Page 48 of Beachside Kisses With My Best Friend

He’s quiet for a moment, and I wonder if I’ve drifted back to sleep. But then comes his soft reply: “I’ll be right over there.”

I assume he’s pointing to the sorry excuse for a chair in the corner.

“No.” My voice is thick with sleep, but I force determination into my tone and give his hand a tug. “Here. With me.”

He squats beside me and a hint of moonlight through the window shows his eyes glittering back in the dark. “You sure?”

I answer him with a squeeze and another tug before rolling over to make space for him.

It takes a full minute, but then the mattress sinks behind me and it’s warm and toasty under these covers, like bread out of the oven. Reaching behind me, I pull his arm around my waist. Then I finally drift off again, not knowing anythingfor sureexcept how Jordan Carmichael makes me feel.

Safe.

thirteen

JORDAN

What did Marilee mean by reaching for me last night? Pulling me into the bed, against her, letting me hold her? And before that, opening up to me about her miscarriages, when it would have been easier to simply watch a movie together and slip back into the old patterns of our friendship.

The thought went round and round in my head all night, invading my dreams. In fact, I thought maybe I had dreamed the whole thing—until that moment when I woke up.

I was still tangled up with Marilee, my palm flat against her stomach. And my mouth… Shoot. My mouth somehow found its way to the bare skin where her shoulder meets her perfect neck. Those hazy first moments after waking tested the limits of my self-control. It took everything in me not to press a kiss there against the vein pulsing just within reach—especially when Marilee emitted the softest, sexiest little sigh and snuggled back against me.

Thanks only to my years of resistance to this woman and her charms, I was finally able to slip from that bed and into the shocking cold air of the room beyond the cave of warmth under the comforter, where I could have stayed forever.

Now, a half hour later, I’m beating my body into further submission by jogging down the boardwalk, trying to outrun all of the voices in my head.

Finally, I stop running.

Interlocking my fingers behind my head, I allow the deep breaths to come as my ribcage expands and contracts. A fierce wind blows up from the water, cooling my heated skin but making me shiver in my sweat-soaked, dry-fit tee. The waves are more tumultuous than usual this morning, a perfect reflection of the churning I feel inside.

I turn to head up the walkway between The Bluestocking Bookshop and Olive Paradise, neither of which will be open for a few more hours. I haven’t passed many people on the boardwalk this morning, just the occasional jogger or walker out for an early morning stroll. But I know one person who will be awake. One person whose advice I trust.

Fifteen minutes later, I’m knocking gently on my parents’ front door with a box of donuts from Al’s Grocery in my hands. Mom opens up, smiling brightly at me, a book in her hand. She looks even better than she did a few days ago when I last visited. “Jordan! What a nice surprise. Come in.”

“Morning, Mom.” I lean down and kiss her cheek. This morning she smells like the cinnamon that’s in her daily morning cup of chai tea. “Here. I brought breakfast.”

“Your father will be happy.”

I follow her into the kitchen, where she slips the box onto the round four-seater table along with her book and pads to the coffee maker, not even asking if I’ll have a mug.

“Is he awake?” I kind of hope not. I don’t want him involved in this conversation. Knowing him, he’ll just tell me to man up—like that’s the answer to every problem.Man up. Stuff your feelings away. Better yet, don’t feel at all.

“Still asleep.” Mom pours me a steaming cup of coffee, which she keeps on constant refill for my dad—who likes to add a little Irish whiskey to his when she’s not looking. She places it in front of me before sitting and folding her hands on the worn oak table. “Now. What’s on your mind, sweetheart?”

“Can’t a guy just bring his mother donuts?”

“Of course. But you’ve got that look about you.”

“What look is that?”

“The same one you had when you were six and couldn’t find the G.I. Joe I’d bought for your birthday.”

“I don’t remember that.” I take a sip of the coffee, hot and black just like I prefer it. It burns going down.

“Mmm. Well, I do.” Mom pulls her mug of tea closer. Her hands look a bit swollen this morning. “Poor thing. You had looked on your own for days and couldn’t locate it. Finally decided to ask for help.”

“And let me guess. You used your amazing mom instinct and found it in a few minutes.”

---