Good For You

“My parents are on a couples’ retreat. They won’t be back until Sunday.”

His fingers halt at the lower point of my sternum and he crooks an eyebrow. “Please say you aren’t teasing me.” I turn my head back and forth against the pil ow and he kisses me hard and deep. “Can I stay the night? Is that al owed?”

I trace the line of his nose and one eyebrow and he leans into my hand and closes his eyes. “I don’t know. They wouldn’t approve, and it’s their house. Of course, they wouldn’t approve of this, either.”

He nods, opens his eyes. “I’m wil ing to do this however you need, with one exception.” I frown, my mind a riot of possibilities until he rol s his eyes. “The exception is I’m not going away. Don’t ask me to do that ever again.”

“Are you sure?” I say, ever doubting him. It isn’t fair, how I doubt him, and I wonder if he’l gather that my loss of faith extends further than I’d ever known it would, severing lines of trust and leveling my confidence like a city-flattening tornado. I’l be rebuilding a belief system from scratch over the next few months, maybe years, and it won’t be easy. Or pleasant.

“I’ve never been this sure of anything.” His serious demeanor is broken when my stomach rumbles as though I’ve forgotten to eat for days. His smile turns up on one side. “Except possibly that I’d better feed you. Let’s go out.”

“Out, where people can see us?”

“You might as wel get used to being Reid Alexander’s girlfriend.” He laughs at the look on my face. “Oh, come on.

It can’t be that bad.” He pul s the sheet over our heads, straddling me in the darkness. “Fine, we’l order in. One more day’s reprieve to keep me a secret. Any longer and I’l think you’re ashamed of me.”

Some rough, vulnerable edge to his voice tel s me this statement isn’t as offhand as it sounds.

“I don’t want to be Reid Alexander’s girlfriend,” I say, and his smile fades. I reach up and frame his face with my hands, the heartbreaking need there so exposed that my eyes sting with tears. “I want to be your girlfriend. As long as you’re who you are right now, with me, I wil never be ashamed of you.”

“Are you sure?” He echoes my earlier question, his dark blue eyes locked on mine.

“I’ve never been this sure of anything,” I say.