“No one knows that.”
He leaned a little closer to me. “Weknow that.”
Pine, salt, cinnamon, eyes that feel like the ocean rushing in on you. I paused to clear my throat. “Semantics.”
If I’d been honest with myself, I wished he would have closed that gap between us again. I would have let him do whatever he wanted in that open doorway, and I wouldn’t have told a single soul about it.
But instead, he nodded and stepped away. Held a hand out to me, like we were closing a business deal. He did it all with that trademark charm, a casual grin on his face. I took his hand, shook it, tried not to show what the rub of his palm against mine did to me.
“Friends?” he said.
I almost laughed. “Or something like that.”
It was the first lie I ever told him. I couldn’t have been just friends with Everett Bridges if I tried.
eleven
This Summer
After the farmers market, we wander the shops in town for a while, our usual traditions popping up unintentionally. Laurel buys everything that even slightly piques her interest: a pale pink cashmere scarf at one shop and Frye boots at the place next door, an All-Clad pan I tell her is my favorite at the fancy kitchenware shop that she will most assuredly never use, a vintage wedding ring at another place that she says signifies hermarriage to herself.
Between that and our stop at the grocery store, we arrive back to the villa bogged down with packages, more things on order to be shipped to Laurel’s place in LA.
“Hey,” she says to me as she straightens her laden arms and lets bags carelessly slip off of them into a heap on the floor of the foyer. “We re-created our first day without even trying.”
“We did,” I say.
Davi comes in behind her, a paper grocery bag in his arms. “We never used to spend money on—” he pulls a bottle out of the bag, squints at it “—hyperoxygenated water? Laurel,” he says. “How much was this?”
“It flushes out toxins,” she says. “I need to flush toxins out of my life right now.”
“Okay,” Davi says, ever-skeptical eyes already rolling, “but—”
I stop him, snatching the bottle out of his hand as Laurel flits into the kitchen. “Let her have her water,” I whisper. Davi completes his eye roll but drops the issue.
Gabe and Everett bring the rest of the things in while I start unpacking in the kitchen. Laurel says she’s going upstairs to change into her swimsuit.
“Anyone is welcome to join me on the beach!” she calls, picking over the bags at the foot of the stairs before she finds the one she’s looking for and leaves.
Gabe watches her as she goes, waiting until she’s out of earshot to say, “Do you think she’s secretly still dating Stephen?”
“What?” I ask, at the same time Davi says, adamantly, “No.”
“Why would you think that?” I say, closing the fridge door. Everett opens it again as soon as it closes, eggs and butter in hand. Our gazes lock for half a second, annoyed, before we both look away.
Gabe shrugs. “She just seems... off.”
“And the only explanation is that she’s secretly dating her cheating ex-husband?” Davi asks.
“Who said anything about cheating?” I say to him, trying to moderate my tone but failing. It comes out shrill, bouncing off all the marble countertops in this kitchen.
“Come on,” Davi says. “Hehadto be cheating, right? To break those two up? They were like—” he waves a hand “—Goose and Amy, or whoever.”
We all look at him in silence, and even Everett closes the fridge door to squint at him.
“You know,” Davi says. “If I can fly, you can fly, or whatever the hell it is.”
“The Notebook,” Gabe translates. “Ryan Gosling.” Everett and I nod.
