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After our dinner at Café Lacroix, we scratched this one off. Cole set every craft beer in the state on the bar for me to taste. I burped so loudly after the fifth sampling that I ran away, so embarrassed I couldn’t look at him until he convinced me to leave my room.
Learn how to cook
“I’m not sure if you can cross this one off.” Cole laughed. “That grilled cheese and tomato sandwich you made me tasted like charcoal.” He shook his head. “In a blind taste test, I wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference between charcoal from my barbecue and that sandwich.”
I slapped his arm and chuckled. “It wasn’t that bad. Sorry my cooking isn’t gourmet like your private chefs.”
“It wasn’t good. But I still ate it.”
He rubbed against me, and I secretly wished he would pin me to the floor and kiss me. A few times, I thought we would kiss, only for him to walk away. He even mentioned my grandfather and his rules on occasion.
“From what I recall, your attempt at cooking was less than stellar, Mr. Marshall.” I gave him a cheeky grin. “You’re forgetting the risotto you made that tasted like soup.”
“Hey, cooking wasn’t on my bucket list,” he said to defend the horrible meal I nearly vomited. “I was only in the kitchen to help you out.”
“Well, I guess culinary school isn’t in the cards for either of us.”
I returned to checking off items on my list to stop myself from looking at Cole. But, once we locked eyes, I had trouble not staring, wondering what he was thinking. Deep down, I hoped he would lean over, close the distance, and kiss me.
Learn how to dance
Cole’s friend, a Knight who lived in Devil’s Creek, helped us with this. Braxton Cade’s mom owned a dance studio. She showed me how to dance salsa before pairing me with Cole. It wasn’t as intimate as I had hoped, mainly because Cole was too stiff and danced like he was trying to perform the motions from a script.
“I will admit,” Cole said when his eyes landed on this item. “I sucked major ass at dancing. Not my forte.”
“I guess you didn’t have many dances at York Military Academy.”
“None. Until last year, it was an all-male college.”
We’d shared everything about ourselves over the past two months, so I didn’t hold back my next question.
“‘Did you date any of the girls?”
“No,” he said without a second of hesitation. “But my friends did. You remember Brax, right? He was hooking up with this one girl in secret. He didn’t think we knew, but how could we not? His girl was a screamer. And the walls are paper thin at the academy.”
What I wouldn’t have given to be screaming Cole’s name. Every thought seemed to flick back to Cole and how much I wanted him to kiss me. Hold me in his strong arms. I wanted so badly to lose all of my firsts with Cole. Too bad he had no interest in doing that with me.
Needing a distraction from his disarming smile, I returned to the list.
Drive a race car
I smiled at the memory of Cole teaching me how to drive his Ferrari, which was a nightmare but also really fun. He was patient and didn’t yell when I almost crashed into the garage.
“You know,” Cole said, tapping his pointy elbow against mine, “when you said you could fly a plane, I was expecting you to know how to drive a car.”
“I’m too short to push in the clutch properly.” I shrugged. “It’s not easy knowing how much pressure to apply. But I eventually got the hang of it.”
“Yeah.” He snorted. “Seconds before our lives flashed before our eyes.”
I flicked my hair over my shoulder to shield my face from him. Sometimes, looking at Cole was too much for me to bear.
Jump off a cliff
Build a fort
Watch a movie under the stars
“That was a good night,” Cole commented as his finger hovered over the last one. “I thought Drake would kill me when I asked him to come over and set that up for us, but it was well worth it.”
