have, my head cleared enough for me to see that I want to live a hell of a lot more than I want to hide from the pain that made me feel like I was being ripped apart.” She crawled over to me and snuggled against me. “I promise you can relax. You don’t need to make Jagger babysit me when you can’t be here with me on the weekends.”
I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her cheek. “I can’t help it.”
“If I’d known there was going to be girl-on-girl action going on here, I would have left a hell of a lot sooner.”
Violet snorted as we lifted our heads to find Jagger standing in the doorway. He had a smirk on his face, but his pale-blue eyes were glued to me. I couldn’t stop myself from running my gaze over him hungrily. I hadn’t seen him in four days, and I felt starved just for the sight of him.
Dressed in well-worn jeans, a black button-up shirt, and his hair styled and pushed back from his face, he looked so delicious my mouth watered. I pressed my lips into a hard line to keep it from falling open and drooling all over Vi’s bed. Violet threw a pillow at him, which he caught before it could hit him in the face.
Laughing, he walked across the room and placed the pillow at the head of the bed before sitting down beside me. “Missed you, Dimples,” he said as he lay down beside me and didn’t hesitate to pull me against his side.
My heart gave a happy little leap in my chest, and I cuddled into him for a few seconds before pushing him off the bed. He landed with a hard crash on the floor, causing Violet to laugh. I stood, combing my fingers through my hair while I grinned down at him. The hunger in his own eyes was enough to make me gulp and quickly look anywhere else but at him. “Vi and I decided on hibachi for dinner. You’re driving.”
“You could have just been honest and said you missed me too,” he said as he got to his feet.
“Where’s the fun in that?” I asked as I wrinkled my nose, flirting instead of admitting aloud that I’d physically ached from missing him.
Mason didn’t like Japanese food, so he said he was going to have a bowl of cereal since his parents were at dinner with Uncle Drake and Aunt Lana. Violet climbed into the back of Jagger’s car, while Jagger opened the passenger door for me. I was tempted to get in the back with Vi, but I couldn’t stop the need to brush up against him as I got in.
Before I could bend to get in the car, he caught my hip and pulled me against him. Lowering his head, he brushed his lips over the shell of my ear. “I need to talk to you about something.” My head snapped up at how serious his voice was. “It’s important.”
I glanced at Violet, sitting patiently in the back seat. “Can it wait until after dinner?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I want to talk to you about this alone, so after we drop off Violet later, will you take a drive with me?”
“Okay,” I agreed, while inside, I was quaking with sudden anxiety.
All through dinner, I tried to keep my mind off what Jagger might want to talk about, but my head kept clouding with the possibilities. I was thankful that we were at a grill with six other people and we couldn’t have a deep conversation. I smiled and laughed at the chef as he did tricks and tossed shrimp into everyone’s mouth. Jagger and the two other guys at our grill tried to see how many each of them could catch.
When the chef tossed the last of the shrimp in Jagger’s direction, I jumped in the way and caught it in my own mouth, making everyone around us roar with laughter. Chewing, I winked at Jagger, and his eyes dilated with need.
Once we dropped Violet off at her house, Jagger drove us toward LA. It took me a few minutes to realize we weren’t just going to a public beach to talk, and I glanced over at him skeptically. “Where exactly are we going?”
“I want to show you something,” he said with a shrug as he changed lanes. “We can talk when we get there.”
“Talk about what?” I muttered, not completely sure I wanted to know.