by Olivia Lynde
"Mr. Anderson, I've loved Summer since she was five years old." Hearing the fiercely spoken avowal, my foster and I both inhale audibly. "I can absolutely be trusted with her."
Greg silently holds Seth's gaze for one interminable minute. Finally he nods, apparently satisfied with whatever he's seen in his eyes. Then he moves his gaze to me. "Summer, are you fully certain about your decision to leave my house with your boyfriend?"
"I am," I whisper. Then I say it louder, so there's no doubt about my feelings on the matter: "I want to be with Seth." And that is God's honest truth.
My foster studies me for several endless moments.
Finally he tells us stiffly, "All right. If that is what the two of you wish to do, then have it your way. However, this agreement only applies strictly until school ends for the year—and no further. In the meantime, Summer, if your social worker comes visiting, I will contact you on your cell and you will need to meet her."
Fat chance of that happening! My local caseworker works, apparently, at this huge agency in Grand Rapids, and she's deluged with more case files than even "three super-competent super–social workers" could hope to manage (according to her). She rescheduled four times before she finally managed to drag herself to Rockford this week, to meet me for the first time—for all of five minutes. I really doubt I'll be seeing her again anytime soon.
So I offer a calm nod in answer to Greg's stipulation while all this time my heart is practically leaping out of my chest, caught in a whirl of abandoned elation.
Seth, too, doesn't show any outward reaction. "That's fair, Mr. Anderson. Thank you."
Greg shakes his head, seeming overwhelmed by the entire situation. "I cannot believe I am agreeing to this. I do hope you kids know what you are getting yourselves into, deciding to live together." Then, his expression darkening abruptly, he looks Seth straight in the eye. "I realize that Summer is over the age of consent, but I would like to make it utterly clear that I do not, under any circumstances, want to hear about her becoming pregnant at sixteen. If that should happen, you will answer to me, young man, and I assure you that you won't like it. So the two of you had better take precautions!"
I am struck mute by Greg's words, but Seth doesn't hesitate in his answer. "We'll be careful. Right now, we're still too young to have a baby."
I stare at him, taken aback. He's thought about this?!
Good heavens, I'm naive! Of course he's thought about this. Obviously.
I panic. Oh, lordy, how soon does he expect us to make love? I don't think I'm ready yet! Am I ready? No, I don't think so. I love Seth and trust him with my life, but I'm scared at the thought of becoming physically intimate with him. Plus, he's been with so many girls; what if I can't satisfy him?!
Through my veil of anxiety, I notice Greg taking out with his wallet. "I will advance you, say, 400 dollars for next month's living costs for Summer," he suggests. "If it isn't enough, then we can—"
Beside me, Seth has turned to stone. "Mr. Anderson," he grits out. "I don't expect or want your money. I said I'd take responsibility for Summer and I meant it."
My foster looks baffled. "But how do you plan on supporting her, Mr. Lewis? You are still in high school yourself, after all."
"I've been supporting myself for five years," my boy replies proudly. "I'm more than capable of taking care of my girl too."
Greg shrugs, bemused. "All right, but if you should change your mind—"
"I won't," Seth interrupts him decisively, starting to rise to his feet and pulling me up with him. He releases me to give my foster a brief handshake, after which he immediately grabs my hand again.
"We'll be leaving now. We've already taken up too much of your time. Thank you again, Mr. Anderson."
We exit the library, and my eyes fall instantly on Jessica and Louise, who are sitting on the sofa in the living room and talking quietly. On hearing us, they both look up with wary eyes. Seth returns their gaze with an inscrutable expression. Finally he gives a shallow nod, and before the two women can say anything, he swivels around and tugs me out of the house.
After we close the house door behind us, Seth starts to move faster, making me almost run to keep up. Just before we reach our car, he turns to me with glittering eyes and pulls me toward him. Instinctively, I jump up and he catches me, raising me higher, and my arms go around his neck and my legs around his waist. Our lips come together in an explosion of relief and passion, and we're kissing deeply, mouths wet and open, tongues tangling and caressing.
Heavens, he's an insanely good kisser! Even without having anyone with whom to compare him, I am sure of this, just by how he always completely scrambles my brain within less than two seconds after he touches me. His earlier, shallower kisses were already mind-blowingly fantastic, but now that he's also French-kissing me, he practically lifts me to a different plane of existence every time.
After our lips separate, we keep our faces very close to each other, look into each other's eyes, and grin at each other full of joy.
"I love you, Sunny," he whispers tenderly.
"I love you, Seth."
Then he's moving, with me still attached to him, to open the passenger door, and he settles me gently in my seat. He closes my door and starts around the car front.
I reach to fasten my seatbelt... and it is at that moment that I look outside through my window and see Jessica framed in the doorway of her house. She's staring in our direction, her expression scarily blank. I wonder how long she's been watching us, how much she's seen and heard. Barely a minute ago, Seth and I were kissing the living daylights out of each other and professing our love.
I would hate for that devil's spawn to have witnessed our intimate moment.
The driver's side opens. "You okay, Sunny?" Seth asks me, settling in his seat.
Darn Jessica, I won't let her ruin this for me!
I arrange my face in a happy expression and turn to my boy. "Actually, Seth, I am very much beyond merely okay."
He gives me a loving smile. "Let's go then."
The next instant, we're driving together through the night, heading home.
But that insidious sense of dread I felt when I saw Jessica in her doorway... it doesn't go away.
Chapter 23
We're stretched out on the bed in his apartment, both of us lying on our sides, facing each other, and Seth's right arm encircles my waist.
I have Seth's giant green T-shirt on, which I also wore the two previous nights (and which I cajoled Seth into letting me keep even though I now have a bunch of new clothes), but I've forgone the drawstring pants in favor of a cute pair of shorts. As a (momentary, I suppose) concession to my shyness, Seth has upgraded his usual sleepwear (boxer shorts only) with a pair of blue sweatpants. His beautiful sculpted chest, however, has been left bared to my greedy stare.
We're looking deep into each others' eyes, and God, how I relish the connection! His dark blue gaze is completely open to me, no part of him held back.
We're talking about the big event of tonight.
"I still can't believe that Greg actually agreed to let me leave his house and move in with you," I murmur contemplatively. "I sort of had this vision that, when he heard your request, he would blow a fuse, try to throw you out of his house, and send me to a nunnery or something."
Seth raises a sardonic eyebrow. "Oh ye of little faith." But then his forehead clouds and his gaze shutters abruptly in that way I hate so much. "You regret that you said yes to moving in with me? Maybe you thought that Greg would be your failsafe so you wouldn't have to go through with it after all?"
Dear heavens, why does he torment himself with such ridiculous thoughts?! Doesn't he know how absolutely, head-over-heels in love I am with him?
I scowl at him. "What you're saying is unfair and untrue! I wouldn't have said that I wanted to live with you if I hadn't meant it with all my heart. Surely you know me better than that, Seth!" Then, very softly: "Surely you must know how much I want to be with you."
I gnaw at my lower lip in distress, and his eyes go from unreadable to devouring in less than blink. Thank goodness!
He leans in for a fierce, deep kiss.
"Sorry for making it sound like I doubted you," he says against my parted lips. "It's just, I want you so damn much I'm crazy with it! And it's hard to trust that, after all these years of thinking I'd lost you, you're now back in my life. And you're mine—my greatest dream come true."
Radiant joy suffuses my soul, then spills over into every single cell of my body. "I'm your greatest dream?"
"Sunny, you're everything! And I swear I won't ever give you a reason to regret that you're mine. I swear I'll take good care of you. I'll do everything so I can give you all you want." His eyes are bright with possessiveness and something else too—something I could almost believe is... reverence.
God, how I love this boy! Still, that caveman mentality of his is in sore need of a bit of an overhaul. I give him an impish grin. "I'll never regret loving you, Seth. But I don't want you to take care of me; I want us to take care of each other. As for giving me what I want—you already have, Seth. You've given me you." And you are my one desire.
I barely finish my sentence before his lips are on mine again, taking me over, submerging me in a sea of searing passion. I finally have to tear my mouth away from his just to get some oxygen into my air-starved lungs, but my heart still feels caught in an earthquake, bouncing wildly inside my chest.
"See," I croak, "proof positive of my happiness at being here with you. I'm really grateful for Greg's agreement. Surprised, but very grateful."
Seth's lust-filled gaze sharpens with astuteness. "Don't be surprised. Given the escalation of the problems with Jessica, Anderson's only option, in the end, would've been to send you back to social services. But that would've really harmed you given the timing, and he was decent enough to admit that. So when we gave him another option to get you out of his house, he jumped at it."
"So you're saying..."
"I'm saying that you're not his flesh and blood, Sunny. That if you'd been his own sixteen-year-old daughter—and not just some foster girl he'd taken in—he would've never allowed you to move in with your older boyfriend."
I look away, unwillingly stung. He's right, of course. Greg doesn't really care how I live my life. Nobody does. My parents would have cared, but they're long dead.
Seth's warm hand rises from my waist and touches my chin, gently turning my face back toward him. His eyes are filled with tenderness and concern.
"It's okay, Sunny. You don't need Greg, remember? You have me, baby! You have me."
But for how long?
Awful, ugly question; and awful, ugly poison that it keeps dripping into my soul. Tainting my happiness with the awful specter of evanescence.
Driven by sudden instinctive urgency, I move closer to Seth, press myself into his body. When I raise my face to his, his lips are already waiting, and our mouths connect in an explosion of untamed feeling.
His hand at my waist rises higher, fingers splaying on my back and drawing me into him. He shifts me onto my back and covers me with his warm weight. All I know is his strong body above me, and his demanding hands on me, and his mouth on mine—drowning me in heat.
His lips move to my neck, forging a trail of sweet, wicked kisses on my skin; then he bites my neck lightly and a more powerful quiver of passion surges through me. He runs his nose sensually along the column on my throat and kisses it again. My hands clench into the warm flesh at his waist, and I arch into him, moaning. He sucks on my neck, then licks delicately, caressing my skin with his sinful tongue.
I trail my hands up his naked back, curl them around his shoulders and curve myself into him. His lips leave my neck in search of my mouth, and we kiss again: wet, deep, deeper, moving and shifting and fusing our lips. Time disappears.
We're intertwined, kissing endlessly. Each frenzied meeting of our lips, each sensual glide of our bodies drives my need higher until I'm shaking with it. I'm pressing myself upwards into Seth, rubbing against his arousal—searching for something, something... I don't know what, only that he can give it to me.
I'm wild for him, utterly lost to our mutual passion... and it's too much, too soon.
Sensing this, he stops kissing me and enfolds me in a confining embrace, halting my arching movements and rolling us so that he's lying on his back and I'm lying on him. Beneath my ear, his heart thunders like a stampede of feral horses, and his body feels rigid with his imposed restraint.
Yet he holds me quietly, gently to him and caresses my hair in a soothing rhythm.
Holy smoke, that was intense! I think when I am eventually able to do so once more. I never imagined that I could feel this way: just ignite, so instantly and completely! It seems as if at one moment I'm a tiny flicker, then he appears like high-octane gasoline and pours himself into me with his touch, his kiss; and I immediately go up in flames, abandon myself to him past all sense of self-preservation.
This boy is not merely dangerous to my senses—he's lethal.
After the lava of need burning in my veins has calmed somewhat, I raise myself slightly on his chest and meet his stormy gaze.
"That was interesting," I tell him cautiously. Then I beam at him. "I like it. Let's do it again very soon!"
At this he bursts into laughter, his chest vibrating under me. "I'm glad you like it because I definitely do."
I lay my head back on his chest and his strong arm around me draws me closer to him. I snuggle contentedly into his heat and feel his other hand burying itself once again in my hair, playing with the wavy strands.
"Seth..."
"Yes, Sunny?"
I hide my face in his shoulder, my voice no more than a whisper. "Do you want to make love to me?"
His hand playing with my hair freezes. Then it resumes its motion.
"There's no rush," he tells me huskily.
"But you want to?" Again with my face buried in his shoulder.
He takes his hand from my hair and moves it to my cheek and lifts my head out of hiding. His eyes are deep blue pools of raging fire. "I want you more than I ever thought it was possible to want. You enchant me. Every little thing about you, every little part of you, fascinates me. I'm crazy from wanting you."
In this moment his gorgeous face, blazing with fathomless desire, seems to me the very quintessence of carnal enticement. The hot embers in my belly start their frantic pulsing all over again.
Giddy, I lower my gaze. "How long do you thing you can wait for me to... you know...? Go all the way with you?"
"Look at me," he orders firmly.
I raise my eyes to his.
"I love you, Sunny. I've been waiting for you forever. Even if I had to spend my life waiting for you—it'd be worth it as long as you're mine. You have your answer now?"
I nod.
A pause, and his eyes darken. "Will you sing for me, Sunny? Like you used to?"
I look away. "I haven't sung in a long time, Seth. I don't know if my voice is any good anymore."
His hand stops moving in my hair once again. "When did you sing last?"
I tell him the truth. "The last time I sang for you."
His body turns solid beneath me, but his voice stays tender. "Please sing for me now, Sunny. I want to hear my birthday song."
I can refuse him nothing. Looking into his eyes, drawing strength from our connection, I sing for him Over the Rainbow.
When my voice first emerges as melody, it's almost as if he stops breathing. When I finish, he pulls my head down and gives me a devastating kiss.
After our lips separate, he rasps out, "Jesus Christ, Sunny! I already thought you sang like a nightingale when we were children. But just now, listening to you, it was like I'd died and gone to heaven because that could only be an angel's voice I was hearing. Your young voice was already incredible. But your mature voice... it's out of this world."
I smile brightly at his praise. "I love singing for you. Except for my pa
rents, you're still the only one I've ever done it for."
His eyes flare and he gives me another consuming kiss.
By the time he ends it, my heart is almost bursting out of my chest with exhilaration.
"Go to sleep, Sunny," he tells me hoarsely. He attempts a smile. "We have school in the morning."
I lower my head back to his chest."Good night, Seth. And... I love you too."
His massive frame shudders on a surge of powerful emotion and curls impossibly snugger around me.
In the quiet, I only feel his heartbeat beneath my cheek, strong and steady. In the quiet, the question starts banging inside my head again—the question that's been stuck in my throat all evening. The question I'm too much of a coward to ask him.
Seth, when you asked Greg to go along with our decision to live together... why did you say "until August"? Because that's when you'll be leaving for college? Because you already know that's when you'll be living me behind?
So that's all the time you asked from Greg, to be with me?
When we found out the truth about the past and we reconciled... I knew from the start that my new happiness was living on borrowed time.
And now I've just had its expiration date confirmed.
Chapter 24
We've reached Rockford High and Seth's just finished parking his BMW. In an unwelcome replay of Friday morning, the school's parking lot and front lawn are filled with students, and we're already attracting a lot of attention.
At least this time I don't look like a frump.
Earlier this morning, I put on some mascara, which makes my light-colored eyelashes seem longer and my eyes more interesting, the green flecks in my hazel iris more pronounced. I also tried to put on a bit of eye-shadow and use the eyeliner, but that turned into a complete disaster, making me look like a raccoon, so I ended up washing off the entire mess in the bathroom. I'll need to ask Dana to teach me how to do my makeup since I obviously can't crack its subtleties by myself. Until then, I'll be sticking to mascara and clear lip gloss only, thank you very much.