Chapter 1: The Long, Hot Drive
The Mustang’s engine was a steady, rhythmic purr beneath the hood, a sound James felt in his teeth and in the worn leather of the steering wheel. Sunlight glinted off the chrome trim, slicing through the cab in hot, slow-moving bars. He flicked his eyes from the unspooling highway to the passenger seat, a habit as automatic as breathing.
Chloe had one foot propped on the dash, her leg a long, smooth line ending in the delicate arch of her ankle. The tiny black triangle of her bikini bottom peeked from beneath the hem of her cut-off denims. She was humming along to some alt-rock song bleeding from the speakers, her head tilted back, eyes closed against the Michigan sun. Her blond hair whipped in the vortex from the open window, strands catching the light like pale silk.
“You’re staring,” she said without opening her eyes. A smile played on her lips.
“Am not.”
“You are. I can feel it. It’s like a little laser between my temples.”
“That’s a headache. You should drink some water.”
She laughed, a clean, bright sound that cut through the wind and engine noise. She opened her eyes and looked at him, her gaze the color of lake water on a cloudy day. “You’re a terrible liar, James Bradford.”
She shifted then, turning her body toward him. The movement made the fabric of her shorts pull tighter. Her hand settled on his thigh, just above his knee. Her fingers were warm, her touch a brand even through his jeans. He focused on the white line dividing the asphalt, his grip tightening on the wheel.
“Just thinking how long till we hit the beach,” he said, aiming for casual and landing somewhere near strained.
“Mm-hmm.” Her thumb began a slow, idle stroke back and forth. “You were thinking about the water? Or the sand?”
“The water. Definitely the water.”
“Liar again.” She leaned closer, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur he had to strain to hear over the road. “You were thinking about this.”
Her hand slid higher, an inch, maybe two. The muscles in his leg jumped under her palm. The car gave a slight, unintended surge as his foot twitched on the gas.
“Chloe.”
“What?” Her tone was all innocent mischief. “You’ve seen me in this suit a hundred times.”
“Not with your hand on my leg while I’m trying to merge onto I-96.”
She laughed again and relented, pulling her hand back to rest safely on her own leg, but the damage was done. His blood was humming, a secondary current to the Mustang’s old V8. The rest of the drive was a sweet, protracted torture. The scent of her sunscreen—coconut and something chemical—mixed with the gasoline-and-leather smell of Old Blue. Her bare shoulder brushed his arm whenever she reached for the aux cord. Every glance he stole felt like drinking something too sweet and too cold, a brain-freeze of want.
They finally left the highway, the landscape opening up to the vast, blue-gray expanse of Lake Michigan. The air changed, tasting of damp sand and distant water. He found their spot, a less-crowded stretch of beach near the state park, and killed the engine. The sudden silence was profound, filled only by the distant cries of gulls and the low, endless wash of waves.
Before he could even unbuckle, Chloe was out of the car, shucking her shorts and tank top in one fluid motion. She stood there for a second in just her black bikini, a silhouette against the brilliant water, hands on her hips.
“Last one in’s a rotten egg!” she called, already sprinting toward the water, her laugh trailing behind her like a ribbon.
He watched her go, the easy grace of her, the way the sun clung to her skin. He was crazy for her. It was a simple, dizzying fact of his existence.
By the time he’d locked the car and trudged through the hot sand, she was already waist-deep, shivering and glorious, pushing a wall of water toward him with a flat palm. “Took you long enough, old man!”
The water was a shock, a breathtaking cold that stole the air from his lungs. He plunged under, the world going silent and green, then surfaced, shaking his head like a dog. She was right there, treading water, her hair plastered to her skull, beaded with droplets on her eyelashes.
“Better?” she asked, her teasing softer now.
“Better.”
They swam, they floated on their backs staring at the high, hard sky, they bobbed in the gentle swells. It was easy. It was always easy with her, even when it was electrically hard. Later, they lay side-by-side on the big striped towel, skin steaming, the sun baking the chill from their bones. Sand stuck to her forearm, a fine golden dusting. He wanted to lick it off.
He rolled onto his side, propping his head on his hand. She did the same, mirroring him. Their noses were inches apart. He could see the faint constellation of freckles across her cheeks, the tiny flecks of darker blue in her irises.
“What?” she whispered.
“Nothing.”
“It’s not nothing.”
He didn’t have a word for it. It was the sun, and the smell of her wet hair, and the fact that his father had kissed his mother in this same car, and that he, James, was here now with this girl who made the entire world feel focused and sharp and unbearably fragile. He leaned in and kissed her. It started soft, salty from the lake. Then her hand came up, cool and damp, to cradle the back of his neck, and it deepened. The world narrowed to the feel of her lips, the sigh she breathed into his mouth, the heat of her skin under his palm.
A kid’s shriek from down the beach broke the spell. They parted, breathless. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips swollen. She looked thoroughly kissed. It was the best thing he’d ever seen.
“We should go,” she said, her voice husky.
“We just got here.”
“Not home.” A slow, sly smile spread across her face. “Back to the car.”
His heart did a hard, single thump against his ribs.
The walk back across the burning sand felt eternal. The Mustang sat where they left it, its blue paint now dusty. The interior was an oven, the leather seats hot to the touch. She climbed in, not bothering with her shorts, just wrapping the towel around her waist.
He started the engine just to get the air conditioning going, the blast of it icy and shocking. The roar of it filled the space between them. She looked at him, then reached over and turned the key back, killing it. The sudden quiet was loud, filled with the sound of their breathing.
Outside, the world was a postcard: families packing up coolers, the lake glittering, the sky beginning to tinge with gold at the edges. Inside the car, it was a different world. Her towel puddled on the floorboard. She slid across the worn bench seat, the backs of her thighs sticking slightly to the leather, until she was in the middle, right next to him.
She didn’t say anything. She just looked at him, her eyes serious now, all the playfulness banked into something hotter and quieter. She took his hand, guided it to the tie of her bikini top at the nape of her neck. Her gaze never left his. Her fingers were steady; his trembled.
The knot came loose.
Later, with the sun a fiery orange disc melting into the lake, they dressed in silence. The air in the car was thick, humid with their breath, sweet with the scent of her skin and his. She rested her head on his shoulder as he drove back toward the highway, her fingers laced with his on the gear shift.
He felt raw, scraped clean. He also felt, for the first time all day, a cold knot of dread forming low in his stomach. This was too big. She was too much. He was twenty-one, driving his dad’s old car, and he had just fallen through a door in the universe he could never close.
As the city lights began to prick the twilight ahead, she squeezed his hand. “That was the best beach day ever,” she murmured, her voice sleepy.
“Yeah,” he said, his own voice sounding foreign to him. He cleared his throat. “It really was.”
But in the rearview mirror, the last of the sunset was bleeding out behind them, leaving only a darkening bruise of sky. He pressed the accelerator, and Old Blue responded with a growl, carrying them forward into the gathering dark.