Page 79 of Olivia's Only Pretending
“Me?”
“Since I met you, I don’t have to be anything butmewhen I’m with you,” he said, grabbing at a loose thread on the blanket. “And I feel like … like you don’t want it any other way than that.”
“Well, you’re right about that. You can always be you with me.” Victor, with his guard down, was my favorite place, too.Still sweet, still funny and goofy, but tender and vulnerable and rough underneath in the best way.
“Just me?”
“That’s all I want—just Victor.”
“Youwantme?” His voice was quiet, but strong, like a pulse.
The sun was gone now. Starlight twinkled overhead, and Victor’s eyes glowed in the dark.
“Well, I’m always inviting you over, aren’t I?” A breathless, vulnerable laugh escaped me.
Somehow, along the way, Victor became a coping mechanism, his arms a restorative place, his voice a healing balm, his presence a need.
Was it always like this, and I was only now seeing it? Or was it a development over months of caring friendship?“You’re a favorite place to me, too. A safe zone.”
“You’re my safe zone, too,” he said.
“I’m better with you next to me, you know that?” I admitted, my head tilting to the side, a piece of hair falling in my eyes.
His eyes crinkled. “Every Olivia is the best Olivia.” He looked down at his hands, the grape in his fingers. “I’d probably obsess over any version of you.”
The feeling was achingly mutual, but I was still trying to tread carefully, walking the shoreline between us, with my dress hiked up, careful of the waves even as the tide came rolling in.
“You know what’s funny?” I said. “How my mom picked you out for Lucy. What if you two had worked out?”
He grimaced at the memory of our mothers setting him up on a blind date over the summer with my sister, Lucy. I laughed at what a failure that date had been. “What’s hilarious is how excited I was for that date. I knew I thought one of those Rhodes sisters was hot—the tiny sexy librarian one with her dark red hair.”
My whole body flushed.
“And those freckles.” He said the last the word like he was gasping. “And instead, Lucy sat down across from me. Lucy’s awesome, but … she’s not you.”
“But, what if?” I pressed. “What if the date went so well and she made you forget all about me?”
He shook his head. “Nothing will ever get you out of my head.”
I rubbed my arms. The temperature was dropping.
Victor tracked the movement, asking, “Are you cold?”
“A little,” I admitted.
He shrugged off his jacket. Then, scooting closer to me, he wrapped it around my shoulders. It was heavy, leather, and smelled like sawdust and him. I slipped my arms in, tugging it closer like a blanket on a cold night.
His arm brushed against mine, setting off a ricochet in my heart. I slipped my fingers into his. I caught his eye, the corner of his mouth curving into a side grin. My mouth tasted like red wine. My chest felt warm, all aglow.
“Your mouth is dark purple.” Victor chuckled. “Looks like you had a popsicle.”
I touched my mouth. “It was the wine.”
He reached over and brushed my lips with his fingertips. “I feel like you do things like this on purpose to drive me crazy.”
I looked up at him, his fingers still on my mouth. “No kissing, remember?” My chest was heaving, every breath heavy.
He nodded, silently. Our eyes locked, memories of the two of us meeting like magnets, hot on my skin. I swallowed.
