Make Me Bad (Page 30)

She’s right. If I had the bottle right now, I’d take the longest swig of my life. I’d probably keep going until the whole damn thing was empty.

“Sure you don’t want to come in?”

She beckons me like a siren.

I told myself I wouldn’t. It’s not a good idea. That water is a barrier. My phone and keys are in my pocket and that means I have to stay here, on land.

She turns away with a shrug and takes a few more steps. The water slides up to cover her butt. Now she looks completely nude. Her hands release her chest and she dips forward, falling into the water slowly so she can start to swim away.

I don’t consciously realize I’m removing my shoes until they’re both gone. My jeans are off before I can even blink. I think I just shredded them. My shirt and jacket are tossed aside and I’m following her into the ocean for one reason: there are so few moments like this in a lifetime. I won’t let this one pass me by.

I run and crash against the waves, swimming fast. I catch her without much effort and reach out to grab her foot. She jerks around, smiling, and I let go.

“See? It’s not bad, is it?”

No, not at all. The water insulates us from the chilly air, and it’s almost warm now that my body is used to it. We swim for a little, keeping our distance until I find a sandbank and wave her over. She stops in front of me and stands. Her shoulders just crest the top of the water, but most of my torso is exposed to the cold air. We’re a few yards from shore and the waves are just strong enough to bob us back and forth in a constant rhythm. Our arms float at the surface of the water to keep us stable.

The water is dark enough that I can’t really see anything below the surface. I know she’s nearly naked though, and every now and then, the tide pulls out to build a wave and I catch dangerous, teasing glimpses of her pale curves cast in moonlight. The ocean is on my side. It wants me to see her. Fuck. I’m trying to keep my attention elsewhere, but just like Andy said earlier, I’m a man possessed.

We’re hardly a foot away from each other now. I force a safe distance, but the waves are trying to bring us closer together, and if I’m not careful, we’ll accidentally touch.

The tide strengthens and pulls the water out to sea and her breasts crest the surface. She bends down quickly, lowering herself under the water more, then she laughs lightly and looks away, knowing what I just saw.

It’s all so innocent and sweet. I need to scrub a hand down my face. I need this water to be forty degrees colder.

This is bullshit. My hands could be on her—I know she wants my hands on her—and yet I’m standing here, resisting.

Is she nervous being out here with me alone like this?

I want to ask her, but she breaks the silence first.

“Have you ever been skinny dipping before?” she asks, giving me her profile.

I want to lie to her, but I don’t.

“We all did back in high school.”

She frowns like I knew she would.

“I never did it alone like this, though…with just one other person.”

“So in some ways, this is a first for you too,” she says, finding comfort in that.

I know it bothers her, the idea that I’ve done more, lived more than she has. I’ve had girlfriends and intimate relationships, and she’s had the company of her books.

“I’m not completely hopeless, you know,” she says suddenly, eyes narrowing out toward the dark horizon. “Guys have been interested in me. Not a ton, one or two over the years…I don’t know, maybe they would have taken me skinny dipping and sought me out more, but my dad was pretty strict and I was a rule follower.”

“You don’t have to explain.”

She laughs and it sounds shrill, pained even. “Don’t I?”

She shakes her head and makes a move to swim away, but I reach out for her, clamping my hand around her bicep. She’s not going anywhere. A tidal wave could swell against us and we’d stay right here, rooted together.

“You’re beautiful.”

She puffs out air like I’ve just said something absolutely ludicrous.

“Fucking hell, Madison. You’re drop-dead gorgeous. Every guy in this town would agree.”

Again, her eyes roll and she yanks her arm, trying to get away from me so she doesn’t have to face what I’m about to tell her. Compliments are hard to receive, especially if you’re not used to hearing them. I want her to hear these.

“Can you tell how much I want you?”

Her gaze jerks up to me and her eyes narrow suspiciously. “Okay, Ben, you’ve made your point. You’ve made the loser girl feel very pretty and special. You can go back to your cool friends now and tell them you did your good deed for the year.”

I want to shake her. In fact, I do. I grab each of her shoulders and haul her right up against me. It wasn’t intentional, but now we’re skin to skin, and I feel her breasts brush against my chest, soft and full and slippery from the water. It’s so intimate, I can’t breathe. I’m surviving on dredges of oxygen as she tilts her head back and looks up at me. There’s fear there.

I’ve never been forceful with her—I’ve never been forceful with any woman—but like I said, this night is a first for me too.

I can’t let her go. My hands stay right there on her shoulders even though they ache to move lower. I want to feel the weight of her breasts, to knead them and tease them and show her why I’m the man for her. Not Andy. Not some nice guy. Me.

“Would you just listen to me?” I plead. “You think I’m lying to you?” I bend to her eye level. “You have eyes so green, sometimes I can’t look right at them. Your hair is never brushed. I’m not fully convinced you even own a brush, and yet your hair is all I can think about. I want to fist it in my hands and tug on it so you’re forced to look up at me just like you are right now.”

She swallows and blinks, completely and utterly frozen. She looks like an innocent animal caught in my trap.

“You’re funny and kind. You take such good care of everyone in your life. You have a heart the size of the moon.”

There are tears collecting in her lashes and I feel bad now. Maybe she wasn’t ready for the truth. Maybe I should have eased into this nice and slow, written her a note with one letter on it and sent it to the library. Each day, I’d send another, until one day, finally, she’d have a full sentence:

M-A-D-I-S-O-N H-A-R-T, I-M F-A-L-L-I-N-G F-O-R Y-O-U.

“Sorry, I’m hurting you,” I say, and I’m not just referring to my hands on her shoulders.

She shakes her head and sniffles. “I’m only crying because I’m a little drunk,” she says, wiping her nose on her shoulder.

Right. Jeez. I’ve picked the worst possible time to be honest with her. I tell myself I need to release her and give her space, but then her palm hits my chest, flat against my heart.

“Did you mean all that or are you just being nice?”

“I’m not that nice.”

She laughs and shakes her head, letting her hand wander down my torso. Her finger dips past my navel and I squeeze her shoulders in warning.

“I really want you to kiss me right now,” she says, gaze on my mouth. “Is that crazy?”

“No.”

“Because you could kiss me and I wouldn’t turn away. It would be another life experience I could cross off my list. Kiss Ben Rosenberg in the ocean: check.”

“Madison?”

“Yeah?”

“Be quiet so I can kiss you.”

16

Madison

This kiss is going to ruin me. I will have this kiss up on a pedestal for the rest of my life, encased in glass. On my wedding day, when I stand across from an ordinary man who makes me feel ordinary things and the pastor announces “You may now kiss the bride,” I’ll think of Ben and the time when he held me in the ocean and told me I was beautiful.

I’ll think of the way he looked: cast in moonlight, tapered muscles, hard lines. I notice the smallest details: the little freckles on the bridge of his nose, his amber eyes backlit by the fire burning inside him, his wet hair sending water dripping down the hard planes of his face.

There’s a terrible feeling buried deep inside me that keeps me from completely giving in to this moment. This is a gift, I remind myself, a memory to keep forever. Not to be confused with a beginning—this is not the first of many.

One of his hands curves under my jaw and the other loops around my waist, hauling me against him even more. We’re touching like we’re lovers, like every bit of his skin is mine for the taking and vice versa. I’m a live wire, the result of too many weeks pining.

Everywhere we touch, our skin sparks. My hips meet his and I feel his hard length beneath his briefs. It’s close, but not close enough. I bring one leg up around his waist. He helps me with the other and now I’m connected to him, coiled like a snake. Waves lap against our bodies and his hands are cradling my face. His lips brush against mine, but it’s not a kiss. It’s an impatient touch, a hint of what’s to come. Another wave builds and it’s bigger than before, crashing against us hard enough that I think Ben will lose his footing, but he stays right where he is.

“Please,” I whisper against his mouth.