She huffs out a breath. “I didn’t have my first kiss until I was eighteen. No Seven Minutes of Heaven. No spin the bottle—though after hearing your story, I’m pretty sure that I’m the lucky one.”
Eighteen . . . a year after her prom night. Angling my fingers at the base of her skull, I tug her down until she’s inches away. “If there are any games tonight, just know that I’ll be first in line to pop your cherry.”
Her shocked laughter warms me inside out, and if it weren’t for Dom calling to check on our ETA five minutes later, I would have been perfectly happy to never leave our rickety mattress.
We spend most of the day checking out the boutiques along Main Street. The snow holds off long enough for the three of us to feast on fudge from a gas station, of all places, and to stop in an all-in-one type shop directly across from our B&B. With walls made of wood and the furnace burning hot, it’s easy to imagine the two-story boutique as a log cabin in the middle of nowhere.
Then again, Bethel, Maine—beautiful as it is—isn’t exactly the center of civilization.
“I’m gonna check out the winter apparel,” Dom tells us when we step inside. “I’m hopin’ they might have something thicker than what I’ve got.”
I pluck at his rain jacket—fat lot of good that thing will do him tonight when it drops into the teens. “You’re not in California anymore, Toto.”
He flashes me the bird and heads off to the clothing section. “Asshole,” he calls out over his shoulder.
Laughing, I turn back to Mina. “Anything you want to look for?”
She smiles up at me, and if it’s not quite as bright as the ones she usually keeps in reserve for me, I try to keep the worry at the minimum. “How about we just browse around?” she says. “We’ve got time to kill anyway.”
We wander through the various sections, my hand linked with hers. This store has everything a person could ever need, from paintings and artwork to even a mini-special-gems exhibit. They sparkle under the glass cases, drawing Mina’s attention like a shooting star darting across the sky.
“Like them?” I nod toward the line of purple amethysts shining under the lamps.
“Love them.” With a little shrug, she ducks down to look at them head-on. “I remember going to the Museum of Science as a kid for school. At one point they had a gem exhibit and it was just amazing. I mean, some of them stood nearly as tall as me.”
I lean my ass against the case. “The dinosaurs got to me.”
She doesn’t bother to hide her chuckle. “Such a man,” she says, a teasing note the only undercurrent to her voice. Maybe she’s feeling better after whatever drove her to my parents’ house? I can only hope. “Let me guess, you were enraptured by the T-Rex.”
“Pshh.” I wave my hand at her. “Overrated. The Allosaurus has my vote.”
“Because it was bigger than the T-Rex?”
“Nah,” I murmur with a wide grin, “but it was faster. More vicious. Shouldn’t you know this, Miss Jeopardy?”
“Seems like I missed the dinosaur episode.” She bumps her hip with mine, and I instinctively curl my arm around her. Our coats get in the way, so I slip my fingers into the back pocket of her jeans. “Please tell me you’ve seen Jurassic Park.”
“Of course I have.” She pauses, and then adds, “I mean, I’ve seen the Chris Pratt version. Because, Chris Pratt.”
Mock-groaning, I drop my forehead to her shoulder. “Way to let a guy down, koukla. That Jurassic Park doesn’t count. We’re adding it to the list of movies to watch.”
“Are we?”
“Yup.” I let the p pop, squeezing her ass through her jeans before stepping away and drumming my fingers on the glass counter. “Now, asking for a friend, which one of these gems is your favorite?”
Turns out, “dating games” is as much of a shit storm as we predicted.
The dinner plates have barely been swept away by the restaurant staff before Sophia launches up from her chair and proceeds to stand at the front of the room. “Thank you all for coming up to Maine!” Clapping her hands together, she does a little shimmy that coaxes some laughs out of this weekend’s victims. “We’re the last ones standing in our grade—single and ready to mingle!”
Mina elbows me in the side, hissing, “My nose is tingling. It’s a bad omen.”
I sling an arm around the back of her chair. “At least you know most of the people here. Dom and I are out of luck.”
This weekend’s shenanigans consist of twelve of us, including Dom. Although Mina seemed nervous when the others stopped by to say hello during dinner, she inevitably warmed up and relaxed. Or maybe it was the vodka talking. Either way, I’m two years older than everyone else—aside from Dominic—which means I may recognize faces but nothing more.
I’m going into this weekend completely blind, save for my partner-in-crime sitting beside me.
“I thought we could do a round of speed dating,” Sophia goes on, “but then I thought . . . screw it, we’re all adults! We should play a fun game.”
Something tells me that my idea of a “fun” game and hers have very different definitions. Idly, my fingers play with Mina’s dark strands.
“So! We’re going to play Attached at the Hip! Does anyone know what I’m talking about?” A few hands shoot up, but the majority of us do nothing but stare back at Sophia blankly. She counts all those who are in the know. “If you’re clueless, never fear. Pretty much, we’re all going to write down a body part on a slip of paper—I’ve got us covered—and pop it into a hat. We’ll be paired into teams of two. Each of you will pick a piece of paper, and then you’ll need to make sure those body parts are always touching.”
“And if they don’t?” calls out a guy with a man bun. “What happens then?”
Sophia’s answering grin is downright diabolical. “You take a shot and you’re out of the game! Easiest rules ever. Don’t stop touching, ever. Not even between positions.”
As though she has it all choreographed, the doors to the private room we’re in swing open and two servers tromp in with shots perched on black trays.
“How well do you hold your liquor?” I whisper to Mina.
She makes the quintessential oh, shit face, and I figure that about sums up this night. “Not well enough,” she grumbles, “especially if it’s Tito’s.”
On my other side, Dom leans forward, elbow on the table. He points a finger at Mina, then says, “I don’t know whether to love you or hate you for the Don bit. This is either going to be the worst night of my life or . . .”
“It’s time to pick partners!” Sophia exclaims from the front of the room. “Oh, Dooonnnn! You’re with me.”
Dom’s finger practically wilts. “When I purposely lose this game, be sure to carry me back to my room and lock the door.” He pushes back his chair and strolls over to Sophia, looking like a dead man walking.
For a moment, Mina and I do nothing but mourn his bad luck.
Then we turn to each other in unison. “Partner?” we both ask.
“All right, let’s do this.” I toss back the rest of my wine and tap the base of Mina’s. “Operation Never-Stop-Touching begins now.”
As mandated by the rules, all of us write down a body part and toss it into the hat Sophia’s procured from thin air. She shuffles them round, shaking the hat, then peers back up at us. “Do three more rounds of body parts, just in case we get ‘leg’ five times. Be creative!”
I toss my jacket on the back of my chair, then loosen the knot of my tie. One glance at Mina shows she’s taking this seriously too. She’s kicked off her high heels and put her hair up in a high ponytail. When she catches me staring, she offers a blinding grin. “Lucky for you, I wore trendy, fashion sweatpants.” She plucks at the soft fabric before dropping to her haunches in what I think she thinks is a stretching pose. “I’m flexible and prepared to do anything it takes to win.”
Biting down on my lip, I do what every other man does when faced with a sexy woman showing off how agile she is: I pull my button-down shirt out from the waistband of my slacks and hope it’ll conceal the activity now happening south of the equator. There aren’t many days that I prefer ditching my jeans and T-shirts for finer clothing—in this moment, with my erection threatening to announce itself to the world, I’m fucking thankful.
“Okay, partners! Stand together as a team.” Sophia ushers one of the servers forward, and I almost feel bad for the utter horror he’s about to witness tonight. “Sean here is going to come around with the hat. Don’t look at what the paper says until I tell you.”
Mina and I line up together. When Sean meets us, we each reach into the hat as one, our knuckles banging against each other’s.
“Hand tango-ing,” she says with a swift grin, “how good does it feel?”
“Better than expected.” I meet her gaze. “Not as good as the horizontal tango, if you catch my drift, but it’s good enough for now.”
She rolls her eyes but I see the lightness there, and some of my concerns drift away. Once everyone has taken a turn with the hat, Sean calls out, “Okay! Go ahead and look now.”
I peel open my slip of paper. “Right foot.”
Mina glances over at my feet. “Back.” Her nose scrunches. “Does that mean I need to lay on the floor? I mean, I will for the sake of competition, but this is not off to a good start.”
“I’ll do it.” When her brows shoot up in question, I shrug. “Teamwork, right?”
All around us, couples are getting into position. I spot Dom looking pained as he gets down on one knee and Sophia perches herself atop it. He’s going to wish he never came to Boston at this rate.
I lay down on my stomach, then feel Mina gently place her foot between my shoulder blades.