Page 19 of Summer Kisses

"I wouldn't mind living in a beach house, even if it is only for a little while." But it was dangerous to think I could live with him and not fall more in love with him each day.

"And I'm not going to be upset that Max comes to live with me. He won't want to leave."

Hazel laughed, just like I wanted her to. "Fat chance of that happening. Max is my baby."

"What if this was an elaborate plan for me to steal your dog? I can win him over and keep him forever."

"First of all, that's not happening. And second, that's crazy. Who would concoct a plan like that? Just get your own dog."

"The only flaw in your argument is that some dogs are irreplaceable."

I'd already built a relationship with Brady, one that started in childhood. I couldn't do the same thing with a future man I hadn't met yet. You couldn't recreate something like that.

What we had was unique. But I couldn't tell him that. He couldn't know that I'd been harboring a crush on him for what seemed like forever. It would be a betrayal of our friendship. How could he ever trust me again?

"So what do you say? Should we move in together? Stifle any rumors that we're not the real deal?"

I sighed, long and hard. "Fine. But when I move out, I'm taking Max with me."

Brady flashed me a grin. "We'll see about that."

I was going to lose more than Max's affection if we moved in together. I was going to lose the distance I desperately needed to keep my heart intact.

At drinks with the girls, Ivy asked, "I can't believe you're moving in together so soon.”

"We are engaged." My heartbeat raced because I was lying to my best friends. "Brady said that Dalton’s moving in with his girlfriend. It’s the perfect timing, and what his family said made a lot of sense. We should give things a test drive before we're actually married." That made me think of sex for some reason. Shouldn't we try everything before we tie the knot?

But we weren't engaged. This wasn't real. The more steps we took—moving in together, the engagement party, the questions about wedding plans—the harder it was to remember that none of this was real. That we had an end date that was rapidly approaching.

Daria wiggled her brow. "Test drive, huh? I like the sound of that."

I blushed, which I shouldn't have done because, as far as my friends knew, we were already intimate.

"I still can't believe you kept it a secret from us," Elena pouted.

"Can you blame us? We wanted to explore things without the pressure and expectations. What if it hadn't worked out? That would have been brutal. And I would have lost Brady's friendship."

"I can understand that," Elena said since she'd only recently had her own secret relationship with Hudson while she was supposed to be interviewing him for a feature in the local magazine. "But I felt like we should have been the first to know. Not our grandmothers."

"You know my grandmother. If there's a secret, she finds it out first. I think she discovered Dalton's girlfriend was pregnant before she did."

Everyone laughed.

"They are powerful gossips. It's best to stay off their radar," Ivy said.

"What about you, Ivy? Have you met any rich real-estate buyers lately?"

Ivy swirled the tiny straw in her drink. "Sadly, no. They're all twenty years older than me, and even if they're interested, I'm most definitely not."

Ivy was a realtor and met a lot of new residents before we did, whether they were vacationers, investors, or permanent island residents. We always went to her for news on what was going on around the island.

"That's the problem with living on the island," Daria said. "We know all the locals, and we've dated most of them. That leaves the tourists, and they're only in town for a short while."

Ivy wiggled her brows. "That's what makes it so fun. No strings. No commitments."

Daria's shoulders slumped. "I kind of want strings. I haven't had a boyfriend in forever. It's time."

"I suppose you don't get a lot of single men coming into the seashell shop," Ivy remarked.

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