Page 83 of Rhodes

I roll the scooter off the curb and get on. Tallulah climbs on behind me without making a thing of it. Her thighs close around my hips, and I'm not half as good as she is at pretending it's nothing.

Her hands settle at my sides, light, more for show than anything. I glance back. "You're going to have to actually hold on."

"I am holding on."

"You've got two fingers on my shirt."

"I see what you're doing."

I start the engine. "Suit yourself."

The first turn out of the property is sharp enough that she folds before we reach the bottom of it. Both arms slide around my waist and lock. Everything in my stomach pulls tight under her forearms.

We catch Granger and Banksie at the next intersection, where Granger's already off the GPS. Banksie's halfway across the console, pointing through the windshield. I pull alongside. Tallulah lifts a hand to wave.

Granger rolls the window down.

"You're going the wrong way," I tell him.

"My father says it's faster," he yells over the diesel engine. "I don't know how he knows, but I'm done arguing with him."

Banksie leans across. "He figured out I was right."

The light changes and they're gone. I follow behind them. Tallulah's chest presses into my back, and I feel more than hear her laughing.

The road drops toward the coast, through little pockets of stacked houses and back out over open water. Laundry is strung between the balconies overhead while lemon trees crowd the stone walls. Every few miles the sea shows up between the buildings, so bright it looks turned all the way up.

Tallulah keeps one arm around me and points with the other every time she wants me to see something. She points to a church wedged into the cliff, then a dog riding in a bike basket. I point out a fishing boat coming into a little harbor with gulls screaming behind it.

Every time she leans up to talk, her mouth lands right at my ear. I catch about half of it. The rest gets lost somewhere between her chest against my back and the memory of what that mouth feels like on mine.

I keep my eyes on the road and decide I've earned some kind of fucking medal for it.

Granger pulls into an overlook ten minutes on, and we follow in behind them. Banksie's out of the car before the engine quits, already complaining that Granger drives like he's got a crate of eggs in his lap. He mutters something about calling a car back to the villas.

Tallulah swings off and pulls her helmet loose. Her hair's a wreck, and the only thing I can think of is that I want my hands in it. I take the helmet she holds out instead.

"Thanks."

"Yep."

Her eyes hold mine half a second past safe. Then Banksie calls her from the wall over the water, and she goes.

Just like that she's a Maybank again, crossing to stand at her grandfather's side while he points down at a fishing village tucked into the bend of the coast.

I stay by the scooter and hang both helmets off the bars. She looks back at me once from beside Banksie, and tips her head at the view, indicating for me to get over there without saying a word.

After Granger and Banksie finally cool off, we head back to the resort. It was an uneventfully normal touristy thing to do, the four of us. And it was amazing.

The table's set for more than we've got. Somebody counted wrong, or nobody wanted to pull the extra chairs, so there are two empty seats down at the end where Cain and Greer sat last night, and the little booster where Sisue kept flinging bread.

Libba drops into a chair and looks at all the room. "It's quiet."

"It's not quiet," Banksie says. "You people just got smaller."

"Cain and Greer flew to Greece this morning," Granger says. "Keller left before any of us were up. Coop's in Spain chasing women, I suppose."

"Dad!" Tallulah says.