Adore Me

Because when Aiden kisses me, I don’t care what the rest of the world thinks.

A ding dong ditcher.

7:30pm

We collect some more shells, watch the sun slide below the horizon, and then sort through our shells, deciding which ones will work best for our jewelry.

“Come on. We’ll go in the toy shed to make them. There are tools in there.”

“We go

“Actually, we’ll use a drill.”

“Drilling sounds like fun,” he says with a naughty smirk.

As I clean the shells off with bleach, I say, “You know, you’ve become a tease.”

“I’m a tease?” he asks, pointing to himself.

“Yeah, you’re a ding dong ditcher.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Think about it. You act like you want in my house. You keep ringing the doorbell, but when I come to open the door, you’re gone. You’re totally a tease.”

He puts his forehead against mine. “I told you I won’t run away.”

“Honestly, Aiden, if you were smart,” I say, seriously, “you’d run far away from me.”

He tenderly touches my cheek. “My dad says love makes you do stupid things.”

I want so badly to say, Love? And for him to answer, Yes, Boots, I love you. But I can’t bear to hear it, so I let out a nervous chuckle. “That’s true. I think all of us have done some pretty stupid things in the name of love. So, back to these shells,” I say, patting them dry. “Next, we’ll drill them. Here are the little shells we picked for you. Do you want to have a single shell or a whole row of them?”

He slides the most perfect teeny pink seashell out of the pile and touches my four-leaf clover necklace. “Can I have this?”

He doesn’t wait for an answer; he reaches his arms around my neck and unclasps it.

He lays the shell on a piece of felt, drills a hole in the top of it, adds a little metal circle to turn it into a charm, and then slides it onto my necklace with the clover.

He puts it back on me, and I look in the mirror. The clover nestles perfectly on top of the shell.

I hold the charms in my hand. “I love it.”

“You know, they say the moon controls the tides. So now you'll have both luck and the tides of fate on your side.”

I smile at him as he pushes me up against the workbench and flirts. “Which means you're about to get very lucky.”

His lips land hard on mine, his tongue sliding into my mouth, and controlling the tides of desire that roll through my body.

“Uh, um,” Damian coughs, interrupting our hot make out session.

“Oh, hey,” I say, untangling myself from Aiden. “Uh, we were, um, just making jewelry.”

“I can see that,” Damian smirks. “We got a bunch of shells too.”

“Awesome!” I turn my attention back to the shells, but Aiden’s hand is still on my back, touching both my skin and the top of my bikini bottoms. And although I am trying to sort through shells to make him the perfect wish bracelet, I’m having a really hard time concentrating.

Especially when he starts massaging my back gently.

I choose shells and then drill holes on the sides of each, sliding them onto a string one at a time and putting a square knot in between each. “Where do you want it?”

Aiden’s eyes get big and he gulps. “Uh . . . ?”

I realize very quickly what he was just thinking. “Your ankle or your wrist?” I add.

He does a little head shake, like he’s clearing out the cobwebs in his brain. “My wrist. So I can see it.”

“Okay.” I lay the shells across the top of his wrist. “This is a wish bracelet. As I tie it on, you have to close your eyes and make a wish.”

“Then what? When do I get my wish?”

“We don’t know when, but once you get your wish, the bracelet will fall off.”

He gives Peyton and Damian, who are sorting through shells, a glance. Then he whispers sexily, “Can I wish for drilling?”

“You can wish for whatever you want.”

“So I’ll be losing the bracelet tonight?”

I try to control my smile, but I can’t.

Because Aiden the tease is the cutest thing ever.

I roll my eyes at him and smack his hand away from where it's sneaking down the side of my bikini.

Plus it’s so much more fun to be the one to say no.

“This wish business is serious,” I tell him as I tie the bracelet around his wrist, purposefully tying it in three tight knots. Maybe if I tie it tight enough, he won’t be able to get it off.

And maybe he won’t forget me when I’m gone.

I picture Aiden back at Eastbrooke, surrounded by girls at the cave, and quickly close my eyes to keep from crying.

“Are you wishing on my bracelet too?” he asks.

Part of me wants to curse his bracelet, so that no one else’s lips will ever touch his.

But I know I’m being ridiculous. I’m giving him closure so that he can move on.

“No,” I say, fighting back tears.

“Why do you look like you're about to cry?”

“I’m not. I think I got shell dust in my eyes.” I wipe tears from the corner of my eyes. “I was supposed to wear safety goggles when I drilled.”

“You need safety goggles for drilling?” he says, grabbing a pair. “Maybe I should bring them to bed.”

I grab his now shell-wrapped wrist. “Come on, we’ve got to finish our list.”

I drag him to the courtyard, where a hammock is strung between two palm trees.

“Lie in the hammock and read? There’s only one problem. We don’t have any books.”

“We don’t need a book. We have some homework to do.”

He groans. “You’re going to make me study French?”

“No, but it turns out that I have this survey I have to do for health class.”

“You’re not in health class.”

“Neither are you. I had to answer your questions, now you have to answer mine.”

He rolls his eyes and pulls me closer to his chest. “Fine. I’m an open book.”

“Names of the last four girls you dated.”

“Emily, Lauren, Megan, and Chelsea.”

“Why did you break up?”

“Um, Emily and I got in a fight about something stupid. I honestly don’t remember. She was always accusing me of cheating on her.”

“Were you?”

He looks at me seriously. “I’ve never cheated on anyone in my life.”

“Good.”

“What about the rest?”

“Lauren broke up with me because she decided she liked someone else. Megan and I had a very volatile relationship. That was a mutual break up. And Chelsea. Um, we never actually went out.”

“How many girls have you said I love you to?”

“Oh, the list is long. The first girl was Angela; she stole my heart in third grade when she gave me a special Valentine. She was a fourth grader. Older woman, you know.”

“Maybe we don’t need to go back quite so far,” I laugh. “And I’m ready for di

“Can we watch a movie while we eat?”

“That sounds fun. Then what?”

“Then, Miss Monroe, we’re going dancing.”

Screaming a lot.

8:30pm

We set ourselves up in back of the theater room at the bar table, deciding to watch a little college football while we eat. We enjoy part of the game, our di

“I’ll go grab another bottle,” I tell him. “You pick out a movie.”

When I come back with the bottle, he holds up two movies. “I’ve narrowed it down to two. Which was really tough considering all the options.”

“They do have a lot of movies,” I say, moving our glasses and the wine cooler up to the theater seats in the front. “What’d you come up with?”

“Well, since we’re on an island, I went with a water theme. So we have Jaws, which may be a bad idea, since we’ll be out surfing again in the morning, or A Day at the Lake, which I’ve never gotten to see but is one of my parents’ favorites.”

I freeze in the middle of pouring more wine when he mentions my mom’s movie. The movie that Vincent wants to remake. The movie that started all this.