Griffon makes his thinking face, scrunching up his mouth until I have to laugh out loud. “Um, for some reason I believe that anyone who inhales chocolate like you do can whip up a batch of cookies blindfolded in the middle of the night, so I’m guessing that one’s true.”
“You’re one for one.”
“Last month you told me that you’d been to Hawaii twice, so I’m going to say that you’ve been snorkeling with dolphins.”
I frown. “I never told you about Hawaii.”
He looks at me like I should know better. “It was May fifth. A Sunday. And we were sitting in my living room watching TV. A commercial for an airline came on, and you said that you’d been to Hawaii twice, once when you were three and then again two years ago.” Griffon smiles. “Is that good enough?”
“Show off.” I laugh. It’s hard to argue with someone who has an eidetic memory. “It’ll do. So the lie?”
“Is obviously that you were attacked by a bear.” He grabs my hand. “In fact, these hands are sissy soft. I’ll bet you’ve never even been camping in your life.”
“Not true! I’ve camped plenty. And for your information, I was attacked once. It was by a baby deer on the way from our tent to the bathroom, but still.”
“Car camping doesn’t count,” Griffon says, pulling me down to him. “We should go backpacking sometime. Just the two of us in a tiny tent in the big mountains.”
“Ooh. Sign me up.” I settle in next to him, pushing myself against the length of his body until he rolls onto his side and puts his arms around me from behind. I watch the fire dance in front of us, feeling the warmth from its heat on my face and the warmth from Griffon’s breath on the back of my neck.
“Did you bring the marshmallows?” I ask, turning my head toward him.
Griffon laughs. “I knew there was something I forgot. You should never go to a posh party in the Marina without a bag of marshmallows.”
I roll over so that I’m facing him, wrapping one leg around his. Reaching up, I ease my fingers through his curls and then trace the side of his face. “If I was Kat, I’d make you go get some.”
Griffon pulls back and smiles. “If you were Kat, I’d make Owen do it.” A serious look passes across his face. “But I’d do it for you. I’d go and get you anything you want. Even marshmallows.” He pushes a strand of hair away from my face and leans down to kiss me, his lips soft but urgent, and I can feel the desire in his touch. The vibrations that always exist whenever we’re together become insistent and almost visible in the small space between us. I run my hands up the inside of his shirt, feeling the muscles of his back contract and goose bumps form as I touch his skin. He keeps his hands outside of my clothes like he usually does, feeling the contours of my body through my jeans as he runs his fingers down my thigh. I inch toward him, closing off any remaining space between our bodies.
My fingers slide down where his jeans meet his skin and he moans softly, pressing against me with even more urgency, his hand firmly on the back of my neck. I can feel his hesitation and silently urge him to keep going, to not stop at that invisible line we’ve respected all of these weeks.
I sense the moment it changes, and reach up to pull him to me even harder, but Griffon’s breathing heavily and pushing himself away from me on the lounger.
“We need to stop,” he says, and I can hear the effort it costs him to force the words out.
I reach for him again, wanting the connection I felt just a few seconds ago. With everything we’ve been through together, I’m not a kid anymore. “No we don’t. There’s nobody else here. Just us. I want to show you how I feel.”
Griffon hesitates, and I can see the emotions playing on his face. He squeezes his eyes closed and shakes his head. “I know how you feel. You don’t have to prove it to me.”
“I know I don’t have to,” I say softly. “I want to.”
He bites his lip as his eyes search mine, looking for the truth in my words.
With centuries of experience behind him, sometimes he seems like an adult—but sometimes he’s every inch a seventeen-year-old boy. I run my hands up his shirt, smiling when I see him flinch. “Why are you hesitating? It’s not your first time.”
Griffon looks at me seriously. “It’s my first time with you.”
I watch his face in the flickering orange light, wanting to lock this one moment in time so that I can go back to it over and over again. I wonder if it will be different when I remember my other first times. If it will make it any less special. “It doesn’t matter whether we’re in some fancy hotel room or right here under the stars. I want to be with you.”
Without saying anything, he bends down and buries his face in my neck, tenderly kissing the curve behind my ear. The air around us seems to have changed, taken on a weight of expectation, and I feel a thrill of anticipation and fear run through me.
I’m so focused on his touch that I don’t hear the voices on the stairs until they’re almost to the rooftop. Griffon must hear them at the same time because he jumps back from me, and the two of us frantically adjust our clothes as Kat and Owen appear at the top of the stairs.
“I knew it!” Owen shouts, and I can hear the pride in his voice.
“Oh. My. God.” It doesn’t take a genius to recognize Kat’s angry voice. “I told you not to embarrass me!”
I struggle to sit up, my heart still pounding at what almost happened. “Which is why we’re up here alone and not making out in the middle of the living room.”
“Right,” she snaps. “Like everyone in the place couldn’t look at the two of you and know what you’ve been up to.”
Griffon glances at me with a smile, and I can’t help laughing. “So what are you doing up here, then?” I ask. “Just coming up to check out the view?”
Kat looks at Owen, and even in this light I can see her face get red. “As a matter of fact, we were.”
“Which is exactly what we were doing.” Griffon points to the other lounge chair. “Have a seat. It’s not so cold with the fire going. I’m going to go get us a couple more drinks.”
I watch Kat and Owen settle into the chair, thinking about how much I don’t want to spend the whole evening watching them make out. I want to go back to the place Griffon and I were just now. “I’ll go,” I say. “Besides, I want to check on Rayne. I didn’t tell her we were up here.” I slide off the chair before Griffon can object and grab the glasses. Bending over to give him a quick kiss, I whisper, “Be right back.”
I know I’m grinning as I open the door at the bottom of the stairs, but I can’t help it. As frustrated as I am at getting interrupted, it felt so right. I lift my sleeve up to my nose just to get the faint traces of his scent, to nudge the last ribbons of memory of what we almost did. Of what we’re still going to do. Soon.
I’m not paying attention to anyone as I walk down the hall toward the living room, just thinking about Griffon up on the roof and how much I want to get back there with him. Which is why I’m caught totally off guard when I hear a shout coming from the crowd in the kitchen.
“Cole! Wait!”
I stop and glance through the doorway, but the person who emerges from the crush of bodies is the last one I expect to see at this party. I’m so stunned to see him again that I can barely get his name past my lips.
“Drew.”
Five
“I heard you were here,” Drew says in his thick Australian accent, glancing behind him as he follows me into the hallway. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”