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“Knox.”
“Hm?”
“Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.”
He doesn’t let me go, though. And I don’t make much of a move to pull away as he trails tiny kisses behind my ear, pulling my hair to the side.
“Knox,” I laugh and he takes a deep breath.
“All right, all right. If you have to.”
“Your parents will be home soon, and I doubt they’d appreciate us making out on their porch.”
He smiles, cool teeth to my warm skin. “They’ve been waiting for you to be my girlfriend for years now. I doubt it would shock them much.”
I freeze at his words. Girlfriend?
He asks, “I mean, you are, aren’t you? Or you will be? Wait, or will you be, I mean?”
It should take some thought. I should be considering the pros and cons and the danger of what our friendship would look like if it didn’t work out between us like this summer, but looking in his eyes, I don’t have to question it.
Knox wouldn’t hurt me, at least not intentionally, and I know if we want to make it through this, it takes full honesty, which is exactly what he’s always given me. I just have to be brave enough to give it right back.
I lean close and press a single kiss to his cheek. “It would be a privilege to be your girlfriend, Knox Turner.”
“Cool.” His voice breaks, so he clears his throat. “Cool, cool, cool.” His fingers snap and he does a little no-big-deal shrug that is so wonderfully cute on him, I would love it in a frame on my nightstand.
“You’re going to get us matching girlfriend and boyfriend T-shirts aren’t you?”
“Already in the works.”
I laugh and lean back into his chest; he’s soaked, but his skin feels like a warm wall of muscle. “Lottie is going to give us the biggest ‘I told you so’ speech ever.”
“She probably already knows. She’s got those weird Spidey senses, I swear.”
“Probably…but for now, it’s kind of nice, just us two knowing.” I clasp our hands together. “Our secret.”
“Yeah, for now. Give it until tomorrow when the whole town starts working on wedding arrangements.”
I’m proven right the second I get home to Riley, my smile so wide my cheeks are sore as she jerks up from the couch.
“You and Knox made out on his front porch!”
Chapter Thirty-One Flick
If I thought Knox was a good friend, he’s an incredible boyfriend.
An incredible, albeit not at all nonchalant, boyfriend.
From that very night that we made us officially official, we have spent very little time apart. No complaints on my end.
He’s taken me to school every morning, running a quick stop by Glazed and Confused for glazed croissants and pumpkin spice lattes. He always orders a very manly black cold brew but has to take multiple sips of my latte “just for a tiny taste.” I tell him just to order his own, but he said that is not “boyfriend material,” which makes me laugh every time.
When he drops me off, we share a sweet, and also arousing, kiss in the senior parking lot that he makes sure everyone around us can see. I climb out of his truck and he rolls down the window to shout that he’ll see me at exactly 2:42 p.m. And he’s always right. After my last period, I come out the back entrance, and there is my lovely boyfriend in my favorite truck, waving excitedly and whistling my way. At one point, I heard Kelly Maxwell sigh and say she wished she had a Knox, and I can’t even blame her, but this one is all mine.
He usually shouts “There’s my girl” or “Get on over here” above the music from the most recent CD he’s made me, which is usually something from Earth, Wind & Fire or Aretha Franklin that we sing the whole way to the shelter for my afternoon shifts.
