Page 92 of Only Fate

Listen, a man who wants to impress your parents is a green flag.

Adrian shakes my mom’s hand, then my dad’s, and then he compliments him on his latest video game.

“I’ve played all your games, but I have to say, this one is by far the best.”

I blink at him.

Since when did he turn into a video game fan?

When he starts going into specifics, it’s clear he either played or researched this so he could have the conversation with my dad.

We sit at a table, and Adrian spends the next hour getting to know my parents.

Impressing them.

Impressing me.

I’ve had one boyfriend come around my parents, and that was in high school. They weren’t fans, and we didn’t stay together long. They threatened to take away my car if I kept sneaking out with him. When I look back on it, it was a crappy relationship. I’m glad it didn’t work out.

Because now, I get to share my heart with Adrian.

I’m not a freak by any means.

It’s hard to be when you don’t feel comfortable in your own skin.

That’s why I’m shocked when I tell Adrian we’re not going home after the party. He peers over at me with curiosity every few moments as I give him directions to a secluded park.

I don’t know if it could even be considered a park.

It’s not popular in Blue Beech.

In fact, the grass is overgrown, the benches are rusting, and there are no streetlights.

But I had to pick somewhere secluded, where I knew no one would be.

“This is like old times,” I tell Adrian as he parks at the end of the dead-end road. “Us hanging out in your car.”

Those were some of my favorite nights.

While Adrian doesn’t have the same car as in college—it’s a new model—the memory is still fresh.

Somehow, the leather seat feels the same.

The air smells the same.

The comfort is still there.

As badly as I want to redo what we started in the park that night in college, the last thing I need is for someone to see us having sex in public.

Okay, technically, we’re in public-ish, but we have the privacy of his car.

I’ve dreamed about having sex in his car for as long as I can remember.

I’d sit in my dorm room, hand between my legs, my fingers sliding through my folds as I imagined myself riding him in the driver’s seat.

During the party, I watched Adrian interact with everyone, as if they’d all been friends for years. Even when I wasn’t with him and talking with someone else, there was no awkwardness between him and the others.

He belongs in Blue Beech.

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