Page 59 of Good Graces

“I—”

The words stall in my throat when her hands slide under my shirt, palms hot against my ribs. My head tips back, and her mouth finds my neck, leaving slow, open-mouthed kisses over my pulse.

Her hand drifts lower, teasing along my stomach before brushing the waistband of my jeans. Then she cups me through the fabric, fingers tracing every inch, every line.

My cock twitches. My whole body tightens.

“Jesus,” I groan, fingers digging hard into her hip, like I can anchor myself to her and keep from coming apart.

Quinn laughs, quiet and breathless, her mouth still against my throat. Her teeth scrape just enough to make my pulse stutter. “Told you you’d miss me.”

“Don’t start,” I mutter.

But I’m smiling, and so is she, and I didn’t know it could feel like this. Not likethis.

Not easy in the sense of simple because Quinn Rose is anything but. She’s sharp where I’m soft, defiant where I hesitate. She pushes, she dares, she burns. She’s a storm I never saw coming and never want to outrun.

But this moment—her mouth on mine, her fingers fisting my shirt, her breath catching in my ear—feels easy. Like something I don’t have to explain. Like something that’s always been ours, even before it began.

And that’s what terrifies me most. The hope that it’ll still feel like this when summer ends. That whatever this is won’t fall apart once we leave this stretch of heat and chlorine and quiet corners behind.

Because I don’t know how I’d handle losing her. I don’t know how I’d survive going from this to nothing at all. From the heat of her breath to cold silence. From everything she is to the empty space she’d leave behind.

She’s everywhere. In the way I wake up thinking about her. In the way I scan the pool deck, waiting to spot her ponytail in a crowd. In the way my body shifts when she’s close, like it’s already tuned itself to her.

And if I lose that—if I loseher—I don’t know how to stop looking. I don’t know if I ever could.

19

QUINN

The first dayof classes always feels like stepping onto a treadmill already set at full speed. No warning. No easing in. Just an immediate, breathless sprint.

I’ve done this three times before. Three different Augusts spent walking these same paths, sitting in these same too-warm classrooms, scrawling my name on too-thick syllabi. But this time feels ... different. Heavier somehow. Like I’m holding my breath, waiting for something to knock the air from my lungs.

Maybe because I spent the weekend convincing myself that walking away from Warren was the right call.

I know it was. It had to be.

After our almost-moment at the banquet, I spent the rest of the night dodging him—ducking into side halls, slipping behind columns, eyes fixed on my tray like I didn’t feel his gaze trailing me.

I left fifteen minutes early, dumped my uniform in the back room, and hurried to my car, like I could outrun whatever I’d almost let happen. A kiss from him, maybe. A crack in the armor, definitely.

I doubt I’d survive that heartbreak twice.

I’d barely survived it the first time. The chest-splitting ache that clung to me for months, like I’d swallowed something sharp and couldn’t get it out. It took me too long to rebuild myself after that. Too long to figure out how to stand on my own.

And besides, Warren’s ... different now. Harder. More closed off, less forgiving.

He was always grumpy—a little rough around the edges, a little too quick to snap—but there was a big part of him that was softer, too. A part of him that let things go, that knew when to cut people slack.

But now that sharp edge has dulled into something colder, heavier. Like he’s stopped bothering to shake things off. Like he’s decided it’s easier to hold on to the anger than figure out what to do with it.

I don’t know how to reach this version of him. I don’t know if I should even try.

That’s why it’s better, I think, if I let him go once and for all.

I repeat that to myself all the way to my second class. It’s a literature lecture I’m TA-ing this semester with Professor Lang. A small win but one I’m proud of. Her class is competitive, and being chosen felt like proof I’ve done something right.

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