“You’ve been reading the Brontës again, haven’t you?” he asks.
“I think it would be romantic. The moors during autumn, all blustery and cold.” I can picture it in my mind. “Wind howling and leaves falling. I think that’s the only way to see it.”
“When is your birthday?” he asks slowly.
Somehow I’ve managed to dodge this particular bit of information. Given the nature of the game, it’s a small miracle. But Sterling isn’t stupid and I’ve let too much slip. I take a deep breath. “Promise me you won’t make me do anything stupid like a party this year.”
“What about our trips?” He’s joking but the amusement fades when he sees my face.
“Not this year,” I say softly. “I don’t want to celebrate anything this year.”
“I understand.” And I know he’s telling the truth. “The year my mom died was terrible. First they took me and my sister away and then they split us up. I remember refusing to leave my room on Christmas morning, even though my foster family bought me presents. I didn’t want their presents.”
He gets it. I don’t want to blow out candles or sing. Not this year. Not without my mom there to clap and hide that she’s teary-eyed. “My mom cried every year on our birthdays. Happy tears.”
Sterling’s answering smile is tight-lipped and I wonder if I’ve said the wrong thing. He’s never opened up this much about his past before. I ache to know more about him but I can’t risk forcing it. I don’t want him to push me away even if it means there are parts of him I’ll never know.
A cloud moves over the sun and the air turns from crisp to chilly in an instant. It’s like a switch has been flipped, the last remnants of summer swept away. Sterling’s mood seems to shift along with it.
“October 31st,” I blurt out.
He turns confused eyes on me.
“My birthday,” I say. “It’s on Halloween. I know. We usually throw a big party and…”
I see him doing the math. Halloween is a week away. We’ve been playing this game and I’ve been ignoring the fact that my birthday is creeping closer each time we play.
“Want to watch a movie this year?” he asks. “Eat pizza. I promise no cake.”
Tears swell my throat and I swallow against the raw pain.
“Cheer up, Lucky,” he orders me. “We don’t have to do anything.”
“Pizza sounds good.” I’m relieved that my voice doesn’t crack on the emotions crowding inside me. “And cake might be okay.”
“No candles,” he promises. He clears his throat. “What else do you do on a picnic?”
He’s not going to linger on the topic, and I’m grateful. I need to be more patient with him and his past. He respects my boundaries. I need to do this same for him.
I take the cue and return to our picnic. “Well, when I was little, we’d pick flowers.”
He picks another one and puts it next to the first.
“Those are buttercups, by the way,” I inform him.
“Ahh, the famous buttercups.”
“I was a very original child,” I confess with a laugh.
“What else?”
“We’d eat.” I point to the bag. Felix made me sandwiches. I paid for them by listening to his well-meaning romantic advice the whole time. “And we’d make crowns.”
“Come again?” he says.
“No laughing.” I scramble away and kneel near the edge of the blanket. Scattered through the lush green shamrocks, white hop clover grows. I pick a few, careful to keep their stems as long as possible. Settling into a cross-legged position, I hold two up and then carefully tie one stem around the bud of the other.
Sterling watches as I do a few more and then hold up a chain.
“You can also make very fancy bracelets and necklaces,” I inform him.
He looks like he wants to laugh but doesn’t dare. “Let me try.”
It takes him a few tries to get the technique down. A few minutes later, he places a crown of them on my head.
“Princess,” he proclaims.
“I told you not to call me that.”
“Okay.” He plucks a shamrock and puts it between his teeth. He wags a finger at me. “Kiss me and I’ll stick with lucky.”
“It’s only got three leaves,” I say, moving closer to him anyway.
“I don’t need a four-leaf clover.” He drops it to the blanket and brushes his lips over mine. I taste mint. “I have you.”
Sterling’s body moves over mine, his weight pinning me beneath the blanket. My legs drop open instinctively and he presses his hips between my thighs. There’s multiple layers of denim between us but I feel every inch of him like he’s set fire to me.
Sterling? He is the world between blue jeans and ball gowns. His body. His lips. He’s not easy. He’s hard. His weight shifts again as if to prove it. I’ve gone places and I’ve seen things. I’ve always dreamed of seeing more, and now I’m seeing the whole world in the blue eyes of a boy.
He dips his lips to my neck, travels to my ear, and whispers, “I think I’ve missed you my whole life.”
My heart cracks open and I turn into him, offering him my lips and with it that wide-open spot in my chest. He accepts. I feel it in his touch. A strong hand skims down my shoulder and explores my breast. My nipple hardens as he furthers his study. Then he continues his adventure, slipping his hand to the waistband of my jeans. There’s a moment of hesitance as if asking permission. I grab his hand and shove it into my panties.
“Patience,” he murmurs with a laugh as a finger begins circling the swollen bundle of nerves he finds.
“Easy for you to say.” I buck against him to show just how impatient I am.
“Shut up and kiss me, Lucky.”
Our mouths collide as we twine together, his hand between my legs, my arms coiling around him. His tongue wanders past my lips, licks a path along my teeth, journeys deeper until he’s my oxygen. We could be anywhere.
