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“Mack, please tell me you’re joking. This is a joke. Not a funny one, but a joke all the same.”
“At least it isn’t snowing.”
The look on her face told me she thought I’d lost my mind. And hey, maybe I had. But we were still surfing today.
I pulled into traffic, enjoying the feel of her eyes on the side of my face, even if they were leveled in a glare.
“The water will probably be warmer than the air temp,” I said, darting a look at her.
Her eyes narrowed further. “Is that supposed to be comforting?”
“Just stating a fact.” I shot her a grin and wondered if she was about to throw her coffee on me. If she didn’t need it to stay awake, the answer would definitely be yes.
“Look, Cheese, I get why you’re freaking out, I do, but you’ll be fine, I promise. I’ll be right there with you. And you know I’d never let anything bad happen to you.” I reached across the space between us, caught her hand and kissed the back of it.
She hummed. “That’s not terribly comforting, either, to be honest, we'll just freeze to death together. How romantic.” She sipped her coffee and slid the hand I’d been holding behind my neck, toying with the ends of my hair. Electricity zinged down my spine.
“Better than one of us freezing and one not. Would you make room on the door for me?” I asked and, to her credit, she almost kept a straight face. But the smile lifted the corners of her lips all the same.
“You are not joking your way out of this,” she said with as much severity as she could manage, while clearly on the brink of a laughing fit.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I shot back.
“I don’t even have a wetsuit.” She was clutching at straws now. “And if you think I am going to wear some hire-wetsuit that other people have peed in! Oh my god, I can’t even think about it, I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.”
The arguing was not surprising, I’d expected her resistance, and I was not backing down now. “Please, can you give me a little credit. Do you really think that I would try and get you in some well-used wetsuit when you won’t even put on a pair of shoes that someone else has worn?”
She pursed her lips. “Well I can’t go in the water in a bathing suit. I didn’t even bring a bathing suit.”
“Will you relax please, I have everything you are going to need.”
“Really?”
“Really, really.”
“You bought me a wetsuit?”
“That’s correct.”
“And a bathing suit.”
“Also correct.” And I’d given it way too much thought. I’d also been tempted to buy a few just to see her in them.
“How do you know they’ll be the right size?”
I shot her a sidelong look, which I hoped conveyed my offense. “Give me a little credit here, you don’t think I’d be able to accurately guess your size?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe you’re not as clever as you think you are, Milton …”
I barked out a laugh. This was going to be fun, whether she knew it or not. “Just drink your coffee, put on some music, and enjoy the ride, Chastity.”
25
CHASE
Mack was looking infuriatingly smug,and I wanted to be mad at him for springing surfing on me in the middle of fucking December, but it was difficult to stay mad at a face like that. Also, there were worse things to be doing on a Monday morning (even this early) than sitting in a car with your best friend, drinking coffee, and listening to good music—I was an exceptional DJ.
I was not at all sure about the idea of going surfing—because it was fucking ridiculous to be considering going in the ocean in the middle of winter—but I found myself curious about it all the same.
