we get home, and then I join James and Ginny on the deck. His eyes sweep my face and then descend, stuttering briefly over my thighs before he raises them again, darker than they were before. My hair is still wet, and my face is bare, and I’m in nothing but shorts and a tank, but the way he looks at me makes me feel loose-limbed andfeverish.

“What’s up with everyone needing to shower after work?” Ginny grouses. “Now you guys are both clean, and I smell like a walkinghamburger.”

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