Page 92 of Charlie

Itook Isla up on her offer and joined her in the driveway late afternoon. Isla hauled a lawn chair from the garage and set it in the sun, motioning for me to lie down. I protest, but she waves me off and slips her headphones back on. I must’ve fallen asleep at some point because I wake to a warm hand sliding over my cheek and soft lips pressing against mine.

"Hey, sleepyhead," Lach croons, dragging his thumb over my bottom lip. "I couldn’t reach you on your phone, so I had to hunt you down. I’m planning the last details for tomorrow – I need to know some of your favorite foods."

I rub my eyes, squinting against the sun. Lach is leaning over me, his eyes the same color as the sky. "What kind of food? Breakfast food, lunch food, dinner food? Snack food?"

His eyebrow goes up a little more with each type of food I mention. He chuckles. "Well, I guess that depends on how early you want to start tomorrow."

I push myself into a sitting position, making room for him to sit next to me, his broad hand massaging the large amount of thigh exposed by my lounge shorts. It’s hard to think when he’s touching me like this. I clear my throat. "Maybe we should start early afternoon? What exactly do you have planned?"

"Wouldn’t you like to know?" he says, grinning.

"I hate surprises," I grumble, twisting the hem of my shirt in my fingers.

"Do you? Or do you hate that all of your previous surprises ended in disappointment?"

Fuck. I breathe out a long sigh. "My favorite thing is probably a good cheeseboard – the kind with the fruit, the chocolate, and all the little snacky things. If I’m thinking particularly of dinner food, my favorite dinner is probably a good steak and loaded baked potato. Is that even a thing here?"

"We'll make it a thing. But you’ll have to call it by its proper name first – a jacket potato."

I laugh. "Is that really what it's called here?"

He nods, the corner of his mouth quirking. "Legend has it that men used to put the hot potatoes in their jacket pockets for warmth during the cold months."

"Is that true?"

"No fucking clue," he says, laughing. "You know that store that's on the road to Lewis?"

"The big one on the left?" I ask, trying to get my directionally challenged brain to cooperate.

"That's the one. They used to have a bear that they kept in a cage. Growing up, we would buy Irn-Bru and biscuits to feed him."

I wrinkle my nose. "That doesn't sound healthy."

He shrugs. "It wasn't, not that we understood that when we were kids. By the time I got to secondary school, he was huge. One day a tourist poured petrol into an Irn-Bru can and gave it to him. The bear flipped out, broke out of his cage, and ran all the way to Harris until he fell over just down the road from here."

"Oh my God! Did he die?"

"No, he ran out of petrol."

My consternation for the bear turns into a surprisingly loud snort. I slap my hand over my mouth, but I can't stop laughing. "Where the heck did you hear that one?" I ask, wiping the tears from my cheeks.

"Good ol' Dolly Parton," he says in a southern drawl which makes me laugh even more. "Okay, back to the matter at hand. What about dessert?"

My gaze drops to his lips.

"Me? Noted," he teases, pretending to write it down in a fake notebook. The side of his mouth quirks up, but his expression changes – eyelids drooping, pupils dilating. "Make sure you rest up tonight, Carebear," he says, his voice husky. He brushes his lips over mine. "I’ll see you in the morning."

"Wait!" I stop him with a hand on his forearm. "What time tomorrow?"

"You tell me."

"Ten o’clock?" I think of all the things I need to do in the morning – shave, exfoliate, moisturize.

"Ten is perfect. I’ll see you then. Sleep sweet, Charlie."

Isla walks over to me, sliding her headphone off one ear. "I have to say, it’s fascinating watching you with each of them. When you're with Jack, you let him be in control – like there's a part of you that completely trusts that he'll take care of everything. You’re confident and outgoing with Cam, encouraging him to take risks with you that he wouldn't normally take. And Lach balances them both out and keeps you grounded, doesn’t he?"

I think about her words for a second, nodding. "I feel different with all three of them. When we're all together, I feel whole somehow."

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