I nod in agreement, staring at a candy apple booth beside me. “Yeah, but it’s probably for the best.”
There’s a brief pause, and when I glance over at him, he’s giving me a quizzical look. “How do you figure?” he asks.
I shrug, stopping and shuffling my heels against the dirt. “Well, he wanted a do-over too, like my mom, only instead of relocating he got a perfect new family, and I don’t really fit into that picture.”
His eyes leisurely scan over my legs, my cleavage, my neck, finally landing on my eyes. His eyes are hooded and gorgeous and his attention makes me feel special. “You look pretty perfect to me.”
My cheeks heat from his compliment. No guy has ever talked to me like this, and I feel like I’m going to melt. “Thanks, but I don’t think he agrees,” I say, and we start to walk again. “In fact, he made that pretty clear when he signed over full custody to my mom because he”—I make air quotes—“didn’t have time to raise a teenager the right way.” I lower my hands to my sides. “Whatever the hell that means.”
“I think your dad is an asshole,” he says with so much anger in his voice it startles me a little. And it should have startled me more. I wish I could go back and shake that girl, tell her to wake up and see the signs, but I can’t. All I can do is remember.
He reaches out and cups my cheek. The anger still there, and I can feel his hand trembling. “How could he not want you?”
His words are so overwhelming I start to tremble, fighting to keep my legs under me. He can feel it, too, and he brings his other hand up and cups my face between his hands.
“Hey, you want to go somewhere more private?” he asks, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Somewhere where we could talk some more without all the noise and chaos.”
I nod eagerly. “Yeah, I’d really like that.”
He takes me up to Star Lookout, where teenagers are known to go and make out. I’ve never been there, but once we get up there I realize the allure of the place. It’s got a gorgeous view of the city, the lights sparkling below and the stars twinkling from above. Plus it’s quiet and there’s no one around, so we have a lot of privacy.
“You know, I used to come up here a lot in high school,” he admits after we park and he puts the parking brake on, leaving the air conditioning on and the radio, along with the headlights.
I want to ask him if he’s brought other girls up here, but not wanting to seem absurdly jealous, I ask, “Wasn’t that, like, this year?”
He shakes his head. “I haven’t been to school in two years.” He pauses, watching me. “I dropped out at the beginning of my junior year.”
“Oh.” I’m not sure how to respond.
“Do you think less of me now?” he asks, more entertained by my uncomfortable reaction than anything. “That you’re on a date with a high school dropout?”
“Not really.” I turn in my seat and face him, tucking my dress under my legs. “I’m not that great in school myself.”
“Yeah, but you still go,” he says, rotating in his seat and leaning against the door, his attention still fixed on me. “I chose to give up and be a deadbeat.”
“You’re not a deadbeat,” I tell him. “You work.”
“Yeah, but I don’t have a steady job,” he says, bitterness slipping into his voice for a brief moment. “I’m just a washed-up loser at eighteen.”
My heart aches for him. “I don’t believe that’s true at all.”
“Yeah, but you barely even know me. And if you asked my father, he’d tell you how wrong you are.”
“Well, I think your father’s an idiot. In fact, most are.”
He sits quietly in the dark for a moment, and when he speaks again he sounds calm and content. “You think so?”
I nod, loving that I made him feel better. “I know so.”
He scoots closer to me and leans forward toward the console. “You know what, Red, you are very wise for a sixteen-year-old.”
My expression immediately falls. “I’m seventeen.”
He reaches for me and grabs a lock of my hair. “I think it’s cute that you’re trying to pretend you’re older,” he says. “But I promise it doesn’t matter.” He plays with the strand of my hair, tugging on it. “And word of advice. The next time you lie about your age, you should let your mom in on it.”
“She told you.” I frown, feeling ridiculous.
He chuckles lowly. “She actually told me a lot.”
“Like what?”
He starts twisting my hair around his finger, forcing my head closer to him, almost like he’s reeling me into him. “Lots and lots of stuff, like how you’ve never had a boyfriend before,” he says, seeming pleased. “But let’s not talk about that.”
Then, giving me no time to get embarrassed, he tugs on my hair just a little bit and my lips crash into his. The taste of him soars through me. I feel high. Powerful. Intoxicated. And the sensation only builds when he pulls me over the seat and onto his lap so I’m straddling him, and he does it somehow without breaking the kiss.
At first everything starts off innocently. Our tongues gently searching each other’s mouth, him playing with my hair and running his fingers along my shoulders. He even shudders once when I bite gently on his bottom lip, something I saw a woman do on television once.
Then his hand starts to wander under my dress, inching under the fabric. And the more heated our kiss gets, the higher his palm slides up, until finally he’s cupping my ass.
I’ve never done this with a guy before, and I feel breathless and excited and terrified all at the same time, because it’s new and I’m not one hundred percent sure that I should want him to touch me this way as much as I do.
I’m so confused, and my confusion only increases when he leans back, gripping the bottom of my dress, and tugs it over my head, without even giving me time to react. But he looks really distracted right now as he tosses the dress aside, his eyes drinking my body in.
I’m still afraid, although the longer he looks at me with desire burning in his eyes, the more relaxed I get. But as he reaches for the clasp of my bra, I panic.
“I’ve never done this before,” I sputter, crossing my arms across my chest.
His eyes slowly slide up from cleavage to my eyes. “I sort of guessed that,” he says, placing a hand on my cheek and wetting his lips with his tongue.
I feel transparent, no longer special, like how I felt at the carnival. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” he says, briefly searching my eyes. “The first time can be scary, but I promise it’ll be worth it.”
I swallow hard, because I’m not sure I want my first time to be right now. I try to figure out the best way to tell him that as he reaches around and unhooks my bra, but I’m conflicted between wanting him to keep touching me and looking at me like this and wanting him to stop.
“God, you’re beautiful,” he says as the bra falls from my body and my breasts are exposed. He reaches out and brushes his finger across my nipple with this hunger in his eyes, and I gasp. The noise seems to turn him on more, the hunger darkening and taking over everything about him, from the way he moves to the ragged intake of his breath, and it makes me feel powerful for a moment. “I just want to kiss you all over.” He keeps touching my breast as he leans forward to kiss me, and my stomach spins with emotions. “I promise this will be good,” he says with his lips hovering over mine.
“But what if I can’t,” I whisper, hating myself at the moment for not being more confident, for not being able to be like my mother and own the moment.
“You can,” he says. “I’ll take care of you.”
I don’t want to make him mad, but at the same time I’m terrified out of my damn mind. “But I’m not sure I’m ready,” I say, feeling the slightest bit of weight lifted off my shoulders until he leans back a little and looks at me and that intense emotion in his eyes looks like it’s about to burst out.