I take a deep breath at the top of the stairs and try to look casual and unaffected by what happened even though calm is the total opposite of what's running through my mind. When I reach the bottom of the stairs, I find the living room empty. Grandma's voice echoes from the kitchen so I follow the sound and find Jace standing next to her by the refrigerator. Grandma points to a photo of me on my thirteenth birthday.
“She was in love with Justin Bieber, let me tell you,” Grandma says, tapping the picture of me wearing a Bieber T-shirt and a collection of Bieber stickers decorating my arms and face. “That girl was crazy about him. Of course now she acts like she's too cool for that kind of music, but you know how kids are.”
“Grandma,” I groan, entering the kitchen and grabbing Jace's arm. “We don't need to tell him my life story,” I say as I tug him away from the embarrassing display of my childhood.
“Oh I'm quite enjoying it,” Jace says. I tell him to shut up and Grandma laughs all the way back to the living room.
Jace opens the car door for me once again, and I slide into the passenger seat. A girl could get used to this. You know, minus all the embarrassing stuff beforehand.
“So, where are we going?” I ask, leaning my head back against the headrest and noticing a sunroof for the first time.
“There are literally no good restaurants in town. And I know because I've been to every single one,” Jace says, buckling his seatbelt. I smell his cologne when he pulls his car door closed. It smells so great it makes the butterflies in my stomach fly on overdrive. “So I was thinking we'd head out of town and hit up this steakhouse.”
“Out of town? Like how far?” I ask, still staring at the sunroof. “I'm not sure what my curfew is or anything.”
“I've got it taken care of.” Jace looks at me and then reaches up to the sunroof and pulls back the cover, revealing the evening sky. “There you go.”
I smile and close my eyes as the warmth beams down on my skin. Jace inhales a breath and I roll my head to the side to look at him.
“I've had one hell of a time,” he says, reaching up and brushing a fallen strand of hair out of my eyes. “But seeing your pretty face takes all of that away.”
A million questions run through my mind but I don’t ask any of them because I don't want to come off as obsessive or annoying. I mean, I'm definitely not complaining that the first thing Jace does when he gets home is take me to dinner, but an explanation for where he's been would be nice.
We approach a red light on the way out of town and I realize this is the only red light in town. Salt Gap is freaking tiny.
“Finally,” Jace says as he comes to a stop.
“Finally what?” I ask, right before he leans over the console and presses his lips to mine. Electricity jumps through my body, and the peppermint taste of his lips have me hoping mine taste just as pleasing to him. “Glittery lip gloss,” he says with a smile as he pulls away from the kiss, his lips almost as shiny as mine.
“Sorry,” I mumble.
Our eyes meet for a fraction of a second before he leans in and kisses my neck, sending chills down my body as he leaves a trail of glitter from my ear to my collarbone. My toes tingle at his touch. I reach up and grab his shoulders, pulling him closer to me.
A car honks behind us. He pulls away slowly, kissing me on the lips once more before putting his hands back on the steering wheel. The light is green.
“Whoops,” Jace says with a smile as he steps on the gas.
Our waitress is pretty, and Jace doesn't ogle her or watch her ass as she walks away. I like that.
“So how's your knitting thing?” Jace asks, grabbing a roll from the middle of our table. He smears way too much butter on it with his butter knife.
“You mean crochet?” I ask.
He shrugs. “It's the same thing, right?”
I laugh and tear off a piece of my roll. “I crocheted a blanket, and it's pretty awesome. But knitting is so not the same thing. I'll let you slide this time, but don't let Grandma hear you talk like that.”
He pretends to zip an invisible zipper across his lips. After swallowing half of his roll, he says, “So where do you normally live? You know, when you aren't banished to your grandparent's house.”
“I'm from a small town near Dallas,” I say as a stab of pain hits my heart when I think about home. The realization that the fun I'm having with Jace is just temporary, hurts more than I care to think about right now.
“Does it happen to be Mixon?”
I wrinkle my eyebrows. “Huh? No, I've never heard of that place.”
His shoulders sag a little as he takes another bite of his roll. “Eh, I figured as much. No one lives there.”
“What's Mixon?” I ask. “You're from LA, right?”
