I sighed and squeezed her hand while releasing an exaggerated sigh. “Just call me Josie Grossie,” I told her.
That made her to laugh. I knew she was remembering the day we’d watched that movie together. She’d lamented that she’d end up just like Drew Barrymore’s character. I’d wished I’d had the balls to change that for her, but I hadn’t. Now that I had, I wanted to keep kissing her over and over again.
“It’s true, Sierra. After all, these lips are sacred, and for as long as I can remember, there’s only been one girl I’ve ever wanted to kiss.”
Her jaw clenched tight and her eyes dulled with a pained expression, taking me aback. Her voice was small as her fingers played in the sand. “Who?”
Was she seriously asking me that? Who? It hadn’t dawned on me that she’d think there was someone else I wanted to be with, but I guess that was my fault. I needed to remedy that, and do it quick.
Now or never, Banks. Now or never. I tenderly lifted her chin until our eyes met.
“You.”
And that’s when I leaned in close, capturing her lips with mine. This time, the kiss was deeper, harder, and I gently coaxed her body down until she was flat on her back in the sand. My hand came to the hem of the shirt she’d changed into. Her skin was cool beneath my warm hand. I forced my lips from hers, my chest heaving as I panted. My eyes bored down into hers.
“That wasn’t a fluke back there, Sierra. I’ve wanted to kiss you for ages. I want to kiss you for ages. I want to start kissing you and I never want to stop.”
“Do you really mean it, Jeremy?” she asked, sounding a bit unsure.
“I don’t want to dance around this anymore. Kiss and then have everything be awkward while we try to make each other jealous when all we want is each other. I’ll pine for you if you make me. I’ll fight dirty if I have to. But, God…please don’t make me. You’re my best friend, Sierra. But my feelings for you run so much deeper than that. Tell me…tell me you feel this, too.”
She gulped. “Umm, yeah, Jeremy. I feel it, too,” she whispered, her hips arching up as my very hard erection pushed against her.
Instead of flushing with embarrassment, I did the only thing I could do. I smiled. Because, in so many words, she had just given me my answer.
“I thought so,” I responded and leaned down, taking her lips with mine, this time not stopping until I tasted her tongue.
Sierra Sullivan. My best friend. My first kiss. If I had my way, my first and last everything. And all that came between.
BY MONDAY MORNING, I was ecstatic. I couldn’t wait for Jeremy and me to walk into the school hand in hand. Sneaking kisses between classes. My arm wrapped around his waist as we walked the halls. I could already hear the shocked gasps, the whispers. The “what does he see in her?” comments from the girls who wished they could snag Jeremy Banks.
But, when we pulled into the parking lot and he leaned across the console to give me a kiss, no one noticed. When we entwined our fingers and said our good mornings to our classmates, not a single eyebrow rose.
Apparently, everyone else had expected this to happen. It had been a matter of when.
“Heck yes!” Ryan shouted when he saw us. He did a stupid fist bump then held his hand out to Chris. “Pay up, buddy.”
“Pay up?” I asked.
He opened his binder and removed a sheet of paper. Names and dates were listed down the page, and he pointed to his. “The Jeremy-Sierra school pool. I guessed sometime during football season. Chris had his money on Christmas. Jace had you guys pegged for the end of summer.” He shook his head. “He clearly had too much faith in you, Banks.”
Jace walked up to us and shrugged. “What can I say? I didn’t realize he’d be so slow to tell Sierra he dug her.”
I rolled my eyes even though my heart was doing a happy dance. “How much money are we talking?” My eyes widened when they told me. “Three hundred dollars?!”
Ryan grinned. “Yep, and it’s all mine. Thanks for being a slowpoke, Banks,” he said, slapping him on the shoulder. “And now that you’re off the market, I’m going to go introduce myself to your sister.”
He took off before I could protest.
Jeremy cocked an eyebrow. “This is not going to end well.”
I nodded. “Let’s go save Lexi.”
“Coming Jace?” he asked, but Jace shook his head and took off in the other direction. Jeremy frowned at me. “That was weird.”
I gazed after Jace’s retreating figure. “Weird, indeed.”
That was it. Our big coming-out. No one had cared—except for Ryan, of course. And Lexi, because she complained for three weeks about Ryan calling her Little Lexi, which then turned into Sexy Lexi. She avoided going down the sophomore hallway whenever she could. It wasn’t until baseball season that she finally started to come out of her shell.
“Sierra Sullivan, you have been holding out on me.”
I glanced up from my magazine. My sister was trying to glare at me. But she was struggling because she was also smiling from ear to ear.
I sat up and closed the magazine. “I have?” I asked, having no clue what she was talking about.
But she was in her Diamond Girls shirt, so she must’ve just gotten home from the away game I’d had to miss thanks to an English paper I’d had to finish. That meant Jeremy would be home, too. But first things first.
“Did we win?” I asked.
She nodded. “How is it that I’ve never met Jace McAllister? I mean, I’ve seen him around school, but holy hell, I had no idea how…how attractive he was.”
I grinned. “Aww. Does little Lexi have a crush?”
“No,” she huffed. “It’s just… He talked to me on the bus on the way home, and I didn’t know how nice he was. That’s all.”
She was protesting too much, so I decided to cool it with the teasing.
“He’s a great guy, Lexi. Nice, intelligent, a killer second baseman from what Jeremy tells me. And I’m pretty sure he’s single. Want me to talk to him for you?”
“No!” she shouted a little too quickly. “He’s giving me a ride home from the game on Thursday and I don’t want him thinking I have a crush or anything. We’re just going to be friends, Sierra. That’s all. I don’t even like him like that.”
Before I could question her further, Jeremy walked in behind her.
“Like who?” he asked.
Lexi groaned and shook her head, pushing past him. Jeremy and I stared after her until the door to her bedroom slammed shut.
“What was that about? Is it that time of the month again?” he asked, groaning.
If any other man had said that, I’d be attacking him with my pillow. But, considering that Jeremy had Jenna, Lexi, and me to deal with, he’d become prepared for whenever Aunt Flo came to visit. Out of the three of us, Lexi was the most emotional and moody, so once a month, Jeremy would come over with popcorn and rocky road ice cream—Lexi’s favorite—and he’d watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail with her until she felt better.
And the best part? It worked every single time. I’d have gotten jealous if it were any other girl, but Jeremy saw her like a little sister and wanted to take care of her, so it warmed my heart and made me fall for him even more than I already had. I hadn’t said the words yet, but he made it really hard not to love him.