Mouth to Mouth (Beach Kingdom 1)

Now, though? She wasn’t so sure she wanted Rory to show up again.

One afternoon at age fourteen, after finishing her schoolwork early, she’d gone out to see a movie. When it didn’t hold her interest, she’d left the theater early and come home to find her parents shooting a video with her siblings. They’d turned to find her in the hallway, guilt written all over their faces. Her brother and sister had been covered in finger paint, laughter frozen on their faces. They’d deliberately left her out of a filming session. And that had been the beginning of the family division; Olive on one side, everyone else on the other. She’d tiptoed through her own house so as not to disrupt their progress, chest panging over the distant sounds of giggling, the pride and encouragement in her parents’ voices. Sure, her mother and father had made an effort to engage her after the videos had been filmed, edited and uploaded to YouTube, but those conversations never stopped seeming forced.

If they’d left her out of the videos at a younger age, Olive probably would have been relieved. But by age fourteen, they’d been entertaining the masses for years and she’d already become known among people in town as that internet girl. They’d seen her sleeping, brushing her teeth, crying, getting haircuts and having her tonsils removed. To suddenly have that identity taken away after working so hard to live within it…was hard. Really hard.

It seemed as though abandonment came in more than one form. Rory dropping her like a bad habit wasn’t on par with her parents losing interest in her. But it left Olive with the same hollowness and uncertainty. She and Rory had only known each other for three days when he’d left her reeling. What would a relationship with him be like? Constantly waiting and worrying for the next time his conscience flared up? She should be grateful he’d ended it sooner rather than later.

Olive was rubbing at the ever-present tightness in her throat when her cell phone rang in her pocket. Just like every other time it had rung for the last two weeks, her heart shot up into her mouth. It wasn’t him, though. Thank God.

Right?

“Hey, Leanne,” she answered, twisting the straw of her drink. A line formed between her eyes when laughing male voices could be heard on the other end. “What’s up?”

“We’re going out tonight,” Leanne squealed back. “You know that sophomore in our Intro to Psych class? I ran into her while getting takeout tacos and she invited me to hang out—she has a place off campus—and all these freaking senior guys are here. Athletes, Olive.”

“What kind?”

“The athletic kind.”

Olive giggled into the back of her wrist. “Continue.”

“They invited us out tonight. We’re going out. To bars.”

“We are?”

“Yes. I’m playing the buddy system card.”

She’d only known Leanne since the first day of class, but they’d bonded over a love of Pavlov and made each other laugh. It had been a while since Olive had clicked with another girl who hadn’t known her as a YouTube personality first and Olive second. It was refreshing and comfortable and Olive didn’t want Leanne going out with near-strangers alone, whether they went to Stony Brook or not. Especially since they were both lacking in the adult party experience department. Just the idea of dressing up and making small talk exhausted her, though. Not to mention, going out with boys…just the idea of it made her feel unfaithful to Rory. Which was ridiculous. And stupid.

Nonetheless, Olive’s knee jiggled under the window bar as she tried to come up with an excuse to not go. She was disappointing herself, but so be it. Two weeks hadn’t been long enough to get the green-eyed lifeguard out of her head and—

A motorcycle rumbled to a stop at the light, across the street from the coffee shop. The rider’s fingers stretched on the handlebars in a way she recognized, along with the tense shoulders, the rangy build. No, it couldn’t be him. Could it?

He took off the helmet and shoved a hand through his hair, making some adjustment to the face shield before replacing the protective gear on his head.

Olive almost dropped the phone. It was him.

Without realizing it, she’d slid off her stool and hidden her body partially behind a pillar. The hair on her skin stood straight up, her pulse in a permanent spike. How dare he look even more gorgeous and masculine than she remembered? She’d never seen him on the bike before and something about the scene excited Olive despite her best efforts. Her palms started to sweat and she dragged her free one down the leg of her shorts, his voice drifting into her head from out of nowhere.

Been dreaming about those legs snapping together around my hips. Just like that.