“You have to drink yours too!” I complain, my throat and eyes stinging like unholy hellfire.
“Are you sure you don’t want to be extra forgetful?” he asks, setting his glass in front of me.
“Adam!” I scold, sliding it back over. My hoarse voice alone is evidence of how strong the drink is.
Adam laughs and sighs, steeling himself. Then in one quick movement, he tilts his head back and empties the amber liquid down his throat. “Holy Christ,” he chokes, setting the glass down and vigorously shaking his head back and forth like he might be able to shake the acid-hot taste away. “If that doesn’t make you forget, I don’t know what will!”
By the time Shawn comes home, Adam and I are totally tipsy. I tend to Adam’s busted knuckles while he tells the story of punching Brady in the face, and then we both giggle like crazy. Even when I learn that Joel sleeps on their couch, so I’ll have to sleep with Adam, I’m too drunk and exhausted to object. I crawl under his covers that night feeling the alcohol weighing me deep into his mattress. Adam is still in the living room with Shawn and Joel, which leaves me alone with way too much quiet.
Before I can stop them, memories of Brady flood my mind and escape in the form of salty tears dripping on Adam’s pillow. I thought I was over him, but that didn’t make the pain of seeing him with that same girl again hurt any less.
When Adam crawls in beside me a little later, I’m trying desperately to keep from sniffling, and instead I end up hiccupping.
“He’s not worth it, Peach,” he says, lying eye-level with me.
The pale moonlight illuminates the concerned expression on his face, and my voice breaks when I say, “I know.”
Adam sighs, and I finally let myself sniffle. After a long moment of silence, he lifts his arm so that the covers are held up and there’s nothing separating us but open space. “Come here.”
“Why?” I nervously ask. I want to go to him. Badly. But my nerves are making me run my mouth instead of closing the distance between us.
“Because I’m going to hold you.”
“You’re going to hold me?”
Adam nods against his pillow.
“Why?”
He pauses for a moment, and then he says, “Peach?”
“Yeah?”
“Stop asking questions and just get over here.”
While I battle my better judgment, Adam holds the covers in the air, waiting. I cautiously inch my way across the bed and press my front against him, and he wraps his arms around me. I don’t know what to do with my hand, so I wrap my arm around him, placing my palm against his back. And then we’re just holding each other.
Adam lets out a deep sigh, and I gaze up at him. “What?”
“Nothing,” he answers without looking down at me. “Go to sleep.”
I snuggle closer, trying to get comfortable, and Adam’s hold on me tightens. My cheek molds to his hard chest, and I listen to him breathe. I want to thank him—for coming to my rescue tonight, for letting me stay with him, for holding me. For everything. But instead, I fall asleep to the perfect rhythm of his heart.
Chapter Twenty-Two
THE NEXT MORNING, I wake in Adam’s arms—which is nice and does all sorts of butterfly things to my stomach until I realize that all of our studying is about to be for nothing because we are running royally freaking late.
“TEN FORTY?!” I launch myself out of bed so fast that my feet get tangled in the covers, and then I’m tripping and hopping and nearly eating floor. “No wonder you’re always late!” When Adam just lies there staring at me, I throw the covers off of him—not caring that he’s only in his boxers—and grab his hand, yanking him to his feet.
He smiles at me as I rant about how he needs to get dressed faster than he’s ever gotten dressed before because I didn’t bust my ass tutoring him all weekend just for fun. With one hand waving frantically in the air and the other clinging to the silky, oversized gym shorts I borrowed from him to wear to bed last night, I’m sure I look insane.
The shorts nearly drop from my waist as I usher Adam toward his closet and then rush out of the bedroom. I sprint to my suitcase in the living room, hastily unzip it, and grab a wrinkled pair of jeans. There’s no sign of Joel or Shawn as I rush to the bathroom and dive into my pants. Adam’s apartment is over ten minutes away from school. Between that and the time it will take to walk to class, we’re barely going to make it. And if he’s late one more time . . .
When I rush out of the bathroom, Adam is fully dressed in long black jeans and a charcoal-gray V-necked T-shirt. His wrists are decorated with bands and string bracelets that he never takes off, and he’s pulling a mug from the kitchen cabinet. There’s a full pot of coffee warming—I’m guessing Shawn made it—but we have time for coffee like we have time to fry up some eggs and bacon and toast and, hell, bake a freaking three-tiered cake while we’re at it.