Page 19 of Road Trip to Forever
“Do you know what we should do, Lola?” Patrick asks.
His voice is rough around the edges but velvety soft in the middle, a seesaw of syllables that scramble my mind. My name sounds wicked, forbidden, so different from every other way he’s ever spoken to me over the years, and Iloveit.
“What?” I find myself whispering, as if the louder I speak, the quicker this moment will dissolve, the dream I’m imagining turning back to reality.
His eyes draw a slow path down my face and catch on the corner of my mouth, a spot I’ve never seen him notice before. They linger there, a fresh flare of heat blazing behind his gaze.
Is he—is he going to ask tokiss me?
That’s whatfeelslike is about to happen, a rush of energy and charged electricity raising the temperature in the room by at least ten degrees.
And would I let him?
I swallow and he follows the bob of my throat, the rise and fall of my chest as breathing becomes difficult, staggered and labored from his attention.
Yes, a small but mighty voice whispers in my head.Yes, you would.
I’ve never felt like this, like I want to grab the collar of his shirt and yank him toward me. Run my fingers through his hair and pull on the longer stands by his ears to find out what he likes. To dance with him in the kitchen while his hip nudges mine and spend the night in his bed with the fourteen pillows he sleeps with so I can show him what I like, too.
It’s possible I’m still tired from traveling and confused by time zones. Jet lagged and wondering why I’m awake when I should be asleep. Or maybe,maybeI’m a sudden lightweight, one beer making me experience thoughts I’ve never previously consider.
Thoughts like Patrick’s mouth on mine. The swipe of his tongue and the press of his lips. Whispered words in my ears and large hands roaming up my thighs and under my shirt.
I stare at my best friend as if it’s the first time I’m seeing him.
I think it might be.
Does he always sit this close to me, my body practically pinned under his?
When did his fingers fold around my knee, and why are sparks igniting under his palm in the innocent spot he’s touched a hundred times before?
How do I get him to stay there and not pull away?
“We should toast to being the perpetually single ones in our group,” he says, that velvety softness wrapping around me like luxurious silk. “Who needs a relationship? Maybe I’ll start living my life like you do.”
Ohgod.
I’m reading this situation entirely wrong.
The fire in my stomach cools to dying embers. The ache between my thighs dulls. The moment—a brief flash of attraction—sweeps by, caught in an undertow. I panic and reach for our beers on the coffee table.
“Right,” I say louder than necessary. I almost shout it at him, hopeful it will snuff out the tension in the room and my stupidity for thinking the man I’ve known for nearly my entire life suddenly wants to hurdle past the platonic barrier ofjust friendswe established years ago. “Sure.”
Patrick’s fingers touch the inside of my wrist as he takes his bottle from my grasp, and everything gets hazy. I don’t know which way is up. I don’t know what we were talking about five minutes ago.
I don’t knowanythingexcept I want to kiss my best friend.
I’ve never wanted to kiss him before, but now I do.
“To failed relationships,” I say, lifting my drink in the air.
“And to never being too much,” Patrick adds. “Just the perfect amount of enough.”
We clink the bottles together and take a sip in tandem, his gaze never breaking away from mine.
It doesn’t break when I take a long sip from the bottle.
It doesn’t break when we finish eating and he tosses over the remote, making me pick out a movie.
