Page 47 of Those Summer Nights (Sweet Cravings 2)

Did she think I was going to say porn or something? “We watched The Internship. It has…”

“Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson? Yeah, I know. One of the most underrated movies of all time. Or at least since I’ve been born.”

I laughed. If J.J. wasn’t my soulmate, maybe Kristen was. “Agreed. I love me some Owen Wilson.”

“I love me some Vince Vaughn. I’m glad we don’t even have to fight over celebrity crushes. And speaking of fighting…next time text me if you’re going to spend all night out. I was worried you were dead in a ditch.”

“Sorry. But I’m alive and better than ever so you can’t be mad.” I gave her my most innocent smile.

“I’m not mad at you. I was just worried. Are you heading out to stalk him already?”

“It’s not stalking him anymore. He even knows I’m coming.”

“Ha! I just got to admit you were stalking him in the first place.”

“Touché. See…I can use that word when I’m sober.” I grabbed my beach bag and headed toward the door.

“Cell phone. We literally just talked about this.” Kristen picked it up off my bed and tossed it to me.

Luckily I caught it because if the screen cracked anymore it would be totally unreadable.

“Nice catch. Text me later if you’re not coming back for dinner.”

I nodded. “Are you sure you don’t want to come with me? You never come down to the beach.”

“I go down to the beach all the time.” She gestured to her running shoes. “I just exercise instead of lying there reading. You should join me sometime. I’m running more than ever since you feed me such delicious, addictive food. I don’t want those calories to catch up to my ass.”

“You’re right. Let’s do that tomorrow morning.” I was giving up my dick diet. But I still wanted to better myself this summer. And exercising was at the top of my list.

Kristen put her hand on her hip. “Am I hallucinating or did you just agree to go on a five mile run with me tomorrow?”

“Five miles!” Who the hell said anything about five miles? Her level of training was clearly too intense for a normal human. “You know what…we can discuss that tomorrow morning. Bright and early.”

“Deal.” She waved me goodbye.

I made a point not to say deal. I was pretty sure I’d die if I ran five miles right now. But I made a deal with myself that I could do it by the end of the summer.

Chapter 14

Thursday

The sun felt good on my skin as I walked to the beach. Walking was so underrated. Kristen didn’t realize that a long walk on the beach was better in every way than a run. But despite the fact that I just agreed to be tortured tomorrow, it felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I was over Aiden. So over Aiden that even thinking about his name didn’t make me feel sick to my stomach anymore. I smiled to myself. I was free from that feeling that I’d failed and had no idea how I’d failed. Aiden was basic AF and it only took me one awesome date with someone else to realize it.

Now I just needed to let my lifeguard know that I wanted to be more than his friend. A lot more. It seemed like he felt the same way. We never acted like friends. I had the biggest crush on him. He definitely knew it. And he seemed to like me back. I thought about his fingers running through my hair this morning and my smile grew even bigger. He was probably crushing as hard as I was.

I looked up at him as I made my way to my usual spot in the sand. When I reached it, I stood there for a second. There was room for my towel right next to his lifeguard stand. I didn't want to keep my distance anymore. Be bold, Mila. I walked over to the empty spot.

"Hey!" I said and tapped the side of the lifeguard stand. I immediately pulled my hand back to my side. There was no need to knock on wood.

He looked down at me. "You're late," he said.

I was pretty sure my smile couldn’t get any bigger. "Yeah, well, I slept over at some random guy’s apartment last night and it threw my whole schedule off."

"Some random guy, huh? Sounds like a sexy evening."

"It was almost really sexy. But his roommate walked in on us." I couldn’t believe that actually came out of my mouth. One pep-talk on being bold and I’d jumped right into the deep end. I mentally high-fived myself.

My lifeguard laughed. "Almost really sexy? I'm not sure I even know what you mean by that." He glanced at the ocean and then back at me. "You'll have to show me what really sexy is sometime, because now I'm just curious."

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